For a brief moment after the attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Centre in 2001, it seemed as if the shock of these events might bring about a general process of reflection by Americans on the place of the U.S. in the wider world. Unfortunately, the form this reflection eventually took was self-defeating. The question of why Al-Qaeda bombed the Pentagon and the World Trade Centre has a relatively clear answer: 'They say they did it because of U.S. support for the corrupt Saudi monarchy and the garrisoning of American troops in Saudi Arabia.' One might then expect people to start asking why U.S. troops should be in Saudi Arabia anyway, why exactly control of this region is so important, and finally how much real power the U.S. has and how it can be best deployed. Instead, public discussion almost immediately began to focus on elaborating various fantasies about Islamic fundamentalism, 'their' hatred of 'our' values, freedom, and way of life, etc. The creation of such imaginary hate figures may give some immediate psychic satisfaction, but in the long run they only spread and increase confusion and aggression. Troops can in principle be withdrawn from Saudi Arabia, policy toward the Saudi monarchy can change, but how can one deal in a satisfactory way with inherently spectral 'Islamic terror'? It no doubt suits some political circles in the U.S. that the population continues to be mystified and frustrated, the better to gain their acquiescence in various further military operations, but it is hard to believe that an emotional and cognitive derangement of the population contributes to increasing U.S. political power.
(Raymond Geuss, "The Politics of Managing Decline," Theoria 52 [December 2005]: 1-12, at 2-3)
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 