Vladimir Levin, New York

In MZ (My Zdes – We are Here) www.newswe.com

On September 11th, 2001, the world stumbled. Had inhabitants of extraterrestrial civilizations been observing our planet, they saw, possibly, how the Earth shuddered. Manhattan became like a boxer who had his teeth knocked out, because New York without those two 110-story towers is not the same. A new epoch had begun, but at the time we had not even guessed this.

Every New Yorker has his or her own September 11th. In my family this day was a holiday, because on the 11^th our youngest and dearest little girl was born. Usually on this day we would all go to an old park on the marvelous island to celebrate her birthday. From morning on, on that day, I had been looking forward with pleasure to the forthcoming encounter with our young, during which usually 60–70 gather with their children. They are interesting children who have become specialists in this country. They are bright and educated — modern-day America.

Usually there was young Filya, who at five made all the women clutch at their heads — so robust and direct was he able to express his seditious thoughts. Since they were seditious, the five-year-old philosopher and I rapidly found a common tongue. Filya’s father had to change his last name, because even during his school days they had to write his name in hyphens. His surname back then was “Blyakher” (TR note: similar to a Russian expletive). There is nothing wrong with it, in Byelorussian it means “tinsmith”, but when written in hyphens it sounded completely different.

I was going through my memory of guests who were to arrive at the island campfire, sitting by the window and smoking, when suddenly got a call from my oldest daughter, the cheerful one. “On the radio they just said that a small aircraft ran into the WTC tower and it's on fire,” she said. “Raechka works there. Turn on TV, maybe there are more details.” I turned on the TV. I saw everything that the whole world saw at the time. Only what they saw was already a little different, slightly ‘touched up’: they did not see people throwing themselves from windows, how they ran down the stairs (yes who could let them in to film?) or as they burned in the infernal flames. Later the strained voice of the anchorman said “collapse”. This was when the north tower collapsed. And forty minutes later — the southern tower.

We were there, the entire family, only a few days ago, at an exhibition of chrysanthemums. I prayed to God that my daughters had not gone to work that day, and that they were at home preparing for the birthday celebration. I stood at the window and smoked cigarette after cigarette. Then the editor-in-chief of the main Byelorussian newspaper “Narodnaya Volya”, Yosef Seredich, phoned from Minsk and asked me to prepare a report for his paper every day. Overcoming my emotions, I tried to reach there (ground zero), but was not able. The region was closed and cordoned off. Only three days later was I able to reach that place.

It was difficult to breathe. Never before had I noticed such a smell or seen so much ash. It was as if from a volcano. Apparently this is how Pompeii perished, all covered in pumice. That, however, was a tragedy of nature. Many people at the site were using respirators. Only later did I realize that we were breathing the souls of incinerated people, souls mixed with computers, plastics, and building materials. I did not keep my reports from Ground Zero — a newspaper lives but one day, and I do not collect my articles, especially my rough drafts. At the site I thought about my girls who had miraculously avoided this Hell.

Raechka had saved herself. I asked her later what she was thinking about as she ran down the stairs of the burning tower (I needed some details). She said: “I thought about how I had broken the heel of my shoe and then lost the shoe. I thought about what I must look like running around barefoot.” Now this is a woman!

In a week an enormous fence arose around the scene of the tragedy, and near it were armfuls of live flowers, and on the fence itself people wrote words from the sincerest depths of the heart, in all the languages of the world.

New York buried people every day: whatever remained of firemen and policemen after the towers’ collapse. The city was immersed into grief, but the souls of those incinerated in the infernal flame still flew high above the capital of the world. Their photographs — young and unusually beautiful — appeared on the fence. These were talented people, because the most capable, the best Americans, representatives of almost every country in the world, worked in the World Trade Center. Among them were our immigrants who made it among the financial and business elite of the world. In time they official statistics established that the mass destruction of people in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania took the lives of 2,973 people, not including, of course, the 19 terrorists who were on board the four airliners. 246 people were on the aircraft and 2,602 perished in the towers. In addition there were 343 firemen and 60 policemen who were killed while rescuing people. There were 125 victims in the Pentagon. 24 people are still considered missing, since not a trace remains of them. In all likelihood they were completely incinerated. The two 110-story Twin Tower buildings were brought down, and another five buildings. The Deutsche Bank, the Marriott Hotel, and four subway stations were covered in debris. The Holy Nikolai Greek Orthodox church was badly damaged. In Manhattan 25 buildings suffered, and all 7 WTC buildings had to be leveled.

And then began the mysterious coincidences. Here is but one of them: in 1997 the federal agency responsible for disasters, FEMA, published a pamphlet. FEMA is something is similar to the Russian MChS (Emergency & Disaster Relief Ministry). In the pamphlet was an article titled “Emergency Response to Terrorism”, while on the cover of pamphlet stood in perfect beauty the north tower of the WTC, with a gun sight drawn on it. The crosshairs were right on the spot that the first aircraft crashed into. Did they predict the target?

