# Fighting & Winning The Global War on Terror (WW IV)



## a_majoor

The Western counteroffensive against the Jihadis and their supporters will continue for another four years under the current leadership, so we should do some forcasting on how the war will develop. 

While the Government sees WW IV primarily as an exercise by the United States and its "Coallition of the Willing" partners, the Jihadis want to take down the entire structure of Western Civilization, which does include us. Like it or not, we may become involved in a much bigger way than ISAF or OP APOLLO.

Some predictions:

1) Having secured firm beachheads in Afghanistan and Iraq, the United States will want to pause to stabilize the situation in those nations and ensure the new democracies have some time to put down roots. Iran, and to a lesser extent Saudi Arabia and the other autocratic regimes take this as a threat to their existing power structures and continue to pour money, resources and perhaps larger amounts of manpower (Arab League cadres?) into the fight to drive out the Americans and topple the fledgling democracies.

2) The United States will have to take action against Iran, either by formenting a revolution against the Theocracy (preferred), but perhaps direct military action if there is sufficient provocation.

3) Syria is also a supporting player against the Americans, but are better insulated against internal rebellion by a ruthless police state structure. The US might take limited military action to seal the border between Syria and Iraq.

4) North Korea is clearly a wild card. Their nuclear program will allow them the leverage to make direct threats against regional powers such as S Korea, Tiawan and Japan, as well as indirect threats against others, including the United States. (Selling nuclear weapons to rogue states and terrorist organizations seems to be a goal of the North Koreans).

5) The Jihadis will attempt to develop or re develop peripheral theaters in order to find safe havens and new recruiting bases. Since they clearly thrive in "failed states" like Somalia and Sudan, we may begin encountering them directly when involved in PSO's in these areas of the world.

6) Should things really slide for the Jihadis, the value of Canada as a recruiting, fund raising and staging base will decline, and they may lash out here both at the "Great Satan" (the United States), and at the "Little Satan" (Canada) as well for an apocalyptic exit from history.

Like it or not, we are players in this war (they declared war on us), the war affects the interests of all western powers, and how we are viewed in history may well be determined by what role we play in this war. I say we should begin to be proactive, rather than wait for an existing operation like ISAF or APOLLO go sour, or worse yet, be forced to confront the Jihadis here.


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## Guardian

Interesting read!

Here's more:

- The Israelis will continue their settlement pullback plan. This will gain them points in the west, and Sharon's profile will rise. The PA will lose Arafat - either through death or incapacitation - and a power struggle will ensue. Hamas and Islamic Jihad will mount attacks on PA factions that do not see things their way. The Israelis will use the lack of a coherent negotiating partner to impose a de facto unilateral solution on the problem - the wall, etc. Eventually the PA will get its act together, but by the time they do their negotiating position will have weakened.

- UN efforts to stop Iran from developing WMD will prove fruitless. Russia and France will block effective action at the Security Council. The mullahs will use WMD - a matter of consensus in Iran - to "rally the troops around the flag". The mullahs' position will be strengthened; the moderates will lose influence. Iran threatens nuclear tests. The US, having lost its appetite for WMD-inspired wars, will seek a "black" solution, and may even mount cruise missile and air strikes, but an invasion is out.

- The Israelis, encouraged by their improved international standing (because of the Gaza pullout) and by the re-election of an Israel-friendly Bush administration, will mount another "Osirak" strike against Iran. They may violate Jordanian airspace - the Israeli government may arrange a tacit agreement with the Jordanians here - and Iraqi airspace (US assets won't shoot down Israeli aircraft). International condemnation will be swift and serious, just like before. Unlike before, the Israelis will fail to completely destroy Iran's capability....

Thoughts?


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## dutchie

Very interesting, both Guardian and A Majoor. The only real disagreement I have with your predictions is the assumption that the War in Iraq will be successful, that democratic and stable governments will be in place in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that Russia would oppose sanctions against Iran if WMD, particularly nuclear, were verified in Iran. Don't forget that Russia is dealing with it's own conflict with Islamo-fascists (I love that term) and probably wouldn't like nukes in the hands of a state that has a long history of supporting, and even directly participating in, terrorist attacks.

I predict that the war in Iraq will evolve into one of two things:

1-A total defeat. The US, Britain, and coalition forces are forced to concede that Iraq cannot be pacified. This will take years of heavy losses, of course. The US doesn't give up too easily.

2- The US assists a democratic Iraqi government in establishing itself and slowly withdraw it's forces. A coup occurs, and an Islamic state is the result. The US does not wish to rush into the cauldron again, and is forced to resort to pressuring the UN for action or using other methods to undermine the government. Iraq may become a real hotbed of terrorist activity, legitimizing military action by the US. 

I think option 2 is more likely.

I am slightly more optomistic about Afghanistan, but I think it's way too early to predict democracy with any certainty. (not that my prediction about Iraq is a slam dunk either).


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## Goober

Good topic, I don't want to distract from it, but what was World War III?


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## NMPeters

The Cold War.


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## a_majoor

I was careful not to predict victory in Iraq, only that the Americans have a firm beachhead and will make a concerted effort to support the establishment of a democratic government there. This sets the stage for the war expanding into Iran, Syria and possibly opening new theaters in the west coast of Africa.

Victory will not come easily, either in Iraq or winding up WW IV in general. In many ways this resembles the "Clash of Civilizations" predicted by Samuel Huntington, or for a really scary historical analogy, the 30 years war in Europe.

What does this mean for the Canadian Forces? We may encounter the Jihadis in unexpected contexts, so there needs to be a recognition that a force hostile to Western powers may insert itself into what we think of as "peacekeeping" or "Peace Support Operations". To the Jihadis, a CF PSO mission in the Sudan is another incursion by the "Crusaders", and they may decide to expend resources to stage another "Blackhawk Down" against us. (In the real Blackhawk down, Islamists did come from Sudan to Somalia to instruct the local warlords on techniques to use against the Americans).

We may also be dragged into the larger war by virtue of our active participation in ISAF or OP APOLLO. The suicide bomber in Kabul and the mine attack which killed Sgt Short could be tastes of what might happen. Our ships may be victimized like the USS Cole when pulling into Quatar (and the Persian Gulf is actually quite "tight" in Naval terms anyway).

An event in or from our homeland is always a possibility, and you can only imagine the American response if a terrorist event is traced back to Canada. I would not be surprised to find US Special Forces teams have been operating under cover here in Canada the last three years ensuring selected people suffered unexpected "accidents" to prevent that from happening.

A bit of brainstorming could help us to think about the possibilities and (maybe) prepare countermeasures to protect ourselves and our country.


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## Bruce Monkhouse

I'm pretty sure "Target 1" would be Parliment hill, I have very little doubt "they" would except that as a "reasonable facsimle" for the White House.


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## dutchie

I have always felt that the GWOT is exactly that: Global. Currently we are in Afghanistan, but I see a lot more on the horizon. I am willing to bet the first 3 years of this war will be the quietest for Canada, and that we will be a lot busier in the near future (Sudan, etc).

In short, I agree with you on all points....................except:

I would not be surprised to find US Special Forces teams have been operating under cover here in Canada the last three years ensuring selected people suffered unexpected "accidents" to prevent that from happening.

No chance. Not in a million years. This would be a direct assault to our sovereignty, not to mention the fact it violates numerous laws.


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## banko

Caesar said:
			
		

> 1-A total defeat. The US, Britain, and coalition forces are forced to concede that Iraq cannot be pacified. This will take years of heavy losses, of course. The US doesn't give up too easily.
> 
> 2- The US assists a democratic Iraqi government in establishing itself and slowly withdraw it's forces. A coup occurs, and an Islamic state is the result. The US does not wish to rush into the cauldron again, and is forced to resort to pressuring the UN for action or using other methods to undermine the government. Iraq may become a real hotbed of terrorist activity, legitimizing military action by the US.
> 
> I think option 2 is more likely.



1 - So what happens in this instance? If coalition forces aren't successful in Iraq, that will just be "proof" that the americans can be beaten, and do you really think hostillities towards western powers will stop at the borders of Iraq? Problems right now are contained in Iraq, imagine what would happen if Iraqi forces actually built up momentum and gained support for their war in neighboring countries?


2 - Why would anyone think that if Iraq had a free democratic vote they wouldn't vote to put an Iranian-style gov't in place? Would the iraqi's vote for an Islamic Theocracy? Would they then team-up with Iran or other countries that are hostile to the west?


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## Acorn

a_majoor said:
			
		

> the Jihadis want to take down the entire structure of Western Civilization, which does include us.



I think their goals are somewhat less ambitions. 



> Some predictions:
> 2) The United States will have to take action against Iran, either by formenting a revolution against the Theocracy (preferred), but perhaps direct military action if there is sufficient provocation.



The preferred method requires patience that has not been evident in the current administration. In fact, US belligerence in the region has effectively played into the Mullahs' hands. The type of dissent that was evident a couple of years ago has effectively been stifled by the hard-liners. Direct US military intervention stands a good chance of having the opposite effect to that desired.



> 3) Syria is also a supporting player against the Americans, but are better insulated against internal rebellion by a ruthless police state structure. The US might take limited military action to seal the border between Syria and Iraq.



Action is already being taken with both Britain and the US applying pressure on Syria. The problem is that the "hard line Syrian government" is not so monolithic as is usually assumed. Young Bashar doesn't have the power base of his dad, and many of the old man's cohorts, who resent the jumped-up young president, are likely freelancing. 



> 4) North Korea is clearly a wild card. Their nuclear program will allow them the leverage to make direct threats against regional powers such as S Korea, Tiawan and Japan, as well as indirect threats against others, including the United States. *(Selling nuclear weapons to rogue states and terrorist organizations seems to be a goal of the North Koreans).*



A western fear that Kim Jong-Il is so stupid as to sell nukes to a non-state actor, or to another state, does not make it so. What logic or evidence do you have to come to this conclusion? I would argue that, given the limited NK ability to produce nuclear weapons, they would be more inclined to husband that resource for their own use/protection. They do a thriving trade in other technologies.



> 5) The Jihadis will attempt to develop or re develop peripheral theaters in order to find safe havens and new recruiting bases. Since they clearly thrive in "failed states" like Somalia and Sudan, we may begin encountering them directly when involved in PSO's in these areas of the world.


We have encountered them in the past, and likely will encounter them again. However, they only "thrive" anywhere when they are allowed to do so. A failed state provides a good safe haven only if it is in complete anarchy, much as Somalia was, or has a sympathetic government, as with the Taliban. Sudan still has a government, and though they are playing a risky game by courting the Janjaweed, they are clearly using it for internal purposes. They do not want to poke the US in the eye, and so will not be likely to harbour the likes of international Jihadis.



> 6) Should things really slide for the Jihadis, the value of Canada as a recruiting, fund raising and staging base will decline, and they may lash out here both at the "Great Satan" (the United States), and at the "Little Satan" (Canada) as well for an apocalyptic exit from history.



I would argue that things don't need to slide much. I think it's only a matter of time before Canada suffers a terrorist attack. If we're lucky or good we will be able to prevent it or mitigate the damage. I do agree that we are players in this war, whether we like it or not. However, I think we need to examine the means to victory a little more closely. This is not the sort of war we can win by military means alone.

Acorn


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## dutchie

1 - So what happens in this instance? If coalition forces aren't successful in Iraq, that will just be "proof" that the Americans can be beaten, and do you really think hostilities towards western powers will stop at the borders of Iraq? Problems right now are contained in Iraq, imagine what would happen if Iraqi forces actually built up momentum and gained support for their war in neighboring countries?

Did I state that I wished the US would fail? No. I stated I THINK they will fail. I wish they would not have invaded the way they did, but I actually hope they succeed at this point. You should read my post more carefully before you assume my wishes.

2 - Why would anyone think that if Iraq had a free democratic vote they wouldn't vote to put an Iranian-style govt in place? Would the Iraqi's vote for an Islamic Theocracy? Would they then team-up with Iran or other countries that are hostile to the west?

What makes you think they want a US-style democracy? I'll accept an argument on the basis that Iraqis desire a Saddam-free government, but I'm not convinced that US-style democracy is the right solution. We have to get used to the idea that Democracy is not the solution to all totalitarian regimes. That theory fails to take into account the ethnic, cultural, religious, or political considerations within the target nation. Democracy is as foreign to them as their system is to us. We wouldn't accept their idea of utopia, what makes you think they should accept ours?

Don't forget that Saddam was a Sunni Muslim, but the majority of the country (and Iran, ironically) is made up of Shi'ite's (IIRC), who might as well be another race/religion. The Saddam Sunni's hate the Iranian Shi'ite's, and the Shi'ite's hate the Sunni's. A Shi'ite dominated country is more likely to persue an Iranian style if not Iranian friendly regime.


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## winchable

> Quote from: a_majoor on Today at 12:59:22
> the Jihadis want to take down the entire structure of Western Civilization, which does include us.
> 
> 
> I think their goals are somewhat less ambitions.



I saw that this morning and have to agree with Acorn after thinking about it for the day.
This would rule out any chance they have of converting anyone (Even Muhammad stopped just outside of Mecca) and it's an apocalyptic game which I'm pretty sure the general conesus is what they don't want.

Also I highly doubt even the US administration would risk any more large scale incursions into any Arab lands, for example a large scale assault in Saudi Arabia would effectively end any chance of ever having the peace we are supposed to be seeking.. And I believe there was a thread a little while back about asking when the means outweigh the end.


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## banko

Caesar said:
			
		

> 1 - So what happens in this instance? If coalition forces aren't successful in Iraq, that will just be "proof" that the Americans can be beaten, and do you really think hostilities towards western powers will stop at the borders of Iraq? Problems right now are contained in Iraq, imagine what would happen if Iraqi forces actually built up momentum and gained support for their war in neighboring countries?
> 
> Did I state that I wished the US would fail? No. I stated I THINK they will fail. I wish they would not have invaded the way they did, but I actually hope they succeed at this point. You should read my post more carefully before you assume my wishes.
> 
> 2 - Why would anyone think that if Iraq had a free democratic vote they wouldn't vote to put an Iranian-style govt in place? Would the Iraqi's vote for an Islamic Theocracy? Would they then team-up with Iran or other countries that are hostile to the west?
> 
> What makes you think they want a US-style democracy? I'll accept an argument on the basis that Iraqis desire a Saddam-free government, but I'm not convinced that US-style democracy is the right solution. We have to get used to the idea that Democracy is not the solution to all totalitarian regimes. That theory fails to take into account the ethnic, cultural, religious, or political considerations within the target nation. Democracy is as foreign to them as their system is to us. We wouldn't accept their idea of utopia, what makes you think they should accept ours?
> 
> Don't forget that Saddam was a Sunni Muslim, but the majority of the country (and Iran, ironically) is made up of Shi'ite's (IIRC), who might as well be another race/religion. The Saddam Sunni's hate the Iranian Shi'ite's, and the Shi'ite's hate the Sunni's. A Shi'ite dominated country is more likely to persue an Iranian style if not Iranian friendly regime.



From my post, why do you think that I was accusing you of wishing the americans would fail? What I wanted to get across is that I hope that the americans DO NOT fail, because if they did, it would make the coalition forces look weak and the insurgents would gain momentum... your last post hypothesised that there was a possibillity of failure, I don't understand what makes you think that I am assuming you want them to fail, that would be bad for the rest of the world... If anything, I was agreeing with you that this would be bad...

My second point was to say that if Iraqis were able to vote, ie have more than one political party and choose the one that they like best, would they choose a party that favored Islamic law, etc. and end up using Iran's gov't as a model... Do the iraqi's want a US style democray? Probably not... What in my post makes it seem like I think the Iraqi's are salivating over the thought of democracy?

My big concern with Iraq is that they will have an election, things might go OK for a few years, and then a few elections down the road, they choose a party that wants to make Iraq the same as Iran... Exactly what you said: 

"A Shi'ite dominated country is more likely to persue an Iranian style if not Iranian friendly regime."


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## dutchie

Good, we're in agreement then.


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## banko

Yes, if you actually read my post you would have realised that long ago...


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## dutchie

Thanks for the tip!


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## banko

So what do people think is going to happen with Iraq over the next few years? Will there be a lasting democracy like the US wants? After the US pulls out of Iraq, what else will they do in that region? A year ago George Bush gave a speech, in it he said:

 "As changes come to the Middle Eastern region, those with power should ask themselves: Will they be remembered for resisting reform, or for leading it? In Iran, the demand for democracy is strong and broad, as we saw last month when thousands gathered to welcome home Shirin Ebadi, the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. The regime in Teheran must heed the democratic demands of the Iranian people, or lose its last claim to legitimacy. (Applause.)"

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/11/20031106-2.html

Does that mean that world war IV is going to move to Iran?


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## dutchie

At the start of the war in Iraq, I would have said yes, they will invade Iran unless they heed quickly and completely. Now I think the US is going to be really apprehensive about invading another middle east state, especially an Islamic state so vehemently anti-West.

I think it will take overt threats or an outright attack by Iran for the US to invade unilaterally (IE-no UN approval).

Others?


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## Goober

I agree with Caesar, and would like to add that I think the US will focus more on their economy this mandate. Could they afford another invasion?

Iran would be the same shitstorm Iraq is now, if not worse.


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## a_majoor

While it is true that from a "practical" point of view, taking down the West is an impossible task for the Jihadis, "We will inconvenience Western interests!" is hardly a rallying cry for the troops. The Fatwas issued by Osama bin Laden and his friends all have an apocalyptic ring to them to inspire the Jihadis to do as much damage to us as possible, break our will and force us out of the fight. Think "Thousand Year Reich" and you will see what the Jihadi leaders and their supporters are trying to achieve with their new "Caliphate".

The Iraqi's are not likely to develop a US style democracy, Americans can hardly explain their own system to us. A stable consensual government can be achieved through various means, from a Republic, a Parliamentary system or even a Constitutional Monarchy, among others. This process will take many years to develop.

I doubt the Americans are doing much more than contingency planning right now, but since Iran is behind a lot of the insurgency, and has regional power and nuclear ambitions, it isn't beyond the bounds of possibility there will be some provocation that makes the US take direct military action.

North Korea is a wild card, like I said. They are quite free about selling ballistic missile technology, and as the A.Q. Khan story shows, selling nuclear weapons technology is attractive even if the rational plan would be to keep your nukes at home. I don't claim special knowledge of North Korean plans, but past behavior is one way of gauging future intent.

I wouldn't put big money on Special Forces teams operating in Canada, but it would not surprise me either, given the rather lukewarm response our Government has been giving WWIV. What other option would the US have if the Canadian government is ignoring the presence of terrorist actors in Canada; a B-2 strike on downtown Montreal? 

President Bush has campaigned on developing the domestic economy by changing from Government entitlements to an "Ownership Society", but should the situation in the mid east deteriorate, or a terrorist event strike the US homeland again, all bets are off.


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## pbi

A couple of comments:

Afghanistan, while nowhere near out of the woods yet (Kharzai hasn't even been inaugurated yet, and the Parliamentary elections are still months away) shows far more progress and potential than the Western media is willing to credit. There are very clear signs of improvement here. The real longer term threat here , IMHO, is not the "Red" forces (AQ, TAL, HIG) but rather the potential for "Green on Green" if Kharzai cannot effectively extend the mandate of the central govt by co-opting some of the regional brokers such as Dostum and Ishmael Khan. Internal fragmentation is a real possibility, but that is as much a political/economic issue to resolve as it is military;

I don't hear or see alot of indication that Iran has much interest in disturbing things here. In fact, Regional Command West, the portion of the country adjoining Iran, is presently the most calm and stable (relative terms...) after the North. Iran is at severe strategic risk if it further pisses off the US, Russia and China, all of whom are concerned with Islamic troublemakers and would not look kindly on a state that fomented them. I am not so sure that the internal struggle in Iran is over yet: the posturing about  their missiles may be very much along the lines of the same act by North Korea: to provide an internal rallying point and to boost its status as a "player" rather to actually launch them against a neighbour. Just my guess.

Cheers.


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## Acorn

a_majoor said:
			
		

> While it is true that from a "practical" point of view, taking down the West is an impossible task for the Jihadis, "We will inconvenience Western interests!" is hardly a rallying cry for the troops. The Fatwas issued by Osama bin Laden and his friends all have an apocalyptic ring to them to inspire the Jihadis to do as much damage to us as possible, break our will and force us out of the fight. Think "Thousand Year Reich" and you will see what the Jihadi leaders and their supporters are trying to achieve with their new "Caliphate".



Your comments above are something less than the idea that they seek the fall of the west. "Break[ing] our will and forcing us out of the fight" is not "the fall of the west." The driving of "crusader" forces from the lands of the umma, and the establishment of the caliphate, is not necessarily practical either, and that is the stated goal of the jihadis (your use of the term is probably the most accurate, certaily more so than "Al Qaeda" to describe what we are up against). Using Nazi references doesn't entirely fit with the model (and one could make a point about invoking "Nazi" in any discussion). They are not Nazis, and ideologically are very different. Our greatest vulnerability in this fight is misunderstanding our enemy.



> North Korea is a wild card, like I said. They are quite free about selling ballistic missile technology, and as the A.Q. Khan story shows, selling nuclear weapons technology is attractive even if the rational plan would be to keep your nukes at home. I don't claim special knowledge of North Korean plans, but past behavior is one way of gauging future intent.



True, they are not reluctant to sell technology. However, looking at it from a practical standpoint, their nuclear technology is in its infancy. The technology they sell is stuff they have developed to its operational state, and in quantity. They learned at the feet of the Soviets - they aren't likely to start sharing anything cutting edge unless they can see a definite benefit. Yhey aren't insane, regardless of what the National Post's editorial page proposes. Sure, they might take the risk of providing nuclear tech to terrorists, but one needs to apply a certain amount of logic to the problem. 

I don't think it's likely in the current context.

I have a little time, so let me offer this:

The Jihadi is an individual that has chosen to interpret jihad as a physical struggle, involving warfare. He still has goals, in the case of the stated goals of UBL and his ilk, to establish a Caliphate over Muslim lands. It's worth noting that this ideal is rooted in Arab culture, and has limited following outside the Arab world. This is the formation boundary we need to exploit in our attack. Islam is no more monolithic than Christianity. To win this fight we need to exploit that. We need to demonstrate to the vast majority of Muslims (the bulk are non-Arab) that our fight is not with Islam, it is with the Jihadi philosophy. This is easier said than done, and sometimes we are our own worst enemy. It doesn't help that the US is a near-fundamentalist state in many respects. It also doesn't help that much of Europe can be considered "godless" by outside observers.

The Arab Muslims have their heads in Palestinian sand. To them, and their propagandists, everything is rooted in the Palestinian problem. A solution there, or at least the beginning of a solution, would cut the legs out from under the Jihadi recruiters. There will always be extremists (on the Israeli side as well), but their base of recruits come from the populations that see no future. Give them a future beyond strapping on an explosive belt and seeking martyrdom and they will take care of the rest.

The problem is, unfortunately, the exception to the rule that any problem can be solved through sufficient application of high explosives (though this problem could be so solved, involving mega-tonnage, and not distinguishing between Arab and Israeli).

Acorn


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## winchable

> We need to demonstrate to the vast majority of Muslims (the bulk are non-Arab) that our fight is not with Islam, it is with the Jihadi philosophy.



Education education education.
It's might sound stupidly idealistic but it's one of the many fronts we have to fight this war on.


