Shortly after the London Bombings we read this:

Opinioneditorials, Letter to Terrorists from the Liberal Front

July 26, 2005

"Dear Terrorists:

We are so sorry that we have caused you to feel bad about us Christians, Jews, and Americans for past injustices. We apologize for our using our expertise in moving into the 21st century, leaving you to fend for yourself in the 16th century where your women are treated like property instead of human beings and you lack the education to escape poverty. We should have had you progress with us through time.

We also apologize for our government which wants to spy on your sleeper cells here in America without giving you any advance warning. The idea that our FBI agents may not tip you off before searching your house thus not giving you a chance to have deleted your computer disks or to have rid your home of your bomb-making materials before they get there is an anathema to us. But since it is a part and parcel of the Patriot Act, for now, we cannot stop it.

You will be happy to know, though, that we have scared the majority of Americans into worrying about what FBI agents may find you are studying in our libraries. Librarians are so concerned about your freedom to read about bomb-making, flying planes only after they are in the air, or even about how subways are constructed that that part of the Patriot Act may be muted for your convenience. At least we know that most libraries are on your side of confidentiality! We don’t think that what you type on a library computer will be recorded for our government to peruse.

We are also doing our best to keep our police officers more concerned about accidentally shooting a minority person than stopping terror. We have stopped all racial profiling even though we know that almost all bombers seem to be Middle Easterners with fraudulent passports or outdated visas. It is better that our police take the time to check Swedish and Norwegian blonds, and grandmothers in wheelchairs, than assume that all bombers of the future may be young Moslems. So what if this delays the prevention of terrorism? We must treat both the innocent and the criminal fairly and equally.

If the London police had failed to stop that suspect from escaping from them and he had blown himself up on the train killing everyone around him, at least we would have known then that he was guilty and London police did their almost best to stop him. It is always better to lose fifty innocent people to terrorism than to lose one innocent suspect to a police bullet!

Again, terrorists, we Liberals apologize for your mean treatment by our Conservatives. Please remember that we and our media friends helped gain Vietnam peace and we are also helping you to get back Iraq and to allow you your own choice of tribal government in the Middle East. So if you do take over this country, please be nice to your friends here. It will be very easy to tell who we are, by the way, as we will be the ones without any guns.

Sincerely, The Liberals of America Front Organizations."

A few days after a CIA Predator Hellfire missile strike in Jan of 2006 missed killing al Qaeda #2 Ayman al-Zawahiri we read this letter:

The Razor, Terrorist Sympathizers Be Warned

January 17th, 2006

Dear Terrorist Sympathizers and Supporters:

Be warned that you will be held responsible for (1) your dinner party guests. Should any of your guests be men who are responsible for attacks on Americans, you will suffer the consequences of your invitation.

Be advised also that you may also suffer the consequences of your neighbor’s decisions. Our laser-guided munitions are accurate; however your buildings may not be hardened to contain their explosions.

You can jump up and down in the streets until you are exhausted, but it will not lessen our resolve to bring our enemies to justice.

Sincerely,

An American

The day after the UK bombings we read:

Snowblink, Dear Terrorists

July 08, 2005.

Dear Terrorists,

I came into work early especially to write this message to you.

I was in two minds this morning as to whether or not to go to work. It’s Friday, and I could easily have taken a long weekend. But I decided not to.

This morning, I took my normal route to work. I went via Starbucks to get my morning cup of coffee. The only difference is that I took my digital camera out with me (see how you’re annoying me enough to take out a digital camera?), and that there were police posted in the stations.

You see? You’ve not actually achieved your goal.

Terror? No.

Damaging financial markets? We’re back to where we were last Friday.

Disrupting traffic? Well it’s not that different from normal service.

Getting your message across? No idea why you did it.

Pissing off most of London? Yes, you have done that. Well done.

Jon

PS Thanks for the two hour walk yesterday, I needed to do a bit of exercise.

And then this one:

The Sheila Variations, Dear terrorists

July 07, 2005

Dear terrorists:

So apparently some group of you claimed responsibility for the attacks in London today on some jihad website. We take everything you say with a grain of salt, because we know you LOVE to claim responsibility for Everything, it makes you feel good about yourself or something (when the relationship with the great love of my life broke up I think you even took responsibility for THAT), but one thing struck me about the message, and it's something that's been on my mind.

