It can happen here.
Although we have been blessed so far, Canadians are just as vulnerable to terrorist attack as the citizens of any other country of the world.
In some respects, Canadians may be even more vulnerable.
Lax immigration laws over the years could have some assassins living among us.
Only the most naïve would believe that the anti-American stance of our Prime Minister and the loud presence of the Canadian anti-nuclear protest movement would cocoon us from terrorists.
The cunning of al Qaeda operatives could use prevalent anti-American sentiment against us.
Who is to say that terrorists don’t realize that an attack on Canadian soil could accelerate anti-American sentiment in Canada?
The potential of making enemies for the United States in the very country that borders it would be a brilliant tactical move for Osama bin Laden and company.
The possibility of terrorist attack here gets worse: The enemy must be aware that the Canadian Armed Forces have for some time been less than a priority of the long-term Liberal Government of Canada. They must be aware that Canadian troops may not be ready to defend us against terrorist attack.
For the first time Canada has been explicitly threatened over its role in the U.S-led war on terrorism in an audiotaped statement said to have been recorded by Osama bin Laden.
It’s no longer just a matter of hand wringing and speculation.
As terrorist expert John Thompson puts it: "We are on al Qaeda’s radar screen."
"Islamic Fundamentalists do not like the Western World--all of it, and that does include us," Thompson wrote in a recent CanadaFreePress.com column. "They hate the ease with which we generate wealth (because we have freedom to grow). They do not like our technological superiority (because we have the freedom to think). They do not like our easy liberal ways. They despise the confidence and self-assertion of Western women--few of whom are more self-confident than Canadian women. They loathe the casual ease with which we range throughout the rest of the world, unconsciously bringing Western culture with us everywhere we go."
In his regular CFP column, Thompson noted the words of Prime Minister Jean Chrétien on the World Trade Centre. "Our Prime Minister who has been much castigated (and deservedly) for comments he made to the CBC about the causes of the World Trade Centre attacks, is not alone in mistaking alleged Western high-handedness and our collective wealth for the prime motivators behind al-Qaeda and other groups.
"Contemporary Canadians have a stunning capacity to ignore dangers and threats to their safety, assuming--against all logic and experience--that because we are harmless the world must love us. Thus we look, sometimes smugly, at the Americans and the Israelis and feel that they are the authors of the hatred directed against them. This is a supremely ignorant view.
"Canadian vulnerability to future Islamic Fundamentalist violence rests on the point that, despite all evidence to the contrary, we still believe ourselves to be safe from it. Although some small measures have been taken since the World Trade Centre attacks, the political willpower and the real funding needed to limit the risk of major attacks has been absent.
"Now with our usual governing party being preoccupied with leadership issues and the "legacy" of the Prime Minister, security will remain on a back-burner--if not moved off the range altogether.
"Canadians are at risk, and just because we have been lucky so far, there is no guarantee we will be lucky in the future."
Thompson wrote these words on Sept. 9, 2002. After the audiotaped threat on Nov. 13, Deputy Minister John Manley admitted to Peter Mansbridge on CBC Television that the anti-terror committee formed after Sept. 11 has not met for more than a year and will not be meeting until December.
Canada Free Press founding editor Most recent by Judi McLeod is an award-winning journalist with 30 years experience in the print media. Her work has appeared on Newsmax.com, Drudge Report, Foxnews.com, Glenn Beck. Judi can be reached at: judi@canadafreepress.com
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