From National Review - "Why 9/11"

I didn't do a post on 9/11 but obviously it is never far from most minds. Having friends in NYC make it seem a little more real to me or maybe it is a little more personal but it still remains an open sore for this country [and I reject the phrase "tragedy" and don't use it as 9/11 was an attack and assault on our country that resulted in the deaths of 3000+ innocent Americans].

So I was over at National Review and just read a great article that was posted on 22 Sept 2008 written by Larry Franklin, a counter terrorism specialist and an Air Force colonel entitled Why 9/11?

Mr. Franklin lays out the historical significance of the 11 Sept date with facts I at least had not heard before. First off, he mentions a passage from the Quran (Surah 9, Part 11) that:

"is the only chapter of the 114 chapters in the Quran that does not open with the salutation “In the Name of Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate.” This is a purposeful elision, as there can be no mercy, no compassion for us infidels."

Mr. Franklin also notes that "9/11/1683 that the forces of militant Islam pressed their jihad critically close to achieving the continental conquest of Europe". These Islamic forces were defeated by armies led by the Polish King John Sobieski and German and Austrian forces under the Duke of Lorraine in Vienna and the flag of the victorious forces still fly over the site.

Other 11 Sept dates Mr. Franklin shares with us

• September 11, 1481, that Venetian sailors turned back the Ottoman Caliphate’s fleet off the shores of Otranto in southern Italy.
• 9/11/1990 was the date that President George H. W. Bush declared a “New World Order.” Franklin notes that "(in) the speech’s opening paragraphs, (President Bush) spoke of our troops arrayed in Arabia. This assertion was anathema to many Muslims — who remembered the Prophet’s admonition that no infidel troops should ever occupy any land on the Island of the Arabs (al-Jazirah al Arabiyah)"
• 9/11/1979, Egypt’s president, Anwar Sadat signed a peace treaty with the Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin at Camp David [under President Carter]. He was later assassinated. Interesting to note that the assassination had a religious opinion approving the act issued by Omar Abdel-Rahman, a cleric later convicted in the U.S. for his role in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

It was a great and insightful article were Mr. Franklin makes the case that Muslim fanatics know their history and the significant events that have transpired in the past and the defeats that their "global jihad" have experienced. In concluding the article Franklin states:

"It would be prudent for our policymakers and intelligence czars to become more sensitive to the Islamic radicals’ worldview and sense of history. They believe their hour has arrived. They remember the incredible defeat of two empires by Muslim armies in Islam’s first century."

Why wouldn't Allah help them with their attack against the West? Franklin continues:

"It is time for our political leaders and their national-security advisers to better educate themselves and our citizenry so that we can mobilize our population for what will prove to be our longest war, one that may determine whether the last best hope on earth will endure."

Great article and well worth reading.

OS