You seem to believe that the people of England would run cowering away from this coordinated series of attacks. You seem to think that they are a soft and cowardly people who would flee at the first sign of confrontation.

I think it's time for a history lesson. I realize that you are uninterested in infidel history. This has been the case even during the glory days of Islam, during the West's dark ages, when you were far ahead of us in terms of education, infrastructure, science, astronomy, everything. You flourished. Europe floundered. European countries would send diplomats and scientists and envoys to your countries, so that they could study in your universities, use your astronomical observatories, and write home about the customs of your land. You all never returned the favor. Because we were infidels. What could you learn from infidels?

Perhaps that was true in the Dark Ages, but it is no longer true, and you are ignorant now of reality.

Well, I am here to tell you that you are WAY off in your estimation of the British character. Are you aware of even the FRACTION of stuff these people have endured on their own soil?

Now I have only picked out a couple of the most blatant examples (see the posts below this one), and I am sure some of my Anglophile readers can add more.

But if you think for one second that the Brits are a people who crumble easily, I have got to say: You are out of your goddamned mind.

There's this thing? It's called History? Maybe you should check it out.

After 9/11 we read this from an unknown American:

Thu Sep 13 16:16:38 2001

Dear Terrorists...

You are about to learn what the U.S. is about

They pay me to tease shades of meaning from social and cultural issues, to provide words that help make sense of that which troubles the American soul. But in this moment of airless shock when hot tears sting disbelieving eyes, the only thing I can find to say, the only words that seem to fit, must be addressed to the unknown author of this suffering.

You monster. You beast. You unspeakable bastard. What lesson did you hope to teach us by your coward's attack on our World Trade Center, our Pentagon, us? What was it you hoped we would learn? Whatever it was, please know that you failed.

Did you want us to respect your cause? You just damned your cause.

Did you want to make us fear? You just steeled our resolve.

Did you want to tear us apart? You just brought us together. Let me tell you about my people. We are a vast and quarrelsome family, a family rent by racial, cultural, political and class division, but a family nonetheless.

We're frivolous, yes, capable of expending tremendous emotional energy on pop cultural minutiae, a singer's revealing dress, a ball team's misfortune, a cartoon mouse.

We're wealthy, too, spoiled by the ready availability of trinkets and material goods, and maybe because of that, we walk through life with a certain sense of blithe entitlement. We are fundamentally decent, though peace-loving and compassionate. We struggle to know the right thing and to do it. And we are, the overwhelming majority of us, people of faith, believers in a just and loving God.

Some people - you, perhaps - think that any or all of this makes us weak.
You're mistaken. We are not weak. Indeed, we are strong in ways that cannot be measured by arsenals.

Yes, we're in pain now. We are in mourning and we are in shock. We're still grappling with the unreality of the awful thing you did, still working to make ourselves understand that this isn't a special effect from some Hollywood blockbuster, isn't the plot development from a Tom Clancy novel.

Both in terms of the awful scope of its ambition and the probable final death toll, your attacks are likely to go down as the worst acts of terrorism in the history of the United States and, indeed, the history of the world. You've bloodied us as we have never been bloodied before.

But there's a gulf of difference between making us bloody and making us fall. This is the lesson Japan was taught to its bitter sorrow the last time anyone hit us this hard, the last time anyone brought us such abrupt and monumental pain. When roused, we are righteous in our outrage, terrible in our force. When provoked by this level of barbarism, we will bear any suffering, pay any cost, go to any length, in the pursuit of justice. I tell you this without fear of contradiction. I know my people, as you, I think, do not. What I know reassures me. It also causes me to tremble with dread of the future.

In days to come, there will be recrimination and accusation, fingers pointing to determine whose failure allowed this to happen and what can be done to prevent it from happening again. There will be heightened security, misguided talk of revoking basic freedoms. We'll go forward from this moment sobered, chastened, sad. But determined, too. Unimaginably determined.

