Has the World Changed since 9/11?

Who doesn’t remember 9/11? Dull question, you might say, as pretty much everyone remembers the most disastrous terrorist attack of all times. Has the world changed since the fall of America’s number one economic symbol? Yes, it has. Was this change positive? Surely, not.

Ten years have passed. Yet the world is still in the same complicated and troubled mayhem as it was before. Clearly, the reaction right after 9/11 of the democratic coalition led by the US did not do much to inflict a massive correction to terrorism. Instead of focusing their efforts on a few targets, they’ve fought where the (false) menace was evident, thus wasting their time, diminishing their strengths, and combating against minor threats – or unreal ones – when those responsible for the gloomy and unacceptable events were in fact much closer to the high American governmental instances than to some random Iraqi citizen who got hit by a collateral damage.

Afghanistan’s 2001 War, Bali and Mumbai’s 2002 bombings, Iraq’s 2003 War, Moscow and Madrid’s 2004 bombings, London’s 2005 bombing, Alger and Karachi’s 2007 bombings, all those endless conflicts and acts of terrorism – and so many more – are the result and consequence of the Global War on Terror initiated by George W. Bush, terror that, instead of fading, did quite the opposite during this bloody decade.

So what have the good guys done since 9/11? Not much, if we think about it. Although the worldwide coalition did manage to prevent some major attacks, Bush blinded himself by concentrating his forces on Saddam Hussein’s Iraq only, and partly forgot the real adversary.

People do not particularly feel more secure and safe either. As the air security budget proves, threats on land are still massively disregarded compared to airs. Travellers going everyday through New York’s most vibrant train station keep living in fear of a bombing attack on Penn Station, especially as the ten years anniversary of the WTC is approaching. The only solution the US government has found to make the people believe they are safe then was to re-authorise carrying a firearm on trains. Clever decision, indeed.

The change did not come from the good guys, no. It came from the Muslim world itself, protector of a rightful Islam and willing to finally put an end to decades of dictatorship. With the Arab Spring, people’s minds began to change, and started to understand that nothing is ever all black or all white. The peaceful and unpredicted series of events weakened Al-Qaeda in the region. Whereas dictators in power accused it to be leading the revolution, Jihadists lowered their weapons and called for a democratic and peaceful resolution, both sides therefore delegitimizing Bin Laden’s faction.

The world rested a little. Yet, once again this blessed lull did not last long. In the hours that followed Oslo massacre all believed it was an Islamist attack, the threat of Al-Qaeda still floating above our heads despite the death of Bin Laden. But we soon realised that our own side was attacking us. We discovered a whole new form of terrorism, fighting against Islamism, against evil itself, and preaching for a better Christianity and a better Europe, free from Muslims. A far-right isolated Christian extremist mass-murdered tens and tens of teenagers, calling the act “atrocious but necessary”, in the name of the fight against Islam, Cultural Marxism, Feminism, and pretty much everything that does not follow the right-wing ultranationalist principles that extol the ideological supremacy of the white man.

Will this madness ever stop procreating new fundamentalists, craving to fight for their own restricted vision of the world? Ten years after 9/11, it sadly appears that the world hasn’t moved on from where it was in 2001. Instead, it simply seems that Islamism terrorism has given way for anti-Islam(ism) terrorism to rise.