To the editor:

A tragedy becomes even more lamentable when we miss the opportunity to learn from our experience. We tend to remain stuck in a haze of confusion, anger, and other emotions. Thus, we fail to examine circumstances and ourselves objectively and intellectually.

This is what bothered me about recent TV coverage of the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Sadly, after 10 years, Americans have learned very little from our worst tragedy. Journalists’ investigative analysis concerning the root causes of the attacks is appallingly absent or extremely shallow. Nor is there any serious probing into our government’s reaction to 9/11.

Fortunately, a few researchers have unearthed something significant. For example, Noam Chomsky’s “9-11: Was There an Alternative” defies Bush’s assertion that they attacked us because they hate our freedoms. More accurately, it’s our policies they hate, according to studies by the National Security Council and the Pentagon. ” … there’s a perception in the Arab world that the United States supports harsh, oppressive dictatorships and that the U.S. blocks democracy and development and that we do it because we want to keep control of their energy resources,” says Chomsky.

Finally, Chomsky states that instead of isolating al-Qaida in order to apprehend key criminal suspects to be brought to an appropriate system of justice, we chose a comprehensive, scatter gun scenario of military retribution. Consequently, America was enticed into a war that would augment and mobilize Arab animosity toward us. As CIA sources reveal, this was bin Laden’s game plan.