The War on Terror

The war on terror continues. The 7-7 bombings of London this week clearly illustrate the global nature of the war. The first engagement of the war is generally considered to be the World Trade Center bombing in 1993, although its origins can go back further:

• 1973 terror attack at the Rome airport, where more than 30 people were killed and a plane was hijacked;
  
  
• The assassination of Egyptian president Anwar Sadat in 1981;
  
  
• The 1983 bombing of the US embassy in Beirut by Islamic Jihad, wherein 63 people died;
  
  
• The 1983 bombing of the US Marine barracks in Beirut (242 killed), and the French barracks in Beirut (58 dead);
  
  
• The kidnap and murder of diplomat William Buckley in Beirut, 1984, by Islamic Jihad;
  
  
• The 1984 bombing of a restaurant in Spain frequented by US servicemen (18 sailors killed, 83 injured);
  
  
• The Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro hijacking in 1985 (1 dead);
  
  
• The 1985 Rome and Vienna airport attacks by the Abu Nidal group (16 deaths, more than 100 injured);
  
  
• 1986 Berlin disco bombing, killing 2 and injuring 79 US servicemen;
  
  
• Pan Am flight 103, blown up over Lockerbie, Scotland (259 dead);
  
  
• The foiled Iraqi bombing of the US ambassador to Indonesia in 1991;
  
  
• The World Trade Center bombing (mentioned above) where 6 died and more than 1,000 injured;
  
  
• The 1993 attempted assassination of former president Bush in Kuwait by Iraqi intelligence agents;
  
  
• Khobar Towers bombing in 1996, in Saudi Arabia, killing 19 US servicemen and wounding 515 others, including 240 US servicemen;
  
  
• US embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, Africa in 1998, killing 301 and injuring over 5,000;
  
  
• USS Cole bombing in 2000, killing 17 and injuring 39;
  
  
• And of course, September 11th, 3,025 killed in 3 hijacked airliners that attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and a the crash of the third plane as US citizens made the first counter-strike and fought to regain control of the plane from the terrorists. Who knows how many more would have been killed at the US capitol or the White House had not brave American civilians been willing to fight back...

As noted in this space before, the war on terror is a battle for freedom and democracy the world over. For the radicals who perpetrate these atrocities, no amount of reasoning will stop the violence. They understand only the smoking barrel of a gun and the power of a bomb.

Despite claims by the Left to the contrary, Iraq,and 9-11 are linked directly as they both are part of the long timeline above. Iraq, as outlined recently on NRO, was directly linked to 9-11, and the toppling of Sadam Hussien has made the world safer.

There is a tiny bit of good news in this recent tragedy, however: (hat tip, RealClearPolitics) An excerpt:

More striking have been the condemnations from radical groups like Hamas, Hizbullah and Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, all of which have denounced the bombings. Many of them have, of course, coupled their attacks on the terrorists with denunciations of American and British policies in the Middle East, particularly regarding Iraq and the Palestinian territories. But that kind of rhetoric is old news. What is new here is the fact that no one, not even Hamas, can continue to condone or even stay silent about these barbarities.

This post also appears on Blogger News Network.