What does that prove exactly?

I don't get your point. If you choose to work in a job that brings a certain risk with it, you need to live with the risk, and well, sometimes destiny grabs you by your nuts and you die while doing your job. There's nothing heroic in my point of view. They did their job, cuz that's what they're doing, for Christ's sake.

No that doesn't sound heroic to me at all. They were doing their job. End of story.

In fact, I think the terrorists were more heroic than the firefighters. They gave their lives for something they believed in, not because they had to but because they wanted to. They sacrificed their lives for Jihad - something they believed very passionately in. I'd say they qualify here:

It all depends on who's side you're on I guess.


:321GFY So, save your rhetoric fuckface!

I agree with [Labret] that the word "hero" is to liberally applied and thus reduces the value of being labled a "hero".

On the other hand I have always had ambivilant feelings about the lable of being a hero.

Today's military is an all volunteer force. Far less than 1% of the US population are active military on any given day. Military personell have to make sacrifices, and live hardships (even in times of peace) that civilians who have never served cannot really comprehend. Are they hero's to make the sacrifice?

In any given conflict approximately 10% of the military forces are actual combatants. In other words, at one point in time in Vietnam we had something in excess of 500,000 troops in country, so only approximately 50,000 were actual combatants that would actively engage the enemy on any given day. Were the non-combatants hero's for being there and supplying the logistics for the combatants?

About 85% of the forces at that point in time were drafted, but for the most part performed whatever job was assigned to them , be it a combat unit or not? Were they hero's?

Within the combat units, were all of those that engaged the enemy hero's, or was it only those that while engaged in a fire fight, performed above and beyond, that were hero's.

And what about the enemy... those you were shooting at.

Were they heroes?

After all, they were exactly the same... just fighting for the other team.

Hitler was a hero to those who thought he was doing the right thing.

Exactly, it's just the arrogant point of view that does not make people see the other side of the coin. Why do you think ObL is being worshipped like a god ? Because he was the one who stood up against the mighty enemy and struck him hard. He's their hero.

But then again it is sick (religious) belief that drives people to their actions. Certainly Hitler was a hero for those blinded by his strong visions, but the rest of the world had to watch innocent people getting massacred and burnt. All a matter of relativity.

I posted this just a few posts above this. Pay attention FUS.

So in answer to your question; they had their share of hero's.

So you agree that the "terrorists" were heroes?

Yes they were heroes. Just not for the American people.

Speaking from a military view point they volunteered to make the ultimate sacrifice for their cause and their mission was successful. If they had been members of the American Military they would have been awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, our highest military award.

The semi-military organization they came from must be hated and destroyed, or made to become totally impotent.

I think the rest of America takes this thing a little more seriously then us here in NY. We don't look at the Policemen & Firefighters who probably had no part to play in rescue as heroes. We don't use hereo as a blanket statement as weepy ass CBS would have you beleive. As a matter of fact, while the rest of the country watches the memorials on TV on the 11th, most of us here will be doing something else while getting on with our lives.

All of us here have watched the site get swamped by tourists every day now. I just left the area and looked at the huge hole in the ground. We are over it. We look at each other and shake our heads at the people that come here to look at it and take pictures while waving hi to the folks back home.

The people who ran in the buildings and gave their lives are heroes. The firemen and police officers that pitched in around the clock for weeks after have given firemen and policemen a new respect all over. Heroes? Maybe not, but we appreciate those guys a lil more than we did on Sept. 10th. A Fireman in Chicago can suck my dick though. I don't even want to start talking about what a policeman in L.A. can do for me. The respect that carried over to them is apalling.

People around the world die everyday. It happened to us. Once. It's over. We don't know why it happened or who did it. What the fuck are we supposed to achieve by thinking about this situation constantly. If something else happens it will most likely happen here. If a nuke goes off in the US it will be my skin that melts. If a biological weapon hits us it's my dick that will fall off. We are in the middle of this but we're not as concerned as the rest of America! We are more concerned about crime in the Bronx. How can you stress over something that Might happen?

Get over it guys.

I agree with Pornwolf. It's honestly time to get over what happened - sadly the US government made it its primary goal to wipe out terrorism in the free world. What they don't see are the people they are stepping on while doing it. Wouldn't surprise me if someone else got pissed and planned a sudden attack.

Uhm, when a drunk, angry nazi fuck kills me with his car while I walk to work, am I a hero ?

No. But when you make a decision to risk your life in an unusually dangerous situation and save a life you are. In war when a soldier saves his trapped platoon and a little girl in a Saigon village under heavy fire it's obvious to me that you guys think that soldier is not a hero. No purple heart for him after he gets his ass blown off because he's a soldier. That was his job.

