Wartime
We cannot choose to stop being the most powerful country in the world, or to stop standing for freedom and democracy.

By John J. Miller & Ramesh Ponnuru
September 11, 2001 2:45 p.m.

apitol Hill this morning seemed a little like London during the bombings. There was confusion, with strangers stopping each other on the streets to trade information — a precious commodity in short supply as word of the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington began to come in. Cell phones were everywhere, but few of them seemed to work. The lines at pay phones were long. People streamed eastward on the sidewalks, away from the closed office buildings and presumably headed for home — or at least to the homes of friends. Rumors were everywhere: Was there a fire in the Capitol Building? A car bomb outside the State Department? Was it safe to cross a bridge into Virginia?

There was fear, as pedestrians jumped at the sound of an explosion from across the river. The buzz of a plane overhead made people crouch — as if ducking would help. Friend or foe? It was the sort of question nobody in America has had to ask — until now.

There was also calm. Partly this calm was from the comforting presence of police directing traffic — a sign of order in the midst of what easily might have been chaos. Partly it was the raw impact of an event whose meaning won't hit home for some time. How quickly will Americans realize that the crimes committed today were not just acts of terrorism but acts of war?

Someone has declared war on us. Why? There will be those who are tempted to think that we could live in peace if only we did less to cause offense: if we withdrew our support from Israel, our troops from Saudi Arabia, our sanctions on Iraq. If we withdrew from the costs of empire and the burdens of leadership.

But this is an illusion. It is not the case that the natural disposition of all human beings, absent provocation, is friendliness to the United States. We have enemies — enemies who hate the fact and the character of our power, not just the uses to which it is put. We cannot choose to stop being the most powerful country in the world, or to stop standing for freedom and democracy. No amount of pre-emptive capitulation to our enemies' demands — which is what, after all, a no-offense strategy would amount to — would ever be enough.

All that we can do is to fight back. And pray.