Watching the miniseries on Carlos the first well know terrorist from the early 70’s reminded me of how much we did not learn from the past about terrorism and its causes. We look at the results of terrorism, like today’s bombing in the Moscow airport, seek the criminals out for punishment but ignore the deeper roots of terrorism.

After 9/11 some, including the Pope John Paul II, without justifying the terrible acts of violence asked us to look at the causes of terrorism. like poverty, lack of education, health care and human rights. There was some of that, I remember going to a forum at MATC to discuss it, but it was soon forgotten in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan which still go on while terrorism rises.

In the CLG News list server today there were three articles about US drone, unmanned aircraft, attacks in Pakistan. One was called Thousands demonstrate against U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan, one was called Unauthorized US strikes kill 13 Pakistanis and the other Unauthorized attack kills 3 in Pakistan. Another article in the same newsletter was about US troops desecrate Qur’an.

Like the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan this way of fighting terrorism, using drones, in creates more terrorists. In the 90’s, during the boycott of Iraq, I remember hearing the story about a youth watching his young brother. bombed bu USA, die due to lack of common medicine that was part of the boycott. The youth swore that when he grew up he would get his revenge by killing Americans, the major power behind the boycott of the medicine.

In the miniseries “Carlos”, the issues Like the Palestine-Israel conflict are the same issues now that are met with violence and terrorism. When will we ever learn that violence, be it bombs or drone attacks, leads to more violence, like terrorist attacks. “The answer my friend, the answer, is blowin in the wind.”

I found out that Carlos is alive in a French prison. Sadly his spirit of terrorism is still alive.

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