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## a_majoor

Acorn said:
			
		

> The Arab Muslims have their heads in Palestinian sand. To them, and their propagandists, everything is rooted in the Palestinian problem. A solution there, or at least the beginning of a solution, would cut the legs out from under the Jihadi recruiters. There will always be extremists (on the Israeli side as well), but their base of recruits come from the populations that see no future. Give them a future beyond strapping on an explosive belt and seeking martyrdom and they will take care of the rest.
> 
> Acorn



Another factor is the poisioned propaganda which Jihadi leaders and autocratic state governments use to deflect the blame for their economic and social plights onto America, Isreal and the West in general. The Palestinians live across the fence from a relatively peaceful and prosperous Isreal, but rather than wonder "what are we (our leaders and institutions) doing wrong", they are conditioned to believe the peace and prosperity of Isreal is the result of the Jews stealing from the Palestinians in 1948. Far better to blame the Jews and Crusaders than admit you might be part of the problem.

So long as people have this sort of world view, it will be almost impossible to effect changes. This will not be accomplished in the time of this administration, and may take a generation. The conflicts in the Balkens had similar antecedents: the Serbs spoke of the battle of Kossovo Polje as if it happened yesterday, not in 1389, and I remember the Greeks and Turks in Cyprus were also obsessed with events dating back to the Ottoman invasions in the 1500's.

We find this hard to understand, since Western cultures tend to be ahistorical in temperment. While we recognize problems may be rooted in the past, we also look for practical solutions in the here and now. I think the hope of the Americans is the practical demonstration of democracy in action in Iraq and Afghanistan will challenge the cultural values which are poisioning the Arab lands and leading to the hopless conditions there


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## Acorn

a_majoor said:
			
		

> Another factor is the poisioned propaganda which Jihadi leaders and autocratic state governments use to deflect the blame for their economic and social plights onto America, Isreal and the West in general. The Palestinians live across the fence from a relatively peaceful and prosperous Isreal, but rather than wonder "what are we (our leaders and institutions) doing wrong", they are conditioned to believe the peace and prosperity of Isreal is the result of the Jews stealing from the Palestinians in 1948. Far better to blame the Jews and Crusaders than admit you might be part of the problem.



Absolutely. At the risk of sounding as a bigot, I've observed that Arab culture has a number of quirks that make it difficult for them to get out of their loop. They are culturally incapable of accepting responsibility for mistakes. "My fault" does not seem to be in their vocabulary. It's exacerbated by governments that use the blame game to deflect attention from their own fault.

Acorn


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## a_majoor

George W Bush has been reelected, and the left flanking by Democrat lawyers has been averted. The question for the moment becomes "Is the US going to consolodate in Iraq and Afghanistan, or will they make a move to take the initiative again?" 

If the answer is "B", where will they go?


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## I_am_John_Galt

B: Iran (through political subversion, if possible) ... in better words than I could put it (albeit from an obviously American perspective):

Is Iran Next?
By Ken Adelman 	 Published  	 06/25/2003 


Is Iran next? Yes -- at least I hope. But, no -- not like Iraq.

Yes, Iran sure deserves going next, right onto the ash-heap of history.

Since the fall of the Shah in 1979, the Iranian regime has been distinctly corrupt and tyrannical to its own people. Plus it's a clear and present danger to its neighbors, and to us, by backing terrorism and pursuing a nuclear weapons capability.

What Michael Ledeen cleverly calls the "mullahcracy" has disintegrated into an incompetent clique of corrupt mullahs, straining to govern a major Islamic state. Iran today, like Afghanistan yesterday, stands as the poster child of a fanatical Muslim state.

In one respect, at least, that's fortunate. The birth of a new, democratic and competent Iraqi government -- America's prime goal now -- comes at a prime time. The long-pulverized Iraqi people can glance across their border -- or afar, across Iran's border into Afghanistan -- and see what disasters arise when fanatics seize power.

In 1991, former U.N. Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick and I journeyed to South Africa to meet with President F. W. de Klerk and ANC leaders around Nelson Mandela. When we asked about the ANC's communist rhetoric and links, the just-freed South African blacks shrugged that off. Look, they told us, at what disasters came from communism in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. We're bound to make new mistakes, they delightfully admitted, but surely not to repeat mistakes made before.

By then, communism was a known failure. Likewise, by now, radical Islamic rule is a known failure. Thinking Iraqis today will want to make their own mistakes, and not rerun the ruins of the Taliban or the mullahcracy.

Ditto for thinking Iranians today. That's why, yes, the Iranian regime may be the next to fall.

But, no, not by a liberation of coalition forces. For unlike in Saddam's Iraq, which was competent in its tyranny, Iranian students, workers, and academics can liberate themselves. And that's precisely what they're doing now. Hardly a week goes by without protests in a major Iranian city.

The mullahs will crack down, as best they can, but eventually they too will face a "Ceausescu moment" -- the stunning instance when the decades-ruling tyrant of Romania, Nicolae Ceausescu, stood on the balcony delivering another vapid speech when "his" people suddenly rose up. For a few seconds, Ceausescu tried to continue his babble. Then, suddenly, he and his dastardly wife froze, and fled. They too realized that their people had quite enough. A few days later, the pathetic pair were caught, and on Christmas Day 1989, tried and shot for their crimes against Romania.

But great historical events don't just happen. They're made to happen.

Hence, the Bush administration has a big role to play in the third great liberation of oppressed Muslims (fourth, if you count Kosovo).

The big "don't" is to avoid legitimizing the Iranian government through State Department contacts. Playing "hawks versus doves" within the mullahcracy will work no better than did playing hawks vs. doves within the Sovietocracy. It gained us nothing, but gained some of those rulers legitimacy.

The main "do" is accordingly to legitimize, and assist, the Iranian liberators. The Bush administration should take the playbook used by the late Carter and Reagan administrations in Poland, when Solidarity was getting going. Both presidents spoke directly to the oppressed people, subtly encouraging them.

Secretly, both supplied tools of liberation -- outside broadcasting of the truth, especially about the ongoing protests, plus some walking-around money to fund internal communications, money for striking workers, publications, etc.

Back then, in Poland, we used the AFL-CIO to launder our funds. Where there's a will, there's surely a way to pass along sums to the Iranian protestors now.

With some un-American subtlety, we could help bring liberation on the cheap. That would be another major achievement of this Bush administration for Muslim decency -- and for our security.  http://www.techcentralstation.com/062503D.html


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Haven't been in here for awhile...

I'm not expecting an abundance of military personnel to jump at this opportunity, but I thought I'd get it out there anyways...

I am a young, political science student, and I am in the midst of conducting research for an academic paper. My area of focus is the justification and conduct of the 'war on terrorism', comparing and contrasting the issue through the lens of Canada and the United States. While I understand that this is a bit of an 'iffy' subject for many, I am on the prowl for military veterans/personnel who are willing to voice an opinion on the matter. I have been in touch with the Human Rights Commission of Canada, several units located in the lower mainland, as well as organizations associated with the Canadian military. For those willing to participate, I require 15 or 20 minutes of your time for a one-on-one interview; I have several questions that I would like to pose, all of which are conducive to my research. Participants may be left anonymous, if they so wish it. If you are located in or around the Vancouver area, this is something that interests you, and/or you are willing to help a gal out, please send an email to lzibrik10@yahoo.ca.

I would appreciate it.

Thanks,

Lindsay
[lzibrik10@yahoo.ca]


----------



## Infanteer

I've been wondering where you'be been!

Now, about the interview, I may be able to help....


----------



## Cloud Cover

Sounds like a good topic. Which perspective will you analyse from .. i.e.  realism etc? Cheers. 
P.S.:  I think you should contact the Canadian office of Amnesty International on this issue ... they will have tons of information on this topic. If you need contact, info then post here and we'll get back to you.


----------



## Michael Dorosh

Does it have to be face to face?  I'd be willing to commit some answers to your question to the electronic medium, if it helps.


----------



## Glorified Ape

They accept anecdotal evidence?


----------



## KevinB

I have several question to this, and wonder if you are aware that we as members of the CF cannot speak beyond our scope.  IE as an 031 PPCLI Infanteer I cant give comments about policy etc.

 Secondly given that you are limting yourself to the Vancouver area you are subjecting your paper to a reserve only bias.


Cheers
Kevin


----------



## pjocsak

I might be able to help in a different way,

I'm at the University of London in the UK and studying Politics at the post graduate level as well. One of my electives is in International Law with a specialisation in the Law of Armed Conflict. It's being taught by a former RN flag officer who was the principal author of the current RN and British MOD issued doctirne manuals as well as being a practicing international lawer. I might be able to have some of your questions addressed by him if it might be of help to you.

Patrick


----------



## Infanteer

Honestly Miss Molson Indy, I don't think you'll get much help from soldiers - the questions you are asking (justification) is the realm of the policy makers.  A soldiers viewpoint may or may not be in line with stated policy, and you'd most likely get conflicting viewpoints.  
Perhaps going to the US Consulate and phoning your MP would be better.

All us guys here can do is give you our informed opinions as private citizens (and you know from these forums that we have enough of those), but the opinions of Joe Blow citizen isn't really what you're looking for in an academic paper.   If you want the official skinny you have to go to the root.


----------



## McG

Your topic is pretty broad/vague as posted.  Are you contrasting Canada's definition of the war on terror with the US definition (which included Iraq), or are you exploring something else.  Perhaps your looking at issues of human security vs national security?
Did you want to post your questions here?  It could give guys a feel for what you are asking, and if they have the background to answer.


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

I've done the run down. To answer most, if not all, of your questions:

The issue will be analyzed from several different points-of-view, including my own, in an attempt to fairly represent both sides of the coin. My paper aims to evaluate and critique this phenomenon in light of several sectors of Canadian and America society: government, non-governmental institutions, multinational/transnational corporations, interest groups, military, and the public-at-large. Naturally, my paper will slant, and my own views will take precedence, but it's conducive to my own findings that I thoroughly explore the issue, as well as provide points-of-view that contradict my own. People have a tendency to exclude and overlook evidence that does not fit into their framework of thought. It is my aim to use this information, not to weaken, but to strengthen my arguments.

I would appreciate contacts for Canadian Office of Amnesty International.

Haha, Michael. I won't demand for you to meet me face-to-face. I do find that it's nice to put a face to a voice. If you object, would you mind if I asked you a few questions via email?

Glorified Age: I'm not entirely after anecdotal evidence, but in answer to your question, yes, academic papers welcome most forms of evidence. All universities, however require that you evaluate the accountability of your resources. I'm interested in what both experts and the populace have to say, and I think it's vital to evaluate both, especially if the issue is one that affects people from all walks of life.

Kevin: If I had it my way, I'd pay a visit to every institution (governmental, or not) across Canada, and the United States. That's a lot of ground to cover. I will be conducting interviews in the United States, via the telephone, but it's impossible for me to cover everything, especially given the amount of time I have. The approach that will be most useful to me is one that allows me to account for views that run contradictory to mine, by opening up my doors to individuals of varying political, social and economic backgrounds. I disagree that CF members cannot speak beyond their scope, in fact, I think if anything, that's where individual soldiers will be able to help me out the most. Naturally, a soldier's views will be influenced by his/her line of work to some extent, but overall, you follow your own intellectual framework. If this isn't the case, then how does one account for desertion, draft dodgers, and soldier revolt? I'm looking for a soldier's individual point-of-view, which happens to be influenced (and it will vary person-to-person) by the position he/she holds in the military. You're right. It's nearly impossible to avoid bias, but there are certain approaches I can take to reduce it.

Pjocsak: That would be incredibly helpful. Would you mind dropping me your email? I would appreciate it.

Infanteer: You're absolutely correct. A soldier's viewpoint may or may not be in tune with stated policy, but I think that this will be case, regardless of where you go. Ideology is extremely subjective, and it's common to find individuals that follow the same ideological framework in disagreement. I think that exploring different perspectives will put my own beliefs and values into check. On issues that directly, and indirectly affect Joe Blow, such as this one, I deem it necessary to hear from Joe Blow. For a system of government that upholds direct and indirect citizen participation in public policy, and more importantly, a system led by a state leader who is elected bottom-up, I don't think that overlooking the viewpoints of your everyday citizen, is going to the root of the issue.

I'm not here to thrust my line of thinking upon you. I'm here to ask for a few more voices, that run parallel or counter to mine, in a matter that I consider to be a public one.


----------



## Michael Dorosh

As interested as I would be in a face to face, time and space unfortunately don't permit.  My email is madorosh@shaw.ca - I don't know that I'd be able to provide much in the way of insight in my answers, but I'll do my best, and at worst perhaps I can help you focus the questions, since that seems to be a concern here....


----------



## Infanteer

So, what's your thesis?


----------



## pjocsak

Ok,

First things first, my e-mail is pjocsak@hotmail.com.

Secondly, I can probably help you narrow down your topic abit by providing you with some of our course reading list. If you decide to drop me an e-mail, I can probably forward a couple of titles that would be of great help to you. Most of it would be regarding the legality of the use of military force, but I would think that any research paper which proposes to look at the conflict in question would invariably have to deal with the legal justification for it at a very early stage in the discussion. I would add these titles to the list now, but I don't have my reading list on me at the moment. Sorry, I should be more prepared.

Patrick


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Infanteer said:
			
		

> So, what's your thesis?



Haha. How many military personnel can a gal offend?

My thesis will be reworked through the wee hours of the morning, I fear. There's so much ground to cover that I'm beginning to lose myself in piles of books...

I disagree with the both the conduct and reasoning behind the war. I believe that fear has been, and continues to be entrenched into the minds of millions, in an effort to mask a hidden agenda, and I also believe that the citizens of America have given extended meaning to the phrase: "Ignorance is Bliss." I think that the United States perpetuates more global terrorism than could ever be received, and I remain skeptical of the course of the world, over the next few years. When the Star Wars Campaign, under the leadership of the United States, shifts into gear, I beg Canada to live up to the ideals of democracy, empower the people, and stay out of it. I plan to forward my paper to various institutions within Canada, and keep tally of how many turn a blind eye to me.

What's your thesis?


----------



## Bruce Monkhouse

Mine is pretty simple....any defensive weapon that works is better than another offensive weapon in the world.

Don't you like peace?


----------



## Michael Dorosh

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Haha. How many military personnel can a gal offend?
> 
> My thesis will be reworked through the wee hours of the morning, I fear. There's so much ground to cover that I'm beginning to lose myself in piles of books...
> 
> I disagree with the both the conduct and reasoning behind the war. I believe that fear has been, and continues to be entrenched into the minds of millions, in an effort to mask a hidden agenda, and I also believe that the citizens of America have given extended meaning to the phrase: "Ignorance is Bliss." I think that the United States perpetuates more global terrorism than could ever be received, and I remain skeptical of the course of the world, over the next few years. When the Star Wars Campaign, under the leadership of the United States, shifts into gear, I beg Canada to live up to the ideals of democracy, empower the people, and stay out of it. I plan to forward my paper to various institutions within Canada, and keep tally of how many turn a blind eye to me.
> 
> What's your thesis?



It's easy to disagree with things you don't understand, though....I think Ignorance is Bliss is far more applicable to Canadians than Americans.  I remain skeptical of the course of our country over the next few years.  I hope we play a large role in Star Wars, just as we did in Cruise Missile testing.  When are you going to email me already? ;-)


----------



## Infanteer

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> I disagree with the both the conduct and reasoning behind the war. I believe that fear has been, and continues to be entrenched into the minds of millions, in an effort to mask a hidden agenda, and I also believe that the citizens of America have given extended meaning to the phrase: "Ignorance is Bliss." I think that the United States perpetuates more global terrorism than could ever be received, and I remain skeptical of the course of the world, over the next few years. When the Star Wars Campaign, under the leadership of the United States, shifts into gear, I beg Canada to live up to the ideals of democracy, empower the people, and stay out of it. I plan to forward my paper to various institutions within Canada, and keep tally of how many turn a blind eye to me.



Too long.

Your thesis should be a one sentence statement.

But your statement sure looks like the usual university bafflegab (US are terroristsm, hidden agenda, etc, etc).  What class is this for, anyways?  Seeing how I'm a Poli Sci grad from UBC, I've probably taken it before.


----------



## Cloud Cover

Sorry for the delay in answering re: the Amnesty information: here is a link you might find helpful to support your work:  http://www.amnesty.ca/resource_centre/backgrounders.php . Cheers.


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## Morpheus32

I find this thread very interesting and indicative of North American politics today.   I thought I would add a twist away from the student/thesis angle we are working now.....so here goes.....

Miss MolsenIndy wrote:   "I disagree with the both the conduct and reasoning behind the war. I believe that fear has been, and continues to be entrenched into the minds of millions, in an effort to mask a hidden agenda, and I also believe that the citizens of America have given extended meaning to the phrase: "Ignorance is Bliss." I think that the United States perpetuates more global terrorism than could ever be received, and I remain skeptical of the course of the world, over the next few years. When the Star Wars Campaign, under the leadership of the United States, shifts into gear, I beg *Canada to live up to the ideals of democracy, empower the people, and stay out of it. I plan to forward my paper to various institutions within Canada, and keep tally of how many turn a blind eye to me*."

I am a professional soldier and I have served overseas on a number of operations.   I have a right of centre bias by virtue of my career.    ;D   I have my opinions on the war in Iraq but I think there is an overriding issue here.   Where does Canada fit in the world?   We as Canadians don't know and are struggling to figure out our place.   It is at times a polarizing discussion.   In some cases we want to be with the big boys and project military power and have seats at the big tables.   In some other cases we don't and don't even want to talk about what is happening.   We claim to hold high moral principles but often let them fall if it is not convenient or we are politically distracted.   We hold the myth of "peacekeeping" as our own invention but often don't do as much as we could in the world.   Or should we be sending our troops overseas at all?   We critic the US on its foreign policy when we lack a definable foreign policy.   We lack the means to control our own borders and are selling off all our over snow military vehicles.   Should we not have our own borders secure?  We often fail to make the hard calls, often not taking a decision being our response to crisis in the world.   Our parliament is ineffective in representing the people outside of party lines.   To be critical of ourselves, should we not have our house in order before we start criticizing another country?   We put 1000 troops every six months in Bosnia for almost 10 years but won't do the same for other countries in more need.   We don't seem to be very consistant in our concern for the needy.   We didn't start the war in Afghanistan, Bosnia, and Croatia, but we sent troops to those countries.   We sent them to protect the innocent and help the people rebuild.   Why are we not sending troops to Haiti, a number of countries in Africa, or Iraq?   Are the people in Iraq less worthy of our support because we don't like the politics that started it?   If our principles and moral values say we should help the less fortunate then why are we not doing that?   If we are not interested in sending troops to rebuild other countries in need, how do we provide continued support to the needy?   How do we value which country is more deserving of our support?   Should we disband the military as it stands now and rebuild it into something conducive to our values and principles?   How do we define our values and principles?   Are our values and principles sufficient to form the basis of our foreign policy and defence policy.   Will these values and principles guide us through the challenges of the future?   It is very complex and full of political pitfalls, not to mention the emotional issues associated with this polarizing debate.   

I think it is a complete waste of your energies to argue the war.   The war has happened, you can not change that, nor can Canadians.   It is here and now, it is a question of what the future holds for Iraq.   If your concern is Canadian values, should there not be a more lively debate on how we can help the people of Iraq?   If the answer is we don't want to help them because we disagree with the US on their reasoning for the war...I would argue our principles, our compassion for those who need help in rebuilding their lives is secondary to politics and the decision to go to war, and not to our desire to do the right thing for the people of Iraq.   If that is so then we must accept that are value and principles are not firm but guided by politics and emotion.   It is hard for us to stand up and demand action when we ourselves are unwilling or incapable.   Our inaction in Rwanda and Sudan speaks volumes.   

I would like to see a clear foreign policy and a clear articulation of our "values".   I would like to see us remain fast to our principles as we see them.   If Canada decides it wants to be a sovereign nation and do what is in the best interest of Canada, we should also be aware the US will likely do the same.   The US can decide not to buy our beef or close the borders to other goods or not allow a US company to operate in Canada.   It is all part of the big game.   If we decide we don't want to participate in Missile Defence, no worries, just don't be surprised when the US asks us to leave the room in NORAD when they have a meeting or say no when we request support or better yet develop some defence plan that will effect Canada and we don't have a chance to discuss it.   We often like to have our cake and eat it to.   The question is where does US interests stop and Canadian interests start?   In terms of our active involvement in the world, if we decided that we would only send teams like the DART to the world hot spots, we could do that very well and focus on the task.   Right now we have to run around and train to do everything with no foreign policy to guide our defence policy.   

I think we think too highly of ourselves and often place ourselves on a moral high ground when it comes to the US.   Our actions and inactions on issues and our lack of a concrete foreign policy makes us very inconsistent in our role in the world.  For example, aggressor in Afghanistan during Operation Apollo on one hand, then three months later, "Peacekeeper" the next during Operation Athena.   How about a thesis on Canadian Foreign policy and the lack there of?   Or how we should hold our principles and value (whatever they are) over politics when it comes to foreign policy and foreign aid?

That all being said.   If you would like to chat for your interviews to discuss my personal opinions and not that of a member of the CF, please feel free to drop me a line.   Cheers

Jeff


----------



## Cloud Cover

Jeff: one of the best posts I have read on the site. BZ.


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## Morgs

whiskey 601 said:
			
		

> Jeff: one of the best posts I have read on the site. BZ.



indeed it is


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## muskrat89

Great post morpheus - a better description I have not seen, of the elephant that is firmly planted in the center of the living room....


----------



## McG

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> I am a young, political science student, and I am in the midst of conducting research for an academic paper. My area of focus is the justification and conduct of the 'war on terrorism', comparing and contrasting the issue through the lens of Canada and the United States.





			
				MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> I disagree with the both the conduct and reasoning behind the war.



I'm for the "War on Terror."   I'm all for hunting down Osama bin Laden & his type.   I fully support taking out organizations that would take hostage a public school on its first day of classes & kill hundreds of children.   I believe in targeting those groups who would support such activities.   I cannot imagine that you are against any of this . . . 

Perhaps you do not agree with the invasion of Iraq and the persuit of an "axis of evil."   But, you will note that the Canadian war does not include this.

So, do you really disagree with the War on Terror or do you maybe object to it being used for tangential objectives?   Give us a little more, what conduct & reasoning specifically do you disagree with?


----------



## HollywoodHitman

Jeff......

Well written. 

TM


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## pappy

:dontpanic:

Something tells me your Poli-Sci professor wouldn't like my views on the War On Terrorism.   Or for that matter my view on reality.
Not sure your ready for reality as of yet, enjoy your innocence for a while longer.   No insult meant, it's just I'm not sure a student can truly understand.

I'm sure the things me and my other former Marines talk about would shock you.   And the stuff we don't even talk about with each other would give you nightmares.

But good luck on that paper!   Tons more eloquent people on this forum can provide plenty of help.


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## SprCForr

Join. See for yourself, live and in colour, 24/7. 

Seriously, the previous posters have had a world of experience. Get some of it for yourself. It may help you to understand some of it.


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## a_majoor

Changes in the Bush cabinet could lead to some interesting changes in tactics and possibly strategy. General Powell's departure from State and his pending replacement by Dr Rice should move things along, since the good Dr is not considered a "moderate"...


----------



## I_am_John_Galt

Rice's appointment may be more political than strategic (i.e., to set her up for a run at the VP or Presidency in 2008) ... nonetheless she is definitely more of a hawk than Powell has no trouble having her voice heard in the admin.

WRT the issue of Arabs and Islamofascism, the (relative) peace enjoyed by the Jordanians suggests that one can be a "good muslim" without a semtex vest!


----------



## Andyboy

I suspect it is a little of both; politically strategic? Setting her up for presidency may be a longer term strategic measure to ensure the war aims are continued past the next four years.


----------



## dutchie

What about Powell running for the Republican nomination in 2008? I have always liked him, ever since the Iraq war of '91.


