"What A Terrorist Incident In Ancient Rome can Teach Us " (NYT op-ed)

[pnorman]

Pirates of the Mediterranean

IN the autumn of 68 B.C. the world’s only military superpower was dealt a profound psychological blow by a daring terrorist attack on its very heart. Rome’s port at Ostia was set on fire, the consular war fleet destroyed, and two prominent senators, together with their bodyguards and staff, kidnapped.

The incident, dramatic though it was, has not attracted much attention from modern historians. But history is mutable. An event that was merely a footnote five years ago has now, in our post-9/11 world, assumed a fresh and ominous significance. For in the panicky aftermath of the attack, the Roman people made decisions that set them on the path to the destruction of their Constitution, their democracy and their liberty. One cannot help wondering if history is repeating itself.

Consider the parallels. The perpetrators of this spectacular assault were not in the pay of any foreign power: no nation would have dared to attack Rome so provocatively. They were, rather, the disaffected of the earth: “The ruined men of all nations,” in the words of the great 19th-century German historian Theodor Mommsen, “a piratical state with a peculiar esprit de corps.”

Like Al Qaeda, these pirates were loosely organized, but able to spread a disproportionate amount of fear among citizens who had believed themselves immune from attack. To quote Mommsen again: “The Latin husbandman, the traveler on the Appian highway, the genteel bathing visitor at the terrestrial paradise of Baiae were no longer secure of their property or their life for a single moment.”
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http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/30/opinion/30harris.html?hp

pnorman

[WCGreen]

1. That was a wonderful OpEd....

I read it on Friday and went out to buy his book....

[pnorman]

3. Thanks for the lead!

I spotted that article on a listserve of my union, and reposted it here without noticing that he was the author of a related book. In all likelihood, that op-ed came directly from that book.

I checked Amazon.com ($15 and up), where I always go to, if only to read the reviews. I also checked Audible.com, and it was there too, for $35. But as a Gold Member, it'll cost me only 10 bucks, so it's in my shopping cart now! I can't wait to hear it. I'm currently listening to Frank Rich's "The Greatest Story Ever Sold", but I'll put it on hold and listen to that one instead. I may be up till daybreak and beyond on this! DURN you, "WCGreen"!! (GRIN!)

pnorman
On edit: I failed to notice that it was a novel rather than a history book. So much the better! It gets great reviews at Audible.com and Amazon.com. I CAN'T WAIT!!!

[opihimoimoi]

2. History is replete with sim stories.But the Bush Don't read...its all MOOT

Ya would THINK.......

[displacedtexan]

4. If you don't learn about Ostia, you'll never understand why...

Shakespeare made Brutus his protagonist.

Heavy sigh.

[ClassWarrior]

5. Dammm... gotta be a paid subscriber to read the whole thing.

Unless of course someone wants to PM it to me...

NGU.

[pnorman]

6. Not really,

but you have to register at the NYT website. About a year or so, they moved most of their good stuff (like Paul Krugman) onto their "Times Select" page. I believe that comes free with a print subscription. I considered that briefly, but decided against it.

I bought his "Imperium" novel from Audible.com, downloaded it onto my HD, and began listening. As I suspected, it carried me to daybreak (PDST) and well beyond. I got to the third hour of an eleven and a half hout book. I'll probably finish the entire book today, it's that good! Most the 70+ books I've ordered from Audible.com these past 3+ years are probably best "read" than "heard". But that one is an excellent "hear"; I couldn't put it down!!

pnorman
PS: Let me know by PM if you can't get registered at NYT.

[IndianaGreen]

9. Here is a key paragraph from page 2

Those of us who are not Americans can only look on in wonder at the similar ease with which the ancient rights and liberties of the individual are being surrendered in the United States in the wake of 9/11. The vote by the Senate on Thursday to suspend the right of habeas corpus for terrorism detainees, denying them their right to challenge their detention in court; the careful wording about torture, which forbids only the inducement of “serious” physical and mental suffering to obtain information; the admissibility of evidence obtained in the United States without a search warrant; the licensing of the president to declare a legal resident of the United States an enemy combatant — all this represents an historic shift in the balance of power between the citizen and the executive.

An intelligent, skeptical American would no doubt scoff at the thought that what has happened since 9/11 could presage the destruction of a centuries-old constitution; but then, I suppose, an intelligent, skeptical Roman in 68 B.C. might well have done the same.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/30/opinion/30harris.html?pagewanted=2&_r=5&hp

[KoKo]

7. Fantastic Read! K&R...

[Cleita]

8. Also, one only needs to read the New Testament of the Bible

to find a parallel to the invasion and occupation of Iraq by our Country. In this case the New Testament takes place in the time the Romans occupied much of the world including that part of the Middle East they called Palestine. There were constant attacks from insurgents or cells of revolutionaries who attacked Romans, other tribes and those Jews who were Roman sycophants.

This is why the Romans and the pharisees feared Jesus. They felt he could turn the rabble against them and lose control of the place not to mention their lives. This is where the whole questioning about whether he claimed to be King of the Jews came about. This was what Masada was about in the century that followed.

I guess we are the new Roman Empire. The Pax Romana, which brought peace to the world for the while at the point of a sword and brutal subjugation is the same Pax Americana that the PNAC want to repeat with America as the new Rome. It seems Ostia was their their Reichstag and their 9/11.