American experts on the 20th anniversary of September 11th： The United States has become a ＂more paranoid, xenophobic and militarized country＂
[Global Times Comprehensive Report] Editor’s Note: Twenty years after the "9.11" terrorist attacks, the United States still shows a strong stress disorder after being hit hard. With the 20th anniversary of "9.11" incident coming, while mourning for nearly 3,000 victims, the American people are also reflecting on some failed domestic and foreign policies in the past 20 years. A more ironic background is that the Taliban regime in Afghanistan was overthrown by the Bush administration three months after the "9.11" incident, but 20 years later, the Taliban came to power again. International public opinion believes that this reveals the failure of the United States to launch the war in Afghanistan, and also makes Biden’s government come under fierce attack in the United States. However, the decision-makers in the United States have not deeply reflected, and have not learned the painful lessons of the past 20 years. On the contrary, they are planning how to deal with more powerful competitors. Some China scholars believe that the rigid strategic thinking of American political elites indicates that the United States will suffer more and more failures.
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"We are getting farther and farther away from the truth"
Unlike the Obama administration’s "low-key" commemoration of the 10th anniversary of "9.11" 10 years ago, the Biden administration, which was overwhelmed by its hasty evacuation from Afghanistan, is trying to use the special anniversary of "20th anniversary" to divert people’s discontent. According to the schedule announced by the White House, President Biden and his wife will visit the attack sites in new york, Pentagon and Pennsylvania on September 11th. There are also spontaneous mourning activities among Americans. At Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, the exhibition "Flag Flying" has been held for 14 consecutive years — — 3,000 American flags were planted on the grass to mourn the victims of the September 11th incident.
From the end of August, when all American troops withdrew from Afghanistan, to the recent commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the September 11th incident in the United States, the atmosphere became more and more intense. Adrian Bonenberg, a retired American soldier, always felt extremely shocked and embarrassed. He told the Global Times reporter: "If someone asked me if the United States was stupid enough to waste 20 years just to catch and kill a person to get revenge, I would say that we were actually. From 2007 to 2011, as the commander of the US Army, Bonanberg went to Afghanistan twice to perform military tasks. What made him dissatisfied was that almost all American policy makers who participated in and created this chaos were trying their best to shirk their responsibilities, and "in American TV programs, the war was just a story in the performance shows of several presidents, such as George W. Bush, Obama, Trump and Biden".
Like Bonenberg, the fragile nerves of those who witnessed the "9.11" attacks are also under new pressure. Brett Eagleson recently talked with nearly 1,800 people affected by the "9.11" incident — — Including survivors, emergency personnel and the families of the victims, asked Biden to take action to unseal the relevant files. Otherwise, he would not go to the World Trade Center in New York to engage in mourning activities this year. When the "September 11th" attack happened, Brett’s father, Bruce, was working in the South Tower of the World Trade Center. He could have fled the building, but he chose to stay and help more people evacuate. The last time Bruce was seen, he went upstairs to get a walkie-talkie and wanted to keep in touch with firefighters and police, but after that, the building collapsed and his family didn’t find his body. Brett told the Global Times reporter: "What makes people angry is that the US government is against ‘ 9·11’ The investigation of terrorist attacks has always been secretive. We are all depressed, because as time goes by, everyone is getting farther and farther away from the truth. "
Ms Zou, a 50-year-old Chinese American, used to work as a software engineer in the North Tower of the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center. On September 11th, 2001, she was lucky to get away with a vacation, but at least 30 colleagues in the same company were injured or killed in the attack. Ms Zou told the Global Times reporter: "War is always mixed with too much self-interest. Twenty years later, about ‘ 9·11’ The truth of the incident remains unsolved, and the American people have not got it ‘ Why do they hate us so much ’ The answer. The US government has created more conflicts and hatred in the United States and around the world. " She still clearly remembers that after the "9.11" attacks, President George W. Bush announced that he would launch a new "Crusade", which aroused the dissatisfaction of the Middle East countries.
