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Opinion

America, don't let bin Laden fool you

Daniela Carpio
Opinion Columnist 

On Thursday, news spread through the airwaves of the world of the appearance of a new tape by Osama bin Laden. In the tape, bin Laden renews his threat of attacks on American soil and offers a truce to the American government and American people.

Bin Laden warns that any attacks of his doing are a direct result of our continuing involvement in the fate of Afghanistan and Iraq. He also warned that American soldiers would continue to lose their lives in vain. 

Analysts of tape agree that the tape is no more than a message of survival; showing that bin Laden is still alive, in an effort to contradict recent intelligence reports that stated he had been cornered. 

However, the tape holds a more important and dangerous purpose: To demoralize the American people. With the growing discontent of our current administration and the growing lack of support for military efforts in Iraq, bin Laden wants to further divide us by appealing to our wishes for a quick resolution of the conflicts in the Middle East. 

Like the Viet Cong before them, al Qaeda knows American's lack the commitment for causes that have no real direct effect on us -- especially when the price is the blood of countrymen. Therefore, they hope to tug at our heartstrings by trying to make us believe that if we withdraw from Afghanistan, and more importantly Iraq, their attacks will cease, American lives would be spared and the conflict would end. 

But history has taught us differently -- human conflicts are never so easily resolved. Not to mention that these promises come from a mass murderer who enjoys making the world suffer, a man who is no head of state in any nation, who has no land to protect and who has no real plan aside from our destruction.

Further, his previous attacks on Western civilization have been the result of hatred -- not of Americans or American culture, but hatred of anything and anyone different from himself. A character such as this cannot be trusted with promises of truce. 

As a result, to think that bin Laden's remarks are by any means reasonable is inconceivable. He hopes to destroy us, and by accepting his words as truth we are destroying ourselves. More than anger, this development should re-ignite the need for justice that was so prevalent in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

Regardless of your opinion on the involvement in the Iraqi war, I urge you to ignore the allegations made by a man of bin Laden's stature. Especially because it has no other purpose than to derail us from the fact that he murdered our people. 

Even when I understand and feel the resonance the conflict in the Middle East has on all American families, it is my sincere hope that this tape has no impact on our commitment to seek justice for the lives of all who have been victims of evil.

Carpio, an opinion columnist for The Daily Cougar, 
can be reached at nielaca@hotmail.com.