Commentaries, Opinions, And Editorials -- September 12, 2011

A World Without 9/11: No President Obama, More China Trouble, Same Debt Crisis -- Michael Lind, Washington Post

Imagine that the twin towers still dominated the Manhattan skyline. Imagine that the Pentagon’s western facade had remained intact. Imagine that there was no reason to build a memorial in Shanksville, Pa. And imagine that the numbers 9 and 11 meant nothing more than an emergency telephone call.

The world changed on Sept. 11, 2001, that much is clear. But how much, and how radically?

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Commentaries, Opinions, And Editorials

Myth and Reality After 9/11 -- Victor Davis Hanson, NRO

In Search of the Next Big Attack, Long After 9-11 -- Cal Woodward, Military.com

Did Osama Win? -- Andrew Sullivan, Daily Beast/Newsweek

What if the 'Lion' hadn't been slain? -- Farangis Najibullah, Asia Times

Al-Qaeda's zealots of yesteryear turning to politics, democracy -- Doug Saunders, Globe And Mail

U.S. Prepares to Talk to Taliban It Wanted to ‘Destroy’ -- Danger Room

Half a Trillion Dollars of Broken Afghan Dreams -- New York Times/Reuters

9/11 Recalled — Kabul -- Sharifullah Sahak, At War, New York Times

In Afghanistan, tie between 9/11 and the war often gets lost -- Laura King, L.A. Times

Are 3,000 Troops Worse Than None in Iraq? -- Kenneth Pollack, Real Clear World

We Need Troops in Iraq -- Max Boot, Commentary

Egypt’s Botched Revolution -- Michael Totten, Pajamas Media

Beyond Cairo, Israel Sensing a Wider Siege -- Ethan Bronner, New York Times

Britain has travelled steadily towards the edge of the cliff in the years since 9/11 -- Melanie Phillips, Daily Mail

Canada's Oil Sands Are a Jobs Gusher -- Mary Anastasia O'Grady, Wall Street Journal

Europe’s Fiscal Fantasies -- New York Times editorial

Commentaries, Opinions, And Editorials -- September 9, 2011

The 9/11 ‘Overreaction’? Nonsense. -- Charles Krauthammer, Washington Post

The new conventional wisdom on 9/11: We have created a decade of fear. We overreacted to 9/11 — al-Qaeda turned out to be a paper tiger; there never was a second attack — thereby bankrupting the country, destroying our morale and sending us into national decline.

The secretary of defense says that al-Qaeda is on the verge of strategic defeat. True. But why? Al-Qaeda did not spontaneously combust. Yet, in a decade Osama bin Laden went from the emir of radical Islam, jihadi hero after whom babies were named all over the Muslim world — to pathetic old recluse, almost incommunicado, watching shades of himself on a cheap TV in a bare room.

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Commentaries, Opinions, And Editorials

The Next Ten Years of Al-Qaeda -- Zalmay Khalilzad, The National Interest

Ten Years After 9/11 -- Jakob Augstein, Spiegel Online

It is Western Muslims who will beat al-Qaeda -- Ed Husain, The Telegraph

Two Questions at Heart of bin Laden's Jihad -- Lawrence Wright, Bloomberg

Libya: 'civil war not over' -- Richard Spencer, The Telegraph

Libya: So far, so pretty good -- The Economist

A Reality Check for Brazil -- Jaime Daremblum, Real Clear World

The euro: peering over the brink -- The Guardian editorial

The Euro's Problems Are America's Too -- Desmond Lachman, Wall Street Journal

Commentaries, Opinions, And Editorials -- September 9, 2011

Reuters

Al-Qaeda Is Winning -- Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, The Atlantic

Their ability to land large-scale attacks like that of September 11 might be eroded, but the group has another strategy: using our strengths against us.

A decade after the attacks of September 11, 2001, national security opinion leaders are converging around the ideas that the threat of terrorism has been substantially reduced over the past 10 years, and that al-Qaeda is on its death bed. "Al-Qaeda is sort of on the ropes and taking a lot of shots to the body and the head," White House counterterrorism chief John Brennan told the Associated Press on August 31. Defense secretary Leon Panetta said in July that the United States is "within reach" of "strategically defeating" the jihadi group, and the Washington Post has confirmed that his assessment is shared by many analysts. Commentators in the public sphere are increasingly adopting similar views. But my own research into the group has led me in a different direction: that this emerging consensus doesn't just appear wrong, but obviously wrong. Al-Qaeda isn't anywhere near defeated -- for all our triumphalism, it appears to be winning.

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Commentaries, Opinions, And Editorials

Mission Accomplished. Finally. Ten years after 9/11, it's time for President Obama to finally call an end to America's adventures abroad. -- Bruce Ackerman, Foreign Policy

A decade of bloody-mindedness -- Mahir Ali, DAWN

Who Really Kept Us Safe After 9/11: The truth about homeland security -- Steve Chapman, Reason

From 9/11 to the Arab Spring -- Fouad Ajami, Wall Street Journal

The Arab Counterrevolution -- Hussein Agha and Robert Malley, New York Review Of Books

Libya's Neighbors Fear Export of Violence as Gaddafi Seeks an Escape -- Vivienne Walt, Time

Finding Hope in Libya -- Nicholas Kristof, New York Times

Revolution in Iran 'a matter of time' -- Ben Farmer, The Telegraph

Who Can’t America Kill? -- Micah Zenko, Council On Foreign Relations

The Bloody War for Southern Thailand -- Richard S. Ehrlich, Asia Sentinel

US response to 9/11 contributed to causes of current debt crisis -- Linda J. Bilmes, Christian Science Monitor

From hyperpower to declining power -- Richard Wike, CNN/Pew Global

An Exorbitant Burden: Why keeping the dollar as the world's reserve currency is a massive drag on the struggling U.S. economy. -- Michael Pettis, Foreign Policy

What the world must do to boost growth -- Tim Geithner, Financial Times

Is Greece About To Default? -- Seeking Alpha