----------



## Guardian

I read somewhere that Powell's wife vetoed that idea; apparently, she's scared to death that he might be assassinated.

And apparently many Republicans are already looking at Rudy Giuliani as their next candidate.

However, I have to say that the idea of a Powell - Rice Republican ticket is VERY intriguing. Not one, but TWO African-American faces on the ballot. And such a ticket would probably satisfy both moderates and hawks in Republican lines....

Versus Hillary Clinton? They'd have a chance. 

As the US has only ever had white men as presidents, now that would be an interesting race....


----------



## dutchie

I think there's 2 reasons why a Powel-Rice ticket wouldn't work:

Rice & Powell are both Republicans, yes, but within that framework, they are on opposite ends of the spectrum- Powel more centre-right and Diplomacy oriented, Rice more ultra-right and more inclined to favor unilateral or military action. 

As well, I 'm not sure the GOP wants to risk alienating some less than enlightened supporters by having an All-Black ticket. Sad as it is, I think that the hit it will cause in the ballot box, as slight as it might be, couild be mean that Hillary becomes the next President. 

Shudders.

Who's under the desk in the Oval Office then, eh?


----------



## Bruce Monkhouse

It would still be Monica ;D


----------



## a_majoor

2008, Condeleeza Vs Hillary; who cares who the VP's are.

This is actually important, since WW IV has certain similarities to the 30 years war rather than WWII. The message of the 
Jihadis is as terrible and all encompassing as that of the National Socialists in the 1930's, and there is no compromise or concession that will stay their hands: http://victorhanson.com/articles/hippolito111404.html

There will be outbreaks of fighting in the Middle East Theater of Operations, as well as many smaller subsidiary battles outside. It will take a long time to wear down the Jihadis, dismantle their recruiting and training structure, change Middle Eastern political cultures, and ultimately, kill off the true believers who will not surrender or change. This war will be going on past 2008, and we may still be reading about actions in 2015, without realizing this is still part of WW IV.

In the old days, the King kept the war going until he either gained his war aims, was killed, died, or realized he had run out of resources. In a Republic, the "King" can be changed by popular mandate, so even if the war is not successfully brought to a close, there could be a change in government in '08, '12 or '16 which allows the surviving Jihadis time to regroup and seek revenge. This isn't the way we are taught or trained to think about war.

If demographic and cultural shifts are as solid as some Republican commentators are suggesting, and the Democrats continue to play victim but be unable to articulate a realistic set of policies that appeal to the American people, then the United States is set to continue the fight for the forseeable future


----------



## sigpig

MissMolsenIndy, I'd be interested in filling out your questionnaire. I might not be as eloquent, or long winded, as some of the posters here, but I may have different insights as a former CF member who has lived in the US for six years and whose views are definitely to the left of the majority of the posters I've read here. I'm at dmacdoug@fccsc.org


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## a_majoor

More evidence of Iranian complicity in destabilizing Iraq: http://www.usnews.com/usnews/issue/041122/usnews/22iran.htm

This sort of provocation, coupled with their nuclear ambitions will probably lead to direct confrontation by US forces in the region. I would be so bold as to suggest this might be a good thing in the long run, since knocking our Iran would take out one of the biggest supporters of the terrorist network, and further splinter and demoralize the Jihadi movement. This would mean paying a bigger "up front" cost, rather than drag the war out for two or three more administrations.


----------



## JBP

Well although I don't disagree with disarming Iran so to speak, it would most definately NOT be a cakewalk to invade that country. They have a much better equipped military and stronger trained force than Iraq did. Larger too. The US hasn't seen casualties yet until they try and invade that country... Not to say they wouldn't win but they would pay for it in the warm blood of thier soldiers. Plus, who then can afford to run that country too? I believe the American taxpayer won't be happy about that. They also won't be happy with going through another war, there are some seriously pissed off people living south of the border about Iraq as it is, nevermind another front...

Anyway, we'll see what happens won't we!


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## rifleman

They'll eventually have to get to Cuba as well. They have been a thorn in the side for too long


----------



## dutchie

Invade Cuba? Bad move. I think they're just waiting for Castro to die, and then they'll lift the embargo and resume trade and diplomatic relations. Also, there is no recent terrorism basis for invading Cubs (i will stand to be corrected on that). As well, as a good percentage of the world is against the continuation of the embargo (I don't want to get into a peeing contest here), an invasion by the US would be met with as much if not more outrage Internationally than Iraq.


If they do invade, let's hope they leave Veradero, the Romero e Julieta and Cohiba factories alone....


----------



## a_majoor

Recruit Joe said:
			
		

> Well although I don't disagree with disarming Iran so to speak, it would most definitely NOT be a cakewalk to invade that country. They have a much better equipped military and stronger trained force than Iraq did. Larger too. The US hasn't seen casualties yet until they try and invade that country... Not to say they wouldn't win but they would pay for it in the warm blood of their soldiers. Plus, who then can afford to run that country too? I believe the American taxpayer won't be happy about that. They also won't be happy with going through another war, there are some seriously pissed off people living south of the border about Iraq as it is, nevermind another front...



It all depends on the situation. The US might decide to take limited action to clear the border between Iran and Iraq. They may step up "black" ops to destabilize the regime in Tehran and tacitly support Israel's attack on Iranian nuclear installations. Only a very brazen move on Teheran's part, or the demonstrated proof of a nuclear capability would convince the US to directly strike into Iran.

That being said, the US has capabilities far beyond what anyone else has, and is evolving new military doctrines to supplement of replace AirLand Battle, and the heavy metal army to support it. The difference between Gulf War 1 and Gulf War 2 are illuminating. General Franks went in without a six week air campaign (Desert Storm), and launched his ground assault with a force about 1/4 the size of the Coalition advance in 1991 (Desert Sabre), yet went far beyond what anyone planned or even dreamed possible in 1991. An invasion of Iran would be difficult, but probably not as difficult as we might imagine.


----------



## a_majoor

The wild card of North Korea has surfaced, with some reports of civil disobedience breaking out:

*November 17, 2004: A North Korean Freedom Movement?*

Hopeful signs have apparently surfaced.

It's Thursday in Japan and I have received email from Kyoto from Mongai Kome, frequent commenter on this blog. His morning paper (Sankei Shinbun) is reporting anti-regime flyers being posted in over fifty places in North Korea. This public display of disobedience in that benighted country is unprecedented and has been going on for the last month. Here is Mongai:

The most prevalent flyer is called the "sixteen lies" of tyrant Kim and his tyrant father and it takes apart the fundamental myths and propaganda regarding the cult of the Kims and outlines the failings of the regime. Another flyer is based on the thesis that Kim Jong-il killed his father (perhaps some propaganda in and of itself but a brilliant move given the traditions of the Korean culture.)

Here is hoping things happen in twos and in Iran and North Korea justice will be done, and done soon, and done of, by, and for the people there with a little help from friends.

From earlier in his email, Mongai means Bush and Rice who he is happy are in office, considering the circumstances. But I think if Kim Jong-il is finally going to be gotten rid of, we already know who is going to do it.

The collapse of the North Korean regime could get very messy, very fast.


----------



## a_majoor

The current issue of Atlantic Monthly examines the issue of Iraq by setting up a "wargame" with experienced American ex soldiers, politicians and diplomats to play the parts of various US Administration officials, and inputs the most current non classified intelligence of the region. The article is available on line to subscribers, the rest of us should buy the magazine and read it.

Some conclusions:

1. Israel attempting a unilateral airstrike against Iran will not have sufficient capability to take out the Iranian program, and cause no end of problems for the West

2. Limited US action is possible, but suffers from many of the same limitations

3. The US has the capability to strike into Iran and possibly do a regime change, however there is no capacity currently to maintain a large scale stabilization force. 

4. The idea of regime change , while nice, is not very specific. Who will the new rulers of Iran be?

5. Most scenarios are flawed because there is no "red cell" involved in their creation. No intelligent enemy will sit passively as an enemy force assembles, and no known current plans seem to take asymmetrical response or Iranian preemptive actions into account.

We need to remember too the ideology of the Mullahs and the Jihadis: First, Islam philosophically divides the world into two camps â â€œ this is Islam's definitions, not mine --  Dar al-Islam and Dar al-Harb. Dar al-Islam is the House of Submission. Dar Al-Harb is not the House of Infidels. It is the House of War. Unless we can wrap our minds around these definitions, it will be difficult to predict how they will behave, or develop effective countermeasures against them.


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Howdy!

I've prepared the following questions for you. I'm sorry that this was later than expected, but Crunch Time has officially started.
I was going to email questions to the individuals that came forward, but I thought that it would be easier to extend it to everyone and anyone.

If you could just email me back with your responses, that would be great: lzibrik10@yahoo.ca

I appreciate it.

Thanks,

Lindsay


1. State your full name for the record.

2. What is your current or past rank, if you no longer serve with the Canadian Military?

3. How many years of service did you provide?

4. For the purpose of confidentiality, would you prefer me to withhold your name in a University/College setting?

5. For the purpose of confidentiality, would you prefer me to withhold your name if further action (i.e. government/institutional copies) is taken with regards to the academic paper?

6. 49 former US Generals told President Bush that missile defense is a waste of funds, and urged Canada not to join. What is your position on this issue?

7. In your opinion, will democracy have a chance to establish itself (temporarily or permanently) in Iraq?

8. With the expected launch of Missile Defense towards the end of 2004, the United States is looking to spend approximately one trillion US dollars (for the entire campaign) to build this system. Critics argue that the money should be spent on diminshing the roots of conflict and terrorism (inequality, poverty, underdevelopment...) instead. Do you agree or disagree? And what are the reasons to support your claim?

9. If the proposed Missile Defense passes, with active Canadian participation included, do you agree or disagree with the likelihood of this defense system creating an atmosphere where more conflict and more terrorist activity emerges, due to the fact that states (particularly those who do not participate in the "global defense system") feel more vulnerable?

10. The United Nations Committee suggests that a mere 8-10% (approximately $80 Billion US dollars) of international military spending pee year will meet the basic needs of every citizen on earth (clothing, food, shelter, water, and education). If these are some of the very problems that contribute to terrorist activity, why have appropriate actions not been taken in the efficiency of the "global war on terrorism"?

11. With recent statistics showing that 70% of Canadians show no desire to join onto the Missile Defense Program for North America, does Canada's participation in the Missile Defense Program look promising in the future years?

12. The United States organized an invasion in Iraq on the basis that the Iraqi government was developing and concealing "weapons of mass destruction". "Saddam Hussein's quest to acquire weapons of mass destruction (WMD) has been systematic and relentless," reports the US Department of State. With the United States harbouring the largest military on the globe, and weapons of mass destruction in greater numberm, strength and capability than any other state, could it be argued on the same line of reasoning that the United States is also a "threat to the peace and security of the world"? (US Department of State) In answering this question, it is necessary to look at it from the point-of-view of the "West", as well as the "Peripheral Countries" (less developed, economically and politcally dependent on the West etc...)

13. As a permanent member of the United Nations, do you believe that the United Staes is subject to and moreover bound by the conditions and negotiations of the international governing body? Why, or why not? Has the United States breached international law?

14. The Vietnam War was launched on "government lies passed on by pliant mass media," where "North Vietnamese torpedo boats launched an "unprovoked attack" against a U.S. destroyer on "routine patrol" in the Tonkin Gulf on Aug. 2 -- and that North Vietnamese PT boats followed up with a "deliberate attack" on a pair of U.S. ships two days later." The Gulf War, was sold to the United States, "the mother of all clients," by a "it bleeds, it leads" story about babies being tossed out of incubators by Iraqi soldiers. As officials and the mass media learned of the witness's blood ties with the Kuwaiti government, the story began to fall apart, and the war was launched on false information/propaganda. The Iraq War was launched by the United States of America on the basis that Iraq was developing and concealing weapons of mass destruction, with no evidence that these weapons of mass destruction even exist, is it viable that government lies and deception have once again "sold a war" to the media and public?


----------



## jrhume

Nice bunch of questions loaded with half-truths and innuendo.  So much for trying to find out anything useful.

All you want is to have your pre-existing beliefs verified.

Have fun.  I won't be responding even though I'm a veteran of that previous war.  

Instead of telling us your version of history, why don't you seek to find out what really happened?

Never mind.  I see a closed mind.

Jim


----------



## Infanteer

Old Guy is right.

You need to take Statistics 101; your questions are loaded and are filled with bias.

You seem to be asking questions to support preconceptions rather then to find out what we think.


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Not at all. If I were looking to have my beliefs confirmed, I wouldn't be here in the first place: the majority of your views stray much farther right than mine. I don't think that one with a "closed mind" would seek information, fully knowing that it would run against his/her values, beliefs and views. 

I'm asking questions, based on how I perceive the world. If you have evidence and or reasoning that runs counter to mine, then present it, but you telling me that my questions are "loaded with half-truths and inneundo," merely shows that your views are just as much loaded as mine.

"Instead of telling us your version of history, why don't you seek to find out what really happened?"

Ok, so what really happened? Keep in mind that history is written by individuals who come from a set of beliefs, values, and bias, much like you and I. If history were objective, it wouldn't have been written a thousand times over.


----------



## Michael Dorosh

I've sent my replies via email.  I don't think these are necessarily loaded, they are a starting point for conversation.  Is anyone suggesting the Gulf of Tonkin Incident actually happened, or that we have actually found WMD in Iraq?  ???


----------



## McG

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> 7. In your opinion, will democracy have a chance to establish itself (temporarily or permanently) in Iraq?


Yes, but only if international troops remain to support the Iraqi government's attempts to maintain security & stability.   Only when Iraqi forces are strong enough, to look after their own internal security needs, can the international coalition leave.   The threat is not just that insurgents overthrow the infantile democratic system.   The threat includes any acts intended to harm the Iraqi people.

The international community must also continue a financial involvement until Iraqi infrastructure and industry is re-established & health.


----------



## Torlyn

McG said:
			
		

> Yes, but only if international troops remain to support the Iraqi government's attempts to maintain security & stability.  Only when Iraqi forces are strong enough, to look after their own internal security needs, can the international coalition leave.  The threat is not just that insurgents overthrow the infantile democratic system.  The threat includes any acts intended to harm the Iraqi people.
> 
> The international community must also continue a financial involvement until Iraqi infrastructure and industry is re-established & health.



I agree with this one.  Do you think that the Americans will be able to create that stability, or is there too much animosity towards them?  Can anyone go in and stabilize Iraq in a way that would be preferable to the Iraqi people?  I'm not necessarily questioning whether or not they should be in Iraq (as it's a moot point now) but would the Iraqi people be better served by having their short-term stability maintained by a nation other than the states/britian?

T


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

I would appreciate direct, individual answers via email, but also encourage debate on the forum. I will be gathering sources from both, so do as you please...

Thanks!


----------



## Infanteer

As I mentioned before, these questions are loaded with your own bias.   You are trying to find out what your reader's opinions are regarding Canadian and US Foreign Policies, not what your reader's opinions are regarding left-wing interpretations of Canadian and US Foreign Policy.

In an attempt to maintain the notion of objectivity, academic surveys and questionnaires should attempt to be as free as possible from language that includes insinuations and pejorative statements (I can see multiple examples in your questionnaire).   By doing this you may be accused of attempting to lead your subjects to their answer or to present a one-sided argument to get the answer you want to hear.   As well, you choice of tone and language implies that you have an axe to grind - why don't you leave that to the daily rag reporters.

In essence, everyone is aloud to have a bias (hell, all of you can read what mine is) but when collecting data and facts in an academic setting, it is important to gather it in a "neutral" manner, less your own bias be seen to have interfered with the data collection process.

Now for your questions:



			
				MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> 6. 49 former US Generals told President Bush that missile defense is a waste of funds, and urged Canada not to join. What is your position on this issue?



How about US Generals that support the development of the system?   What exactly were the generals arguing against - specific system technology or the concept in general?   Do the generals have an axe to grind (for example, their department lost funds to the BMD system)?

You're "headlining" here, just like a newspaper.   Your asking us a question without supplying any qualitative substance for us to base our position on.



> 7. In your opinion, will democracy have a chance to establish itself (temporarily or permanently) in Iraq?



That one is a crapshoot.   There are so many different interests colliding in Iraq - American's pursuing the GWOT, Al Qaeda operations, Shia fundamentalism (supported from Iran), left over Ba'ath party rebels (all those Republican Guard divisions had to go somewhere), Sunni's who fear a Shi'a takeover, Kurds who hate both parties.   When you got a situation that is that complex, you have to take things one day at a time.



> 8. With the expected launch of Missile Defense towards the end of 2004, the United States is looking to spend approximately one trillion US dollars (for the entire campaign) to build this system. Critics argue that the money should be spent on diminshing the roots of conflict and terrorism (inequality, poverty, underdevelopment...) instead. Do you agree or disagree? And what are the reasons to support your claim?



If we want to base the debate on economic issues we can.   Brad Sallows summed up my outlook on the economics of the issue best in another thread:

_I estimate that on one city block where I live, there are approximately 25 single detached residences.   In a grid square, I estimate there could be as many as 1800 residences.   Assuming the replacement cost of each to be $100K, including reconstruction, refurnishment, landscaping, replacement of vehicles, refurbishment of utilities, etc, that amounts to about $180M.   Now be conservative and cut the estimate by nearly one-half to a nice, round, $100M to replace one grid square blown away by a nuclear warhead.   A 3km radius of devastation?   Maybe $700M.   5km?   Maybe $2B.   Keep in mind my estimates should be on the low side.   I can't begin to estimate the cost of replacing densely populated high-rise residential or commercial property.   There are also, not incidentally, the lives.

Of course, there are the economic costs: what happens if in the aftermath of a detonation cargo stops moving out of the Port of Vancouver (check out the daily cost of a longshoreman's strike) and most of the surviving population decides to take an extended vacation with relatives east of the Rockies?   That could happen even if a near miss occurs and the worst that happens is that the "Lions" are slightly resculpted.

Likelihood of occurrence: very small.   Impact: very large.   Worth at least a little more commitment to research into preventive measures against missiles as well as sea containers?   You decide._



> 9. If the proposed Missile Defense passes, with active Canadian participation included, do you agree or disagree with the likelihood of this defense system creating an atmosphere where more conflict and more terrorist activity emerges, due to the fact that states (particularly those who do not participate in the "global defense system") feel more vulnerable?



If you look at the proposal for the BMD, it is built to deter attacks from "Rogue Nations".   A problem with this is that there is the chance that the outcome can lead to other states in believing that their nuclear deterrence has fallen below acceptable levels, leading to increases their arsenal to offset US invulnerability.   Consider that this argument is geared towards China and Russian, who both already possess a preponderant amount of nuclear warheads from all three points of the triad (SLBM, ICBM, Air-Delivered) I don't see where the _increased_ level of danger is going to come from; the situation already has the potential to be catastrophic.

I am unsure of how this breeds terrorism and conflict though.



> 10. The United Nations Committee suggests that a mere 8-10% (approximately $80 Billion US dollars) of international military spending per year will meet the basic needs of every citizen on earth (clothing, food, shelter, water, and education). If these are some of the very problems that contribute to terrorist activity, why have appropriate actions not been taken in the efficiency of the "global war on terrorism"?



Kind of hard to give people clothing, food, shelter, water and education when a militia comes rolling through and cuts the noses off of those who accepted aid from Imperialists.   Kind of hard to distribute aid when most of the aid money is siphoned off by tin-pot dictators (how else does Arafat squirrel away billions of dollars?).

Stability and security are the key elements to an environment that is conducive to productivity.   Otherwise, why wouldn't these people have got clothing, shelter, and education on their own?   Cutting military spending in return for "I Love Canada" tee-shirts to give to Palestinian kids isn't going to do much for rectifying the problem.



> 11. With recent statistics showing that 70% of Canadians show no desire to join onto the Missile Defense Program for North America, does Canada's participation in the Missile Defense Program look promising in the future years?



70% of Canadians also identified Lester Pearson as Canada's leader in WWII.

1)   Statistics are shaky, just ask Steven Harper about his job as the Prime Minister.   For every statistic that came out supporting the war in Iraq, there was one that came out opposing it.

2)   You're assuming that the general populace of Canada is familiar with the details of BMD policies and strategies.   Considering more Canadians pay attention to the latest gay couple on "Will and Grace" or who's offering what in the NHL lock-out, I wouldn't be too confident on basing policy decisions on the fickle nature of the mob.



> 12. The United States organized an invasion in Iraq on the basis that the Iraqi government was developing and concealing "weapons of mass destruction". "Saddam Hussein's quest to acquire weapons of mass destruction (WMD) has been systematic and relentless," reports the US Department of State. With the United States harbouring the largest military on the globe, and weapons of mass destruction in greater numberm, strength and capability than any other state, could it be argued on the same line of reasoning that the United States is also a "threat to the peace and security of the world"? (US Department of State) In answering this question, it is necessary to look at it from the point-of-view of the "West", as well as the "Peripheral Countries" (less developed, economically and politcally dependent on the West etc...)



This one is silly.   You are trying to draw direct comparisons to the arsenal of the United States to the one that Iraq had possessed (and used).   If you think that the US is irresponsible with its Nuclear Weapons policy, then I implore you to point out to me where their transgressions lie.   Although there are strategic dilemmas with the US arsenal (with high-readiness, Launch-On-Demand silos being the most obvious), I think we can give the US enough credit to move them out of the "threat to the peace and security of the world" camp.



> 13. As a permanent member of the United Nations, do you believe that the United States is subject to and moreover bound by the conditions and negotiations of the international governing body? Why, or why not? Has the United States breached international law?



I am not sure on what you mean with the US being a permanent member of the United Nations; the US is not bound in any way to remain in the UN in perpetuity - adherence to the UN Charter is the legislation of the individual states that compose it, and that legislation could be reversed as easy as any other law.   Perhaps you meant permanent member of the United Nations Security Council?

I think that the legitimacy of the UN has been challenged to such an extent that it's legitimacy as the *aegis of international law* has been sufficiently diminished.   The structure of the UN worked fine during the Cold War (a geopolitical arrangement that it was designed to facilitate) but I think it becomes less and less relevent every year.   Why should the United States hold itself to the proclamations of an organization that puts it on the same level as the Sudan; that puts Iraq (under Saddam) in charge of the council on disarmament and Libya in charge of the council on human rights; or one that gives France a veto is world security issues but discards countries like Germany, Japan, and India.   Quite farcical if you ask me.



> 14. The Vietnam War was launched on "government lies passed on by pliant mass media," where "North Vietnamese torpedo boats launched an "unprovoked attack" against a U.S. destroyer on "routine patrol" in the Tonkin Gulf on Aug. 2 -- and that North Vietnamese PT boats followed up with a "deliberate attack" on a pair of U.S. ships two days later." The Gulf War, was sold to the United States, "the mother of all clients," by a "it bleeds, it leads" story about babies being tossed out of incubators by Iraqi soldiers. As officials and the mass media learned of the witness's blood ties with the Kuwaiti government, the story began to fall apart, and the war was launched on false information/propaganda. The Iraq War was launched by the United States of America on the basis that Iraq was developing and concealing weapons of mass destruction, with no evidence that these weapons of mass destruction even exist, is it viable that government lies and deception have once again "sold a war" to the media and public?



This one stinks so bad I can smell it in the office.   The Vietnam War was started on the "lie" of the Gulf of Tonkin?   Please, the American's were involved (as per the policy of Containment) in Vietnam long before the Gulf of Tonkin incident.   Do you think that the US public supported the Vietnam War based on the pretext of the Gulf of Tonkin?   How many recruiters did you see marching down the street saying "Avenge the _Maddox_!".   Same with GW1 (Iraqi baby killers) and GW2 (WMD).

