Down the wrong path

BOOK REVIEW
Down the wrong path
9-11: Was There an Alternative? by Noam Chomsky
Reviewed by Christopher Bartlo

"The book you are holding was conceived, produced, and published as an act of protest." This is the first line of the editor's introduction to Noam Chomsky's revised book about the causes and effects of the September 11, 2001 attacks. Originally titled simply 9/11, the book was published in November 2001. The 2011 edition features a new introduction - "Was There an Alternative?" - in which Chomsky comments on the assassination of Osama bin Laden and other developments since the book was first published.
Chomsky's initial comments 10 years ago provide a sobering perspective today, warning about events that have since unfolded. Chomsky argues that the US government has done exactly what Osama bin Laden wanted it to do: Dig into a series of expensive and bloody wars in Muslim countries, draining the American economy and causing many civilian casualties. As a result, "the security situation in Afghanistan has worsened to its lowest point since the toppling of the Taliban a decade ago and attacks on aid workers are at unprecedented levels." The people of Afghanistan, teetering on the edge of starvation in September 2001, were deprived of much of the food and medical assistance from international aid that was keeping them alive because Coalition airstrikes destroyed infrastructure and made travel unsafe for aid trucks.

Chomsky laments that the US government largely dismissed these human-rights problems in its quest to "secure our interests." The invasion of Afghanistan was far from the first time North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) overran unstable civilian populations in the search for terrorists (Chomsky offers several examples in the book) and, as we now know, it was not the last.
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