Terrorism In Early America
Almost 180 years ago our infant country attacked Tripoli under circumstances that are eerily similar to contemporary times. That conflict, immortalized in the Marine Corps Hymn, "From the Halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli" called the Tripolitan War or the Barbary Pirate War, came shortly after we gained our independence from England. The United States chose to fight the pirates of Barbary, rather than pay tribute, as did all the other nations who traded in the Mediterranean Sea. The decision was bold, but the eventual victory by the tiny United States Navy broke a pattern of international blackmail and terrorism dating back more than one hundred and fifty years of European appeasement.
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