You seem to be painting the notion of the _casus belli_ being a monolithic, all-or-nothing issue.   If you bothered to look into the beginning of these conflicts, you would see that their are many more valid issues (as opposed to Chomsky-esque "government lies and deception") that different segments of society accept as valid reasons for war.   Anyone who takes press sensationalism as the justification for war is stupid (which, unfortunately, is more then we'd like to admit) and anyone who feels that the the government (and the society it represents) finds its sole _casus belli_ in inflated, but relatively insignificant, news-clippings needs to up the Ritalin dosage and take a second look at the big picture.

----

As I said above, cut-out the rhetoric and the innuendo and the questions are pretty good.


----------



## combat_medic

To add to what Infanteer has already said (great post, BTW), the majority of your questions are about as flagrantly biased as a Quebec Referendum ballot. You rely a great deal on media sensationalism to prove your points, and even more on conjecture, not to mention that many of your questions contain incorrect statements or are worded very poorly. It doesn't seem that you've done much in terms of real research to substantiate your point(s), and, as such, will get answers that reflect that.


----------



## Britney Spears

I've read through the questions over and over, yet I can't find the innuendo! 

Seriously, how will the answers to these questions support or disprove your theory in any way? If you're trying to prove that members of the CF generally have a rightward slant on their opinions on politics, well please tell me you already knew that. Otherwise I'd be interested(in apurely academic sense) in knowing how you were going to incorporate these responses into a relevant argument. So xx% of CF members support/do not support the US led invasion of Iraq, what exactly is that suppose to mean?

Admit it, its clear from the questions that you're simply trying to vocalize a political opinion you believe in. Its ok, I've done it before too, its the only way to make these academic papers interesting.


----------



## JBP

Ouch! You folks really reamed her a new one! 

Infanteer, your damn arguementative essay type posts are so good you convince people to believe you! Even though we don't see eye to eye on many issues I have high respect for you!  ;D

Anyway, you folks do have a good point, but keep in mind she's still _learning_... Sure she's in 3rd year University. She didn't ask for your opinions on what her questions were like, just your answer to the questions. If you all wanna pick at things analy, it isn't going to help much. If you wanna help, answer her questions to the best of your ability, simple as that! What's that saying??? "Keep it simple stupid!"... I'm not saying I'm excluded from that, certainly NOT. But, if you folks wanna be nice, help the girl out! Don't rape her!

I know I know you would say if she came here posting that kinda stuff it's a public forum and she gets what she deserves posting that kinda stuff yada yada yada! BUT, mom always said, "if ya don't have anything nice to say don't say it at all"... And there's hardly any juvenille or inexperienced posters who have posted to this thread either. You all know what your opinions are and your way of putting it into words...

All I'm sayin' is play nice, help her out, leave it at that if you wanna be nice fellow Canucks!

Joe
~ All for Peace ~


----------



## Infanteer

Well, are we not helping her by holding her opinions up to critical thought?


----------



## Bruce Monkhouse

Yes you are, but Joe wants the answers that she wants, otherwise we are [pick one] racist/redneck/uncaring/sexist/mean/etc.........
Sounds like a typical left wing rebuttal to a well-thought out response.


----------



## Britney Spears

Ok *MissMolsonIndy*, I'll tell you exactly what I think.

1) Your thesis is not appropriate for an academic paper. Perhaps for an Ann Coulter book, or a Micheal Moore movie, but not for anything that could be finished in one term. The fact that you made it to 3 years without figuring this out means that I'll never trust a Poli Sci Major or anyone from the province of British Columbia ever again. Considering the number of army officers who were poli sci majors, this scares me.

2) Your question suck. *Infanteer* has already gone through this in detail. My advice to you would be to drop it now, because if your instructor has any kind of education  he/she would fail you on methodology alone. 


3) These are mistakes that high school students make. See point #1. 


Oh, BTW, I mostly agree with your opinions on the War on Terror and missile defence.  I wish there were more people like you, keep up the good work!


----------



## Fishbone Jones

Once again we'll state her methodology and stance is not the question. If you wish to provide input, stick to answering the actual questions or factually debating the individual rebuttals. Leave the snide comments and chivalristic tones out of it. Do not attack the person, attack the idea(s).


----------



## Infanteer

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> I'll never trust a Poli Sci Major or anyone from the province of British Columbia ever again.



Hey, I'm a Poli Sci Major from British Columbia.... :warstory:


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Infanteer said:
			
		

> As I mentioned before, these questions are loaded with your own bias.   You are trying to find out what your reader's opinions are regarding Canadian and US Foreign Policies, not what your reader's opinions are regarding left-wing interpretations of Canadian and US Foreign Policy.



Infanteer:   Posing questions on this forum in order to determine readers' opinions with regards to â Å“left-wingâ ? interpretations of Canadian and US Foreign Policy, is equivalent to finding a needle in a haystack. This has been addressed several times already; don't argue for the sake of arguing.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> In an attempt to maintain the notion of objectivity, academic surveys and questionnaires should attempt to be as free as possible from language that includes insinuations and pejorative statements (I can see multiple examples in your questionnaire).   By doing this you may be accused of attempting to lead your subjects to their answer or to present a one-sided argument to get the answer you want to hear.   As well, you choice of tone and language implies that you have an axe to grind - why don't you leave that to the daily rag reporters.
> 
> In essence, everyone is aloud to have a bias (hell, all of you can read what mine is) but when collecting data and facts in an academic setting, it is important to gather it in a "neutral" manner, less your own bias be seen to have interfered with the data collection process.



Indeed. These questions are loaded with my own bias, much like any other opinion that I hold. And while I realize, and agree with you, that the majority of these questions should have been re-phrased in a more objective manner, judging by the responses I've received thus far, I have yet to run into an opinion that runs parallel with my own. Which tells me two things: Firstly, the majority of you are very capable of recognizing and pinpointing bias, and secondly, the â Å“insinuationsâ ? and â Å“pejorative statements,â ? ingrained in my questions, have by no means swayed the individuals on this forum, if anything, my ingrained bias has forced them to think more critically about the questions.

I find it hard to accept as true that you believe that you can collect completely â Å“neutralâ ? data, on a subjective issue (not to mention one that the public feels strongly about). The fact of the matter is there's no getting around bias in a situation of the sort. There are certainly measures (some of which I've failed to reproduce) that you can take to help eliminate it, but to completely do away with it is impossible if you are collecting data from human beings, who are cognitive, emotional and who piece together a picture of the world that is comprehensible and workable in their frame of thought from social experience. Even if you have taken all of the necessary measures, what â Å“groupings of society,â ? respond to your questionnaire (with participants chosen at large, and at random) is beyond your control. We see the same patterns in the Canadian Electoral system. If Canada could only achieve a voter-turnout of approximately 60% in the last election, at best, what makes you think that the same doesn't occur in polls and other statistics? Individuals have a predisposition to exclude themselves from issues that tend not to concern them, or similarly issues that they stand â Å“neutralâ ? on.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Now for your questions:
> 
> How about US Generals that support the development of the system?   What exactly were the generals arguing against - specific system technology or the concept in general?   Do the generals have an axe to grind (for example, their department lost funds to the BMD system)?
> 
> You're "headlining" here, just like a newspaper.   Your asking us a question without supplying any qualitative substance for us to base our position on.



I respect and admire your ability to think outside the box. And while I can't answer your questions, it will definitely be a criticism explored within the context of my paper.

I'm unsure of how you have formulated your views on issues in the past, but it is the responsibility of the reader to look for sources and information upon which his/her position will be based; it is not my place to supply you with â Å“qualitative substance.â ? 



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> If we want to base the debate on economic issues we can.   Brad Sallows summed up my outlook on the economics of the issue best in another thread:
> _I estimate that on one city block where I live, there are approximately 25 single detached residences.   In a grid square, I estimate there could be as many as 1800 residences.   Assuming the replacement cost of each to be $100K, including reconstruction, refurnishment, landscaping, replacement of vehicles, refurbishment of utilities, etc, that amounts to about $180M.   Now be conservative and cut the estimate by nearly one-half to a nice, round, $100M to replace one grid square blown away by a nuclear warhead.   A 3km radius of devastation?   Maybe $700M.   5km?   Maybe $2B.   Keep in mind my estimates should be on the low side.   I can't begin to estimate the cost of replacing densely populated high-rise residential or commercial property.   There are also, not incidentally, the lives.
> 
> Of course, there are the economic costs: what happens if in the aftermath of a detonation cargo stops moving out of the Port of Vancouver (check out the daily cost of a longshoreman's strike) and most of the surviving population decides to take an extended vacation with relatives east of the Rockies?   That could happen even if a near miss occurs and the worst that happens is that the "Lions" are slightly resculpted. _


_

This is not meant to be taken as a personal attack, Infanteer, but I don't see how this has anything to do with the question. If you don't hold an opinion on a specific matter, then leave it blank.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		


			Likelihood of occurrence: very small.   Impact: very large.   Worth at least a little more commitment to research into preventive measures against missiles as well as sea containers?   You decide.
		
Click to expand...

_


			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> If you look at the proposal for the BMD, it is built to deter attacks from "Rogue Nations".   A problem with this is that there is the chance that the outcome can lead to other states in believing that their nuclear deterrence has fallen below acceptable levels, leading to increases their arsenal to offset US invulnerability.   Consider that this argument is geared towards China and Russian, who both already possess a preponderant amount of nuclear warheads from all three points of the triad (SLBM, ICBM, Air-Delivered) I don't see where the _increased_ level of danger is going to come from; the situation already has the potential to be catastrophic.



Indeed. The world is about to witness another arms race. However, I disagree with you that the â Å“increased levels of dangerâ ? have not been given care and consideration: A â Å“Non-Proliferation Treatyâ ? is currently under debate, and is expected to pass through next year some time. The treaty demands the disarmament of nuclear weaponry, and all preventable measures to be taken in order to ensure that the proliferation of nuclear weapons does not spread to rogue states. 



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> I am unsure of how this breeds terrorism and conflict though.



Which question are you referring to?



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> 70% of Canadians also identified Lester Pearson as Canada's leader in WWII.



While I cannot personally identify with the statement made above, I'm sure it holds its ground. Statistics are shaky, and those statistics only came from a single poll, in reality, the figures could prove to be much different. While I cannot offer you statistics upon which everyone will agree on, I can say that I sense an overwhelming sense of hostility towards US foreign policy in Canada, and many other parts of the globe. When President Bush makes his appearance in Ottawa next week, protestors are expected to explode onto the streets. I suppose we'll have to wait and see.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> 1)   Statistics are shaky, just ask Steven Harper about his job as the Prime Minister.   For every statistic that came out supporting the war in Iraq, there was one that came out opposing it.



I agree.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> 2) You're assuming that the general populace of Canada is familiar with the details of BMD policies and strategies.   Considering more Canadians pay attention to the latest gay couple on "Will and Grace" or who's offering what in the NHL lock-out, I wouldn't be too confident on basing policy decisions on the fickle nature of the mob.



I agree, however, keep in mind that it is the participation of this fickle mob that democracy requires in order to keep it functioning. You've made an excellent point: the public-at-large does not go to great lengths to inform themselves, and if nothing else, I would argue that the public is largely uninformed on a variety of issues. Considering the mass media, and the national newspapers constitute the two major forms in which people acquire information (with a relatively small proportion of the population actually looking to alternative sources), both of which are infinitely concentrated into the hands of few both in Canada and the United States, you have a public informed by components of the mass media, each pushing their own agenda/ â Å“spinâ ? on the issue. That being said, it would not come as a surprise to me to learn that the Canadian populace was being pumped with information with a â Å“spin,â ? or disinformation.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> I am not sure on what you mean with the US being a permanent member of the United Nations; the US is not bound in any way to remain in the UN in perpetuity - adherence to the UN Charter is the legislation of the individual states that compose it, and that legislation could be reversed as easy as any other law.   Perhaps you meant permanent member of the United Nations Security Council?



If the UN is the legislation of the individual states that compose it, then is it not the case that all members are expected to abide by its legislation?



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> I think that the legitimacy of the UN has been challenged to such an extent that it's legitimacy as the *aegis of international law* has been sufficiently diminished.   The structure of the UN worked fine during the Cold War (a geopolitical arrangement that it was designed to facilitate) but I think it becomes less and less relevent every year.   Why should the United States hold itself to the proclamations of an organization that puts it on the same level as the Sudan; that puts Iraq (under Saddam) in charge of the council on disarmament and Libya in charge of the council on human rights; or one that gives France a veto is world security issues but discards countries like Germany, Japan, and India.   Quite farcical if you ask me.



Have you considered that perhaps the reason that its legitimacy has been significantly diminished is because the strongest nation in the globe, and the most important player in the UN consistently defy it? I certainly think that if the United States participated in the committee and bound itself thereby, the UN would be more enforceable in the international context.




			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> This one stinks so bad I can smell it in the office.   The Vietnam War was started on the "lie" of the Gulf of Tonkin?   Please, the American's were involved (as per the policy of Containment) in Vietnam long before the Gulf of Tonkin incident.   Do you think that the US public supported the Vietnam War based on the pretext of the Gulf of Tonkin?   How many recruiters did you see marching down the street saying "Avenge the _Maddox_!".   Same with GW1 (Iraqi baby killers) and GW2 (WMD).
> 
> You seem to be painting the notion of the _casus belli_ being a monolithic, all-or-nothing issue.   If you bothered to look into the beginning of these conflicts, you would see that their are many more valid issues (as opposed to Chomsky-esque "government lies and deception") that different segments of society accept as valid reasons for war.   Anyone who takes press sensationalism as the justification for war is stupid (which, unfortunately, is more then we'd like to admit) and anyone who feels that the the government (and the society it represents) finds its sole _casus belli_ in inflated, but relatively insignificant, news-clippings needs to up the Ritalin dosage and take a second look at the big picture.



While my information with regards to the â Å“Gulf of Tonkinâ ? incident starting the â Å“Gulf War,â ? is debatable, the American government sold further justification of the war to the American public. Had the Americans fully supported the war in the first place, the American government wouldn't have found itself in a place where it needed to spread lies and deception in return for public support: â Å“If it bleeds, it leads.â ?


----------



## Fishbone Jones

OK
This is good. This is where it should be, let's try keep it here.


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## 48Highlander

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Have you considered that perhaps the reason that its legitimacy has been significantly diminished is because the strongest nation in the globe, and the most important player in the UN consistently defy it? I certainly think that if the United States participated in the committee and bound itself thereby, the UN would be more enforceable in the international context.



And thank god they do.  Can you imagine the sort of disasters that would occur if "the strongest nation in the globe" allowed itself to be lead  around by a bunch of third world nations and tin-pot dictators?  If it were up to the UN, the US would have been invading Israel instead of Iraq.


----------



## JBP

> Yes you are, but Joe wants the answers that she wants, otherwise we are [pick one] racist/redneck/uncaring/sexist/mean/etc.........
> Sounds like a typical left wing rebuttal to a well-thought out response.



Well EXCUSE me! Do not put words in my mouth! If I was intending to "brand" someone as you might as well have done to me I'd simply say what I meant! My post didn't have any "left wing" in it, I didn't say Infanteers' post was bad at all, in fact I commended him on his posts and this isn't the first time thank you very much! I am a person who posts exactly what I think so if your some kinda expert on me then you should already know I do such and have been called out for it before.

I find it offensive that you would put words in my mouth like that, I honestly do. It was uncalled for and insulting. If you expect to hold others to a higher standard as a leader on this site then at least treat people with respect! Lead by example as they say. I suppose I'm allowed to start putting words in others mouths' then also right???

 :rage:

Certainly not impressive from someone as experienced as you, you could have done much better.
 :threat:


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## Fishbone Jones

Get off the air. If you want to argue, do it with PM's. This is not part of the discussion.


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## jrhume

First let me establish my bonafides, then I'll make two observations -- one general and one specific.

I am a Vietnam veteran who was not a combat soldier (REMF, for those who know the term).  At age 43 I completed a BS in Business and at 52 an MS in Finance.  Both degrees required a fair grounding in practical statistics.

General observation:  MMI's contention that using loaded questions full of her own bias is a legitimate way to conduct a study is so much horse manure.  All one gets in that event is agreement from some and violent disagreement from people who don't agree.  There is no opportunity to find out what people really think on a topic because the parameters of the discussion preclude that.

Some people will attempt to 'educate' the questioner, but such attempts are almost always doomed to failure, because the questioner's mind is not open to change.

A researcher should start with neutral questions when asking for freeform answers and then evaluate the responses in an attempt to discover what the respondents think, then write a paper reflecting the results of the research.

Market researchers are the best at conducting true opinion research.  Why?  Because their companies are going to spend a good deal of money implementing their findings in the form of new products or services.  Soft science academics are the worst sort of researchers because they tend to try and validate their own opinions by using questions difficult to answer or refute in a few paragraphs.  They write papers for professors who share their bias, get a passing grade and go merrily on their way.  And who's to stop them?  No one.  Their work never has to run the gauntlet of a marketplace and the people who get smeared usually never know about it, nor could they have any effect on the results even if they did.   

MMI is looking either to parse the responses for agreement or to produce a paper disparging the opinions of this group.  Mark my word -- most of you will not be happy with what she produces.

Specific observation:  Legitimate historians have concluded the the attack on the destroyer in the Tonkin Gulf actually occured.  Personal note -- I attended college with a retired Navy veteran who watched the attack on radar.  It happened.  The attack on the second night probably did not occur.  Whether the Administration knew within a few day, or ever, that the second attack was likely a false alarm, I don't know.  To my knowledge, opinions on the subject are divided and represent nothing more than various people's opinions.  

The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution afforded a pretext for further US involvement in Vietnam, for good or ill.  Congress may have failed in its responsibility to fully investigate the events leading up to it, but that does not mean anyone 'lied' to anyone else.  My own opinion -- worth no more than any opinion ever can be -- is that Johnson used the attacks, real and purported as a reason for escalating the war against the North Vietnamese.  But the war was already in progress and had been for years prior.  Mistakes happen, even at the highest levels.  The political situation in South Vietnam and Johnson's own frustrations about the whole situation played a part.  

Two years later I found myself in Vietnam.  I'm proud of that service and ashamed that we spent so much blood and treasure only to leave the people of SE Asia to the murderous hands of the North Vietnamese and the Kymer Rouge.

Nuff said.  I'm outta here.

Jim


----------



## Infanteer

That's probably as close to "the horses mouth" as you're going to get, MissMolsonIndy.

Old Guy,  .


----------



## McG

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> 8. With the expected launch of Missile Defense towards the end of 2004, the United States is looking to spend approximately one trillion US dollars (for the entire campaign) to build this system. Critics argue that the money should be spent on diminshing the roots of conflict and terrorism (inequality, poverty, underdevelopment...) instead. Do you agree or disagree? And what are the reasons to support your claim?


Ballistic Missile Defence and the War on Terror are not linked beyond the fact that they are both issues of national security.  However, they have as their objectives different threats to defeat.  You may as well have asked if money spend on sewer improvements would be better spent on BMD.

You have raised the issue of human security (poverty, exploitation, denial of rights, etc) which is closely related to the issue of â Å“roots of terrorism.â ?  Without a doubt more emphasis could be put on human security issues.  However, I will not suggest that money be diverted specifically from BMD, sewer projects in major US cities, university funding, or whatever.


----------



## Brad Sallows

First, I admit I'm too lazy to read through the 6 pages of preceding discussion, so I will just make some comments on the questions.

>6. 49 former US Generals told President Bush that missile defense is a waste of funds, and urged Canada not to join. What is your position on this issue?

Which issue: missile defence, Canadian participation in missile defence, or the fact that 49 retired general officers have announced a position?   If the issue for which you wish to solicit an opinion is "missile defence" or "Canadian participation", why is the factoid about the US general officers included?   Is it more important than all the other points of the debate?   If you want to present facts as part of the question and/or resolution, you should include all of them (whereas, whereas, whereas...), or none.   My position: no-one will know whether BMD is a waste of funds until after the program is complete, just as we had to wait until well after the Apollo program to know all the side benefits that were reaped; Canada should participate; the general officers have opinions and other attributes.

>7. In your opinion, will democracy have a chance to establish itself (temporarily or permanently) in Iraq?

Yes.   Anything not expressly ruled out may occur.

>8. With the expected launch of Missile Defense towards the end of 2004...Critics argue that the money should be spent on diminshing the roots of conflict and terrorism (inequality, poverty, underdevelopment...) instead. Do you agree or disagree? And what are the reasons to support your claim?

I disagree, because the fertile ground of terrorism is oppressive rule rather than poverty, and to dimish the roots of conflict and terrorism does not necessarily diminish the threat of use of nuclear missiles (which are not commonly held by terrorists in any event) by states.   BMD and countermeasures against non-state terror are two separate issues.

>9. If the proposed Missile Defense passes, with active Canadian participation included, do you agree or disagree with the likelihood of this defense system creating an atmosphere where more conflict and more terrorist activity emerges, due to the fact that states (particularly those who do not participate in the "global defense system") feel more vulnerable?

I disagree states will feel more vulnerable.   Most states can't possibly feel any more vulnerable than they do now: they don't have nuclear weapons and delivery systems, and the US does.   The "vulnerability" excuse is surreal.   The status quo is that the US could launch with impunity against irritating states, but does not, not does it (by any source I have read or heard) threaten to do so.   Neither does any other state currently possessing nuclear weapons.   The acquisition of nuclear missile delivery by oppressive regimes is for entirely bad intentions: to continue to be oppressive, and maybe even a little acquisitive.   Moral question: should states which continue to treat their citizens poorly be permitted to acquire a nuclear shield against international (UN-sponsored or otherwise) intervention?

>10. The United Nations Committee suggests that a mere 8-10% (approximately $80 Billion US dollars) of international military spending pee year will meet the basic needs of every citizen on earth (clothing, food, shelter, water, and education). If these are some of the very problems that contribute to terrorist activity, why have appropriate actions not been taken in the efficiency of the "global war on terrorism"?

First, the question can't be answered because the assumption that material need promotes terrorism is improbable.   Second, the cost of a solution and the delivery of that solution are two separate problems.   If my meaning isn't clear, what do you think of the likelihood of any of the money reaching the intended targets?

>11. With recent statistics showing that 70% of Canadians show no desire to join onto the Missile Defense Program for North America, does Canada's participation in the Missile Defense Program look promising in the future years?

Yes, provided the government can shake off its weathervane instincts.

>12. The United States organized an invasion in Iraq on the basis that the Iraqi government was developing and concealing "weapons of mass destruction"... With the United States harbouring the largest military on the globe, and weapons of mass destruction in greater numberm, strength and capability than any other state, could it be argued on the same line of reasoning that the United States is also a "threat to the peace and security of the world"? (US Department of State) In answering this question, it is necessary to look at it from the point-of-view of the "West", as well as the "Peripheral Countries" (less developed, economically and politcally dependent on the West etc...)

You will find in the President's address to the UNGA (Sep 2002) that the case for war was founded on: failure to comply with various UN resolutions related to treatment of citizens, repatriation of prisoners from the Kuwait war, and co-operation with terrorists; assassination attempts; failure to completely accede to disarmament inspections; evidence of continued WMD programs through the 1990s; and subversion of UN-imposed sanctions.   I think that's all, or at least most, of it.

Is the US a threat to the world - no.   Is the US a threat to thugs masquerading as legitimate governments - yes.

>13. As a permanent member of the United Nations, do you believe that the United Staes is subject to and moreover bound by the conditions and negotiations of the international governing body? Why, or why not? Has the United States breached international law?