"Every ‘ 9·11’ The anniversary is a reflection for the United States. " Washington post recently published a commentary saying that the original "9.11" incident aroused heroism in the United States, and the police, firefighters and emergency personnel who risked their lives to save others in Manhattan, new york, were the themes of these memories. As the United States plunged into two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the lies and misdeeds of the American government and intelligence agencies began to be exposed to the world, followed by the shady exposure of prisoner abuse and indiscriminate killing of civilians, and the reflection on the necessity of the war on terrorism and the collapse of America’s just image began to become the theme of reflection. Now, on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of "9.11" in the United States, the United States has just withdrawn its troops from Afghanistan and the Taliban has regained power in Afghanistan. The American people will surely ask: Why has the United States failed so badly? Are the blood and money paid by Americans worth it?
America’s "Lost 20 Years"
“‘ 9·11’ The impact of the terrorist attacks on the United States can be compared with the Pearl Harbor incident during World War II. " Joseph nye, an American political scientist, said this recently. But in the view of American writer Fred Kaplan, compared with the Pearl Harbor incident, the terrorist attacks came from uncertain organizations and individuals. In this sense, al-Qaeda turned the United States into a more fragile country, even though the United States once overthrew the Taliban regime and killed bin Laden, these victories were just a flash in the pan, and terrorist organizations continued to do evil for 20 years. More unfortunately, the "9.11" incident has made the United States a "more paranoid, xenophobic and militarized country", and this negative impact has continued to this day. When the "9.11" incident happened, Fred Kaplan was the director of the new york branch of The Boston Globe. Looking back on these 20 years, he thought that this incident also marked a change in American understanding of the world, and some American politicians began to exaggerate the external threats to the United States, which gave birth to "Trumpism" and led to the growing division and confrontation of American politics.The gap between racial discrimination, political party disputes and class contradictions seems to be increasingly insurmountable. Threats from outside (real or exaggerated) aggravate the division of Americans, making it difficult for Americans to reach a consensus on the most basic issues, including the fight against the COVID-19 epidemic.
Gulevich, an observer of Russian newspaper Kommersant, believes that the United States is facing more serious problems than it did 20 years ago. At that time, almost all countries sympathized with or declared their support for the war on terrorism launched by the United States, but no one could have predicted that the war in Afghanistan lasted for 20 years.
Talking about the "change and invariability" of the United States in the past 20 years, Li Haidong, a professor at the Institute of International Relations of the Foreign Affairs University, told the Global Times reporter that it has been 20 years since the "September 11" incident, and the change in the United States is — — Its own strength and international reputation have suffered dual substantial damage. 20 years of huge resources spent on military or so-called "reconstruction of other countries" actions have directly intensified the existing all-round crisis within the United States itself, and plunged the United States into a highly chaotic state of political polarization, rampant racism and populism, pervasive class opposition, and loss of national and personal identity. Li Haidong believes that it is difficult for an extremely morbid United States to maintain its domestic foundation of so-called international leadership for a long time. "The unipolar pattern has collapsed and the multipolar pattern is rapidly becoming a reality.". The constant in the United States is — — In the past 20 years, the United States has never changed its old habit of establishing its international status and planning its international behavior pattern by creating clear opponents or enemies. After the attack, the United States won the sympathy of the international community. It should have effectively coordinated all forces to eradicate international terrorism and extremist forces. However, in the process of combating al-Qaeda’s counter-terrorism, it sought to advance its global hegemonic goal of geopolitical interests.As a result, it set off a series of intervention, occupation or transformation actions against sovereign countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria in a unilateral and preemptive way, which led to long-term turmoil in these countries and related regions.
Li Haidong told the Global Times reporter that the double failure of domestic and foreign policies in the United States in the past 20 years was not caused by other countries, but was precisely caused by the lack of self-reflection awareness and self-correction courage of the American political elite, which gradually accumulated one wrong step and one wrong step. More and more international scholars have reached a consensus: American decision-makers have not made full use of the past 20 years to solve or alleviate many major problems that plague America’s own development, such as domestic political polarization, social rigidity, and widening economic gap. On the contrary, they are obsessed with power struggle and grandstanding, and their current inability to fight the epidemic has completely exposed the shortcomings of America’s own domestic governance.
In the eyes of China scholars, the "lost 20 years" of the United States was brought about by its own mistakes in judgment and decision-making, and it was totally self-inflicted. In the past 20 years, the United States has not made good use of its absolute superiority to create an international order based on the coordination of major powers and the stability of relations between major powers. Instead, it has deliberately excluded and suppressed countries such as China and Russia and engaged in geopolitical tricks.
