My generation and I flew what were then the largest bombers (B-24s), loaded with 1,000-pound bombs to drop them on the enemy’s assets and turn them into rubble. We would fly in formation by the hundreds of planes, through flak and enemy fighters to assigned targets. We were young and unsophisticated, however, we understood there was a threat to our American way of life, a threat to our freedoms, our liberty. Many of us gave our lives, others were prisoners of war, many were wounded, but we never thought of quitting. We knew our way of life was at stake. We won!

The American way of life is unique on this planet. In no other country do people enjoy the individual liberty that we do. Nor do they enjoy, or even understand the right of freedom, of individual choice that we have. And underlying freedom and liberty is the right to individually own property.

Our founding fathers understood the value of owning property and thus created the concept and placed it in our founding documents. They understood that that precept would form the basic wealth of the country into the future. It is also basic to the individual feeling of certainty of his rights and freedom – the right to own your own small piece of the planet.

Now, nearly 60 years later, comes again a threat to our American way of life. There are humans on this small planet who hate our way of life, who do not have the slightest understanding of liberty, or freedom or owning property. They turned the concept of bombing on its head to destroy the very symbols of freedom and wealth and property.

They hijacked commercial planes – much bigger than our World World II bombers – and made certain that the planes were totally loaded with high-octane jet fuel – better than WWII bombs – and used these planes, with their passengers, as the bomb. The results were successful beyond imagination. They destroyed the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York and then flew another “bomb” into the Pentagon. Their timing of the hijacking, their timing of flying the bombs into the buildings appeared to be highly choreographed in order to have maximum psychological impact.

As some have said, this is the greatest day of infamy in our history. But we do not cower or bow or weaken. We recover from the blow, stronger and totally united as the people of America. We go on to destroy our attacker, and we will be stronger as a free people.

It is the sovereignty of America that is another key to our way of life and our continued strong survival on this planet. There will always be those nations and those individuals who attempt in one way or another to weaken America. One of the current means is to penetrate our national sovereignty via international treaties and United Nations creations and organizations. Many of the U.N. members want to weaken our sovereignty and penetrate it through U.N. treaties and organizations, such as the International criminal court.

The United Nations was supposedly never conceived as a world ruler of all nations. It was conceived as a means for all nations to discuss common issues, and to spread a commonality for all nations, big and small. You could say it was the creation of a world town meeting place.

Yet today many of its officials see it as a means of controlling world peoples and establishing procedures, such as the so-called world “Tobin” tax, that slowly but surely establish the U.N. as the government of the world. U.N. officials call it “global governance,” which is U.N. code for world government. Global governance doesn’t seem to threaten sovereign nations, but it means central world domination. The Tobin tax would collect a fee on all financial transaction worldwide, and be used to support a U.N. military force.

We must be aware and constantly on guard to protect our national sovereignty, just as we must protect our values and freedoms. Our national sovereignty is the face that others see, it is who we are, it is what we are, and it is the values we stand and fight for.

As mentioned above, the timing of the current attack was amazing. It means this attack was well financed, well organized, and took much advanced planning. It certainly couldn’t have been accomplished by a dozen or so guys getting together in a bar somewhere.

So just as in WWII, we are now at war. But not that kind of war at all. And the new kind of war we fight must be based upon our values and freedoms. This will be a war more like we fought against the Barbary pirates, which President Thomas Jefferson oversaw. It will revolve around small forces, surprise attacks, intelligence gathering, and many covert operations. And, America, the free, will win.

As our founding fathers said, and which we reinforce, “In God we trust.”

Robert O.Voight of Lubec is a retired lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Air Force.