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Old 06-05-2009, 09:20 PM   #11
combatmedic
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Default Re: Non 9/11 Parallel Earth?

Al Qaeda would simply attack us someplace else, in another way. They would still have the means, the motivation, and plenty of opportunities to carry out attacks. This war against the takfiri didn't start with 9-11, that's just when people in this country started actually paying attention to something other than reality TV- for a couple of years, at any rate.
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Old 06-05-2009, 09:26 PM   #12
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Default Re: Non 9/11 Parallel Earth?

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Originally Posted by combatmedic View Post
Al Qaeda would simply attack us someplace else, in another way. They would still have the means, the motivation, and plenty of opportunities to carry out attacks. This war against the takfiri didn't start with 9-11, that's just when people in this country started actually paying attention to something other than reality TV- for a couple of years, at any rate.
Yeah, but they even hit U.S. targets (like the USS Cole) without getting much of a response. "Terrorism. It happens" seemed to be the policy of the day, and would be in this AU. In fact, I believe that many people still hold to this, and feel we grossly overreacted to 9-11, which they see (right or wrong) as a one-time fluke.

It's pretty hard to wake the sleeping giant, all told.
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Old 06-05-2009, 09:48 PM   #13
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Yeah, but they even hit U.S. targets (like the USS Cole) without getting much of a response. "Terrorism. It happens" seemed to be the policy of the day, and would be in this AU. In fact, I believe that many people still hold to this, and feel we grossly overreacted to 9-11, which they see (right or wrong) as a one-time fluke.

It's pretty hard to wake the sleeping giant, all told.
Well, on the day that they finally manage to nuke us....
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Old 06-05-2009, 11:06 PM   #14
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Default Re: Non 9/11 Parallel Earth?

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There was compelling evidence that Saddam Huissein was trying to get WMD (despite revisionist history, everyone at the time thought so. Even Saddam thought he was trying to get WMD. He was screwing with the inspectors to protect phantom weapons programs his scientists assured him existed so he wouldn't kill them) and you can't run a No-Fly Zone forever. Trying to attack him, under those circumstances might seem reasonable...
Oh, I don't dispute that he WANTED them, or even that he was trying to GET them for a while. It's up for debate whether he knew there were no current programs prior to the invasion or not, and likely we'll never know for sure. But he demonstrably lacked the means to get them, is the point--he had neither the cash nor the technical expertise at his disposal any longer. Knowing the theory behind nuclear fission and being able to put it into practice are two very different things. Witness the two so-far failed attempts to produce a working nuclear weapon in North Korea (they've managed to make a really big conventional bomb that likely has side-effects similar to a "dirty bomb" rather than a proper nuclear weapon, as I understand it). It is significant to note that, in truth, the atom bomb was only invented once. Every other attempt to develop the technology independently has failed. Every country that has them, EVERY country, acquired them due to leaks from the US project that developed them. Making those things is HARD and EXPENSIVE. And that's not even discussing the technical difficulties in constructing a reliable long-range ballistic missile (something else North Korea is having some trouble mastering), which is pretty much required for such a device to be useful these days. Unlike in WWII, no one intent on using one of these things is going to be able to easily drop a bomb from a plane on their chosen target.

All of which is to say that while Hussein's ambitions were no mystery to anyone, it was also fairly well understood what his practical limits were. He was a threat to his own people and his immediate neighbors, but no threat to the larger global community except insofar as threatening his neighbors risked oil supplies (hence why he was smacked down for invading Kuwait). It took some pretty elaborate twisting of the facts, and wholesale invention, to justify a "pre-emptive" war. That would have been even more the case in a world where people were not irrationally afraid of another terrorist attack, but I think not beyond the means or determination of the Bush administration.

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However, I doubt Bush would have been re-elected for a second term. His main power at that point was lingering support for the GWoT. He wasn't wildly popular to begin with, and only achieved record-breaking results after 9/11 (less a statement about him and more a statement about American solidarity). If he had pushed for war, I'm certain he would have lost (most "neoconservatives" were convinced of the need for Wilsonian intervention in despotic tyrannies BY 9-11, ie "Wow, we can't just keep ignoring the misery of the world. 'Real Politik' nearly got us killed!', thus justifying both a compassionate impulse to make the world all great and democratic "just like us," with the need for military action against terrorists) because he didn't have the support he needed behind him. He'd have gone down in history as a nobody, a one-termer like his dad.

I suppose we'd have seen the first term of Kerry, and I rather expect the economy would have broken a bit sooner, with the blame falling squarely on Kerry's shoulders. Obama wouldn't have run (can't run against your own party), so I imagine McCain would have beaten Kerry. Obama would probably wait to run in 2012, where I imagine he would win, especially if McCain couldn't fix the economy (and I imagine he couldn't).
An excellent point, and you're probably quite right. Kerry likely would have been able to squeak by with a win if not for the level of fear-mongering Bush was able to employ thanks to 9/11. And McCain probably would have been able to beat him in turn in 2008, presuming the economy still tanked (which it almost certainly would have, since the factors that caused it to happen significantly predate 2001). I wonder in that sort of circumstance whether Obama still would have been able to secure the nomination, though. There's a pretty good chance that Hillary would have taken some sort of cabinet post in a Kerry administration. Maybe not Secretary of State, but possibly something almost as prestigious. And let's not forget Vice President Edwards (who would be much more likely to get shielding for an affair in that case, preventing it from becoming public knowledge). Both would have been in much stronger positions to run for President in 2012 than they were in 2008.
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Old 06-06-2009, 12:24 AM   #15
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Default Re: Non 9/11 Parallel Earth?

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Originally Posted by combatmedic View Post
Well, on the day that they finally manage to nuke us....
Safe to assume that without further PODs that will not happen between the day that 9/11 failed to happen and now, which is all that is relevant.
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Old 06-06-2009, 12:54 AM   #16
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There was compelling evidence that Saddam Huissein was trying to get WMD (despite revisionist history, everyone at the time thought so.
Source ? The way I remember those discussions that is plainly untrue.
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Old 06-06-2009, 01:06 AM   #17
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Default Re: Non 9/11 Parallel Earth?

Maybe if Gore won the elections he would have read the memos and prevented the attacks.

Im more interested in a Gore parallel than in a no 911 parallel

that said, I think bush would only have served one term too.
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Old 06-06-2009, 03:59 AM   #18
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Default Re: Non 9/11 Parallel Earth?

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I did not realize things were that bad.
I'ld say that captiolism aka money has always ruled the U.S. with a few exceptions.
I'ts the exceptions that make the american ideal forever memorable.
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Old 06-06-2009, 04:02 AM   #19
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Maybe if Gore won the elections he would have read the memos and prevented the attacks..
Despite being an uber-liberal I don't think that would happen. The idea of flying planes into buildings is a no-brainer, and should have been prepared for decades ago. I just don't see Gore as the genious required to see the invisible obvious.
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Old 06-06-2009, 04:06 AM   #20
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Yeah, but they even hit U.S. targets (like the USS Cole) without getting much of a response. ....
An act of war is much different than terrorism.
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