On September 11, 2001, I was driving near Dulles Airport, in Dulles, Virginia, when the Pentagon got hit by American Airlines Flight 77 hijacked from Dulles Airport. I pulled into my office parking lot, got out of my car, and saw waves of my co-workers racing out of the doors for their cars to flee the area, expecting another plane to crash from out of Dulles Airport. I later drove by the Pentagon, with the smoke pouring out of after the terrorist attack. One of our friends was killed there. I spent 9/11 providing lookout support in defense of a strategic building of critical infrastructure, which had been mostly evacuated, including most of the security.
In November 2001, I looked into the pit where the World Trade Center towers were in New York City. The pit yawned deep into the Earth. The photos people have taken do not truly show the devastation. I refused to take a photograph of such an open grave of my fellow Americans. It was in an area near where a precious relative was going to school. This is why I changed my job to support the Department of Homeland Security after the attacks, to help defend the United States of America. On 9/11, President Obama was in Chicago at an Illinois state meeting. Having where you live attacked by terrorists is completely different than watching it on television somewhere.
The United States has been victims of terrorists over and over. But we have gotten lazy, and come to believe it won’t happen to us anymore. We tell ourselves, everything is an “isolated incident,” and we have nothing to worry about. But most people have no idea how many terrorist plots have been FOILED because of a Zero Tolerance attitude towards terrorist activity, and aggressive law enforcement.
Too many have been DECEIVED by the success of a historic Zero Tolerance and previous aggressive law enforcement attitude on terrorism, well, maybe there just is not a terrorist threat at all. Baloney. Most major U.S. American cities have been targets, including Portland, of course. Vigilance against terrorism and consistency on the LAW is not fear and surrendering our liberties. It is deciding that this nation of free men and women will not live as cowering victims to criminal terrorists. It is deciding that we live by a Rule of Law, and lawless terrorists will NOT be allowed to simply attack, threaten, and kill without our DEFIANCE and CONSEQUENCES.
Today, the Bundy terrorist gang in Oregon is viewed by some as “protesters,” “occupiers,” and now “trespassers.” But the Bundy gang are terrorists in accordance with the U.S. Code of Federal Regulations which defines terrorism as “the unlawful use of force and violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives” [28 C.F.R. Section 0.85 (1) ]. The law is the law.
We have learned, and I have personally seen with my OWN EYES, the consequences of failing to be vigilant against those who seek terrorism against this great nation. We cannot make this mistake again. Too many fellow Americans might pay the price tomorrow for such indifference today.