I think you misunderstand.

The attack on Iraq was about projecting a desire, amongst members of the Bush Admin. (and associated insterests) for global domination (aka global corporate hegemony).

The Bush Administration would like to have you think that Iraq posed a threat to the USA, but in fact it did not. Iraq did not threaten the USA, nor did it pose a threat prior to the invasion.

It is well known the world over that members of the Bush Administration and their accomplices in the mainstream media (e.g. Judith Miller) made false statements about the threat posed by Iraq.

The foreign policy of the USA is exploitative and oppressive in many parts of the world. The author of the article was making that point. The attacks on 9/11 were in response to the exploitative and oppressive qualities of US foreign policy.

Bert, I think it's worthwhile to point out that Chalmers Johnson is a former CIA analyst who introduced the world to the CIA term Blowback, which means the "unintended consequences of of covert operations." I would argue that it's not so much a symptom of an exploitive system as a noun encapsulating the idea that our clandestine actions abroad have consequences which, when they occur, shock many people in America because we don't often know what our government is doing in our name.

In principle, I am an anarchist. Kurt Vonnegut once said he was an agnostic who respects Jesus Christ. I am an anarchist who loves democracy." - Kenzaburo Oe

Hence much of the speculation about insider conspiracy to blow up the towers (an enemy within, etc.)

Afterall, Bin Laden was on the CIA payroll (when was he removed?).

Also, when you see the Project for a New American Century's analysis that a "new pearl harbor type event" would be necessary to institute its policy of global full-spectrum dominance, well - it's enough to make you think... It sure answered the call for a fear component that would be necessary to the domestic social policy of pulling off global dominance in the guise of defense.

But that's another topic.

A simpler explanation for the towers would be malicious intent to cause death and destruction. Evil doers, as such.

But then again: why was the prime evil doer, supposedly responsible for masterminding the attacks, a recipient of direct military and material aid from the USA?

Norm asked: why not kill the people who have control over that? Instead they threw a rock at a bee's nest and now we are running around playing GI Joe. How did this help accomplish their goal? They could have saved us all a bunch of trouble and just taken out a politician.

I think that if you look at the 1993(?) WTC bombing it becomes apparent that the WTC was seen as a symbol of American power, exploitation, rapacious capitalism and that knocking down a tall symbol and bastion of American power had attraction.

If I recall correctly, there were defense plans against planes being flown as weapon against one or more of the international meetings where politicians met to discuss their global plans.

As targets go, the towers were easier to hit than a politician or a group of politician. For context on that, look at the the "surgical" bombing the US attempted at the beginning of the Iraq war with the plan of taking out Hussein and the top of the Iraq military leadership. Again, as I recall, those "precision, surgical strikes with smart bombs" did not succeed in taking out a single one of the targeted individuals and that miserable record is put together with the best hardware that our money can buy.

As to how this helps accomplish their goals: the predictable response of attacking generally muslim, civilian populations with overwhelming military power, but without the ability to spot and kill the "bad guys" in the midst of these civilian populations could be counted on to provide a brand new population of folks with a suicidal grudge toward the US. We made the enlistment targets for Al Qaeda and similar groups a sure thing.

If it was easy to kill a single person or the group of people who is seen to have control over something, would Osama Bin Laden still be alive?