When in the 1994 the historian Eric J. Hobsbawn published his most important work, "Il Secolo Breve", he laid a milestone in world historiography, giving a new interpretation to the events that occurred in the 20th century. He, thanks to a fluid and analytical narration, gave back an extremely accelerated image of the events that marked the twentieth century. A relatively short space of time within which man resolutely changed the course of his history: the October revolution, the First World War, Nazism, Fascism, the Second Conflict and the Cold War in fact led to the existence of millions of people. The era of the great cataclysms - this was the subtitle of the opera - seemed unstoppable although, with the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the world forever erased the specter of a third world war. Hobsbawn used a magnifying glass that allowed him to look at the consequences derived from fairly circumscribed social collapses (Russian revolution, fascism and Nazism), but which had repercussions at a global level. The end of the nuclear scarecrow and of a partial pacification between the two superpowers lowered the level of tension, once again confining it to areas far away from collective interests. The Middle East - which has never stopped worrying men of common sense - was a powder keg, but the Americans always flaunted the ability to manage it by interposing itself as a proponent of a peace of convenience between Israelis and Arabs. This downsizing of the "war" problem in the broadest and most catastrophic sense of the term, also had a placebo effect on issues such as the fight against terrorism.
In the Sixties and Seventies, armed struggle (one of the offshoots arising from East / West tensions) emerged as a primary issue on the political agenda of several European countries. England, Germany, France, Spain and Italy were the target of attacks of various forms of terrorism: from the IRA nationalists, the Basque separatists to the Marxist movements like the Red Brigades in Italy or the Baader Meinhof in Germany. Above these phenomena intra moenia - but with relevant operational links - Islamist terrorism has always occupied a privileged position because it was the only one capable of attracting media attention from half the world. The massacre of Monaco in 1972 inaugurated the era for a decisive change of course of the western nations which began to equip themselves with more appropriate instruments to counter more firmly the Islamist threat. Despite the excellent organization set up by countries such as England, Germany and Italy itself, terrorism continued to be addressed as a circumscribed dilemma, including that of religious political matrix. The only ones with a cosmopolitan vision of the "struggle" were the terrorists thanks to an international exchange of information and the necessary know-how on how to carry out the attacks. The United States, repeatedly persecuted by organizations like al-Qaeda, they condemned their politics exclusively on the protection of the Americans, trying hard not to understand the spiderweb on which international terrorism was moving. Not to mention the internal issues related to the failure to exchange information between the CIA, the FBI and other government agencies acting on their own. This malfunction was the first unfortunate act that led to the fateful date of the September 11 when four planes, hijacked by terrorists mostly of Saudi nationality, crashed into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon.
That morning no New Yorker imagined that his city would become the casus belli destined to change an era: the collapse of the two towers and the death of thousands of innocent people forever undermined the certainties of every Westerner, traumatizing the way of life of much of the world. The War on Terror enunciated loudly by Bush recalled the call to arms of Uncle Sam who, firmly pointing at his index finger, said "I want you". Afghanistan and Iraq were just the beginning of a clash without a solution, the consequences of which arrived in the main western cities in the form of suicide attacks and mighty armed commandos whose minds were filled with a distorted view of the Koran.
The September 11 is not a date to remember only for the Americans, but the whole world should stop for a moment to commemorate the dead but also the living who live on their skin the effects of that terrible day. From that moment on, events have undergone an impressive acceleration that has included more or less legitimate wars and the very degeneration of terrorism with the birth of the Islamic State. Yet the noise created by the collapse of the towers has turned into a dull, continuous and therefore indifferent noise. Compared to the short century of Hobsbawn, the subjects involved in the change of the 21st century have shown that they have a short memory and do not know how to organize the future. The various "Marshall plan" developed for the Middle East were a giant flop, if not an aggravating erosion of already fragile social balances.
Will we ever come out? The question seems out of date, since the absence of political far-sightedness by the governments involved is already in itself a negative response. Trump, for the second consecutive year, will travel to Ground Zero, moving during the anthem and then shake hands with those who were the only true heroes of that day: New Yorkers.
(photo: US Navy)
