To the Rasta Editor;
The American People had better wake up! The Gospels in the Bible say ³as
ye sow, so shall ye reap². Since my teenage years the United States has
bombed Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Libya, Panama, Grenada, Iraq, Sudan,
Afghanistan and Yugoslavia injuring and killing millions of civilians.
Do we think we can go around the world forever killing innocent civilians
and it wont catch up to us? Bin Laden is a terrorist and was one when the US
was essential to launching his career in the early 1980ıs. Saddam Hussein is
a terrorist and was one when the US helped put him in power and then kept
him in power both before and during the Gulf War in 1991. Bombing their
countries and killing innocent civilians has only made them stronger.
In 1987 I joined with over 200 Americans in going to Libya and attempting
to express to the families of the dozens of children killed in their beds
at 2 am by a so called smart bomb dropped by an American jet that this
wasn't the doing of the American people, that please, please don't kill
innocent Americans in retaliation.
For this ³crime² I was threatened with 5 years in prison by the American
government.
In 1988 I again joined with many other guilt stricken Americans in
attempting to express condolences to the families of 300 Iranian civilians
on a civilian airliner shot down by an American warship in the Persian Gulf.
The American government has to this day refused to pay any compensation to
the families of those killed and to add insult to injury, refused to punish
any of those military personnel responsible for this crime. And what was the
American warship doing in the Persian Gulf when it shot down this civilian
airliner? Helping keep Saddam Hussein in power.
As terrible a tragedy as the World Trade Center bombing was, maybe we can
turn this into the beginnings of a change in US foreign policy that will
signal the beginnings of peace on this planet. But first the American people
have to wake up and demand this change be made. If not, expect more WTC
atrocities.
Thomas C. Mountain
Founding member, Hawaii Alliance for Peace and Justice in the Middle East
(1982)
47-431 Hui Nene St.
Kaneohe, Hawaii 96744
239-8112
