"none of the causes in this world - including our self-'defense'- is worth a single, innocent life. Not one. That’s ... terrorist logic - that we must kill to save the world. The truth is the exact opposite: as both the Torah and the Qu’ran teach, 'To save one life is as if you have saved the world.' "

--Ramzi Kysia, Education for Peace in Iraq Center

Many of the various investigations into the horror of 11 September seem to adopt a model according to which events occur in a chain-like process. To an extent, this way of thinking is sensible. Events do seem to follow an ordered sequence. The upshot of this viewpoint also makes sense: if only we can interrupt the sequence at some point, we can prevent disaster. Accordingly, we read accounts that trace the whereabouts and movements of hijackers over several months prior to the execution of a gruesome plan. Such analysis assumes that their final violent acts have a specific beginning or origin. This simplistic treatment suggests the strategy that the U.S. government currently promulgates: find the origin of terrorism and you can eliminate future threats. Trouble is, terrorism and violence in general might very well not have an origin. Consider two schoolyard combatants each of whom accuse the other of instigating the conflict. Indeed, both parties might even express themselves with conviction and honesty.

I suggest that a more thoroughgoing metaphor regards violence as erupting within a web consisting of behavior, values, ideas, beliefs, etc. Such a web has no single center, but perhaps many centers that connect to one another in a complex variety of ways. Each violent act extends the network and further complicates its structure. According to this image, an action can appear to be either aggressive or reactive depending on your position and connection to other actions, value systems, modes of thinking, etc.

In the web of international violence the U.S. occupies both central and peripheral positions. In some instances there's direct and proximate involvement in gratuitous military strikes and invasion while in others, there's indirect and remote activity that facilitates the use of terror. The historical details are well-established if not well-known. In the present context the case of Afghanistan is particularly relevant.

Recently, Christopher Hitchens has advocated provocatively that the U.S. is within its rights--even duty-bound--to undo the Taliban's rise to power.

"Here is one such crime that can be admitted and undone--the [U.S] sponsorship of the Taliban could be redeemed by the demolition of its regime and the liberation of its victims." (The Nation Online, 24 Sept)

This is a reasonable course to follow by the lights of the chain model of events--as in a word processor's edit menu. But, according to the web metaphor, an attempt at violently undoing the Taliban would likely produce unpredictable and possibly profound effects in the network.

A militarist response to the recent terror might well disable or disconnect certain centers of violent thought and action. But, it would continue the growth of the overall web of violence and terror. Violence and terrorism beget violence and terrorism. Ultimate responsibility for an act is perpetually evasive. Of course, the U.S. administration seeks only proximate responsibility. This is the sort of thing that can be discovered and the associated parties possibly defeated. This is also the kind of description that sits well with entertainment-journalism. Promotion of such a mindset might well lie behind Bush's remark that "you're either on our [militarist] side or on the terrorist's side." This simple-minded offense to free-thinking reveals much about U.S. policy.

Like it or not, we're caught up in this web of violence. If there's no means to sort out its connective structure, what can American citizens do? Rather than blame extremists with whom we feel no connection, we can own up to our own responsibility in these dreadful acts. We've elected government officials who have pursued or supported violent campaigns of terror throughout the world. Non-violence provides the only means of extricating ourselves from the sticky web of violence. While this might not be tantamount to peace, it could be a precursor to more peaceable relations.