Do you mean "permanent member of the UNSC"?   Regardless, the US is neither more nor less bound than any other nation signatory to the UN Charter which is a Member State.   The US has probably breached international law on several occasions.   Is there a useful conclusion that should follow that assertion, or merely a righteous and sanctimonious one?   I think it difficult to find a saintly nation, or to find a nation which is prepared, to borrow a phrase, to adhere to "international law" to the extent of a suicide pact.   Certainly there appears to be no mandate in its Charter for the UN to interfere in the internal affairs of any state, no matter how evil and depraved.

>14. The Vietnam War was launched...The Gulf War, was sold...and the war was launched on false information/propaganda. The Iraq War was launched by the United States of America on the basis that Iraq was developing and concealing weapons of mass destruction, with no evidence that these weapons of mass destruction even exist, is it viable that government lies and deception have once again "sold a war" to the media and public?

The US has had to "sell" many of its major war entanglements to its citizens.   Sometimes (eg. WWII) it can't even do that.   I hope you recognize that to invalidate propaganda points doesn't invalidate any of the other pretexts for war.   Kuwait really was invaded.   Hussein's Iraq really was in violation of UNSC resolutions, unco-operative with inspectors, and cheating UN sanctions.   All of the speeches of note are on the record, and mostly (all, I guess) available on the WWW.   It's all out there in the open to be examined - how could that be lies and deception?   If there was deceit, it was self-deceit in the minds of those who chose to narrow their focus on selected reasons.   A broad swath of the media and public seized on "WMD", and now they can't seem to remember anything else.   A campaign of lies and deception does indeed exist, but it may not be the one of which you are thinking.


----------



## Infanteer

MissMolsonIndy,

Since you took the time to respond, I'll offer up my rebuttal.



			
				MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Posing questions on this forum in order to determine readers' opinions with regards to â Å“left-wingâ ? interpretations of Canadian and US Foreign Policy, is equivalent to finding a needle in a haystack. This has been addressed several times already; don't argue for the sake of arguing.
> 
> Indeed. These questions are loaded with my own bias, much like any other opinion that I hold. And while I realize, and agree with you, that the majority of these questions should have been re-phrased in a more objective manner, judging by the responses I've received thus far, I have yet to run into an opinion that runs parallel with my own. Which tells me two things: Firstly, the majority of you are very capable of recognizing and pinpointing bias, and secondly, the â Å“insinuationsâ ? and â Å“pejorative statements,â ? ingrained in my questions, have by no means swayed the individuals on this forum, if anything, my ingrained bias has forced them to think more critically about the questions.
> 
> I find it hard to accept as true that you believe that you can collect completely â Å“neutralâ ? data, on a subjective issue (not to mention one that the public feels strongly about). The fact of the matter is there's no getting around bias in a situation of the sort. There are certainly measures (some of which I've failed to reproduce) that you can take to help eliminate it, but to completely do away with it is impossible if you are collecting data from human beings, who are cognitive, emotional and who piece together a picture of the world that is comprehensible and workable in their frame of thought from social experience. Even if you have taken all of the necessary measures, what â Å“groupings of society,â ? respond to your questionnaire (with participants chosen at large, and at random) is beyond your control. We see the same patterns in the Canadian Electoral system. If Canada could only achieve a voter-turnout of approximately 60% in the last election, at best, what makes you think that the same doesn't occur in polls and other statistics? Individuals have a predisposition to exclude themselves from issues that tend not to concern them, or similarly issues that they stand â Å“neutralâ ? on.



Old Guy really said it best.   Instead of asking a question that begins with a negative opinion on Missile Defence/Iraq/George W Bush/whatever and then asking the question, why don't you simply ask the question?

eg:

instead of:

_14. The Vietnam War was launched on "government lies passed on by pliant mass media," where "North Vietnamese torpedo boats launched an "unprovoked attack" against a U.S. destroyer on "routine patrol" in the Tonkin Gulf on Aug. 2 -- and that North Vietnamese PT boats followed up with a "deliberate attack" on a pair of U.S. ships two days later." The Gulf War, was sold to the United States, "the mother of all clients," by a "it bleeds, it leads" story about babies being tossed out of incubators by Iraqi soldiers. As officials and the mass media learned of the witness's blood ties with the Kuwaiti government, the story began to fall apart, and the war was launched on false information/propaganda. The Iraq War was launched by the United States of America on the basis that Iraq was developing and concealing weapons of mass destruction, with no evidence that these weapons of mass destruction even exist, is it viable that government lies and deception have once again "sold a war" to the media and public?_

couldn't you just ask:

_Do you feel that the media plays a role in legitimizing or presenting a state's justification for war?   If so, what do you think is the nature of this relationship?_



> I respect and admire your ability to think outside the box. And while I can't answer your questions, it will definitely be a criticism explored within the context of my paper.
> 
> I'm unsure of how you have formulated your views on issues in the past, but it is the responsibility of the reader to look for sources and information upon which his/her position will be based; it is not my place to supply you with â Å“qualitative substance.â ?



No.   You're offering of the "bone" of 49 Generals is presented in a way which attempts to lead a person to the answer you want to hear.   When asking someone about what their stance (and hence their own supply of qualitative substance) is on Canadian participation in BMD, the point of 49 Generals is irrelevent.

I could rephrase the question in many ways and the notion of the "expert" would be equally superfluous.   The question is wrong because it injects a notion of someone's opinion into the intended answer and doesn't give the person "all the facts":

_Parliament told President Bush that missile defense is a waste of funds, and urged Canada not to join. What is your position on this issue? _

or

_Wayne Gretzky told President Bush that missile defense is a waste of funds, and urged Canada not to join. What is your position on this issue?_

or

_Spongebob Squarepants told President Bush that missile defense is a waste of funds, and urged Canada not to join. What is your position on this issue?_

Do you see what I'm getting at?



> This is not meant to be taken as a personal attack, Infanteer, but I don't see how this has anything to do with the question. If you don't hold an opinion on a specific latter, then leave it blank.



It has everything to do with the question.   You've attempted to justify the utility of the BMD program based on costs.   A cost/benefit analysis is one good way to approach the issue.   I countered with my own thoughts on a cost/benefit analysis.   Is the cost of the BMD so large that it justifies ignoring ways to prevent the cost of a major metropolitan center being immolated because someone like Kim Jong Il had a bad hair day?



> Indeed. The world is about to witness another arms race. However, I disagree with you that the â Å“increased levels of dangerâ ? have not been given care and consideration: A â Å“Non-Proliferation Treatyâ ? is currently under debate, and is expected to pass through next year some time. The treaty demands the disarmament of nuclear weaponry, and all preventable measures to be taken in order to ensure that the proliferation of nuclear weapons does not spread to rogue states.



Nuclear weapons are the latest incarnation of man's desire to have the "nicest car on the block" - whether that "car" happens to be the largest and strongest warhorses, the Arsenal of Venice, the largest cannon, the _HMS Dreadnought_, or the latest MIRV, it's part and parcel of civilization.   I don't see how a "Non-Proliferation Treaty" (There has been many treaties on Nuclear Disarmament - check them out) is going to suddenly lead us to a utopia.   It would similar to the land-mine treaty; everyone says it's a great thing, but in reality it doesn't solve much (and it just sets people who actually believe it, like us, back one step in the big rat race).

Being that there are literally thousands of nuclear weapons in the arsenals of China and Russia, the notion that the BMD, which is designed to shoot down a few loose missiles, suddenly leading these two states to get paranoid and build thousands more seems to be a little far-fetched.

Besides, I don't see what the notion of BMD (counter-missile technology) has to do with Non-Proliferation (the metastasizing of nuclear technology).



> Which question are you referring to?



The notion that the US Ballistic Missile Defence will breed _"an atmosphere where more conflict and more terrorist activity emerges, due to the fact that states (particularly those who do not participate in the "global defense system") feel more vulnerable?"_ (Your words).   The BMD isn't designed to stop a bomb in a container ship, it is aimed at states that possess limited nuclear arsenals and may be inclined to use them.



> While I cannot personally identify with the statement made above, I'm sure it holds its ground. Statistics are shaky, and those statistics only came from a single poll, in reality, the figures could prove to be much different. While I cannot offer you statistics upon which everyone will agree on, I can say that I sense an overwhelming sense of hostility towards US foreign policy in Canada, and many other parts of the globe. When President Bush makes his appearance in Ottawa next week, protestors are expected to explode onto the streets. I suppose we'll have to wait and see.



Is this "overwhelming sense of hostility toward US foreign policy" genuine though?   Just because a few hundred idiots decide to march down the street opposing "US occupation of Afghanistan" and "Dictator Bush and his Fascist Lies" doesn't mean that the entire population is up in arms.   I believe that tacit approval for the US comes from the "silent majority" - why is it that most of the animosity towards the US seems to only pop up when cameras are around and seems to be propagated by the same people who march against Globalization, The depletion of the ozone layer, and human rights abuses in Tibet.

Try not to confuse a few noisy peons with a general consensus.

That being said, I won't deny that there is genuine opposition to the US policies, but I'd say that this is attributed to a few reasons (among others):

1) Other interests:   Was France really concerned about unilateralist or the Iraqi people - or were they more interested in opposing a war which would put the US in the forefront of the world's foreign polices.   It seems to me that the French were real eager to try and set the EU up as a legitimate counter-balance to US hegemony following the end of the Soviet Union - a plan which fell flat on its face.

2) Penis Envy:   Many people just "hate" the US as a knee-jerk reaction because of the fact that the US is the Hegemonic power on the globe today.   Nobody seems to be protesting the multitude of unilateralist invasions France has launched throughout Africa in the last few decades to secure it's own interests.   Ending up on the top of the pile will naturally garner the United States loads or angst and ire - and envy - by default; it was the same for Rome, Venice, Spain, and Britain.   However, if you sit a normal citizen down and actually set the issues out, I have a feeling they'll take the SUV driving American over the guy in a cave that wants to murder their family.



> I agree, however, keep in mind that it is the participation of this fickle mob that democracy requires in order to keep it functioning.



Yes, put the job of the citizenry is to send representatives to focus on and deliberate the issues for us and to hold them accountable to the duties of their Office, not to decide policy on a whim.

Read Edmund Burke.



> You've made an excellent point: the public-at-large does not go to great lengths to inform themselves, and if nothing else, I would argue that the public is largely uninformed on a variety of issues. Considering the mass media, and the national newspapers constitute the two major forms in which people acquire information (with a relatively small proportion of the population actually looking to alternative sources), both of which are infinitely concentrated into the hands of few both in Canada and the United States, you have a public informed by components of the mass media, each pushing their own agenda/ â Å“spinâ ? on the issue. That being said, it would not come as a surprise to me to learn that the Canadian populace was being pumped with information with a â Å“spin,â ? or disinformation.



I wouldn't say that we're "pumped full of spin"; the average Canadian citizen is at least smart enough to form their own opinions.   The problem is "cognitive dissonance"; when someone latches onto a particular idea that appeals to their world view, they are apt to only really consider evidence that supports their thinking.   Thus, cognitive dissonance leads them to take a position without thoroughly examining the issue.   We're all guilty (as fallible human beings) of cognitive dissonance at times, but I think that the relatively spoiled lifestyle that most Canadians have been lucky enough to inherit leads society to become a little too dissonant a little too fast.   It's hard to sell pragmaticism to someone through the comfort of their own home.



> If the UN is the legislation of the individual states that compose it, then is it not the case that all members are expected to abide by its legislation?



The UN has no sovereignty over the acts of independent states.   Yes, it is the duty of signatories to uphold the Charter, but considering that the UN has been a political pawn-game since day 1, do you really expect any state to adopt such an altruistic view to the detriment of their own interests?



> Have you considered that perhaps the reason that its legitimacy has been significantly diminished is because the strongest nation in the globe, and the most important player in the UN consistently defy it? I certainly think that if the United States participated in the committee and bound itself thereby, the UN would be more enforceable in the international context.



So it is okay for the US to enforce its decisions on others through bullying in the UN, but it is completely unacceptable and bordering on fascism for the US to enforce its decisions and bully others outside of the UN?   The UN will not make politics "clean".   Go back to you Poli Sci 100 class, what is politics all about?   Power.   Whether its exercised in the UN or out of the UN, there is always going to be winners and losers.   You seem to be piling the failure of the UN on the US, but did it ever occur to you that the UN might be failing for more structural reasons - ie: the fact that the United States and the Sudan are viewed as equals?



> While my information with regards to the â Å“Gulf of Tonkinâ ? incident starting the â Å“Gulf War,â ? is debatable, the American government sold further justification of the war to the American public. Had the Americans fully supported the war in the first place, the American government wouldn't have found itself in a place where it needed to spread lies and deception in return for public support: â Å“If it bleeds, it leads.â ?



See Old Guy's interpretation of the event.   I think it firmly points out the old adage that "The First Casulty in War is the Truth" - but I'd be wary of saying that the abuse of truth is a systematic and continous ploy by spooky government guys.



[Edited for spelling mistakes and grammatical errors]


----------



## Infanteer

I see that while I was writing my essay Brad Sallows managed to deliver another good post that is along the basic thrust of my points.

You see, this isn't just me trying to tell you things here....


----------



## enfield

I'm going to wade in here....
My opinions on these matters have already been well articulated by others.

However, I must commend MMI on her attempt to take into account other points of view, and her initiative to find military personnel to give these views. We disagree on a lot, but face it troops, the bias we see in MMI's questions is common to many people, university students, and a fair chunk of society in general. MMI has had the guts to come here, ask her questions, take our rebuttals (a few of which have been rather rude), and carry on. How many other students have done something like that? 
I think a lot of the discussions here have their own bias, so be careful about throwing stones. (for an example of true right wing bias, see SOCNET)

PS I am also a BC Poli Sci student....


----------



## Acorn

Lots of stuff to absorb here. I think I'll have to address the issues in bite-sized chunks.

First will be BMD, as that issue seems to have drawn most of MMI's Question Period-style queries.

As Infanteer alluded to, a good place to start is risk analysis. I'll briefly explain the process (apologies to those who understand it, and for my relatively simplistic explanation.)

In analyzing risk one takes into account two factors: consequences and probability. An example of a scale of consequences: Trivial, Minor, Major, Catastrophic. A scale of probability may look like: Negligible, Low, Medium, High (one doesn't have to match four and four, but I like symmetry).

So, BMD, in my opinion, is a risk of catastrophic consequences, and negligible probability. Infanteer's quote of Brad outlined the logic behind the consequences. I guess I'll have to explain why I believe the probability to be negligible.

The concept is predicated on a State Actor having both means and intent to fire a missile at North America (most likely the US). I say State actor because the means of launching a missile rests now, and for the forseeable future, with states capable of both constructing the warhead and the missile technology capable of delivering it to the North American continent. States with that capability (or with a high probability of possessing that capability now, or in the near future) include the following publically known actors (in no particular order): Britain, France, Russia, China, Israel, India, Pakistan, Iran, North Korea and Japan.

So, we know those with the capability. What about intent? Britain and France can be eliminated as Allies of the US (despite French differences with the current US administration). Russia is also tending towards being a US Ally of sorts, but is also restrained by the doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD).

Sidebar: BMD does not profess to provide comprehensive protection from massive missile attack, as SDI did under Regan. Therefore any claims of it sparking an arms race are spurious. Existing Russian and Chinese arsenals would still be capable of inflicting major damage to the US.

China is also constrained by MAD, even more so, as they do not likely possess an arsenal sufficient to ensure anything remotely like a first strike KO.

Israel's arsenal is small, and not likely targeted at any target outside the Middle East and North Africa - the direct threats the the existence of the Jewish State.

India and Pakistan are aiming at each other, with arsenals still small in size. Neither would be likely to shoot at the US - a country both are trying to cultivate. However, more on Pakistan anon.

Japan relies on the US, and is more likely to develop a nuclear deterrent against other regional threats (if they haven't already).

Iran and North Korea. First, I may have been optimistic regarding capability. At the moment they are only able to target regionally, not inter-continentally. I would assess that they are developing nuclear weapons for two principal reasons: 
1. Prestige - the idea that nukes, and their means of delivery, are the height of technological advancement. In the case of Iran and Pakistan this is also related to reinforcing to the world the the idea that Islam is not backward.
2. Local deterrence - the US would be unlikely to use their overwhelming conventional superiority against these countries if there as the risk of massive US casualties from a nuclear strike.

In terms of intent the above observations indicate that intent to attack North America directly by missile is minimal. 

Now, the final point: should Canada be involved: I say most emphatically YES. We can offer many dual-use technologies to the programme, such as surveillance and communications satellite capabilities. Such capabilities can be used for both military and civilian purposes beyond the support of BMD. We can also, if necessary, permit US weapon systems on our soil. There is precedent for that, and many other countries permit it to this day. This will allow us to retain a voice in continental defence, a voice established in 1940.

Make no mistake, the US will do this without us if they wish. The trick is to turn it to our advantage, and certainly don't use this issue to poke our greatest ally in the eye with a sharp stick.

Acorn


----------



## Infanteer

Good post Acorn, I find myself liking the risk analysis point of looking at it.

The main point of my earlier yakking was to support this statement:



> Sidebar: BMD does not profess to provide comprehensive protection from massive missile attack, as SDI did under Regan. Therefore any claims of it sparking an arms race are spurious. Existing Russian and Chinese arsenals would still be capable of inflicting major damage to the US.



So many of the anti-BMD types use the notion of an "arms race" as the reason against the plan (A goof-ball professor, whom Enfield is now currently enjoying the prostrations of, comes to mind) when it is a far-fetched notion - in your words: probability is negligible.


----------



## Pikache

Nuke is the greatest equalizer. Isn't this the reason why Iran and NK is trying to develop a nuke?


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Infanteer said:
			
		

> MissMolsonIndy,
> 
> Since you took the time to respond, I'll offer up my rebuttal.



And I will offer mine.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Old Guy really said it best.   Instead of asking a question that begins with a negative opinion on Missile Defence/Iraq/George W Bush/whatever and then asking the question, why don't you simply ask the question?
> 
> eg:
> 
> instead of:
> 
> _14. The Vietnam War was launched on "government lies passed on by pliant mass media," where "North Vietnamese torpedo boats launched an "unprovoked attack" against a U.S. destroyer on "routine patrol" in the Tonkin Gulf on Aug. 2 -- and that North Vietnamese PT boats followed up with a "deliberate attack" on a pair of U.S. ships two days later." The Gulf War, was sold to the United States, "the mother of all clients," by a "it bleeds, it leads" story about babies being tossed out of incubators by Iraqi soldiers. As officials and the mass media learned of the witness's blood ties with the Kuwaiti government, the story began to fall apart, and the war was launched on false information/propaganda. The Iraq War was launched by the United States of America on the basis that Iraq was developing and concealing weapons of mass destruction, with no evidence that these weapons of mass destruction even exist, is it viable that government lies and deception have once again "sold a war" to the media and public?_
> 
> couldn't you just ask:
> 
> _Do you feel that the media plays a role in legitimizing or presenting a state's justification for war?   If so, what do you think is the nature of this relationship?_



Yes, you're right, the question could have and should have been phrased in ways that would have reduced any excess indications of bias. The questions, however, have already been formulated, many responses have already been welcomed, and this issue has been addressed several times over; I have made it clear that I am in agreement with you, so why do you insist on beating a dead horse? You don't make your argument any stronger by reiterating the same point again and again.

If you're still convinced that I have come to this forum (which is, needless to say, predominated by conservatism, and by and large â Å“right-wingâ ? views) in search of having my commonly â Å“left-wingâ ? beliefs confirmed, particularly in the sense that the questions I have posed will 'sway' readers towards responding with more â Å“leftistâ ? ideals, values and supporting information, than they otherwise would, then I honestly don't know what more to say, Infanteer...

I have come here to have the very views and supportive evidence that I accept as â Å“truthâ ? to be challenged by alternative ways of thinking. If that weren't the case, would I not be at the local 'war resisters campaign,' bathing in 'idealist goodness'?

Furthermore, I have been erroneously painted with stripes of â Å“academic with a deficiency of real world experienceâ ?, â Å“leftist-eggheadâ ?, and â Å“idealism.â ? Although I can unearth validity in the ways in which â Å“idealistsâ ? paint the world, my views very much run parallel with the realist perspective. I believe that ideology, â Å“a set of expectations, assumptions, beliefs, values and prescriptions for the organization of society,â ? and the most fundamental ways in which human beings render the complexity of the world into something simplistic and comprehensible, inevitably breeds conflict, and conflict, for the most part, promotes change. I do, however, remain skeptical about the ways in which this particular conflict should be dealt with, be it with diplomacy or â Å“hotâ ? conflict. Therefore to paint me as an â Å“idealist war resister,â ? on the basis that I disagree with the fundamental basis and implementation of the Iraq War (for moreover philosophical reasoning than for aiding the Iraqi populace to live freely from an oppressive dictatorship) runs against the perspective in world politics that I most closely associate myself with: realism. Furthermore, to paint me as such also reveals the narrow line of thought in your ideological framework, because if I'm not entirely â Å“forâ ? the war, then I must be â Å“againstâ ? it. I think our good friend George W. Bush says it best: â Å“If you're not with us, you're with the terrorists!â ?

As per the â Å“attacks on Academia,â ? it is my belief that you lack an understanding of how the Academic World functions: academic institutions don't serve as a breeding-ground for â Å“leftistâ ? ideals, if anything, academic institutions provide grounds upon which one formulates and confirms one's own perspectives on local, national and international affairs. How else would one account for â Å“right-wingâ ? politicians (many of which complete their undergraduate degree within Political Science), Infanteer's generally â Å“right-wingâ ? views (who also studied Political Science at a local University, no less), and a large portion of the population who don't necessarily conform to â Å“left-wingâ ? values and ideals? I've had excellent professors, in every which field I have studied, that have come from â Å“left-wingâ ?, â Å“right-wingâ ?, and everything in between. Again, you wrongly assume that because one doesn't fall as far â Å“rightâ ? as possible on the spectrum, that they automatically fall as far â Å“leftâ ? as possible. I fall somewhere in between the rightist and leftist extremes, and refuse to make the case that the majority of individuals fall far â Å“leftâ ?, or far â Å“rightâ ?, when most of the political parties available do not hold fast to either extreme.

Similarly, on the same basis that you have argued that Academia births â Å“leftist-eggheads,â ? I could argue that military institutions birth â Å“right-wing war mongers.â ? Although I cannot speak for all, I personally refrain from this line of reasoning; I simply wanted to indicate that the coin could be flipped either way.

Lastly, no I have not served in the military, but unless you are suggesting that the military is the only means by which one may acquire real world experience, it does not inhibit my potentiality to gain real world experience, nor does it discount any real world experience that I have previously gained.

Likewise, on what basis can you argue that all military personnel have acquired â Å“real world experienceâ ??

Paint me if you so please, just know that you are colouring me on individual grounds, and not on the basis of my arguments.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> It has everything to do with the question.   You've attempted to justify the utility of the BMD program based on costs.   A cost/benefit analysis is one good way to approach the issue.   I countered with my own thoughts on a cost/benefit analysis.   Is the cost of the BMD so large that it justifies ignoring ways to prevent the cost of a major metropolitan center being immolated because someone like Kim Jong Il had a bad hair day?
> 
> The notion that the US Ballistic Missile Defence will breed _"an atmosphere where more conflict and more terrorist activity emerges, due to the fact that states (particularly those who do not participate in the "global defense system") feel more vulnerable?"_ (Your words).   The BMD isn't designed to stop a bomb in a container ship, it is aimed at states that possess limited nuclear arsenals and may be inclined to use them.