C'mon, give credit where credit is due.

Oh sorry, didn't read your post properly. Just scammed it :thumbsup But you're right.

Most of the terrorists do not live in a free world. The USA's primary goal shoud be to wipe out its enemies, or, at the least, make its enemies totally impotent.

What you may not understand is that our government does see the people they are stepping on and they do not care. If it interferes with the destruction of the enemy, or making the enemy impotent, they should not care.

The USA is the most powerful Nation in the history of the World, and only fools would dare become our enemy. We will deal with enemies, as they appear, and if in these efforts we make more enemies, we will deal with them in turn. Bottom line, do not fuck with the USA.

We once had a flag that said "Do not tread on me". The world needs to read it, learn it and know it.

No, that would not make you a hero.

Someone that puts their own life in danger to save another, pretty much falls within the category of being a hero.

See Pathfinder, this is exaclty the arrogant attitude that I, along with millions of Europeans, can't stand. I love US, otherwise I would not live here, but the 'mess with us and we'll crush you like a peanut' attitude simply makes my head shake. :ugone2far

From what I understood, the extremist muslim world got pissed at the US, because they did not leave the Holy Land after the Gulf War was over. That was one of the reasons why there is such hatred going on in the East. Now, if you think it is better to provoke others with your behavior, piss them off, get your ass kicked (see Sept. 11th) and then run a revenge campaign that will again piss even more people off ... ok, sure thing. Just don't be surprised if more innnocent fall as victims to an ignorant Bush regime.

Isn't it that many allied (with the west) countries surrounding Iraq voted against an attack on Saddam Hussein, because they are afraid of a massive economic recession in case Bush launched a sudden attack ?

This is a typical military mindset. These people are not capable of independent thought. They do what they army tells them and they believe what the army tells them. Pathetic conformists.

100 !!!

*If* the (Quote) "USA is the most powerful Nation in the history of the World, and only fools would dare become our enemy", then please tell me why there was the Cold War, during which both sides were playing Cat&Mouse on the verge of a Third World War ?

Maybe the CCCP were fools, but they were pretty damn fucking powerful enough to scare Big Brother and make him tremble.

You know what Equinox, I would normally agree with you. Not on the attitude argument though. All through history the success of countries has been determined by who is stronger. Nothing is different today. If Russia didn't have a history of having nukes(strength) they would matter to us as much as Greenland does. A nations status is still determined by strength. We are strongest. Sometimes we have to bark at the other dogs to remind them and keep them scared. So be it.


I think the way this 'terrorism' issue is being handled is very Cowboy like. But it is being handled by a Cowboy so that explains it. I'm sure if we were actually fighting terrorists we would have killed them, their babies, and erased their history from their local library for future generations. Maybe I'm a little too confident in our military but that's what I believe. I'm sure Pathfinder could tell me if I'm off base. I don't think we are hunting terrorists at all.

Ya know, measuring a state's power by the amount of nukes he's got in his bunker, that's a joke. Just imagine a conflict where India would nuke Pakistan, and vice versa, Saddam would send out chemical weapons and nukes, and the US would nuke them all ... uhm yeah right. Ain't gonna happen. Why not ? Cuz our beloved Mother Earth would not be anything more or less than a radiating piece of junk. That's what everybody's scared of. An escalating conflict. That's why hopefully there's gonna be a worldwide treaty on destroying those nukes, because they're simply useless.
Nowadays, I would measure the strength of a state on the economy. But who am I to judge that :)

Killing terrorists ... hmm. Basically a good idea, but what I think is that once you wipe out one of the leading assholes, another one will emerge that will find blind sheep to follow him. Just like there's always Neo-Nazi movements emerging in Germany, whose history is nothing less than a DARK RED chapter that nobody really wants to be reminded of.

That is one of the reasons.

Strategically speaking it is wise to have military forces prepositioned. We have military forces and logistics prepositioned throughout much of the World.

We are the worlds only super power and as a Nation our government is going to protect that status. Whatever our government determines is in the best interest of the Nation it will do.

We left prepositioned forces in the Mid East as the Mid East oil fields are vital to the World at large. Those oil fields are more important to you in the European countries than they are to us. Today we could decide not to buy another barrel of oil from the Mid East and survive it. European countries could not.

At this point in time we buy Mid East oil because it is economically viable. If Europe did not have to have the oil, we probably would simply withdraw from that part of the world.

