Cross posted at http://www.peaceisactive.com
I think we should start calling the War on Terror what it really is - The Sunni Civil War.
In order to maintain access to oil in the Middle East, the United States has been allied with the Sunni governments of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Jordan. Some people in these Sunni countries don't like their governments for various reasons. In their fight against their own governments, Sunni movements such as al-Qaeda have attacked both their own Sunni governments and the governments' American supporters.
We thought we had a solution in the 1980's when we directed the attention of the Sunni opposition against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. The idea was to provide training and weapons to the Sunni rebels as they successfully kicked the Soviet Union out of Afghanistan. As they fought the Soviets, less attention was paid to overthrowing their own governments.
After the war in Afghanistan, the Sunni rebels returned their focus to overthrowing the Sunni governments of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Jordan.
Since the United States provides so much support (and oil business) to the Sunni governments, groups such as al-Qaeda decided they would have to also attack the United States if they were to be successful in overthrowing the Sunni governments. This is why 9/11 occured.
al-Qaeda is led by Sunni rebels primarily from Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Most of the highjackers on 9/11 were from Saudi Arabia. Their goal is to overthrow the American backed governments in order to replace them with Islamist governments.
The Sunni terrorists on 9/11 didn't attack us because they hate our freedoms, they attacked us because we are supporting the governments they are trying to overthrow.