And then there were various conspiratorial insinuations. Various theories of sabotage of the WTC buildings were thoroughly discussed, as well as design deficiencies, etc.

Considerably later people understood that another era had begun — that this indeed this was the first year of the new millennium, but a year later.

I heard discussions by completely intelligent and sufficiently adult people, concerning the fact that President Bush on this day, was flying over the earth on board Air Force One, like some genius from a Vladimir Voynovich pulp novel, and was about to order a nuclear attack. All of Manhattan lay below, covered by ash. The horror of the experience had not yet lessoned, and already they were thinking about a nuclear strike. But on whom? The whole point is that a new type of war had been declared on America. It required a new weapon, and a new means of defense. What was required was the concentration of the world community’s armed forces to deal with this challenge.

Terror is a weapon of mass destruction. First of all, it defeats populace’s psyche. Terrorists attempt to deliver crushing blows against the security of millions of people. They need the participation of the media: the more horrors they can show, the better it will be for them. No matter what channel you turn to, the television and the media are instruments of terror.

I am far from charging the television stations with anything — they have been working professionally and honestly during a troubling time. But objectively… Since the purpose of terror is mass psychological defeat, it is not as important for them how many victims there are - 3 thousand or 5 thousand. It has no value. The main thing is to strike at that the hearts of those remaining alive. After all, following September 11^th, as many people died of heart attacks as from the terror attacks, but they are not included in the statistics of terrorism.

In this respect reports from the Israeli city Sederot are characteristic: after the latest rocket attacks a certain number of people are in the state of shock. For the terrorists this even is more important than those killed and injured, though for them, of course, this is too deep. Important to them are how many souls are destroyed, but no one sees this, or more accurately, no one wants to see this. People cannot walk to work, however. They cannot send their children to school, and they are in a terrified psychological state. And their terror is transmitted to millions: the TV strikes at the heart and soul.

In this war there are no heroes; there are only traitors. Terror strikes against moral principles, it demolishes moral standards, it overpowers humanistic prohibitions. Today live broadcasts of death are commonplace. Satanic scenarios are painted people who are by no means half-literate idiots. Masters of the craft now occupy themselves with it.

On September 11^th, 2001, the most latest and most powerful installment of evil was created. Was this the work of the devil? Indeed, something similar had been devised in the horror films that Hollywood producers and scriptwriters use to torment the nerves of American sybarites. The terrorists studied these.

Terrorism by itself is a rather cheap undertaking. The attack on New York on September 11th only cost about $250 thousand. This includes the aeronautics school instruction, the cost of airline tickets, and the travels of the plan’s executors to the different countries of the world and their instruction in German universities. But the damage from it cost, according to the most conservative estimates, from $250 billion to $1 trillion, without considering the collapse of the stock market, damage to the economy of the country as a whole, the loss of four aircraft, the destruction of buildings, and the bankruptcy of airlines from people being afraid to fly. The main thing, however, was that a mighty blow was made against the perception of life and the mechanisms of consciousness.

Where are the headquarters of the terrorists located, where is their nest? They do not have a unified center. There are networks, and, possibly, they are only virtual ones. They will not disappear until they are destroyed, for these are fanatics. Their “brains”, their bosses, move throughout the world as preachers of death. Their activity is symbolic, but in the public consciousness there are many painful areas. There is a feeling of insecurity, the expectation of an attack, a catastrophe, and certainly a distrust of everything. The level of intolerance is especially terrifying, as was learned from life in the USSR. But the entire world hates the Jews, because the Islamists declared us to be the original cause of terror. During terror attacks even more clearly are revealed the lies of the political advisors who work for the authorities. For example, on the day of the terror act in Beslan, Russian state television showed a film on female masturbation and a “documentary” on the 25 greatest beauties of Russia and their sex lives — this is mental masturbation. Today the only hero of Russian cinema is a bandit or a prostitute, or a policeman, which is one and the same.

We have examined holes on Mars. We will soon be building a hotel on the Moon, and it has been declared that four Russians and two Europeans will soon fly to Mars. We do not see, however, that which has been created right in front of our eyes. Terrorists have declared that they will soon have a nuclear bomb. It is not without good reason that they call Israel “the one bomb nation”: they believe that one bomb will be sufficient to destroy all of Israel. Jordan, autonomy, Lebanon — these are values that can be disregarded. Or sacrificed. It will reach the Saudis as well? Well, too bad for them! Then they will not be able to give the Americans any oil. The Jews can be finished with one blow. It is even a very convenient final resolution of the Jewish problem. By the way, in the depths of the Lyubyanka they thoughtfully translated into Arabic Hitler's “Mein Kampf”. It is “My Jihad”. They also reprinted the infamous “Protocols of the Elders of Zion”.

