"Have you forgotten how

it felt that day, to have your homeland under fire, and her people blown

away?"

So goes the refrain of a popular country song by Darryl Worley about the

Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Those attacks killed thousands, devastated

the lives of thousands more, and changed the world forever.

But the words can also apply to another terrorist attack that happened

20 years ago, on Oct. 23, 1983, in Beirut, Lebanon. That attack left hundreds

dead, and changed the worlds of hundreds of families and friends forever.

That was the day a terrorist truck bomb carrying thousands of pounds of

dynamite wrapped around gas cylinders killed 241 servicemen in Beirut,

Lebanon. The truck slammed into the atrium of a four-story building where

400 servicemen slept, bringing it down to a story and one-half of rubble.

FBI investigators would later declare it was the largest nonnuclear explosion

they'd ever investigated. Some would say it was the largest-ever-terrorist

attack on Americans up to that time. Still others insist it was the opening

volley in the current War on Terrorism.

The big difference in the two attacks is that one was on a military target

in a recognized foreign battle zone; the other was on unsuspecting civilians

on American soil. A similarity between the two is that both attacks represent

a deliberate tactic employed by people who see themselves as combatants

in a long-running, perpetual holy war.

Another similarity in the two is that as time passes, people forget. The

fact is that both incidents are subject to the danger of the American

public's selective amnesia. In our world of TV sound bites, instant

gratification and questionable values, as a people we tend to forget things

and move on with our lives. We have a short attention span. But, in this

War on Terrorism, we can't afford to forget.

In 1983, the bombing of the Marine barracks was headline news, for about

two weeks or so. Then the media, and the American public, moved on to

other pressing issues. Over time that event in Beirut became a fading,

then disappearing, historical footnote.

But the servicemen, friends and families who were so closely touched by

its magnitude have never forgotten it. This year, on Oct. 22 and 23, hundreds

of them will gather at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, in Jacksonville,

N.C., to remember. It was mostly Marines, 268 total, who were killed in

Beirut during their two-year "peacekeeping" mission from August

1982 to August 1983. There were also soldiers and sailors killed.

A citizen's committee in Jacksonville, called the Jacksonville Beautification

Committee, will host the 20th Beirut Remembrance. A servicemen's

group, the Beirut Veterans of America (BVA), will co-host the event, staying

true to their motto, "Our First Duty Is To Remember." A family

group, the Beirut Connection, comprising families of those killed in 1982

and '83 in Beirut will bring its members to the event to help sponsor

it.

There will be a candlelight vigil, and a formal remembrance with former

commandant of the Marine Corps, General Al Gray, as guest speaker. There

will be a banquet for 400 guests.

But most of all, there will be remembering, and camaraderie. There will

be men there who have been living with the event for the past 20 years,

some who have never quite dealt with it. The Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist

bombings brought it all back for them.

There will be now-grown children of servicemen killed in the bombing,

who were infants when their fathers went off to a "peacekeeping"

mission never to return. They want to meet people who knew their fathers,

to hear about them, to know them through others because their chance to

know them was cut short by terrorists.

There will be mothers and fathers, now older and grayer, who lost their

young sons 20 years ago to terrorists, who still remember, still carry

the pain, still miss their child.

There will be friends of men who were killed, now 20 years older but still

keeping their buddies alive, by remembering.

It's good to remember. It's not good to let a memory stop you

from progressing beyond it. But it's good to look back and recall

the lessons that past events should have taught us.

Take terrorism, for instance. The people who will be remembering in October

have known for the past 20 years, in their hearts if not in their minds,

that an event the magnitude of 9/11 was possible, maybe inevitable. They

learned the lesson because the evil hand of terrorism personally touched

them. Once it touches you, it's like a plague; it won't go away

unless you kill it.

"Some people say, we don't need this war. I say there's

some things worth fighting for," continues the country song. "What

about our freedom, and this piece of ground. We didn't get to keep

them, by backing down."

Terrorism is not going away any time soon, at least not all by itself.

That's a new reality that free people of the 21st century must accept.

Terrorism is an affront to humanity. It is a threat to basic human freedom

just as surely as a dictator who rules through intimidation and violence;

there is no room in this modern world for either of them.

Whether we like to admit it or not, it has already taken a great deal

of our freedom from us. We don't move so freely around the world

as we did before 9/11. We don't stand in a crowded public place anymore

without looking over our shoulders, or suspiciously eyeing anybody who

looks different. Some have quit flying entirely, while others do so only

when they have to.

Isolationists would say leave it alone; if we don't bother them,

they won't bother us. But it's gone beyond that now, way beyond.

Terrorism is a cheap, cowardly tactic, but it is effective. It does kill

people and it does disrupt the flow of life. And it spreads like a cancer,

from cell to cell, each one mutating into a different strain of disease.

Like a cancer, it must be isolated and destroyed one cell at a time, until

they're all gone.

It won't be cheap and it won't be quick to kill this cancer;

it's ugly, but it has to be done. The last thing we as a people should

do is forget; go on with life, yes, but never forget.

Remember Sept. 11.

Remember Oct. 23.

[Editor's note: Randy Gaddo is a retired Marine who served in Beirut

at the time of the bombing and is now director of leisure services for

the city of Peachtree City.]