The Wall Street Journal carried a front-page story Tuesday (Sept. 2) about an Indonesian school that trains terrorists. The alumni of Pesantren al Mukmin, an Islamic boarding school, should appear on a "most likely to succeed" page in a terrorist yearbook. "The school has produced almost all of Indonesia's top terrorist suspects," says the Journal, "including participants in last month's attack on Jakarta's J.W. Marriott Hotel and last October's deadly nightclub bombing on the island of Bali." Indonesia is 90 percent Muslim, and the government fears if it cracks down too much on the extremists it risks an uprising.
While we argue about the place of God in U.S. society, our enemies are not so conflicted. They believe their god wants us dead. No amount of munitions, money and Marines is going to stay these fanatics from their ordained rounds. To them, death is victory. To us, it is tragedy. They are counting on us not wanting to die. They welcome death as a promotion. They believe we will cut and run if they can spill enough of our blood. We regard our blood as precious. They see theirs as the currency of martyrdom.
Newsweek magazine reports that Osama bin Laden is planning an attack that will dwarf 9/11, and this time he plans to strike panic into the populace using biological weapons. Who knows if the report is true? Who doubts that it could be?
Many think the war began two years ago. It began a long time before that. Unlike every other war in which the United States has been engaged, this one will have no end - not as long as there are "Mohammeds" willing to kill and to die in large numbers and to take as many of us with them as they can.
Sept. 11 will not be the last tragedy we will be forced to observe in recurring anniversaries.