Scruples Obscuring Sight-Lines

"Strike while the iron is hot!" is one way of saying that sometimes opportunities that present themselves do not linger to allow decision-makers to ponder too deeply about the ultimate wisdom of delaying, neglecting, and failing to act. Of course it is entirely explicable that when there are doubts caution is expressed. Another old adage is the one that tells us that fools rush in where wiser heads take stock.

Unfortunately, what has been done - or neglected to have been done - cannot, once time has passed, been undone. Three thousand innocent people cannot be brought back to life. Thousands more that still suffer both psychological and physical trauma from the events of 9/11 can be offered compassion but nothing can console them to the fact that their lives were irretrievably altered. And a traumatized world cannot return to complacency.

And it's entirely possible that the malevolent events that Osama bin Laden spurred into action from his careful planning, tutoring and fundamentalist ideological dream brought to life, might have occurred in any event. Since his message had long since been received and disseminated, become holy scripture for Islamist jihadists whose martyrdom missions on behalf of Islam were gladly embraced.

The CIA had him in their sights. They tracked him for years, discovered his more recent whereabouts, ensconced in Afghanistan as an honoured guest of the Taliban, which shared much of al-Qaeda's beliefs and intentions. Saudi Wahhabism, thanks to Saudi oil money that handsomely funded madrassas all over Pakistan and Afghanistan ensured there would be no dearth of eager conscripts to offer themselves for suicide missions.

Perhaps the depth of the deadly carcinoma that they were dealing with was not yet quite realized by the U.S. government and the CIA. They could not, in their wildest nightmares, have envisioned 9/11, even after the attacks on two American embassies in East Africa. And they are, after all, basically civilized, restraining themselves from action lest innocents be caught in the cross-fire. That was then, this is now, when innocents do get caught in the cross-fire.

The plan, concocted by the CIA, with the involvement of local tribesmen (that's the thing about tribal interests, there are always life-enemies in the form of other tribes, and loyalties in a society that knows how to haggle and for whom corruption in politics is a way of life, can be sought and bought) was to abduct bin Laden in a raid, and hand him over to the CIA which would undoubtedly have returned him to the eager hands of the Saudi authorities whom he also planned to usurp in a bloody uprising.

Here's another old adage: The best-laid plans of mice and men do often go awry. And they did. The abduction raid was suspended because in the final analysis the CIA operatives who made the decisions did not feel fully confident they could rely on the tribesmen involved. And although other opportunities did arise, they were elusive and nothing came of them - until the final denouement, of course.

Osama bin Laden is history, but it is a lethal history and he has become an adored martyr whose exploits are emulated everywhere and anywhere aspiring jihadists rise out of the fire of Islamist martyrdom aspirations. A prospect that seems to be most appealing to a certain brand of Islam, which has claimed time and again how much it loves death. These malevolent forces love dealing death to others, and they aspire to achieve it for themselves, so they may rise to Paradise.

The West is involved in helpfully sending them there, sans the opportunity to take innocent lives with them.