If that is how you choose to read into it. Perhaps my question should have been rephrased. My implications were aimed at trying to isolate other variables involved, and (forgive my leftist crayons) perhaps ulterior motivations in the establishing of this Missile Defense Program. National security arguments aside, it is my belief that the implementation of such a program has a strong correlation with a â Å“power-hungryâ ? globe.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Yes, but the job of the citizenry is to send representatives to focus on and deliberate the issues for us and to hold them accountable to the duties of their Office, not to decide policy on a whim.



You bet, however by sending these representatives on our behalf, and holding them accountable to their duties in Office, the public-at-large speaks through a singular voice in order to have their interests and values pursued. Policy may be determined by a few heads at the table, but it is the public that has put these heads in office in order to push a common agenda through the door.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Read Edmund Burke.



Maybe over the Christmas holidays...



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> The UN has no sovereignty over the acts of independent states.   Yes, it is the duty of signatories to uphold the Charter, but considering that the UN has been a political pawn-game since day 1, do you really expect any state to adopt such an altruistic view to the detriment of their own interests?



If the United Nations has no sovereignty over the acts of independent states, then how do you explain the UN sanctions, and possible military action in Darfur, Sudan? The United Nations was set up as an international governing body to impose collective measures on states. The following was taken from the â Å“Mid American Global Education Councilâ ?:

â Å“When the delegate stands up crying about infringements on his/her sovereignty, other delegates just might point out the obligations of all states to uphold all the principles of the UN Charter.   States voluntarily waive some of their sovereign rights simply by agreeing to be in the UN.   It is up to states, individually and collectively, to negotiate to what extent they will surrender their sovereign rights in pursuit of the common good.   In short, not every resolution which calls upon states to alter their behavior is, in fact, an illegal attack on sovereignty.â ? (MAMUN, 2004)

The United Nations certainly doesn't have an unlimited scope of sovereignty over nations, but that does not mean it is completely lacking...



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> See Old Guy's interpretation of the event.   I think it firmly points out the old adage that "The First Casualty in War is the Truth" - but I'd be wary of saying that the abuse of truth is a systematic and continuous ploy by spooky government guys.



I saw it. I'd be interested to have him run his list of â Å“veritable historiansâ ? by me, and explain to me why historians that counter his particular view are by no means â Å“recounting history as it truly happened.â ?



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> [Edited for spelling mistakes and grammatical errors]



Your spelling mistakes and grammatical errors, or mine?

I look forward to a response.


----------



## McG

. . . and on that note, lets try to keep with the topic now.

Debating academia can get its own thread: http://army.ca/forums/threads/22954.0.html


----------



## Infanteer

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Yes, you're right, the question could have and should have been phrased in ways that would have reduced any excess indications of bias. The questions, however, have already been formulated, many responses have already been welcomed, and this issue has been addressed several times over; I have made it clear that I am in agreement with you, so why do you insist on beating a dead horse? You don't make your argument any stronger by reiterating the same point again and again.



I'm only beating it because you insisted on beating it too.   Consider it "Infanteer's stubbornness"....



> If you're still convinced that....
> 
> I have come here to have....
> 
> Furthermore, I have been erroneously painted.....



You happy now?   I don't no what brought this impassioned _apologia_ on.   I was merely trying to help you with the structure of your questions.   I don't recall painting you with any title or trying to find your ulterior motives - I simply stated that you have a bias (which we all do) and how you could help tone it down in the questionnaire.



> As per the â Å“attacks on Academia,â ? it is my belief that you lack an understanding of how the Academic World functions:



Thanks.   I'd like to think that my time spent in the hallowed halls of Buchanan - C Block for 4 years gave me no perspective on my surrounding environment.   If you look at the general trend, you will find academia to be more liberal in their positions.



> Lastly, no I have not served in the military, but unless you are suggesting that the military is the only means by which one may acquire real world experience, it does not inhibit my potentiality to gain real world experience, nor does it discount any real world experience that I have previously gained.
> 
> Likewise, on what basis can you argue that all military personnel have acquired â Å“real world experienceâ ??



Where did I say that?



> If that is how you choose to read into it. Perhaps my question should have been rephrased. My implications were aimed at trying to isolate other variables involved, and (forgive my leftist crayons) perhaps ulterior motivations in the establishing of this Missile Defense Program. National security arguments aside, it is my belief that the implementation of such a program has a strong correlation with a â Å“power-hungryâ ? globe.



Explain "power hungry" globe?   I'm having a hard time seeing how a defensive system consisting of a few ballistic missiles in Alaska is some sort of Machiavellian ploy to assert US Hegemony (which they already have).   Maybe I missed that part when I was busy misunderstanding university....



> You bet, however by sending these representatives on our behalf, and holding them accountable to their duties in Office, the public-at-large speaks through a singular voice in order to have their interests and values pursued. Policy may be determined by a few heads at the table, but it is the public that has put these heads in office in order to push a common agenda through the door.



Now your confusing me.   "Singular Voice"?   What does this have to do with my understanding of Representative Democracy.   I'm not trying to knock what you said, I just don't understand how it relates to my earlier statement.



> Maybe over the Christmas holidays...



Ask nicely, and Santa Claus will bring you Thomas Hobbes too....



> If the United Nations has no sovereignty over the acts of independent states, then how do you explain the UN sanctions, and possible military action in Darfur, Sudan? The United Nations was set up as an international governing body to impose collective measures on states. The following was taken from the â Å“Mid American Global Education Councilâ ?:
> 
> â Å“When the delegate stands up crying about infringements on his/her sovereignty, other delegates just might point out the obligations of all states to uphold all the principles of the UN Charter.   States voluntarily waive some of their sovereign rights simply by agreeing to be in the UN.   It is up to states, individually and collectively, to negotiate to what extent they will surrender their sovereign rights in pursuit of the common good.   In short, not every resolution which calls upon states to alter their behaviour is, in fact, an illegal attack on sovereignty.â ? (MAMUN, 2004)



If you believe that statement, watch how far a UN Peacekeeping mission to Chechnya gets.



> The United Nations certainly doesn't have an unlimited scope of sovereignty over nations, but that does not mean it is completely lacking...



The UN possesses no capabilities of its own - any powers it possesses are those of the member states who choose to execute them.   When the largest economic and military power in the world says that it won't be dealing through the UN, then that notion you presented is displayed for the charade it is.



> I saw it. I'd be interested to have him run his list of â Å“veritable historiansâ ? by me, and explain to me why historians that counter his particular view are by no means â Å“recounting history as it truly happened.â ?



Having a witness statement from one who was present at the Gulf of Tonkin incident is usually a credible source.   Not saying I buy his version outright, just that there are probably more sides to the story then "government lies aimed to sell an illegal war to the American public".



> Your spelling mistakes and grammatical errors, or mine?



Mine.   The 80 psi fingers are not conducive to a good looking yarn.



> I look forward to a response.



Well, look no further....


----------



## McG

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> 11. With recent statistics showing that 70% of Canadians show no desire to join onto the Missile Defense Program for North America, *does Canada's participation in the Missile Defense Program look promising in the future years? *


If â Å“promisingâ ? means â Å“likely,â ? then I cannot say.  The brokerage style politics typical in this country often leads governments to make popular decisions that may not be the best in the long run.  Remember the the decision to intern ethnic Japanese during WW II was driven by popular opinion despite being described as unnecessary by RCMP and military officials.  However, there is hope that the government will make the decision based on what is right for Canada (and not the next election).  As has already been described, the government must do its â Å“risk analysis.  



			
				MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> 12. The United States organized an invasion in Iraq on the basis that the Iraqi government was developing and concealing "weapons of mass destruction". "Saddam Hussein's quest to acquire weapons of mass destruction (WMD) has been systematic and relentless," reports the US Department of State. With the United States harbouring the largest military on the globe, and weapons of mass destruction in greater numberm, strength and capability than any other state, *could it be argued, on the same line of reasoning, that the United States is also a "threat to the peace and security of the world"?* (US Department of State) In answering this question, it is necessary to look at it from the point-of-view of the "West", as well as the "Peripheral Countries" (less developed, economically and politcally dependent on the West etc...)


No.  The US does not have a history of government orchestrated crimes against humanity (including genocide). The US leadership is not corrupt and holding on to power through fear and violence.  If anything the threat is economic exploitation of impoverished nations by western corporations operating within the regulations of corrupt local powers.  This is something the western world should address (possibly through the UN) with an international human security policy/program.  However, this is well outside the scope of your question.



			
				MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> 14. The Vietnam War was launched on "government lies passed on by pliant mass media," where "North Vietnamese torpedo boats launched an "unprovoked attack" against a U.S. destroyer on "routine patrol" in the Tonkin Gulf on Aug. 2 -- and that North Vietnamese PT boats followed up with a "deliberate attack" on a pair of U.S. ships two days later." The Gulf War, was sold to the United States, "the mother of all clients," by a "it bleeds, it leads" story about babies being tossed out of incubators by Iraqi soldiers. As officials and the mass media learned of the witness's blood ties with the Kuwaiti government, the story began to fall apart, and the war was launched on false information/propaganda. The Iraq War was launched by the United States of America on the basis that Iraq was developing and concealing weapons of mass destruction, with no evidence that these weapons of mass destruction even exist, *is it viable that government lies and deception have once again "sold a war" to the media and public?*


Is it possible that the US intelligence community just came to the wrong conclusions?  Conclusions, which had they not been wrong, could have been grounds for invasion?

Regardless, you have oversimplified the origins of all three wars and ignored the majority of factors (choosing instead to focus on the media sensationalized events).  Your criticism here should not be of the US government.  It should be of US news media. 

Going back to one of my earlier posts:





			
				McG said:
			
		

> Your topic is pretty broad/vague as posted. Are you contrasting Canada's definition of the war on terror with the US definition (which included Iraq), or are you exploring something else. Perhaps your looking at issues of human security vs national security?


How do you define the war on terror?  You've made no mention of military actions in Afghanistan.  You focus on the unrelated issue BMD.  You reference human security issues but seem to believe that the humanitarian aspects are mutually exclusive of the military aspects.  *What is "the War on Terror" to you?  What should it be?*


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Goober said:
			
		

> The motive behind Bush invading Iraq was to end Saddam's tyranny. Is that a crime?



I believe there to be multiple motives behind the invasion, some of which are justifiable, and others clearly not.
Whether or not the war unjust is really dependent on how large of a driving force you assign to each motive.


----------



## McG

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> I believe there to be multiple motives behind the invasion, some of which are justifiable, and others clearly not.


What unjustifiable motives do you believe caused the war?


----------



## Ty

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> I believe there to be multiple motives behind the invasion, some of which are justifiable, and others clearly not.
> Whether or not the war unjust is really dependent on how large of a driving force you assign to each motive.



A quick caveat- the war is justifiable if you believe that any one motive carries enough weight to offset the immediate consequences of your actions.  For example, if you believed that the tyranny in Iraq had to come to an end immediately and that belief was so strong that it justifies the means, then you go ahead.  It seems that you believe that since some people's motives may be unjustifiable in your opinion, it negates the legitimacy of the war based on other peoples motives, which, again in your opinion, may be  justifiable.  I'm unsure if I misinterpreted your post.  

My personal belief is that the Bush administration carried out the invasion of Iraq for far less honourable intentions than liberation of an oppressed people- a point that can be debated ad nauseam on this board (and already has); However, I supported military action in Iraq as Husain's regime was creating another pot of instability in the powder keg of the middle east.  I am not ignoring the damage created by military forces in Iraq (100,000 civilian deaths), nor am I ignoring the occupying force's casualties, and I am certainly not condoning the criminal misbehaviour of some American troops, but these unfortunate facts are ones that we must accept in a modern military operation.  You don't have to like it (I certainly abhor this fact), but if you hold any of the motives of which you speak as justifiable, than you must understand that this is the way it had to be.  

At the risk of sounding partisian, you are either for the war, or against it- both stances are based on your own justifications.  If you choose the former, then you must accept that the negative consequences of your decision will be far more tangible and immediate than the latter.


----------



## Docherty

Just curious to know how many of you think Canada will ever have to go to Iraq and if so when?


----------



## Da_man

Mr. Martin has been very clear on the subject, Canada is not going in Iraq.


----------



## MikeM

Yes but Mr. Martin's government could collapse at any time. In the event that someone else takes over as PM, such as Harper, do you think we would then commit to the war in Iraq?


----------



## Greg_o

Its the governments job to lie, so the people feel safe..


----------



## Redeye

MikeM said:
			
		

> Yes but Mr. Martin's government could collapse at any time. In the event that someone else takes over as PM, such as Harper, do you think we would then commit to the war in Iraq?



Deployment to Iraq is highly unlikely, given how much of a footprint we're placing in Afghanistan.  Not only that, it seems there would be very little public support for any deployment there, something that any government has to take into consideration.


----------



## I_am_John_Galt

MMI, I realize I'm a little late to the party here, and I don't want to beat a dead horse too much, but as someone with degrees in Political Economy and Business, and having done surveys and written papers myself, I also will suggest you re-read Old Guy's post on the previous page.

The phrasing of the questions you've asked are loaded with presumption and bias: the answers you will get will be likewise distorted.  If you are looking to skew your results this is a very good way to do it, but they will be meaningless in any statistical sense.  IMHO, you should really re-examine your questions before you get too far down the road on this one ...

It is encouraging to see that while you have your convictions, you are at least willing to hear conflicting arguments and opinions: there is not enough of this these days!

Just trying to be helpful .... cheers!


----------



## Acorn

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> I believe there to be multiple motives behind the invasion, some of which are justifiable, and others clearly not.
> Whether or not the war unjust is really dependent on how large of a driving force you assign to each motive.



The obverse of that is that some *opposed* to the invasion clearly had multiple motives, some of which are justifiable and some which are clearly not.

Acorn


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

a_majoor said:
			
		

> My main problem with the "leftist" position is they still seem to focus only on the undeniable collateral effects of war, without looking at the political objectives the war is meant to achieve. This allows people to make silly statements like "Bush is a war criminal" with a straight face, since for the most part, they really have no idea what they are talking about. If 100,000 people have been killed in Iraq due to the actions of the coalition (BTW, this was a speculation, not an informed casualty count, see the "100,000 and counting" thread), then a very high price has been paid, but the political ends; removing an aggressive and destabilizing regime, breaking support links to various terrorist organizations, preventing the resumption of WMD research and development, and saving the citizens of the country from further oppression; would seem to make taking action worthwhile. Since the real casualty count is much lower, then the price is acceptable for what has been achieved, and since the conventional laws of war have been followed quite scrupulously by the coallition, then there is no case for stating the President is a "war criminal".



I disagree. I think that the "leftist" position (if you can even call it that these days) presents the undesirable consequences of war in an attempt to weigh them with the political objectives (i.e., in pursuing a certain political, economic and or social objective by means of warfare, is the resulting damage too significant or reasonable, for the lack of a better word, for the cause?) The process of policy making has a mandate to evaluate the results of any policy passed (domestic or foreign), and to further decide whether or not the decision made is the approriate route of action or non-action, and unless the decision-making process is placed entirely into "leftist" hands (which it wasn't, the last time I checked), then this process is similar for "right-wing" positions. Certainly, in the end, both parties will follow their own objectives, but that doesn't outrule possible consequences that don't happen to follow closely with their party line.

Furthermore, with the same line of reasoning that you've just presented, one could argue that the "rightist" position fails to take into account the "undeniable collateral effects of war," and simply pursues its own political agenda. You see, you can flip the coin both ways. Both sides of the coin are a little extreme for where I stand on the issue. I disagree with and challenge the notion that if you're not one, then you must be the other: one can further the political objectives of a state as well as take action to reduce the negative social, economic and political impact that will result.

I agree that certain political objectives were pursued in Iraq for collective reason, but I stand my ground as far as conduct of the war, and I believe that to be the position that is heavily under debate.



			
				a_majoor said:
			
		

> The other problem with most "leftists" is even when confronted by factual evidence, they will simply dismiss you with some insult and carry on as if you had never spoken. The only thing for "ignorent redneck cracker bible-thumping baby-killers" to do is continue to press on, find the facts and publish them wherever you can. It can't hurt, and you might help someone somewhere.



I'm sorry, but I couldn't keep a straight face in reading this response...

I agree with you on the basis that when an issue is undergoing debate, both sides push personal issues in the line of attack, but I think that your claim that only "leftists" do this, is outrageous. I can pick out multiple examples on this forum, including this thread, where personal attacks have been thrown at someone for representing leftist ideals, or ideals that stray further left than those on this board. If I need to drag them out for you, I will. I disagree with debates being pulled down to an individual level, but you'll realize that many of your fellow conservative posters can have the accusatory finger pointed at them, including yourself.

This is not a phenonmenon specific to any one ideology...


----------



## a_majoor

*Europe's Ritual Dance*

The Western counterpart of Iran's deception.

The European "solution" to the threat of Iranian atomic bombs bids fair to join the "peace process" as the most boffo running gag in the history of show biz. Every few months, the elegantly dressed diplomatic wizards from London, Paris, and Berlin race across a continent or two to meet with Iranians dressed in turbans and gowns, and after some hours of alleged hard work, they emerge with a new agreement, just like their more numerous counterparts engaged in the peace negotiations. The main difference is that the peace-process deals seemed to last for several months, while the schemes hammered out with the mullahs rarely last more than a week or two. Otherwise, it's the same sort of vaudeville routine: a few laughs, with promises of more to come.

The latest Iranian shenanigan may have set a record for speed. On Monday they announced they had stopped the centrifuges that were enriching uranium. On Tuesday they asked for permission to run the centrifuges again. The Europeans sternly said no. The next scene will be at Turtle Bay, with brief interruptions for somewhat off-color remarks about sexual harassment at high levels (so to speak) of the United Nations.

No serious person can believe that the negotiations are going to block, or even seriously delay, the Iranian race to acquire atomic bombs. The European posturing is the Western counterpart of the Iranian deception, a ritual dance designed to put a flimsy veil over the nakedness of the real activities. The old-fashioned name for this sort of thing is "appeasement," and was best described by Churchill, referring to Chamberlain's infamous acceptance of Hitler's conditions at Munich. Chamberlain had to choose between war and dishonor, opted for the latter, and got the former as well. That is now the likely fate of Blair, Chirac, and Schroeder. 

They surely know this. Why do they accept it? 

They accept it for many reasons, of which two seem paramount: They have huge financial interests tied up with the Iranian regime (billions of dollars worth of oil and gas contracts, plus other trade agreements, some already signed, others in the works); and Iran is the last place in the Middle East where they can play an active diplomatic role. This is particularly acute for France, which knows it will long be a pariah to free Iraqi governments, and views Iran as its last chance to thwart America's dominant role in the region. Sad to say, there is no evidence that the Europeans give a tinker's damn either about the destiny of the Iranian people, or about Iran's leading role in international terrorism, or about the Islamic Republic's joining the nuclear club. They are quite prepared to live with all that. 

I think they expect Iran to "go nuclear" in the near future, at which point they will tell President Bush that there is no option but to accept the brutal facts â â€ the world's leading sponsor of terrorism in possession of atomic bombs and the missiles needed to deliver them on regional and European targets â â€ and "come to terms" with the mullahcracy. In other words, as the editorialists at the Wall Street Journal have wryly commented, the real goal of the negotiations is to restrain the United States, which, left to its own devices, might actually do something serious. If President Bush found a way to prevent Iran from acquiring atomic bombs, it might well wreck the Europeans' grand appeasement strategy.

There is certainly no risk that the United Nations will do anything serious, which is why the Europeans keep insisting that it is the only "legitimate" forum for any discussion of the Iranian nuclear menace. 
At the same time, I rather suspect that the Europeans, like many of our own diplomats, would be secretly pleased if someone else â â€ that is to say, Israel â â€ were to "do something" to rid them of this problem. When they whisper that thought to themselves in the privacy of their own offices or the darkness of their own bedrooms, they mentally replay the Israeli bombing of the nuclear reactor in Osirak, Iraq, in 1981, an attack they publicly condemned and privately extolled. They would do the same tomorrow, sighing in relief as they tighten the noose around Israel's neck. Rarely has the metaphor of the scapegoat been so appropriate: the burden of our sins of omission loaded onto the Israelis, who are then sacrificed to atone for us all.

This may seem sheer wishful thinking, but wishful thinking is an important part of foreign policy. The idea that "we don't need to do anything, because so-and-so will do our dirty work for us" has in fact been central to Western strategy in the Middle East for quite a while. For example, it was practiced by Bush the Elder in 1991 at the end of Desert Storm, when the president openly mused that it would be simply wonderful if the Kurds and Shiites overthrew Saddam Hussein. They tried it, foolishly believing that if things went badly the United States would support them. But Bush the First was quite serious about his wishful thinking, and stood by as Saddam slaughtered them â â€ the scapegoats of the hour â â€ by the tens of thousands.

Similar wishful thinking is now at the heart of European â â€ and probably a good deal of American â â€ strategic thinking about the Iranian nuclear project. That it is a disgusting abdication of moral responsibility and a strategic blunder of potentially enormous magnitude is both obvious and irrelevant to the actual course of events. 

I do not believe Israel will solve this problem for us, both because it is militarily very daunting and because successive Israeli governments have believed that Iran is too big a problem for them, and if it is to be solved, it will have to be solved by the United States and our allies. Whether that is true or not, I have long argued that Iran is the keystone of the terrorist edifice, and that we are doomed to confront it sooner or later, nuclear or not. Secretary of State Powell disagreed, and he was at pains recently to stress that American policy does not call for regime change in Tehran â â€ even though the president repeatedly called for it. And the president is right; regime change is the best way to deal with the nuclear threat and the best way to advance our cause in the war against the terror masters. We have a real chance to remove the terror regime in Tehran without any military action, but rather through political means, by supporting the Iranian democratic opposition. According to the regime itself, upwards of 70 percent of Iranians oppose the regime, want freedom, and look to us for political support. I believe they, like the Yugoslavs who opposed Milosevic and like the Ukrainians now demonstrating for freedom, are entitled to the support of the free world. 

Even if you believe that a nuclear Iran is inevitable, is it not infinitely better to have those atomic bombs in the hands of pro-Western Iranians, chosen by their own people, than in the grip of fanatical theocratic tyrants dedicated to the destruction of the Western satans?

And maybe it isn't inevitable. Faster, please.

â â€ Michael Ledeen, an NRO contributing editor, is most recently the author of The War Against the Terror Masters. Ledeen is Resident Scholar in the Freedom Chair at the American Enterprise Institute.


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## jmackenzie_15

All I have to say is, it's going to be a long time before there isnt any work for Canadian Peacekeepers/Warfighters to take care of.   :threat:


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## a_majoor

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> I disagree. I think that the "leftist" position (if you can even call it that these days) presents the undesirable consequences of war in an attempt to weigh them with the political objectives (i.e., in pursuing a certain political, economic and or social objective by means of warfare, is the resulting damage too significant or reasonable, for the lack of a better word, for the cause?) The process of policy making has a mandate to evaluate the results of any policy passed (domestic or foreign), and to further decide whether or not the decision made is the appropriate route of action or non-action,...



I doubt that anyone in the US administration is persuing war for its own sake, and indeed, if you remember the 2000 election, President Bush campaigned almost exclusively on domestic issues, and rejected the idea that America needed to insert itself into nation building or prolonged peacekeeping missions. On Sept 11, 2001, that position became untenable. 

Various diplomatic efforts, the 12 year enforcement of the "no fly zone", the now revealed corruption in the "Oil for Food program" were doing little to contain Iraq's aggression, the risks of inaction were escalating constantly, and a repeat of the 9/11 attacks was far to high a price to pay. The political objective, to be blunt, is the safety of the American people, and I would expect from historical analogy they will be prepared to pay an enormous amount of blood and treasure for that. The closing battles of WW II, the various small wars during the cold war period, the gigantic sums expended to contain the USSR all suggest that the Americans will stay the course, and will regrettably accept the collateral damage as part of the cost of protecting themselves.