Gaballah, a member of the Egyptian Foreign Affairs Committee and a columnist of Al-Pyramid, told the Global Times reporter that the United States had to blame itself for hastily withdrawing from Afghanistan before the 20th anniversary of the September 11th incident. Interfering in other countries’ internal affairs and intervening in regional affairs reflects the inferiority of the United States, which should cause the US government to deeply reflect and learn from it. But the reflection of the United States is obviously not in place. The United Arab Emirates "Declaration" published an article saying that in fact, whether it was the Vietnam War or the Afghanistan War, the United States ended in failure. The article thinks that when the United States thinks it is unnecessary to waste time and energy in Afghanistan, it will turn east and face China as a competitor.
"America has prepared a gallows for itself."
The German newspaper Sü ddeutsche Zeitung said that after the September 11th terrorist attacks, the United States set up a new department — — Department of Homeland Security, from that moment on, the United States regarded "anti-terrorism and national security" as a popular word for political decision-making and defense of military action. The most tragic legacy left by "9.11" will still be the continuous involvement of the United States in the war — — Revenge out of fear, or naively think that terrorism can be defeated by bombs and invasions. In fact, there are very few real terrorists who have been killed or injured in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
According to the estimation of Brown University in the United States, at least 1 million people have been killed in countries where the United States intervened in the past 20 years. Nita Crawford, co-founder of the school’s "Cost of War" project, said that this is only the data that directly died in conflict with the US military, and has not included those who died of hunger or disease due to war. "Most of the so-called terrorists killed by the United States are civilians. Is this the power given to the United States by the international community?" It is estimated that the United States spent more than $8 trillion on the "war on terror", and the US government also claimed that the money was used to develop occupied countries, but as people have seen, Iraq and Libya are deeply poor, and one third of Afghanistan’s population is starving.
RIA Novosti commented that in these bloody conflicts, the U.S. military industry has been making huge profits for 20 years, and all these costs were paid with innocent lives. As Chris hedges, an American columnist who wrote America: A Farewell Journey, said, "The United States is humiliated in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, just like in Vietnam and Cuba before, and still turns a blind eye to its decline, incompetence and barbarism. The United States didn’t realize that the gallows they were building were for themselves. "
Marcus Zinel, a researcher at the German Marshall Foundation, believes that NATO’s withdrawal from Afghanistan 20 years after the "September 11" attack is a failure of the "war on terror" and Europe must learn from it. He believes that in the past 20 years, European allies followed closely because of their loyalty to the United States, and Western governments vigorously exported Western-style democracy. But 2021 is no longer 2001, and Europe has been taught a lesson: it is realized that the United States is completely pursuing pure self-interest, and "American priority" applies not only to Trump but also to Biden. Other NATO countries are just helpless appendages. The war in Afghanistan is the last death knell, and Europe must liberate its military and security policies from the hands of the United States.
In response to the reflection of German public opinion, Li Haidong said that the alliance system was originally the most important strategic resource of the United States, but the U.S. government’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan and abandonment of its allies made its allies highly question the American decision-making elite and the coherence and predictability of policies at home and abroad.
In the past 20 years, the democratic and Republican parties in the United States took turns to govern, and the domestic and foreign policies showed a vicious circle of "one side dismantled and the other side built". When the United States handled international affairs, it often brought crisis consequences such as division, confrontation and war, which made more countries recognize the reality that the United States is a "global chaos seeder". In the past 20 years, the United States actually has a clear understanding, that is, it is rare to admit that solving many problems facing the United States cannot be separated from international cooperation. When dealing with challenges such as terrorism, global financial crisis, climate change, epidemic situation, nuclear non-proliferation and drug smuggling, most American politicians emphasize the importance of international cooperation. However, when dealing with these issues that require cooperation, the United States often has the intention of double standards and geopolitical competition, which ultimately leads to the failure to realize these issues with the wishes of the United States. At present, more analysts believe that populism will affect the trend of American politics and foreign policy for a long time, which is reminiscent of Germany before World War I and World War II. This is a blessing or a curse for the United States and the world, and people can only keep watching with vigilance.