World Trade Towers and Pentagon Attacked

The World Trade Towers in new york were crashed into by 2 planes, one on each tower, 18 minutes apart. Nobody really knows who did it, but the planes were big ones. Normally I wouldn't consider posting this on Slashdot, but I'm making an exception this time because I can't get news through any of the conventional websites, and I assume I'm not alone. Update We're having server problems. Sorry. Updated info, both towers havecollapsed, pentagon hit by 3rd plane. Part of it has collapsed.

Comments

Accident...?

[pathwayX]

I really don't see how this could be an accident. The rule is that any airplane accident is a combination of at least three different errors/factors.

However. Any urban area, especially one with such a dense traffic, is at all times under radar surveillance and Air Traffic Control. Unless a number of people simultaneously had their braincells commit mass suicide, this could (or should) not have happened.

I fear that this is the result of terrorism. And if the news say different, I'll be very skeptical. After all, if it were terrorism, what does this show to the US public? That they're vulnerable at any time. Not exactly a sentiment the Powers That Be would like to instill to their voters...

And one last thing. Whatever this turns out to be, and as much as people all over the world are glued to their PCs or TV sets for news, there's one thing to remember here. It's not 'exciting', it's not 'fun'. It's tragic. These were real, live people...and the news channels are having a field day.

Watch for the attack on your rights!

[bluGill]

Congress typically feels the need to respond after some high profile incident like this. There is no way at this time to know what accually happened, or how to prevent this. (Much less how to prevent this without trampeling your rights). Still congress wants to do something, so they appear to have the ebst attentions. Odds are this will be used to trample on your rights.

We had it coming...

[takochan]

They hit tower one of the WTC and *now toppled both over*. And got the pentagon too..

Now, a couple things.. this is bad, this is really bad..

Apparently it was Palestinian terrorists that
did it (so TV is reporting)..

If it really was Palestinians, as much as I hate to say this.. I sort of understand..

before I start, I am a normal American white guy, am open minded, and think every race in the world has a right to their own safety and piece (including Americans).. I have absolutely nothing to do with the Arab israeli conflict (I am not arab, or Jewish, or anything like that), nor do I know any of either side closely at all..

But I was in Isreal once on business, and I saw what the Israelies do to the Palestinians, and what I saw made me sick to be an American because of how our government supports what the Israelis do to those people..

Basically, the isrealis take palestinian land bit by bit to make settlements for Israelis only, and shoot/run over/kill Palestinians with the guns, helicopters and bullets that we, America give the Israelis.

We dont report these travesties on American news (though you can get it on the BBC, CBC and other foreign outlets, and watch Israelis shoot with machine guns, 12 year old arab kids throwing rocks).

It is worse than south Africa, and I go as far to say, that the Israelis have put the Palestinians in concentration camp like conditions for the last 20 years or so, bulldozing their houses for their land, shooting their kids, controlling their land, their economy and choking them off one by one..

And when other countries like the Africans try to tell the truth (yes, the Israelis are racists..absolutely, they have dual licence plates for Palestine cars, dont let them drive on the same roads as Israelis, and occupy their country).

And we, the United states government, give more money, bombs, guns and weapons to Israel than to any other country in the world in foreign aid.., knowing (and allowing0 the Israelis to shoot, maim and rob more palestians of there property, lives and freedom.

And we have been doing that for 20 years now at least..

What else should we have expected really?

This terrorism really sucks, .. but we should
also look at what we have been doing too the last 20 years.. and why a people felt so driven to do this to us..

Re:We had it coming...

[zeus_tfc]

I'm sorry, but I must disagree. A group of Jewish people sitting on a stretch of land so small you can spit across, and surrounded by enemies, and you blame them for being brutal for protecting thier land? They are not trying to take over the area, merely trying to SURVIVE. The Israeli motto is "NEVER AGAIN"... Never again will they sit by and let a group try to eradicate them. Never again will they be victimized.

With regard to your words about atrocities, both sides are equally guilty of brutality. Don't lay all the blame on Israel. The main reason why we side with the Israel, aside from the Holocaust, is the fact that SEVERAL leaders of Middle eastern nations have vowed to ELIMINATE the Jews. Not "get our land back," or "defend ourselves and our way of life," but ERADICATE the jewish people. All Jews everywhere. By aiding Israel we are not participating in a mass extinction, we are trying to prevent one from happening.

Zeus_tfc

Re:We had it coming...

[fanatic]

This isn't the way to address this. We (the US) are now COMPELLED to go totally hardline. If we roll over for this in ANY we, we guarantee ourselves a steady diet of this in the future.

If Palestinins did this, they have killed any chance for poeace in this generation - and the real killing is probably just beginning.

As a side note, if our airline security is so good these days, how come they were abler to use 3 (or is it 4 - just heard Camp David got hit, don't know if this is true or not) airplanes as weapons?

Re:We had it coming...

[imipak]

We (the US) are now COMPELLED to go totally hardline

That won't solve anything. I have family in Ireland, and we well know the result of that kind of an attitude. The right way forward is much harder than just bombing the crap out of a random Islamic country. It's down to GWB to do the right thing.