Europe is economically important to the USA so it is important to our interests that their economy remain reasonably sound, so protecting, or waging war over the Mid East oil is beneficial to our interests but is vital for European interests.

The loss of two buildings and 3,000 people out of a Nation of 270-280 million people is not getting "your ass kicked". It was an important act, but far from getting "your ass kicked".

The Government acts, for what it considers to be, in the best interests of the Nation. If this in turn means pissing off whoever, then the Government has considered that the ends justifies the means. Super Powers can do that.

Some of the nations you are speaking of have been dealing with Sadam, in violation of their aggreement to a blockade of certain goods. They would like to continue with their little sweetheart deals, and don't want all that they have been doing exposed.

The bottom line is our government does act, and will continue to act, in what they think is in the best interests of the Nation with little care as to the minor irritant of pissing someone off. I do not always agree with the thinking of the government but I chose to be a soldier not a polictician, so what I think is of little import.

FUS.

Tell me, from the Cold war who is the only remaining Super Power and who is now a third world country with a third world military?

True, thanks to a failed ideology called Marxism. :thumbsup

Their form of government might have survived if they had not foolishly decided to become an enemy of the USA and engage in an arms race which we could afford and they could not.

Because they decided to do this they were always a third world country with a military, and their economy simple collasped.

A country always needs an enemy coexisting. Otherwise people don't get distracted and bitch about the government :)

Could you afford it?

CLICK HERE and take a look at your nations national debt.

:1orglaugh

the term 'hero' certainly gets overused in this day and age, however Joe Sixpack... your views tend to make me think you're smokin rope.

my 30th birthday was 9/11/2001 - those bastards ruined it for the rest of my life proablt - it's like a bad 4th of july now :-(

arrogance. the whole "usa power" thing makes me laugh out loud. look at the size of the land. it seems that many of the citizens fail to realise that any strength the usa has is based on numbers and has been built up through allies and agreements with other nations. import and export is a good example.

playing on the arrogant attitude, cut down the population of america and any other non-third world country (germany, uk, france, japan, italy, etc) to the same size, give them both the same equipment and technology, and believe me, usa would not be kicking anyone's ass. that is if the arrogant attitude and in-fighting did not mean the usa's downfall before any combat actually took place.

granted, it would be unfair to see all americans thrown into one boat. but for those that believe the USA is some kind of mighty unstoppable superpower (aka "the BEST") - the funniest thing about that situation would be boasting about how great their land is, and speaking like they and their friends down at the burger joint are personally responsible for every success of their nation. yet they are VERY selective when something goes wrong.

WE won the basketball game. WE bombed them. WE did this. WE did that.

for example, bush does something with success. WE did it with great success!

yet, when something fucks up or bush says/does something stupid, the attitude changes to "HE is an idiot" or "HE failed to do it successfully".

arrogance what the average non-american sees when they look at the usa. and you can't comment on that, let alone understand it, until you can see it from the outsider's perspective - which you'll never be able to do, if you're american. it doesn't apply in all cases of course, and there is always an exception to the rule, but it seems (again, from an outsiders point of view) that there is some kind of inbred attitude going on in the states.

i for one would wonder how the average arrogant "i have an american flag in my garden" pro-american could believe that america is THE global superpower successfully capable of policing the rest of the world, when they can't even fight their own crime problems.

that is an outsiders view. if you don't like it... go fuck yourself. or come to live in another country and speak to enough people. they'll give similar opinions. maybe we could argue the toss all day and all night, but you can't change the facts, let alone dispute them unless you've lived outside of the country long enough to have developed a matured adult opinion similar to those around you. 6 months in london doesn't really count. :1orglaugh

---

besides that: terrorists.
i hope they all die a painful death.

The collective "we" (which includes ancestors and Burger King workers), for whatever the reasons, in little more than 200 years have become the only Super Power on the earth.

The collective "we" are arrogant and the collective "we" do not care who "we" piss off or their opinons about "us".

FUS. We are number one in many areas.

What does FUS mean?

fusilier

i think.

hahmike:

Nope.

You European Assholes always have an excuse!

As with Iraq, you're afraid that if and when we do take Iraq, we'll find documentation that shows most of Europe has been supporting Iraq and ignoring the embargo!!

hehe.... Live free, just thanks us and walk on!

Cluelessjoe,
You're the real idiot of the board here!

Well...he is a FUS so one should feel come compassion.

This is simply impossible. Even G7 would pick up on anyone not respecting the embargo.

and... still I don't know what FUS is!?!

From a fuckwit like you that's actually a compliment. I hope the next hijacked passenger jet will be headed for your street.



:1orglaugh