Fact: The Western world (not just America, America is simply the richest and most aggressive) has used economic warfare to keep most of the third world in debt for over half a century. Frequently by loans made to dictators who were installed in the country in question by Western intelligence agencies and many of whom have subsequently fled taking all the money. Fact: The Western world has used third world countries to fight wars by proxy against both the former Soviet Union and various other communist governments. This has now changed to Muslim countries, now that Communism has proven to suck. Fact: The WTC contained the head offices of a large number of corporations who were either partly or directly responsible for continued economic exploitation of third world countries and the deaths of at the very least thousands if not millions of citizens of those countries. Fact: Thousands of civilian casualties were sustained by Afghanistan during the "War on Terrorism". My question is this: When did attacking a country's means of production (and the companies in the WTC produced WEALTH, the primary method of waging war in this instance) cease to be a legitimate way to exercise strategic policy? Given that a large number of people in the WTC were highly placed in financial institutions or corporations that have been directly responsible for the death of MILLIONS of moslims in Africa and Asia, why are they not legitimate military targets? Now I know some of you will already be about to post something along the lines of "even if that were the case, what about all the people in the WTC who WEREN'T opportunistic, avaristic scum who profited off the back of human misery?" That's beside the point. When people wage wars, innocent people die. Army bases have cleaners, cooks and medical personnel who aren't in the armed forces, just like the World Trade Centre. The loss of innocent life has never been a serious issue during warfare. That's why they call it warfare, rather than cuddling. People making bombs and ammunition were considered acceptable targets during World War Two. Even people who weren't engaged in such activities were considered acceptable "collateral damage". As NemesisZero will patiently tell you, the 25,000 people killed by the RAF and USAF during the bombing of Dresden weren't soldiers. In fact, corroborated estimates put the figure at less than 1,000 military personnel killed during the bombing. So we managed to nail one actual soldier for every 24 civilian men, women and children (note, unlike the revenge attacks carried out by the US on Afghanistan and Iraq, precious few children could be found during the day in the WTC). Not wearing a uniform doesn't make you guiltless or a non-military target. And surrounding yourself with human shields doesn't mean that you can't be attacked. Since the muslim world find themselves fighting a vastly more powerful and wealthy enemy, they can hardly land in Florida and fight their way on land. Striking precisely at clear military targets (The Pentagon, The WTC and almost The White House [lucky eh?]) was hardly an unreasonable act. Half a century of campaigning and attempted reasoning with Western business has simply resulted in political interference and destabilisation, ecological disaster and strip-mining of natural resources WHILST exploiting the local work-force. If the aim of the exercise was to cause casualties, the WTC was an awful choice of target. A packed football stadium would have yielded vastly more casualties. Or a concert. Or 5th Avenue on the 4th of July. Or Times Square on New Year's Eve. Think about that. The US got off lucky because Al Queda restricted itself to Political/Military targets. Neither Iraq, nor Sudan, nor Libya and most certainly not Afghanistan got off so easily. There is one word for the American response to the attacks: Terrorism. The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons. That is what occured in Afghanistan. The only thing that one might question is "unlawful". Well, both the UN and the Geneva convention would have things to say on that front. I am ashamed that my government (admittedly against the will of the citizens of the UK) assisted in these operations. Also please note, this is not an attack on Americans, or America, but on the concept that somehow the attacks on other sovereign powers had any ethical justification. The timing of this post is slightly coincidental.