You see, there is steel beneath this velvet. That aspect of our character is seldom understood by people who don't know us well. On this day, the family's bickering is put on hold. As Americans we will weep, as Americans we will mourn, and as Americans, we will rise in defense of all that we cherish.

Still, I keep wondering what it was you hoped to teach us. It occurs to me that maybe you just wanted us to know the depths of your hatred.

If that's the case, consider the message received. And take this message in exchange: You don't know my people. You don't know what we're about. You don't know what you just started.

Here's an email that's going around:

Dear Terrorists,

I am a Navy Aviator. I was born and raised in a small town in New England. I come from a family of five. I was raised in a middle class home and taught my values by my mother and father. My dad worked a series of jobs in finance and my mom took care of us kids. We were not an overly religious family but attended church most Sundays. It was a nice small Episcopal Church. I have a brother and sister and I am the youngest in my family. I was the first in many generations to attend college.

I have flown Naval aircraft for 16 years. For me the flying was never a lifelong dream or a "calling," it just happened. I needed a job and I liked the challenge. I continue to do it today because I feel it is important to give back to a nation which has given so much to me. I do it because, although I will never be rich, my family will be comfortable.

My government has spent millions to train me to fly these multi-million dollar aircraft. I make about 70,000 dollars a year and after 20 years will be offered a pension.

I like baseball but think the players make too much money. I am in awe of firemen and policemen and what they do each day for my community, and like teachers, they just don't get paid enough.

I respect my elders and always use sir or ma'am when addressing a stranger. I'm not sure about kids these days but I think that's normal for every generation. I tell you all this because when I come for you, I want you to know me. I won't be hiding behind a woman or a child. I won't be disguised or pretending to be something I am not. I will be in a U.S. issue flight suit. I will be wearing standard US issue flight gear, and I will be flying a navy aircraft clearly marked as a US warplane. I wish we could meet up close in a small room where I could wrap my hands around your throat and slowly squeeze the life out of you, but unfortunately, you're hiding in a hole in the ground, so we will have to do this a different way.

I want you to know also that I am very good at what I do. I can put a 2,000 lb weapon through a window from 10,000 feet up. I generally only fly at night, so you may want to start sleeping during the day. I am not eager to die for my country but I am willing to sacrifice my life to protect it from animals like you.

I will do everything in my power to ensure no civilians are hurt as I take aim at you.

My countrymen are a forgiving bunch. Many are already forgetting what you did on Sept 11th. But I will not forget!!

I am coming. I hope you know me a little bit better, see you soon...sleep tight.

Signed

A U.S. Navy Pilot

See also An open letter to terrorists and those who harbor and support you. From an American Grandfather.

And finally I'd like to close with my own Dear Terrorist letter:

July 27, 2006

Dear Terrorists:

I want you to look at the picture below. This is an infidel whore, so you will not see her in Heaven. In fact, you will never be able to enjoy the company of any decent, beautiful, intelligent woman ever. The closest you will get is to rape and brutalize her as you do all over the western world where we have allowed your kind to infest and pustulate our cities.

In addition, I suggest that Muslim Men also cover their faces with a Burqa for you are a shame unto all mankind, unto our species as a whole. It is wrong and bigoted to call another human being an animal. But fortunately for me I can call Islamic Jihadists animals because you are not humans. You teach your children that Jews are descended from apes and pigs. It would honor Islam if you Muslims were even close in species to apes and pigs.

Keep it up. It would be a blessing for the world if someday my grandchildren would read in biology books that there once existed a lifeform in the early part of the century known as Muslims but now extinct. Keep it up.

---

ENDNOTES

(1):

Confederate Yankee, Guess Who's Coming To Dinner

Al Qaeda's No. 2 leader was invited to dinner marking an Islamic holiday at the Pakistani border village struck by a purported CIA airstrike, but he did not show up, intelligence officials said Sunday, as Islamic groups demonstrated across the country in protest of the 17 people killed in the missile strike.

The two Pakistani officials told The Associated Press that this could explain why Friday's predawn attack missed its apparent target, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Usama bin Laden's top lieutenant.

Al-Zawahiri sent some aides to the dinner instead and investigators were trying to determine whether they had been in any of the three houses that were destroyed in the missile strike that killed at least 17 people, one of the officials said.