30.06.2001
To: John. 
It seems we agree on some points. Afghanastan is a sovereign country. The US should be required to give at least some of the evidence to the Taliban in order to effect his hand over. I dont know what all has occured between the two goverments. The only people that know that are the diplomats. News stories are most often only a small portion of the real story. I cant say that I would support a death penalty. I dont think death sentences should be handed out by man. Man is not omnipitant and therefor can never be sure of all the facts. I dont think we are qualified to make a decision like that. If God wants you to go you'll go. Besides, I think it is a far heavier punishment to make someone live to a ripe old age in a prison cell than it is to kill them. Just remember this. The keepers become responsible for the individual. That is not a good situation for either country. It can only bring about further conflict.    Yes, Afghans are obviously a resilient people. Very brave warriors. I have a great respect for warriors such as the Muj and the VC and Montangards of Vietnam. They are some of the great warriors of modern times. What these groups lacked in training and equipment they more than made up for with bravery and enginuity.   Ahh the subject of Israel. I remember the case you mentioned. Didnt really understand Israel's motivation to take that action but these are two very different cases. Both cases involve murder certainly but "terrorism" seems to bring a much worse connotation and Mr Bin Laden is purported to be indirectly responsible for much more than just one murder. Of course, one mans terrorist is anothers freedom fighter.   As far as the "Americans feeling we are a super power and that everyone should submit to us" I say this. The great suffering in World Wars 1 and 2 were mostly brought about by an internalist attitude of Americans. We sat around and said, It's Europe's problem. Who cares what happens in the South Pacific Islands, China, Korea, Indonesia? Until the problem was much bigger and at our doorstep. The world would be a much nicer place if Americans were allowed to sit back and only worry about what goes on INSIDE our own borders. Unfortunately, we learned the hard way through two world wars that the cost is much higher when we take this attitude. Someone has to be the Gate Keeper standing ever vigilant. I did my time protecting the world. I have spent the majority of my adult life wearing camoflage and and hoping I was doing the right thing.  I cant tell you what a profound experience it was to stand on a hilltop in South Korea looking out across the valley at Heartbreak Ridge and! Propaganda village seeing that only two small fences and about 1 Km of rice paddy seperated me from that North Korean guard that would probably just as soon kill me right there. Or the fact that I spent many a night in this and that country keeping opressors at bay. I hope that the majority of this time was spent doing the right thing. In the case of Somalia. The intent was nice but the reality was rediculous. It so reminded me of all the stories I had read of Vietnam. Politicians tying the military's hands. The French Foreign Legion didnt have these problems. No Somali was dumb enough to throw rocks at a Legionaire lest he risk his life. Is it the right thing for the US to play Policeman of the world? Only time will tell but I dont see that we have a better option on the table at this time.
Clay, USA
E-mail: JrSkymonkey@aol.com

30.06.2001
To Clay from USA.
Hello Clay, you seem to be very fair person with good understanding of the things around you. Before I proceed further please see my posting on 6/28/01 above(this is regarding documentary on www.pbs.org, probably it will add more knowledge about Islam.) I like to bring to your attention that Osama bin laden was in Afghanistan before Taliban, he was living there when Ahmed Shah Masood and Rabbani was ruling. America had a good chance to arrest him when he was expelled from Sudan and his home country Saudi Arabia. Also I like to point out that Afghans attitude and thinking is very different from US. Taliban have repeatedly asked for evidence from USA and they even said they will make him stand trail and if found guilty he will be given death sentence, I believe in it completely because I have observed that they always said what they belived and did it without bowing to the pressure on them. Let me come back to there attitude, these people never submit nor like to get bully around, lets take the example from history: After Alexender the great accoupied India, his next expedition was Afghanistan (this is before Islam to this region) and after 6 months of seige to the city, Alexander's army could able to break the seige but his ! army got beaten very badly as well himself. After he received severe injuries they withdrew and Alexender with his army head back to Rome but on his way back he died of the injuries near the steppes of Khazakistan. After that British tried twice to occupy both time they were beaten badly.Then they destroyed Soviet Union another world power. So we have to conclude from this that these people never give in, I know we as American's feel that we are super power and everyone should submit to us (whether you deny or not this is the fact). Trust me the more we push Afghans they more they will resist. Also I like to say that Isreal's constitution does not allow to deport any criminals or terrorists. They refused repeated requests from US to hand over a criminal (american jew)who killed his friend and dismembered his body into pieces then he fled to Isreal and he was given santuary and immidiate citizenship becasue he is Jew (even though his parents are not Isreal's citizens). Well y! ou might argue here with me that Osama is a terrorist, I would say if he is then lets produce some evidence (why I say that, last week spain arrested an Algerian and claimed that he is the right hand of Osama bin Laden and most wanted on FBI list but US department denied that he is not one of the convicted nor they are looking for him, so it concludes that, everyone is abusing and maybe putting innocent people behind bars for the personal gains with the pretext of terrorist of Osama bin laden) Russsia said they arrested a bin laden's man trying to assasinate Bush, its cleary a bull as these guys wants to come closer to Bush department and ward off the Bush's department critism of Russia's brutal campaingn in Chechnya. Recently Indian government arrested a car mechanic, a jobless guy, etc who are planning to blow up US embassy, first these guys who are bums and no military background, second why now he could have done it long time back as he is so close to India. Now India wants to use bin laden pretext to gain favor from US inorder to pressure Pakistan in stopping support for Kashmiris. So everyone got a black sheep to gain there own sinister political ends by uniting under pretext.
John, USA
E-mail: john@hotmail.com