Retaliation necessary

Missing: 4,763\nConfirmed dead: 576\nThat is 5,313 fellow Americans who will always be a part of America but who will never again walk this great land.\nA town's worth of fellow citizens who were felled by an act of terrorism.\nAt least 50 of them were soldiers and sailors who swore an oath to defend our country against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Implicit in that oath is the understanding that we, the American people, have a part in this pact. Our part is to not let their deaths go unavenged.\nBy choosing targets Americans hold dear as symbols of our freedom -- the Pentagon, the White House and the heart of Manhattan -- these terrorists have attacked us all.\nIn response, the defense department made an unofficial declaration of war on Thursday.\n"One has to say it's not just simply a matter of capturing people and holding them accountable," said Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, "but removing the sanctuaries, removing the support systems."\nWe owe it to these 5,000 fellow citizens to avenge their deaths. A slaughter like that is the equivalent to wiping out the entire Indiana University faculty -- at all eight campuses. Most of the victims were innocent civilians.\nTuesday's bombings were an act of war. \nWhen the federal government has conclusive and irrefutable evidence as to who committed these acts of war -- and only when that evidence exists -- we must retaliate against those who slaughtered our fellow citizens.\nThat retaliation must be decisive and complete.\nWe owe it to the 126 dead at the Pentagon, the 184 dead at the World Trade Center, the 266 dead on the four airliners and the 4,763 who are still missing.\nWe owe it to the 21 soldiers and 33 sailors who died in the defense of their country.\nWe owe it to scores of future Americans who may otherwise never know the feeling of living in a land free of terror.