It's not 9/11

First and foremost, a warm thank you to all the people that send emails or other means to make sure that I was ok. I don't know a thousand people, but it sure felt like it yesterday and I appreciate the concern. I even got a text message from Colorado, which was cool.

I was on my way to work when the bombings started. At least, I was at my tube station. There were delays due to a "power outage", which didn't give one cause for concern because the Underground always has problems like that. Once I got a train, we began the long, slow ride to the East. I was on a District Line train headed to Upminster. I got as far as Sloan Square, which is exactly three stops from Earl's Court where I live. Meaning, of course, that I was no where near the bombings. When the train stopped at Sloan Square, we were told to leave the train and the station, but never given a reason. More than anything, we were utterly confused. Not once did I stop and think, "terrorism" because we were never informed of explosions or anything like that.

I looked for a bus at Sloan Square thinking that I could find my way across the city to work. That wasn't happening. Every bus that came was packed to capacity. That's when it dawned on me that it wasn't just the District Line or Sloan Square that was closed - the entire Underground was closed. Still, I didn't think terrorism.

So I called work, left a message saying it would basically be impossible to get in (I was only on for a half day anyway) and began the longish walk home. Along the way, I kept expecting to reach a tube station, see it open, and then kick myself for bailing so early on the Tube. Yet, each station was closed. Finally arriving home after about 40 minutes, I went into the TV room. That's when I saw it was a bombing; it was terrorism.

This marks the second time I've been relatively close to terrorism yet really been unaffected by it directly as well. I'll count my blessings. Two of the bombings hit close to home. The one at Liverpool Street and Moorgate is essentially where I work. I was at Moorgate Station on Wednesday. Still, it's hard to see how that one could have effected me since I rarely go there. The one at Edgeware Road, however, is entirely different. For about six months, I took the Piccadilly Line to the Baker Loo Line to get to school. But I tired of that route because it's all underground, there's nothing to see, and it's ultimately a longer distance to travel, even if it's sometimes quicker. So, I had switched to taking the District Line from where I live to Edgeware Road and then another train one stop to Baker Street. If yesterday had been a school day, I very well could have been hit.

Still, this event, as terrible and as tragic as it was, was not another 9/11 simply because it didn't have the shock value of 9/11. There was no footage of the bus blowing up or a train blowing up. There was no footage of a building collapsing. In fact, there was very little to watch and read because there was little information at all.

London's had terrorism before and sadly, will most likely have terrorism again. That does nothing to diminish the pain and suffering of the victims and their families, but it does help explain why the people in this city did not panic. There was not hysteria. Instead, there was quiet, grim determination. If a terrorists interest is to create panic, hysteria, and mayhem, then they failed in London. Instead, you had a city respond exactly how they should have responded. The bus the blew up, for example, just happened to go off outside the British Medical Association, which, of course, led to a phalanx of highly skilled doctors rushing out into the streets and providing immediate treatment before ambulances arrived. In other areas, you had doctors, nurses, and EMT's vacationing in London who just dropped everything and did what they could. Lives were saved yesterday because the people in this city responded with calm professionalism.

Ultimately though, it's not 9/11 because there can never be another 9/11. This was shocking and tragic, but it was also expected and understood as inevitable. 9/11 blew the cover off of our collective sense of security. Now, we are aware that we live in a constant state of insecurity. Culturally, we're more prepared to deal with the side effect of our way of life. Maybe I would think differently if I was directly involved, but my fairly dispassionate analysis is a luxury of not being involved.

In the end, setting aside all the cliches, there's no way the terrorists are ever going to win. They may think they can because after the Madrid bombing, Spain pulled out of Iraq. After the Bali bombing, Indonesia pulled out of Iraq. But the British and Americans are different. We're not about to stop doing something because of a couple of bombs, or a hundred bombs. Winning the war is ultimately about sympathy and the terrorists lose sympathy to whatever their causes are when they blow up innocent working class citizens. No, this new breed of terrorism, while highly skilled, heavily armed, and well financed, is not the terrorism of old. They don't have political causes that they want remedied. Instead, they want vengeance against the West for slights and offenses that we don't even begin to understand, not to mention comprehend. In my view, the individuals who engage in terrorism are not rational. They're not sitting around planning a strategy to win some claim or accomplish some goal. No, now the only goal is mass slaughter. And for that, they'll burn in hell if the US and British troops don't get them first.