Regarding airline security: this is the result of the US having had it so EASY for the last 40 years. As a friend said, none of us (Euros) would have been surprised for something like this to have happened at any time, virtually, since the 1982 massacres in Beirut at least. Not to mention the many, many, many other countries around the war that the US has picked on to protect their trade interests, or to prop up some dictatorship.

Re:Unconfirmed report...

[Fesh]

As I said in my first reply, they don't have me running scared. I'm pissed. And I'm ready to do whatever I'm called to do to. They haven't won. I will not break.

sarcasm, folks

[waldoj]

I was going to post the same thing. This shows how incredibly foolish and shortsighted that it is of us to believe that this missle defense shield will do us any good. It has often been mentioned that anybody can get a suitcase-sized nuclear bomb into the country, but this shows that it doesn't even take that to entirely shut down the country.

Here we all are -- on Slashdot. I'm at home, and I bet that I won't go to work until late this afternoon. Most of the country is in similar shape. No missle defense shield could help this. In fact, I'm not sure that *anything* could help this. If half a dozen guys decide to hijack airplanes and crash them into major buildings, no defense shield or anything else will help.

The biggest casualty

[rossz]

The biggest casualty will probably be our

Constitution. Whenever a tragedy likes this occurs, the government always announces a get tough on terrorists policy that will have no effect on the psychopaths who do this, but will severely limit our rights.

The huge loss of life is bad enough. The subsequent loss of what truly represents what this country stands for will be intolerable.

DONATE BLOOD

[Marshall Rosenstein]

If you are wondering what you can do to help.

Re:An interesting test

[Galvatron]

My prediction is that they'll wait until the investigation has turned up some solid information before doing anything. I should point out, Clinton made a not very subtle threat against the middle east in the wake of Oklahoma City. He looked pretty stupid when it turned out to be an American anarchist. Still, given that something on the order of half a dozen attacks occured nearly simutaneously (two planes into the WTC, one car bomb nearby, some unknown means of attack against the pentagon building, and a crashed plane outside of western PA), this was probably the work of either a very large terrorist organization or a foreign government.

This is a sad sad day for palestine

[stonewolf]

The TV is reporting that a Palestinian group conducted these attacks. No matter who did it many Americans will believe that it was done by Palestinians. Over the last 5 years public opinion in the US has been turning toward the Palestinians and away from the Israelis.

But now, this attack will rate up their with the loss of the Battleship Maine and the attack on Pearl Harbor. Who ever has done this has doomed themselves, and they have destroyed Palestine as well.

If you are religious this would be a good time to pray that no nukes are used in retaliation. There will be retatliation. Even God can't stop that.

Stonewolf

I saw it happen.

[arkham6]

I work right across the river from NYC, and around 9 someone told me that a plane had hit the WTC. I ran down to the conference room and saw a huge cloud of smoke. There was a giant hole in the building, and i could see the flames licking out. A few minutes later, the second airplane hit in a huge explosion. I went back to my office to talk to co-workers, and about 20 minutes later, went back to the conference room. I just got there when there was this huge puff of dust and smoke, and I saw the building fall.

Please, if anyone wants to help, go see your local red cross, and donate a few pints of blood. We are going to need it.

Don't take it out on your Arabic neighbours

[zulux]

99.9999 of Arabic people in the US are here because they love the US. They may express it differently, and sometimes have odd viewpoints, but at the end of the day, they are here and love the USA.

Re:FUCK YOU!!!

[dingbat_hp]

BOMBS THESE FUCKERS BACK TO THE STONE AGE

I think I heard that one before.
Did it work then ?

Do not seek revenge against the wrong people

[mrogers]

I sympathise with your desire for revenge. But please try to bear in mind in the days and weeks to come that revenge against a large group of people will hurt many innocent people. Those responsible for this attack are unspeakably evil individuals, but don't get so caught up in your desire to punish them that you end up hurting yet more innocent people - for example the civilians of another country. God forbid this tragedy should get any worse; that's what will happen if the US seeks revenge against an easy national target such as Palestine or Afghanistan rather than hunting down the individuals responsible for this awful attack. Please don't add your voice to those calling out for blood. Enough blood has been spilled already. Let us find and punish the individuals responsible, but let us not make an easy scapegoat out of innocent civilians, whatever their nationality or religion.

Do we become terrorist, ourselves?

[Stephen Samuel]

they've just given our government a green light to massively increase defense (and offense) spending and completely obliterate them,

Oh, great! This sort of revenge attitude is precisely the kind of thing that which whe terrorists want, and the kind of thing that leads to more of these terrorist attacks.

1. We get attacked, and innocent people die, so
2. we go out and 'punnish' innocent people who are vaguely associated with the cause of the killers.
3. switch sides and go to step one.

Hatred and random violence are not the appropriate responses to violence. Hatred comes from fear. Generating fear in random people on the other side is only going to create an opening for those who wish to generate more hatred against us.

Most notably: attacks against innocents only vaguely associated with the terrorist only helps the cause of the terrorists. It makes more people desperate and angry -- feeding the machinery of the terrorists. This is the last thing we want.