During the last two decades the Islamists have murdered thousands of people in Europe, the US, and the Middle East. How much did it cost for the explosions in the railway stations in Spain and the London subway, the fires in Paris, and the recently discovered terrorist training centers in Italy disguised as mosques? Civilized Europe looks on indifferently at the constantly growing and cultivated hatred for the Jews in the Moslem world until it hits there.

This hatred is turning into a norm.

The USSR shoved its head into the gigantic Moslem anthill as early as 1979 when it sent its forces into Afghanistan, and the religious and narcotic expansion of Islam against the West began at this time. Specifically, it was at this time that a flow of Islamists disguised as refugees from Arab countries gushed into Europe. From Afghanistan came a school of thought that was improbable, and thus far unprecedented, in its cruelty, disrespect, and contempt for Judeo-Christian moral values. The media began to propagandize this cult of violence, and an era of hypocrisy began. It, however, has never ended.

Today basic polemical method is a bullet. It is an argument.

America has a different culture from Europe. Here one rarely meets shades of gray: it is either white, or completely black. There was universal carelessness until September 11th, now there is universal anxiety. There was practically no air defense, but now they have created even an anti-soul defense (TR note: a play on words with ‘protivoVOZdushnaya’, anti-aircraft, and ‘protivodushnaya’, anti-soul), every person is probed at the airport. The son of a rabbi, Michael Chertoff, heads the gigantic Department of Homeland Security: probably so that even the demons would be frightened.

On this day I think about a brilliant prophetic writer. The gloomiest predictions of Orwell have come to pass literally before my eyes. Everywhere there are computer numbers, social security numbers, and passports, and these have finally become identity documents. Cameras that observe you externally and internally follow you everywhere, and not just in the airports, stores, and business establishments. You and your credit card are registered where necessary and your cell phone is being listened to. You are either under the camera, or in a cell (TR note: a play on words with ‘kamera’, meaning camera and chamber or prison cell).

Since September 11th total control has been introduced. A senator was caught in a bathroom with homosexual inclinations. No one is free in the freest country. No one guarantees your personal inviolability, and you are followed continuously. We have lost control of our own privacy. The Internet is under control and no one has a right to a particular personal life. Most surprisingly, no one is astonished by any of it. The loss of ones own privacy, however, leads to the fact that man has been converted into an animated robot.

They frightened us very well. Yes, even into false elections of false governments in America. But we can still turn in a different direction.

Do you know why Don Quixote is immortal? Because windmills are immortal.

Recently I listened to popular American comedian George Carlin, who is somewhat similar to our Zhvanetskiy, and I wrote down for you my translation of his monologue:

“The paradox of our time in history consists in the fact that we have tall buildings, but low tastes, wide highways, but narrow points of view. We spend more, but we have less. We buy more, yet we get less pleasure from it. Our houses have gotten bigger, but our families are smaller. More conveniences have appeared, but we have less time. We have more higher education, but we have less sense and poorer judgment. We have more experience, but more problems. Medicine is better, but our health is worse. We drink too much, we smoke too much smoke, we spend our money thoughtlessly, yet we laugh very little. We get up early, we lay down to sleep late, we read less and less, and watch TV more and more. We have more possessions, but fewer values. We speak too much and love too little. But then we hate more frequently. We learned to earn a living, but did not learn to live. We added years to our lives, but they did not add life to our years. We visited the Moon, but we cannot cross the street. We conquered space, but not the space around us. We have cleaned the air, but soiled our souls. We conquered the atom, but not our prejudices. We learned to hurry, but forgot how to wait. We input masses of data into our computers, but we converse among ourselves less and less. Our time is a time of fast-food restaurants and slow digestion, of large people with small characters, high profits and small relationships. These are the days of high-speed travel, low morals, fatty bodies, and pills that do everything: cheer us up, calm us down, and kill us. We live at a time when everything is in the shop window, but nothing is in the warehouse.”

That terribly painful day slowly fades. Soon it will again be September 11th, the day when we used to gather for a celebration. Six years ago we moved this day to a week earlier because there is no specific name for that awful day, even though it is officially called “the struggle with terrorism”.

Meanwhile, children grow up. If the Earth could stumble back then, could it turn in a different direction? I do not know, but anything is possible.

Be first to comment this article

Write Comment
Please keep the topic of messages relevant to the subject of the article. Personal verbal attacks will be deleted. Please don't use comments to plug your web site. Such material will be removed. Just ensure to *Refresh* your browser for a new security code to be displayed prior to clicking on the 'Send' button. Keep in mind that the above process only applies if you simply entered the wrong security code.
Name:
E-mail
Homepage
Title:
Comment:
Code:*
	I wish to be contacted by email regarding additional comments

Powered by AkoComment Tweaked Special Edition v.1.4.6
AkoComment © Copyright 2004 by Arthur Konze — www.mamboportal.com
All right reserved