The Germans for some reason have a huge collective guilt about what their ancestors did. They have an understanding that it was the German government that was the aggressor during the war. Therefore, they don't have the same hostility toward the English or Americans who occupied their territory later on. As for the Japanese, there were suicide bombers during the war. They attacked American ships, but they might have attacked American cities if they were given the chance.
Okay, but what is the picture that is being painted here? That the wars we had with them really doesn't matter. We dropped a few atomic bombs on Japanese cities and no one is retaliating.
Maybe the point to take away is that people who 'retaliate' wish to attack us anyway. I'm not sure what the exact messes the United States created in the Middle East before 9/11. If attacking Saddam during the first Gulf War and supporting Israel is our crimes, then well, that's a poor excuse. Iran and Shah (if that is truly a bad thing - I don't agree) doesn't matter, as Al Qaeda and Iran hate each other.
It might help you to understand why a person might be more or less motivated to attack American targets.
It doesn't help to understand why Japanese person doesn't attack American targets. Same thing for Yugoslavians or Serbians or Italians or the number of others.
Which makes it a useless statement.
The apprehension or destruction of an aggressor is just and right. The question becomes, "who is the aggressor?". The American government aggresses against people in the middle east. A couple dozen of them get pissed and wrongly attack American civilians instead of the American government. The American government wrongly invades Iraq and Afghanistan resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. Could it be that both the terrorists of 9/11, the American government, and many governments in the Middle East are all wrong and evil? The government tells you that it is there to protect you. It does a poor job at a high price just like every other coerced monopoly.
And here comes the sloppy moral relativism backed up with the content lacking tautology of the 'non-aggression principle'. You say 'the American government aggresses against people in the middle east.' No, the American government dishes out it's interest in the middle east. As dictatorships, theocracies, and countries of mass rights violations do not hold rights. We have the moral right to attack any of them.
The American government didn't wrongly invade Afghanistan. America was attacked. Our enemies lived there. They were enabled and supported in Afghanistan. Afghanistan is a country that doesn't respect rights and America went in and dished out it's interest. End of story.
As for a Iraq, I think a degree of argument can be made whether it was the next threat. Obviously Iran or Saudi Arabia should have been next on the list, but again, Iraq is a dictatorship, it holds no rights, and due to it's past aggressions holds a potential for threats against the people of the United States. To say that overthrowing a dictator makes us the moral aggresser requires you to explain why. It is no different than saying arresting a murder is aggression because well, 'he's not a threat to me, well, maybe, I don't know, he's sort of nuts."
Then you ask the question of the sloppiest moral relativism of all, could it be that middle east, Al Qaeda and America be all evil? Seriously? I suppose if all evils are relative, yeah, they're all evil. Reality is not relative. Let's do some comparisons, Nation of objective laws vs nation of Islamic laws, nation of innocent until provent guilty vs nation of supreme rulers and sentencers, a nation that allows the individual to flurish vs a collectivism of mystic standards. I could go on and on. The best thing you can do to guage 'evil' is to get a rainbow flag that the LGBT community uses at pride parades. Go to the Gaza Strip and start waiving it around. You may not be able to report back to us what will happen, but I'll certainly see it in the news. The question really becomes whether the car battery they attach to your testicles will run out of juice before they finally slit your throat.
Which enemies? The ones that murdered people on 9/11? They said that the American government was the enemy, and that the attack was a tactic to bankrupt the USA just as they had bankrupted the USSR. It seems like they are achieving their goal. Instead of focusing on bringing those associated with the murderers to justice, Bush and Obama have gone on a multi-trillion dollar war adventure. They got Osama like 10 years later.
I noticed how you completely glossed over the attack on civilians. "They said" is irrelevant. They murdered roughly 3000 people and destroyed their rights in a matter of hours.
I also don't care what their 'tactic' is. They aren't going to bankrupt us. If there tactic isn't their stated Islamic Caliphate (which they state) and is truly to 'bankrupt' us, I don't see how the defence of freedom and rights should bow.
What exactly is the point of stating this and that they're 'achieving' it? The only thing I can think of is to bow down.