The most disturbing things I hear in response to 
the whole Afghanistan/Taliban/Al Queda are here 
at my university. They generally go along the 
lines of 'The US deserves anything anyone can 
throw at it' and 'Hunting down terrorists is no 
different than the witch persecutions during the 
Inquisition'  So stuff on this forum isn't that 
bad in comparison, but I still feel the urge to 
point out a few things:

The Crusades: Yes, we all know about this.  The 
pope felt his power over the european states 
weakening, so he declared a holy war to unify his 
power under God, and eradicate the heathen middle 
east.  Sound familiar?  Right.  Well, what would 
have happened to all those Arabs if they just sat 
there saying "We're above this.  Fight?  Why 
fight?"  For one thing, there wouldn't be an 
Islamic nation today, and despite the current 
events, that would be wrong, because most people 
from that area are just as decent as any 
American, and like here, they have a lot of 
bastards too.  That's human nature.

Japan and Germany post WW2:  We did essentially 
set up their governments after we defeated them.  
Do we rule them now?  No.  Do they hate us now?  
Quite the opposite.  Germany's backing us up, and 
so would Japan, except they haven't been allowed 
an army capable of offense yet as part of the 
post WW2 pact.  In fact, if you look at accounts 
of Japanese just after the war ended, they were 
generally amazed that people they had just been 
at war with were so kind.  

The 'If we don't retaliate they won't come after 
us' ideology:  Well, see above crusades example.  
And see how the bin Ladens' attacks have 
escalated over the past decade when we didn't 
eradicate the problem thoroughly.  Oh, and one 
more thing:

ANTHRAX.  Its a biological weapon, it certainly 
doesn't happen by accident in places like the US 
and its showing up in Florida, in the offices of 
the Sun tabloid  newspaper, coincidentally right 
next to where one of the hijackers were staying 
and learning to fly planes. BEFORE retaliation. 
There are articles about it on msnbc.com  If an 
area were to be sprayed with antrax, and it 
doesn't take a whole lot of the bacteria to 
infect vast areas, there isn't going to be much 
hope of a rescue operation, just a whole lot of 
death.

-_-