We Must Get the Job Done!
Subject: The Alarm Bell Tolls
You have to read the catalogue of events in this posting. Then, ask yourself how anyone can take the position that all we have to do is bring our troops home from Iraq, sit back and rest the snooze alarm, go back to sleep, and no one will ever bother us again. Just in case you may have missed it, World War III began in November 1979… That alarm has been tolling for years.
US Navy Captain Ouimette is the Executive Officer at the Naval Air Station at Pensacola, Florida. The following is a copy of the speech he gave last month. It is an accurate account of why we are in so much trouble today and why this action in Iraq is necessary.
AMERICA NEEDS TO WAKE UP!
That’s what we think we heard on 11th of September 2001 (When more than 3,000 Americans were killed) and maybe it was, but I think it should have been “GET OUT OF BED!” In fact, I think the alarm clock has been buzzing since 1979 and we have continued to hit the snooze button and roll over for a few more minutes of peaceful sleep since then.
It was a cool fall day in November 1979 in a country going through a religious and political upheaval when a group of Iranian students attacked and seized the American Embassy in Tehran. This seizure was an outright attack on American soil, it was an attack that held the world’s most powerful country hostage and paralyzed a Presidency. The attack on this sovereign U.S. Embassy set the stage for events to follow for the next 25 years.
America was still reeling from the aftermath of the Vietnam experience and had a threat from the Soviet Union when, then President Carter, had to do something. He chose to conduct a clandestine raid in the desert. The ill-fated mission ended in ruin, but stood as a symbol of America’s inability to deal with terrorism.
America’s military had been decimated and down sized/right sized since the end of the Vietnam War. A poorly trained, poorly equipped military was called on to execute a complex mission that was doomed from the start.
Shortly after the Tehran experience, Americans began to be kidnapped and killed throughout the Middle East. America could do little to protect her citizens living and working abroad. The attacks against U.S. soil continued.
In April of 1983 a large vehicle packed with explosives was driven into the U.S. Embassy compound in Beirut. When it exploded, it killed 63 people. The alarm went off again and America hit the snooze button once more. Then just six short months later a large truck heavily laden down with over 2500 pounds of TNT smashed through the main gate of the U.S. Marine Corps headquarters in Beirut and 241 service men were killed. America mourned her dead and hit the snooze button once again.
Two months later in December 1983, another truck loaded with explosives is driven into the U.S. Embassy in Kuwait, and America continued to slumber. The following year in September 1984, another van was driven into the gate of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut and America slept.
Soon the terrorism spread to Europe. In April 1985 a bomb explodes in a restaurant frequented by U.S. soldiers in Madrid. Then in August, of that year, a Volkswagen loaded with explosives is driven into the main gate of the U.S. Air Force Base at Rhein-Main in Germany where 22 are killed and the snooze alarm is buzzing louder and louder as U.S. interests are continually attacked.
Fifty-nine days later a cruise ship, the Achille Lauro is hijacked and America watched as an American in a wheelchair is singled out of the passenger list and executed (the passenger was shot and then thrown overboard, wheelchair and all).
The terrorists then shift their tactics to bombing civilian airliners when they bombed TWA Flight 840 in April of 1986 that killed 4 and the most tragic bombing, Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988, killing 259. Clinton treated these terrorist acts as crimes; in fact we are still trying to bring these people to trial. These are NOT crimes, they are ACTS of WAR.
THE WAKE UP WARNING BELL IS TOLLING LOUDER AND LOUDER!
The terrorists decide to bring the fight to America. In January 1993, two CIA agents are shot and killed as they enter CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. The following month, February 1993, a group of terrorists are arrested after a rented van packed with explosives is driven into the underground parking garage of the World Trade Center in New York City. Six people are killed and over 1000 are injured. Still this is crime and not an act of War? The snooze alarm is pressed again.
Then in November 1995 a car bomb explodes at a U.S. military complex in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia killing seven service men and women. A few months later in June 1996 another truck bomb explodes only 25 yards from the U.S. military compound in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. It destroyed the Khobar Towers, a U.S. Air Force barracks, killing 19 and injuring over 500. The terrorists are getting braver and smarter as they see that America does not respond in a decisive manner.
They move to coordinate their attacks in a simultaneous attack on two U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. These attacks were planned with precision. They kill 224. America responded with a cruise missile attack and went back to sleep. The USS Cole was docked in the port of Aden, Yemen for refueling on the 12th of October 2000, when a small craft pulled along side the ship and exploded killing 17 U.S. Navy Sailors. Attacking a U.S. Warship is an ACT OF WAR, but America sent the FBI to investigate the crime and went back to sleep. And of course we all know the events of 11 September 2001. Most Americans think this was the first attack against U.S. soil or in America. How wrong they are. America has been under a constant attack since 1979 and we chose to hit the snooze alarm and roll over and go back to sleep.
In the news lately we have seen a lot of finger pointing from every high official in government over what they knew and what they didn’t know. But if you read the papers and paid a little attention, I think you will see exactly what they knew. You don’t have to be in the FBI or CIA, or in the National Security Council to see the pattern that has been developing since 1979.
The President is right on when he says we are engaged in a war. I think we have been in a war for the past 25 tears and it will continue until we as a people decide that enough is enough. America needs to “GET OUT OF BED” and act decisively now. America has been changed forever. We have to be ready to pay the price and make the sacrifice to ensure that our way life continues. We cannot afford to keep hitting the snooze button again and again and roll over to go back to sleep.
After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Admiral Yamamoto said, “…it seems that all we have done is awakened a sleeping giant.” This is the message that we need to disseminate to terrorists around the world.
Support our troops and support President Bush for having the courage. Political and militarily, to address what so many who preceded him didn’t have the backbone to do, both Democrat and Republican. This is not a political thing to be hashed over in an election year, this is an AMERICAN thing. This is about our FREEDOM and the FREEDOM of our children and grandchildren in years to come.
My Words:
If our elected officials and the liberal Americans do not wake up to reality, if they do not pull their heads out of their butts, the United States will run out of time, if we haven’t already.
If America does not wake up, we will only have ourselves to blame. To maintain freedom, to maintain our rights, takes people with courage. If that means fighting a war then so be it. Appeasement of ones enemies has never led to freedom, it can only lead to slavery.
When you hear that wake up bell ringing, you have only two choices, you can silence the bell and go back to sleep or you can stand up and fight for all you hold dear.
For whom does that bell toll? It tolls for you and me.
Abouna Gregori
Abouna Gregori
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