Per the last lines of my post, I have had the misfortune to encounter people who (without being aware of my military affiliation) launch into tirades against the war and keep going even in the face of contrary evidence (i.e. President Clinton did exactly the same thing in Kosovo, Haliburton received contracts in Bosnia on the same terms as the ones in Iraq without a peep from anyone etc.). If I press the point, I am usually rewarded with an insult, which seems to pass for "debate" among  this crowd. I have no problem with people who believe in "left wing" political philosophies (some of my best friends belong to the NDP or are members of the Teachers Union), as long as they are willing to support positions with facts then debates are enlightening and enjoyable. "Spouting off" is not debate (not that I am accusing you MMI), and yes, many conservatives are prone to do this as well...


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## I_am_John_Galt

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> I disagree. I think that the "leftist" position (if you can even call it that these days) presents the undesirable consequences of war in an attempt to weigh them with the political objectives (i.e., in pursuing a certain political, economic and or social objective by means of warfare, is the resulting damage too significant or reasonable, for the lack of a better word, for the cause?)



Unfortnately the "leftist" position _leaves_ the analysis/debate at "undesirable consequences" vs. "sinister motives": there is much reluctance from the left to accept, or even acknowledge, the _desirable_ (intentional or not) consequences of war ...


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## Bograt

We can go at nausea regarding the justification of the military action in Iraq.

My silly question to the "lefties" is "What do you propose to do now." Its a mess- Kurd, Shiites, Turkey Iran, Syria, Sunnies (sp) all ready to skin themselves. If the US leaves what then? 

It is easy to bitch and moan about the current situation, but your argument would have more weight if you offered some kind of alternative. So what is it... I'm listening.


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## rifleman

Come on, easy solution there, walk away. Funny thing is, people survived there before us and will after us too


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## winchable

I'm a "leftie" But sure as hell don't object to war or a great big military.

Gah that's starting to bug me.

2 Dimensional politics are politics for dummies and it's pretty obvious that no one here is a dummy.

As for the war on terror.
And don't anybody take this the wrong way, I think that for the present it's a good thing obviously and the present world leaders/countries should stay in and finish the job. But in the long run, the history of the region suggests that the modern concept of "Democracy" will not last long.
The longest lasting governments have been empires and military regimes, whereas the elected ones with idealistic thoughts of installing good western civility seem to be on the outs.


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## Bograt

Che,

By no means did I mean to suggest that there are two sides to this debate. I absolutely respect your opinion. My issue is what do we do now? When the boat is sinking this is not the time to argue about who steered the ship into the iceburg. What do we do now? If the US pulls out of Iraq there will be civil war and perhaps a larger conflict between Turkey, Iran, Syria etc...

The world is not black and white, nor are countries inspired by evil or righteousness. It is a constant balance of trying to achieve national interests with the least amount of harm.


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## winchable

Oh no worries, it wasn't directed at anyone in particular I've just been counting the number of times I've seen the word leftist today and it's almost making me as sick as when people espouce any extreme view.



> The world is not black and white, nor are countries inspired by evil or righteousness.



I'm beginning to wonder whether or not this is true today...for either side.



> It is a constant balance of trying to achieve national interests with the least amount of harm.



True, but I've noticed lately, especially around these parts that people are choosing to ignore the fact that balancing and achieving national interests involves listening to those _"leftists"_.
I've seen some well informed well argued opinions from the other side and I've seen these arguments retorted by a barrage of sometimes well informed arguments but almost always they're mixed in with insults and this is exact same thing that we complain about here happening.
This is a phenomena that has arisen as of late.


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## I_am_John_Galt

Che said:
			
		

> in the long run, the history of the region suggests that the modern concept of "Democracy" will not last long ... the elected ones with idealistic thoughts of installing good western civility seem to be on the outs.



Care to expand on this?


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## winchable

The Ottomans ran the region for about 500 years through an imperial Turkey based and military heavy regime.
They had the advantage of not being plagued by the media and humans rights watches and not having to uphold any ideal of democracy.
Do you think that a government working under the guise of democracy would work in a country of tribes unified by a treaty made in 1746 after years (thousands) of tribalism?
Empires have held the region under moderate stability, Military regimes hold stability. This modern notion of democracy has ended something like this in Afghanistan:


> (assassination), 1929 (abdication), 1929 (execution), 1933 (assassination), 1973 (deposition), 1978 (execution), 1979 (execution), 1979 (execution), 1987 (removal), 1992 (overthrow) and 1996 (overthrow).



And in Iraq after the Monarchy was overthrown in 1958 and named a republic, the Ba'ath party took power and that worked out quite well.

Afghanistan has been occupied by the perisans, alexander and genghis khan and it has always reverted to tribes in power.
Iraq was held by the caliphs until the ottomans and if you look at anything past the treaty of sevres in 1918 it's been assasination, coup etc.

I have no doubt that the war on terror will do a lot in the short run to save our hides by routing many of the bad guys. However Afghanistan(especially), Iraq will go the way of any other democratically elected regime in the region, the dustbin. Eventually the west will lose interest, perhaps when another means of fuel is found? And the people of the region will be left to their own devices which will result in the natural Arabian state, that of Tribes, city states etc.

I think that we will not live to see the end of the war on terror, but it will bring us stability in our lifetimes, quite frankly beyond that I care little. However history judges all things and I wonder how people will see it a hundred years from now?


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## Ty

"The war on terror"- that phrase irks me to no end.   How do you wage war- in the traditional sense- against a concept?   If they're using it in the not so traditional sense, then the REAL war on terror wouldn't be primarily a military war.   It would target inequality, ignorance and, to a lesser degree, poverty.   I'm probably going to take heat on this, but I truly believe that no-one wants to die, regardless of what afterlife has been promised.   Humans, regardless of nationality, have an ingrained need for self-preservation.   Indeed, it's one of the main columns supporting the definition of life.   If we examine those people that not only put themselves in harm's way, but actually set out to kill themselves- those that commit suicide, those that ram battleships with aircraft, and those that hijack planes and crash them into buildings- the underlying principles are the same:   Distress, duty, and desolation- or a combination of the three.   The explanation that terrorists do what they do because they are "evil" is absurd and dangerous.   They do what they do because they believe, on whatever level, what they are doing is right- either to their people or to themselves directly.     To me, winning the "war on terror" doesn't mean tracking down every last terrorist cell and bombing them, it means eliminating the root causes of terrorism.

It means revisiting foreign policy in a global context and not always doing what is absolute best for you, but something that you can live with and would make the world, on a whole, a better place.   Before some sling arrows here, I'm not a pacifist.   I realize that some people, usually the "haves" of respective societies, will not allow this in order to protect their way of life (i.e. the Taliban among hundreds of others). And where there is unequivocal support and a cry for help form a truly oppressed people- and where diplomacy falls on deaf ears- we should explore the use of force.   

All said, if a nation wishes to route out terrorist cells, organizations, and individuals, that right, with the adequate proof, should unequivocally be there and supported.   However, doing so will not address the root causes of terrorism and will only delay terrorist acts- not eliminate them.   Only by giving people no basic need to be terrorists will we ever succeed at the latter.     I never support terrorism which I define as the undue and intentional targetting of non-combatants- please don't take my post to be justification or acceptance of any terrorist act.

That said, I have absolutely no evidence besides empirical personal and first-hand observations to back up any of those statements-   please take them as you will.


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## Acorn

TA, I agree to a certain extent that "War on Terror" is a bit absurd. However, I think you have followed the wrong path as to the root causes. You are right that human nature is self-preservation, but wrong (IMO) in the assumption that suicide attackers are motivated by "sistress, duty and desolation." It's indoctrination, pure and simple, that creats a suicide attacker. Distress and desolation may take part, but more often do not. I would pose that not one of the 9/11 attackers suffered distress or desolation, and any duty was questionable. They were indoctrinated to believe that the US was a great enemy, and that suicide is "martyrdom" that grants greater priviledge in the afterlife.

Acorn


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## a_majoor

Just as an aside, Osama Bin Laden came from a wealthy family. Mohamed Atta and the other 19 attackers in the 9/11 plot were well off by Arab standards, and if they had completed flight training, potentially could have made very good incomes as airline pilots in the west. Yassar Arafat was one of history's great Kleptocrats, no one knows for certain how much money funneled to "the cause" ended up in his bank accounts.

_The root cause of terror is power,_ and the terrorist has discovered that spreading fear is a very fast and potent means of gaining power. If the terror masters can indoctrinate young and naive persons into becoming suicide bombers, then they create a very sinister weapon to spread more fear, and hopefully gain more power in turn. It is not the Bin Ladens or Arafats who wear the vests but rather celebrate the spread of fear against their "enemies" to consolodate their power within their own limited spheres. (For those of you with classical education, think "better reign 'or Hell than be a servant in Heaven"). Left unchecked, they will eventually grow to the extent they can take over states (SA street thugs in 1930, rulers of Germany by 1936), or in the modern age, religions.

TA is right in a way, discredit the terror masters in their own lands and they will find their flow of funds and recruits dry up, and the power they so covet runs through their hands like water. Unfortunately for us, the best way to discredit the terror masters is to hand them their heads on a plate, or pummel their followers with a totally humiliating defeat. A rapid CIMIC/PSYOPS campaign along with Nation building afterwards will prevent the rebirth of the terrorist idiologies; National Socialism is no longer alive as a motivating force in Germany, nor is Imperial aggrandizement the ruling meme in Japanese culture.


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## McG

Would early intervention in failed states & against represive governments make a substantial dent in terrorist recruiting pools or do we have more to worry from certain "stable" states?


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## 48Highlander

TA said:
			
		

> I'm probably going to take heat on this, but I truly believe that no-one wants to die, regardless of what afterlife has been promised.



Look at how many suicides take place across north america every year.  I can say, with a fair ammount of confidence, that the majority of us have at some point or another considered suicide.  Especially during the teenage years.  Obviously, none of us have followed through on it, but just try to imagine what it would be like to live in a society that encourages "martyrdom".  Having a cause to die for when you're already considering suicide....and being able to do it with the touch of a button....I don't know.  If I had been born and raised in, for instance,  Palestine, I know that I may very well have ended up being a suicide bomber.  I'm not trying to justify their actions, I'm just pointing out that there ARE a lot of people who, at some point in their lives, want to die.  The only reason most of them don't (in our culture) is because they're concerned about how it would affect their family and friends.  But in a culture which encourages suicide bombings...what motives could stop an angst-ridden teenager from strapping on some explosives and walking onto a bus and hitting the button?


----------



## NavyGrunt

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Look at how many suicides take place across north america every year.   I can say, with a fair ammount of confidence, that the majority of us have at some point or another considered suicide.   Especially during the teenage years.   Obviously, none of us have followed through on it, but just try to imagine what it would be like to live in a society that encourages "martyrdom".   Having a cause to die for when you're already considering suicide....and being able to do it with the touch of a button....I don't know.   If I had been born and raised in, for instance,   Palestine, I know that I may very well have ended up being a suicide bomber.   I'm not trying to justify their actions, I'm just pointing out that there ARE a lot of people who, at some point in their lives, want to die.   The only reason most of them don't (in our culture) is because they're concerned about how it would affect their family and friends.   But in a culture which encourages suicide bombings...what motives could stop an angst-ridden teenager from strapping on some explosives and walking onto a bus and hitting the button?



Especially when your family gets that fat paycheck and everyone goes around worshipping your memory....


----------



## rifleman

a_majoor said:
			
		

> Just as an aside, Osama Bin Laden came from a wealthy family. Mohamed Atta and the other 19 attackers in the 9/11 plot were well off by Arab standards, and if they had completed flight training, potentially could have made very good incomes as airline pilots in the west. Yassar Arafat was one of history's great Kleptocrats, no one knows for certain how much money funneled to "the cause" ended up in his bank accounts.
> 
> _The root cause of terror is power,_ and the terrorist has discovered that spreading fear is a very fast and potent means of gaining power. If the terror masters can indoctrinate young and naive persons into becoming suicide bombers, then they create a very sinister weapon to spread more fear, and hopefully gain more power in turn. It is not the Bin Ladens or Arafats who wear the vests but rather celebrate the spread of fear against their "enemies" to consolodate their power within their own limited spheres. (For those of you with classical education, think "better reign 'or heck than be a servant in Heaven"). Left unchecked, they will eventually grow to the extent they can take over states (SA street thugs in 1930, rulers of Germany by 1936), or in the modern age, religions.
> 
> TA is right in a way, discredit the terror masters in their own lands and they will find their flow of funds and recruits dry up, and the power they so covet runs through their hands like water. Unfortunately for us, the best way to discredit the terror masters is to hand them their heads on a plate, or pummel their followers with a totally humiliating defeat. A rapid CIMIC/PSYOPS campaign along with Nation building afterwards will prevent the rebirth of the terrorist idiologies; National Socialism is no longer alive as a motivating force in Germany, nor is Imperial aggrandizement the ruling meme in Japanese culture.



First, There are very few leaders in governments that are poor middle class working types. They also use the naive and young to further their view for the betterment of the nation. You won't see Bush or Martin putting on a vest and doing sentry on the line. 

Second, Handing the "terror masters" their heads on a platter only allows the position to be filled by someone else who will now swear revenge. As for the followers, you have to show them that their is a better way of living. Having Families in other countries, living this life can be a powerful weapon against creating new followers

I argue that if a person is constantly told that the enemy is an evil nation bent on destroying them, then that nation ends up bombing the heck out of thier homes, killing their dog, just reinforces what the "terror masters" told them. No CIMIC/ Psyops can fight that. - We are hurting you cause we love you.

Every situation has to be looked at differently and treated differently.

Just my view outside of the Lefist/Right spectrum


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## I_am_John_Galt

Che,

You have made an excellent argument for why would should be supporting the idea of democracy in the Middle East.  Democracy doesn't spontaneously break-out: it comes about as a result of use of (or successful resistance to) force and/or coercion (generally aided, if not foisted, by an outside power).

With few exceptions, Middle Eastern countries have simply not had the situation where the "democrats" enjoyed the strongest support (Israel's experience suggests this is the result of a lack of external support).  Much like Japan, which had no democratic tradition and was coerced into it, they will be grateful a hundred years from now!


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## Kirkhill

I am a "Top Down" type of person when it comes to wars and revolutions.

I believe that most armed insurrections, etc start when the person or people next to the throne see no chance at achieving the throne.  To achieve their personal goals, whether they are doing for self-aggrandizement, out of idealism or evil intent, they then work to secure an activist core (organizers and soldiers) and a base of support.  The activist core probably includes a fair share of idealists as well as those that are in it out of self-interest.  The base of support is created by telling the populace at large how bad things are, how the problems are the fault of those warming the throne and how much better they will be if only the new crop of leaders gets to run the show.

The procedure is the same whether or not we are talking about Russian, French, American or British revolutions or civil wars, Hitler's Germany or Canadian and US elections.

To get to power you must define some deficit in peoples' lives, make it obvious too them, then convince them it can be changed, it must be changed and you can change it.

It doesn't matter if the issue is bread, conscription, poverty, liberty, abortion, freedom of religion or even riding to hounds.   It is only important to find and exploit an issue.

I agree that by treating poverty and making people prosperous they are likely to become indolent and idle.  Just like most of us in the West.  And that certainly is one way to undermine the enemy, by taking away his arguments.

However even in our own prosperous, indolent an idle country people can sow dissension.  Tanks, Health Care, Aircraft Carriers, Abortion, Separation, Trees, Residential Schools, Oka, Quebec Politicians, Alberta Politicians.  All of these have been used recently just for those purposes.

You can never address all the issues that may divide.  Those intent on dividing will always find a "wedge".  Politicians do it as a matter of course. It is the road to power.   

Power is the goal.


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## jmackenzie_15

http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2004/12/05/martin051205.html

Martin's vague answers on the extent of commitments he is willing to make to iraq, and whether or not he wants to send troops is likely a political move to not anger the american people... still, it scares me.


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## scm77

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2004/12/05/martin051205.html
> 
> Martin's vague answers on the extent of commitments he is willing to make to iraq, and whether or not he wants to send troops is likely a political move to not anger the *american people*... still, it scares me.



I'd say it's more of a political move to not anger the Canadian people.


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## jmackenzie_15

hes a fence sitter... I wish the liberals would just make up their minds and say No we arent sending troops, the end, or, on a darker day, yes we do plan to send troops, the end.


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## mazda3mazdaspeed

I believe Canadian troops should NOT go to Iraq currently for the US war against terror. After all, who is everyone looking for? It should be throught the Sudan not necessarily Afgani that soldiers should be sent to look for PRICK laden. Would he hang around the most popluar US occupied areas? For the topic, laden claimed responsibility for the attack on US, he was NOT Iraqi and lead the Al-Quadia, and US bombs Iraq? What the he?? What will we as Canadians be fighting in Iraq if we are sent, the poor local people, Sadaam is already gone, mission accomplished, what purpose? If anything, only peacekeeping missions should be performed in Iraq at this time. Please correct me anybody if I misunderstand the situation.


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## cgyflames01

Canada will go to Iraq, IF/WHEN the Un goes into Iraq


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## McG

mazda,
It must be nice to live in such a simple/black&white world.   But pull your head out at think about this for a moment:

You could very easily argue that Iraq was not an urgent target in the war on terror (you could even argue it was irrelevant next to other threats).     However, whether or not you agree with the invasion of Iraq (or its relevance, under Sadam, to the war on terror), Iraq has become iconic on both sides of the struggle.

No.   Canadian troops would not go to Iraq to fight the poor local Iraqi civilians trying to go about their lives.   Canadian troops could participate in the fight against armed insurgents (both Iraqi and foreign that travelled to Iraq to participate in a "holly war") that destabilize the region and provide challenges to the Iraqi people trying to rebuild their nation.   To put it simply:   military force is still required in Iraq because there are people ready to employ force to re-establish the nation as an oppressive anti-western state.

"Peacekeeping" missions are not required in Iraq.   Security, Counter-insurgency, and provincial-reconstruction missions are required in Iraq.


----------



## a_majoor

Why would we go to Iraq? What would our Government hope to accomplish by sending troops? Would they send a contingent in as part of the Coallition forces to prosecute WWIV, of under UN sponsorship to accomplish whatever dubious goals the UN wishes to achieve? (Think Oil for Food).

Many posters have rightly pointed out the true limiting factor is domestic politics. No one cares enough about the people of Sudan to force the Government to dispatch a battlegroup to Dafur,for example, and most Canadians are so negative about the American goals in WWIV they would not support the coallition in Iraq or wherever else they might have to go. (As an aside, the Sudan was once the home base for Al Qadea, and it is possible there are still elements there. If American or coallition forces enter Sudan to hunt down residual terrorist elements, where does that leave us?)


----------



## Disillusioned

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> hes a fence sitter... I wish the liberals would just make up their minds and say No we arent sending troops, the end, or, on a darker day, yes we do plan to send troops, the end.




 hear, hear....but that would require courage.


----------



## a_majoor

You can wage war on terror

from National Review, February 1st 2004

by Mark Styen

Among the instant cliches that sprang up after 9/11 was the notion that a "war on terror" is a meaningless concept. "It is misleading to talk of a 'war on terrorism', let alone a 'war on global terrorism'," sniffed the distinguished British historian Corelli Barnett in December.
"'Terrorism' is a phenomenon, just as is war in the conventional sense. But you cannot in logic wage war against a phenomenon, only against a specific enemy." Most of us warmongers were inclined, if only in private, to agree with Mr Barnett. We assumed "war on terror" was a polite evasion, the compassionate conservative's preferred euphemism for what was really going on - a war against militant Islam, which, had you designated it as such, would have been harder to square with all those White House Ramadan photo-ops.
But here's the interesting thing. Pace the historian, it seems you can wage war against a phenomenon. If the "war on terror" is aimed primarily at al-Qaeda and those of similar ideological bent, it seems to have had the happy side-benefit of discombobulating various non-Islamic terrorists from Colombia to Sri Lanka. This isn't because these fellows are the administration's priority right now, but rather because it's amazing what a little light scrutiny of international wire transfers can do.
Pre-9/11, almost every country was openly indifferent to terrorism's global support network. In my own native land, Canada, financial contributions to terrorist groups were tax deductible.Seriously. As part of the repulsive ethnic ward-heeling of the multiculti state, Liberal Party cabinet ministers attended fundraisers for the Tamil Tigers, the terrorist group that's plagued Sri Lanka for two decades. These guys are state-of-the-art terrorists: as the old song says, they were self-detonating before self-detonating was cool. Two decades back, they used a female suicide bomber to kill Rajiv Gandhi, the Indian Prime Minister, and, until the intifada, they were the market leader in "martyrdom operations". It's somehow sadly symbolic of the general bankruptcy of Palestinian "nationalism" that even its signature depravity should be second-hand.
But in an odd way Canada's indulgence of Sri Lankan terrorism became part of its defence against American accusations that the Great White North wasn't doing its bit in the new war. If you pointed out the huge sums of money raised in Canada for terrorism, Ottawa politicians would roll their eyes and patiently explain, ah yes, but most of that's for the Tamils or some such; nothing to do with Osama, nothing Washington needs to get its knickers in a twist about. As if destabilising our Commonwealth cousins in the Indian ocean had mysteriously become an urgent Canadian policy objective.
They were doing what most of the rest of us were doing - buying into the conventional wisdom that the "war on terror" was the war that dare not speak its name. But, funnily enough, intentionally or not, the Tamil Tigers wound up getting caught in the net. Their long campaign reached its apogee in a spectacular bloodbath at Sri Lanka's principal airport just over two years ago, a couple of months before 9/11, back when nobody was paying attention. By February of last year, they'd given up plans for an independent Tamil state and their chief negotiator in London was suing for peace on the basis of some sort of regional autonomy. It's an uneasy truce but tourists are returning to the island and the Tamil stronghold of Jaffna is being touted as "the new Phuket" (the Thai resort beloved of vacationing Brits).
You can find other examples of long-running local conflicts around the world from Burundi to Nepal that seem to have mysteriously wound down over the last two years. Might be just coincidence, as the media's bien pensants assure us is the case with Col Gadafy's about-face: nothing to do with Bush and his absurd war, old boy, don't you believe it. Or it might be that putting the bank transfers of certain groups on an international watch list has choked off the funding pump for a lot of terrorism. Even nickel'n'dime terrorists need nickels and dimes, and in your average war-torn basket-case state that usually means fundraising overseas.
Corelli Barnett was wrong when he wrote that "you cannot in logic wage war against a phenomenon, only against a specific enemy." For most of the last half-century, the activist left opposed not a specific enemy but a phenomenon - nuclear weapons.Indeed, insofar as they wished our side to lead by example, they were more concerned by Anglo-American manifestations of the phenomenon rather than the specific enemy's. In those days, only the US, UK, France, China and the Soviet Union had nukes and the left was convinced Armageddon was just around the corner: fear of the phenomenon sold a gazillion posters, plays, books, films and LPs with big scary mushroom clouds on the cover. Now that nukes are no longer the preserve of an elite club of five relatively sane world powers but can be acquired by any ramshackle dictatorship or freelance nut group, the left is positively blasé on the subject.
But in their less decayed Cold War state the left was right to this extent: sometimes the phenomenon is the enemy. Germany's Baader-Meinhof Gang trained in Saddam's Iraq. The IRA has ties to Gadafy and to Colombian drug terrorists. Even the old line that "my enemy's enemy is my friend" doesn't quite cover these alliances: Saddam was pally with the Germans, and Gerry Adams and co have enough friends in high places in Washington who wouldn't take kindly to the IRA's Hispanic outreach. What drew these people together is the phenomenon: the mutual lack of squeamishness about blowing the legs off grannies in pizza houses. In that sense, they've more in common with the international piracy and slavery networks of two centuries ago.
President Bush implied as much in London a few weeks back, in his tip of the hat to the Royal Navy for stamping out the slave trade. As usual, the so-called idiot figured it out quicker than the smart guys: in the days after September 11th, he was shrewd enough to identify the real enemy and declare war on it. Two years on, in all kinds of tiny corners of the globe you never hear about on CNN, the bad guys are feeling the heat.


