by David A. Bell

On Sunday, the Los Angeles Times ran an op-ed of mine that discussed the significance of the 9/11 attacks. The piece ran in the print edition under the headline "Apocalypse, No." In the newspaper's Web edition, however, it ran under the headline "Was 9/11 Really That Bad?" This was a stupid headline that I had no role in writing and was never consulted on (and which, in fact, the editorial page editor had nixed for the print edition). It implied that I was minimizing the importance of the attacks, and showing disrespect to the victims. It has generated a considerable controversy, and an impressive volume of attacks in the blogosphere, on talk radio, and by e-mail. For the record, the piece was not in any way meant to show disrespect, and I regret any offense it may have caused. Its point was not to minimize the attacks in the least--I tried to stress their horror and importance at several points--but to consider them specifically as acts of war, in the context of world military history. More specifically, it asked whether we should be treating the conflict they sparked as something equivalent to the world wars. It was meant as part of a discussion which has been carried on for some time, notably by John Mueller in his book Overblown. It addressed the question not of whether we should fight the terrorists--of course we should, as strongly and effectively as possible--but how. As to whether the attacks were one of the most monstrous crimes in history, however, there is no debate. Of course they were.