Jim Austin

His previous columns are archived HERE.

JIM AUSTIN

Last month I shared a letter with you that I wrote to Luiz Carlos Nogueira, a businessman in Brazil, wherein I asked his view of recent events. Here is his reply, translated from the Portuguese by his son Clovis. I have changed nothing.

Dear Jim,

Since the WTC tragedy occurred, it's been on my schedule to write to you. It was my plan to talk about this fact that left a mark of terror at the beginning of this century. You anticipated my idea when you wrote me a letter on the 25th of September, where you showed interest in knowing my point of view about this issue.

I was at work when I received a phone call from Cl&eacue;a, in shock:'- I just saw on TV the explosion of an airplane, it was flown against a building in New York. Thousands of people might have died!'

Later, during lunchtime, I saw the on TV the replay of the real crash on the towers and the Pentagon on flames.

I suppose nobody had imagined the possibility of such a tragedy happening. I don't understand how such a powerful country like US could be astonished by such a cruel attack.

What do so many strategists, scientists, and mainly, the government of your country do that they didn't imagine the hypothesis of this kind of attack? How come no precautions were taken? One among them, with a very low cost, which has been taken by Israel since 1978, when they made the pilot cabin inviolable. Since 1978, an airline from Israel, always aimed at by terrorists, hasn't had an airplane hijacked.

This shows the efficiency of some of the precautions taken by Israel, such as: Better boarding control, training the crew against terrorist action, inclusion of specialized agents in the passengers list, a safe pilot cabin and inaccessible to the terrorists. This last precaution, easy to turn reality, would have hindered the terrorists to take over the airplane and flown it against the buildings previously selected.

Both of the World Trade Center towers were on the terrorist's aim. In the past, a terrorist tried to destroy it with a load of explosives. After he was arrested, he declared to regret not having enough money to buy a bigger load enough to blow the whole thing. Even though they heard that from the terrorist, the authorities responsible for the people safety didn't take efficient precautions.

I look for an explanation to this incautiousness in the safety of your country, and I found difficult to find it. But I have a couple ideas about this issue.

In the universal history, no country had accumulated as much power as US has done. Imposed your language to the world. Someone who doesn't know English has difficulties to communicate and to follow the evolution of knowledge in the actual world. This conquest facilitates the propagation of the American culture among other people.

Dollar was changed to a universal money. The American currency became the unit of measurement of all our belongings. And only the American government has the power to put in circulation the currency, adopted as an international standard. This conquest brought big advantages to the American nation, in the economy and in the international market field.

Today, the US is in the forefront of the human knowledge. Among them, the most sophisticated and efficacious war equipment.

It is obvious that such a conquest on a cultural, economic, scientific and military range would provoke envy and go against other country's interest. Based on experience, it is impossible to accumulate so much power and wealth, without making dangerous enemies.

All the conquests were accomplished based on the value of the American nation. This is a motive for a great pride for your people. But it may generate some distortions among your people. One of them is the feeling of absolute safety. It felt like your country was an unbreakable fortress, where, once inside you were totally protected. The greatest act in the terrorism history, has happened recently, and interrupted this dream. Upon this sensation of absolute safety, the authorities were not sufficiently stimulated to take precautions, capable to avoid such a brutal attack, as occurred in New York.

I think that from now on, the American people will have to accept changes and an increase of control of their civil rights. The level of liberty is so high in this country that the terrorist had full and easy access to schools and libraries, where they acquired knowledge and training to accomplish with a great success their stroke against the American people.

There is another aspect that I can't explain. The airplanes hijacked flew for about 30 minutes towards west, and took a full turn directed to WTC towers, for about more 30 minutes. During this period of time no defensive action to intercept or take down the airplanes was taken efficiently. If the airplanes were supersonic rockets instead, full of nuclear bombs, maybe New York wouldn't exist anymore. Sixty minutes is a long period of time for rockets that fly really fast. This fact makes me think that the American defense system is still very vulnerable.

I imagine the size of the impact caused in the mind of the people by this coward attack. It's natural that at first you feel like a revenge. The formidable US military force could transform into ashes, in a few hours, Afghanistan and more half a dozen of countries that sponsor or collaborate with the international terrorism. And could do that without losing even one soldier. Using, I imagine, less than 10 perecent of your stock of nuclear weapons, you could destroy those countries forever.

But this revenge would be a huge tragedy to the whole mankind and the consequences to the American people would be even more tragic than the loss suffered on the attack in NY and the Pentagon. I believe that the American nation will not follow the same irrational and primitive destroying revenge way.

Upon such a violent stroke, a real act of war, it's fair that the government do some retaliation against the international terrorism. If these steps are not taken, efficiently, the terrorist will feel stimulated to intensify their criminal actions. I suppose most of the countries will collaborate in this combat against this new century's plague.

A great amount of the people that adopt the Islam did not evolve at all. They continue adopting a medieval way of life. They can't disconnect religion from politics. They apply old religious norms to justify the domination of the people, enjoy privileges, and mainly to enslave the women. The leaders use all kinds of oppression, psychological, economical, religious and political to maintain themselves with the power. Because of that they forbid the use of television, Internet and all the other ways of modern communication. They try to keep their people isolated from the free world. I don't believe this behavior can succeed, in a long term. The human being has a tendency to evolve based on the principles of freedom to choose.

The countries that sponsor the terrorism have two powerful weapons: The fanaticism and all the money derived from the exploration of petroleum. The fanaticism permits extremely audacious and dangerous actions that normal people would avoid. The money buys everything. They don't have the science or the technology, but they will be able to buy nuclear, chemical and biological artifacts to use on their terrorism attempts. They will also be able to buy labor and the collaboration of scientists to train them for criminal acts.

Luiz Carlos