----------



## JasonH

Canuck troops to Iraq?

By STEPHANIE RUBEC, Ottawa Bureau

OTTAWA -- Prime Minister Paul Martin opened the door yesterday to deploying Canadian soldiers to Iraq once he follows through on a promise to boost military ranks. The PM said the Canadian Forces are too stretched at the moment to contribute to a new mission. 

But when pressed during an interview on CNN's Late Edition on whether Canada could deploy to Iraq once it bulks up the military, Martin responded: "That's going to depend on where we're asked to go." 

And when asked whether Canada is outright against contributing a military force in Iraq, Martin answered that Canada simply doesn't have the soldiers to staff a mission. 

"Our commitments are such that it would be very hard for us to commit troops into Iraq," the PM said. 

Martin said Canada is stretched too thin to even contribute 1,000 troops to provide security during the upcoming Iraqi election. 

Martin said that, for Canada, the military commitment in Afghanistan would always trump a decision to answer the call for more troops in Iraq. 

The number of Canadian soldiers patrolling Kabul were reduced from a high of 2,000 to 900 this year to give the exhausted army an 18-month break from deployments. 

The PM said he'll boost those numbers this year and OK a reconstruction team made up of soldiers and civilians that will be sent into Afghanistan's badlands to rebuild war-torn towns. 

Martin promised during the throne speech to boost the military's ranks by 5,000 full-time soldiers and 3,000 reservists, but hasn't set a timeline. 

Martin downplayed Canada's opposition to the invasion of Iraq and expressed an eagerness to see Canadians helping out in next month's election. 

Mon, December 6, 2004


----------



## Cliff

I seriously doubt it will ever happen since Afghanistan will remain the focus and excuse for not commiting troops to Iraq. It will be years before the CF sees a serious increase in the ranks, not to mention the eqmt and trng.


----------



## JasonH

Sending CF troops to iraq anytime soon with the shit hitting the fan must be a big no no for any government in canada.  Death never made for good publicity afterall  :-\


----------



## KevinB

Might be sooner than some think...


----------



## Franko

Can't see it.

Regards


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Howdy boys and girls:

I just wanted to say thanks for all of your help, and the interesting debates that have arisen as a result.
To date, my paper is 75% in completion, and will be submitted tomorrow morning. I was told to work within a 3,500 word frame, but I went in to speak with my prof, and she has agreed to let me explore the topic in full, regardless of the word count and will grade me accordingly, as I have demonstrated that I feel awkward representing a small slice of the pie. I have realized that a topic as such cannot be explored in 3,500 words, or even 7,000 words...it's just too complex...

I will post it on the forum in the next few days or so, as soon as I get final exams all sorted out.

Thanks again,

Lindsay


----------



## Disillusioned

I wouldn't put it past Martin to do that, but if Martin wants to win the next election he knows that he'll either have to do what the majority of Canadians wants: 

or continue to play a Tony-Blair poodle to Bush's imperial adventures in Iraq, which may have already killed 100,000 people unnecessarily.   www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/10/29/62614/814

And many coalition troops: http://icasualties.org/oif/

Always remember if someone tell you that they really had to "Oust an awful dictator," just remember that *Saddam Hussein is their guy * :     http://nsarchive.chadwyck.com/igintro.htm

as were many other brutal dictators:   http://nsarchive.chadwyck.com/igintro.htm

I still laugh at people like Paul Martin who think that playing U.S. lap-dog gets them respect on the world stage. People respect those that stand up to them--not those who are cowards.


----------



## Disillusioned

Disillusioned said:
			
		

> I wouldn't put it past Martin to do that, but if Martin wants to win the next election he knows that he'll either have to do what the majority of Canadians wants:
> 
> or continue to play a Tony-Blair poodle to Bush's imperial adventures in Iraq, which may have already killed 100,000 people unnecessarily.   www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/10/29/62614/814
> 
> And many coalition troops: http://icasualties.org/oif/
> 
> Always remember if someone tell you that they really had to "Oust an awful dictator," just remember that *Saddam Hussein is their guy * :     http://nsarchive.chadwyck.com/igintro.htm
> 
> as were many other brutal dictators:   http://nsarchive.chadwyck.com/igintro.htm
> 
> I still laugh at people like Paul Martin who think that playing U.S. lap-dog gets them respect on the world stage. People respect those that stand up to them--not those who are cowards.




I forgot my links about what Canadians want:

www.canadians.org/display_document.htm?COC_token=coc_token&id=1041&isdoc=1&catid=359

www.canadiandimension.mb.ca/extra/d0217js.htm

Here's a cached google link discussing how Canadians' desire to become more independent from the U.S. goes much farther......including restricting energy exports......

www.google.ca/search?q=cache:KRIDKSX_7_QJ:www.queensu.ca/cora/polls/2004/March31-canada-us.pdf+ipsos+reid&hl=en


----------



## Infanteer

You don't really do much but yap about "American Imperialism", do you?  Maybe someone else is willing to listen to your constant babble, but we're not...go away.


----------



## McMan

k I read similar news reports, almost identical actually, but mine were in reference to Canadian contribution to the elections in Iraq, not a military contribution. They would oversee and aid in the first elections and play a role that way because really...there's no way they'll end up pulling a 180 and placing troops in Iraq anytime soon.


----------



## Armymedic

Exactly, civilians, not soldiers. We'll (the CF) be tied to Afghanistan until 2010-2015


----------



## dutchie

There is no way that Paul Martin will send troops to Iraq until it becomes (IF it becomes) a UN mission. Stephen Harper might, but there is no way PM Martin will. I see his response to Wolf Blitzer's clarifying question regarding "when you bring troop levels up, will you send them to Iraq?' as a bit of a Martin 'Waffle'. He is not going to tell the US public on CNN that he will not commit troops to Iraq even with increased numbers. The PM is trying to mend bridges, not burn them. So he says, 'Well, we'll have to see where were asked to go'....he didn't say, "No frickin' way Wolfie, you guys are crazy!' as the US would lose it, and he didn't say 'Just as soon as we have the manpower, we'll be there." as the Canadian public would lose it. So he made a smart political decision - he didn't commit either way.

I'll eat my hat if a significant contingent of Canadian troops join the US and Britain in Iraq....unless the Tories get it, then all bets are off.


----------



## KevinB

1-2 years
 I forsee a LAV based BN+ sized BattleGroup

 Heck is a better place to be than a lose-lose situtation like Africa...


----------



## dutchie

Look at how many suicides take place across north america every year.    
Regarding the 'suicide' thing, I just had to put my 2 cents in.....

You really can't compare North American teenage angst over pimples, pubic hair, broken hearts, or bad grades causing (temporary, in most cases) suicidal thoughts to the motivators behind Islamic suicide bombers. One is literally child's play, the other is deadly serious and is much more complex with religious, cultural, and political implications and stressors involved.

In short, I don't think that a Palestinian kid depressed over normal teenage life would cause him to strap dynamite to his chest and blow up a bus. In fact, if he acts like most other kids who are depressed, he'd be so apathetic you couldn't motivate him to clean his room.

Just my Humble Opinion.


----------



## jswift872

KevinB said:
			
		

> 1-2 years
> I forsee a LAV based BN+ sized BattleGroup
> 
> Heck is a better place to be than a lose-lose situtation like Africa...



words right out of my mouth, i feel the same way pretty much.


----------



## 48Highlander

> You really can't compare North American teenage angst over pimples, pubic hair, broken hearts, or bad grades causing (temporary, in most cases) suicidal thoughts to the motivators behind Islamic suicide bombers.



I know you can't.  I wasn't suggesting that palestinian teens blow up busses because they have pimples.  I was saying that those who are already suicidal don't have much to lose by giving their lives to a cause.  People commit suicide even in a society which dissaproves of it.  How much more likely would they be to do it in one which glorifies it?



> In short, I donlt think that Palestinian kids depressed over normal teenage life would cause him to strap dynamite to his chest and blow up a bus. In fact, is he acts like most other kids who are depressed, he'd be so apathetic you couldn't motivate him to clean his room.
> Just my Humble Opinion.



I think the Columbine kids would disagree with your opinion.  Suicidal people in groups can be quite dangerous.


----------



## Whiskey_Dan

If they send troops to Iraq, which I hope they do, I just hope they wait a couple of years so that I'm old enough to deploy with that force. ;D
A nice, light LAV based force would be one hell of a contribution.


----------



## Infanteer

I think you're comparing apples and oranges.  The mentality of suicide (to escape one's problems) is a completely different then that of martyrdom.  Suicide is an end in itself, whereas suicide bombers view their martyrdom as a means to an end.


----------



## Fishbone Jones

Infanteer said:
			
		

> I think you're comparing apples and oranges. The mentality of suicide (to escape one's problems) is a completely different then that of martyrdom. Suicide is an end in itself, whereas suicide bombers view their martyrdom as a means to an end.



I'm not sure that they look at it quite as a means to an end. More like a means to a new and better beginning. In their mind, they can only reach that higher plane and paradise through the act of martyrdom. Also, no matter the trangressions of the rest of the family, that would prevent them from reaching paradise, a martyr in the family equates to a get out of jail free card for them all, allowing the whole family entrance.


----------



## Goober

IMO Mr. Martin won't send troops to Iraq. He only made the ambiguous comments to the US media because they are softer than a "No", and its time for softer words.


----------



## McG

Acorn said:
			
		

> I would pose that not one of the 9/11 attackers suffered distress or desolation, and any duty was questionable.


I don't think that is necessarily the people at the bottom of Maslow's Pyramid that become the terrorists.  However, such people are certainly a cornerstone for justification within ideologies that support terrorism.  Without these â Å“oppressedâ ? (real or imagined) there is no injustice which needs to be righted.   Without an injustice, there is no â Å“justificationâ ? for the means and no motivating factor for someone to become a terrorist.

An ideology which champions the down-trodden may be able to inspire people in better positions to make sacrifices for â Å“the cause.â ?  I believe we see examples of this in the radicalization of some environmentalists, anti-globalisationists, anti-abortionists, etc.  

In the case of Islamic terrorism, preachers of the ideology use religion as an identifiable link to recruit Muslims that may never have experience the injustice they will fight against.  Specifically, recruits with their own means (money, education, influence, etc) would be sought.  

So, what does this all add up to?  There are three parts of a chain here that the war on terror must address.  Humanitarian injustices must be addressed (this will take away all the terrorist recruiting arguments).  Those who preach (and those that facilitate the preaching of) an ideology of hate and terror must be silenced (through political, legal, financial, and/or military means).  Lastly, those who execute acts of terror must be destroyed (police and military action).


----------



## dutchie

Suicide is an end in itself, whereas suicide bombers view their martyrdom as a means to an end. &
a means to a new and better beginning. In their mind, they can only reach that higher plane and paradise through the act of martyrdom.

I think were getting closer to the truth here. It's tough for us to comprehend, living in the most privileged of societies, the 'rationale' behind a young person strapping HE to his chest and killing dozens of strangers indiscriminately in the name of one's religion to acquire a ticket to paradise. To us, suicide is a way to end emotional pain and is considered by most to be an irrational thought, and a tragedy when successful. Usually, the suicidal person views their life in an unrealistically negative light. Small problems and issues become inescapable to these kids. In short, they don't view their life in a realistic manner, and act unreasonably, by our standards.

I don't think suicide bombers are irrational in the same sense. I think they fully understand what is at stake, and are probably not 'bummed out'. Instead of their families being horrified at their act (as in a teen suicide in North America), they likely view it as glorious, and plaster his (or her) face all over town. The suicide bomber is a hero to these people. It is something to aspire to. 

Suicidal kids want to end their life, and that's it. Suicide bombers want to go to 'heaven' and kill the enemy at the same time. Ending their life is merely a requirement of the task, not the task itself.

Huge difference. 

Re:I think the Columbine kids  


The Columbine kids don't represent the average suicidal teen. They were likely sociopaths, but that is another discussion for another thread.


----------



## bossi

Brilliant article.  Certainly, fighting criminals via accounting doesn't seem as glamorous, but Elliot Ness made it work ... and "The Troubles" flamed out when IRA fund-raising in the US was strangled ...

I remember the Tamil Tiger fund-raising dinner debacle - another classic example of political correctness in Canada running amok.

It will be interesting to see the results when the sights are finally turned upon BOTH sides of the Palestinian/Israeli conflict (i.e. and money stops flowing in from safe havens outside the confict zone ...)


----------



## bossi

... and, as if to prove my point ... Leishman's article fizzles in the final sentence
(i.e. it would have been so much more effective if it had simply said "... world war on terrorism ...")



> *Believe it: Canada is in al-Qaida gunsights*
> 
> By RORY LEISHMAN
> 
> In an address welcoming President George Bush to Halifax last week, Prime Minister Paul Martin said: "The terrible events of Sept. 11 have redefined many realities in the world and on our own continent. We are in a war against terrorism and we are in it together: Americans and Canadians."
> 
> Some Canadians would challenge that statement. They suppose that Canada is safe from terrorist attack, because al-Qaida is targeting only members of the United States-led coalition that have taken part in the liberation of Iraq.
> 
> Martin, however, is undoubtedly right. In a report released last month, the Integrated National Security Assessment Centre -- the body responsible for collating the information gathered by Canada's various intelligence agencies -- noted that
> 
> al-Qaida has ranked Canada as "the fifth most important Christian country to be targeted, following the United States, the United Kingdom, Spain and Australia."
> 
> Al-Qaida especially hates Canada for having dispatched a few hundred crack troops to help free Afghanistan from the Taliban. While most Canadians honour our troops in Afghanistan as brave liberators, Muslim fascists throughout the world denounce them as foreign occupiers.
> 
> In an effort to appease al-Qaida, the socialist government of Spain hastily pulled Spanish troops out of Iraq following the terrorist massacre at the Madrid railway station last March. Some Canadians think the Martin government should do the same: Withdraw all Canadian troops from Afghanistan and all other participation in the overseas dimensions of the war against Muslim terror.
> 
> Bush noted in his Halifax address that isolationists in the United States advocated much the same approach at the beginning of the Second World War. They insisted that by keeping out of the conflict overseas, the United States could best avoid attack by the Nazi and fascist powers.
> 
> In contrast, Canada, under the leadership of Mackenzie King, promptly entered the war in September 1939 and dispatched troops overseas to take the fight to Germany.
> 
> Bush recalled that this brave decision was not universally popular in Canada. King warned his critics: "We cannot defend our country and save our homes and families by waiting for the enemy to attack us. To remain on the defensive is the surest way to bring the war to Canada."
> 
> "Mackenzie King was correct then," Bush said, "and we must always remember the wisdom of his words today."
> 
> Martin, for his part, observed that military dominance will not suffice to make the world safe from terrorism. "We believe that security can only be ensured through freedom of choice, education, individual endeavour and equality of opportunity," he said. "That has been the philosophy behind our actions -- in Bosnia, in Afghanistan, in Haiti; and, we hope soon, in elections in the Middle East and Iraq."
> 
> Isn't that wonderful: Martin said he supports elections in Iraq. When will he apologize for having opposed the war of liberation that has made these elections possible?
> 
> While Martin grandly affirms: "We are in a war against terrorism and we are in it together: Americans and Canadians," he knows full well that thanks to years of neglect by a succession of Liberal and Conservative governments, the Canadian Armed Forces are now so pitifully small and ill-equipped that they cannot effectively defend Canada from terrorists at home, let alone fulfil Canada's responsibilities in helping to fight the enemy overseas.
> 
> Altogether, Canada now has a grand total of just 1,400 troops deployed overseas, including 700 in Afghanistan. The United States has almost 258,000 military personnel on active duty in foreign countries, including about 18,000 in Afghanistan and more than 210,000 in and around Iraq.
> 
> Under these circumstances, one can only admire Bush's magnanimity in praising Canada's contributions to the war on terror. "Canada's leadership is helping to build a better world," he told his Halifax audience. "Canadian troops are serving bravely in Afghanistan at this hour. Other Canadians stand on guard for peace in the Middle East, in Cyprus, Sudan, and the Congo."
> 
> True enough, but Bush was too polite to state the obvious: Canada, having made heroic contributions to the defence of freedom in two earlier world wars, should be contributing a lot more now to the world war on Muslim terrorism.


----------



## Kirkhill

The "Slave Trade" gambit was, in retrospect, brilliant spinning by Her Majesty's Government of the day.  It allowed the Government to claim the moral high-ground both at home where it could convince war-weary Brits to continue investing taxes in the Royal Navy as well as giving it international cover to board any vessel of any flag any where to verify what they were carrying.  As a result the sea-lanes were made safe, trade prospered and Britannia made a lot of money.

Fast forward to 2003 and America tightens ports to screen out bombs and catches marijuana. It tracks the flow of money and Jerry Adams wants to talk to Ian Paisley about detente in Northern Ireland. It proposes and international Naval construct that would allow America and her Allies to board any vessel on the high seas to verify the lack of nuclear devices on board.  Who knows what they may turn up along with N. Korean drugs being run into Australia.


----------



## 48Highlander

Sociopaths tend not to act in organized groups.  The columbine kids acted together, and while they may have seemed anti-social I wouldn't say they were sociopaths.  Within their own group they functioned just fine, something that sociopaths generaly aren't capable of.  Actually we received a really good briefing this weekend that covered some of the motivation and rationale behind suicide bombers.  The instructor listed all the common reasons that people think influence suicide bombers such as poverty, criminality, religion, and sociopathy amongst others.  He then related the findings of recent studies of suicide bombers which found that the majority of organized suicide bombers/terrorists didn't fit into those categories at all.  That in fact the only time criminality and sociopathy fit into the equation was in instances of individuals acting alone (eg. Oklahoma bomber).  I wish I'd been more awake at the time so I could list some of the specifics here.  It was a fascinating lecture.



> Suicidal kids want to end their life, and that's it. Suicide bombers want to go to 'heaven' and kill the enemy at the same time. Ending their life is merely a requirement of the task, not the task itself.



Are you sure about that?  I'm not saying you're wrong...I've certainly never been inside the mind of a suicide bomber...but how can you be so certain of that?  I'd agree that they want to go to heaven and kill the enemy at the same time...that they want to give their lives to a cause which they see as a way of improving the lives of their families and the "downtrodden"....but surely if they weren't suicidal as well, they might at least try to plan bombings which they could walk away from.  Why walk on to a bus and blow yourself up when you can have the bomb on a timer, set to go off after you've dropped it off and left the bus?  As far as I know, Allah gives them 70 virgins for killing their enemies, not for getting themselves killed in the proccess


----------



## Infanteer

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Sociopaths tend not to act in organized groups. The columbine kids acted together, and while they may have seemed anti-social I wouldn't say they were sociopaths. Within their own group they functioned just fine, something that sociopaths generaly aren't capable of.



Are you sure about this?  I remember seeing something that said that many of the goons of the Nazi death machine were clinical sociopaths, and they got on just fine with eachother.



> Are you sure about that? I'm not saying you're wrong...I've certainly never been inside the mind of a suicide bomber...but how can you be so certain of that?



All the interviews I've seen indicates that this is the number 1 reason - hence the relation of suicide bomber with the term martyrdom.

However, I'm sure, like all phenomenon, that there is a whole range of motivations and issues.  But I'd be willing to bet that this one is tops.



> Why walk on to a bus and blow yourself up when you can have the bomb on a timer, set to go off after you've dropped it off and left the bus? As far as I know, Allah gives them 70 virgins for killing their enemies, not for getting themselves killed in the proccess



See: martyrdom.

They don't call themselves the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade for nothing.


----------



## 48Highlander

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Are you sure about this?  I remember seeing something that said that many of the goons of the Nazi death machine were clinical sociopaths, and they got on just fine with eachother.



I'm not certain no, but recent studies on terrorism show that very very few of them are sociopaths.  At least that's what the gyst of that briefing was and the numbers seemed pretty solid.  I should probably do a bit more independant research on that.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> See: martyrdom.
> They don't call themselves the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade for nothing.



Might as well be the darwinism-in-action brigade.  I don't know, it just seems to me that non-suicidal people wouldn't intentionaly kill themselves when there's other more effective ways of achieving their goals.  I don't have any studies or facts to back up those beliefs though, so I'll concede that you could be right.


----------



## dutchie

thanks Infanteer, you took the words right out of my mouth. 

48th: None of us can be sure what is going on in the mind of a suicide bomber, and so we have to go on what we do know (media reports, their own statements, etc). My whole point is that beyond a willingness to kill themselves, suicide bombers and suicidal North American kids have little or nothing in common. 

Sociopaths don't always 'work alone'. They can work with others, they just tend not to. The predominant reason I referred to the Columbine kids as Sociopaths was due to their overwhelming desire to cause pain and death to others, with little or no mercy. If they had survived and displayed no remorse (real remorse, not the kind seen in a courtroom), this would also point towards sociopathy.......another argument, however.

I agree with Infanteer. The suicide bomber SEEMS to have a strong desire to go to paradise (don't we all?), believes that Martyrdom is a sure bet to get there, and hates the Jews and more specifically Israeli Jews, ergo, he straps 25 lbs of C4 chest and blows up a bus full of mums and kids. Ending his life is merely a requirement of this task.

they want to give their lives to a cause which they see as a way of improving the lives of their families and the "downtrodden".... 

I never said this, and totally disagree. Were talking about hatred, pure and simple. Did Himmler want to exterminate the Jews to better the lives of Germans? No (I think), he hated Jews and wanted to kill as many as possible. He was also a raving sadist, but that's another discussion. Same thing with the average Palestinian bomber (again, IMHO). I'll bet he can spout the latest rhetoric, but would he have a real grasp of the conflict? Would he care? Or would he know all about the issues, as long as it centred around hatred of Jew/Israelis and Martyrdom? I think you'd find that suicide bombers would use this conflict as an excuse to kill Jews/Israelis and martryr themselves at the same time. It's convenient. 

Oh, and again with the Columbine kids, as I stated they don't represent the average suicidal teen (thank God). A typical suicidal teen wants to kill himslef, is apathetic to the world, and has little or no motivation beyond suicide. A year planning an assualt on a school and their inhabitants doesn't fall in line with those characteristics. They have little in common with the average suicidal teen as well.


----------



## McG

Caesar said:
			
		

> they want to give their lives to a cause which they see as a way of improving the lives of their families and the "downtrodden"....
> 
> I never said this, and totally disagree. Were talking about hatred, pure and simple.


But why does a terrorist hate?  It is because he has bought into an ideology that identifies the hated group as the cause of some injustice (real or not).


----------



## 48Highlander

Caesar said:
			
		

> The predominant reason I referred to the Columbine kids as Sociopaths was due to their overwhelming desire to cause pain and death to others, with little or no mercy. If they had survived and displayed no remorse (real remorse, not the kind seen in a courtroom), this would also point towards sociopathy.......another argument, however.



By that definition, all muslim terrorists are sociopaths.  Causing pain to others and having no remorse do not make you a sociopath.



			
				Caesar said:
			
		

> I never said this, and totally disagree. Were talking about hatred, pure and simple. Did Himmler want to exterminate the Jews to better the lives of Germans? No (I think), he hated Jews and wanted to kill as many as possible. He was also a raving sadist, but that's another discussion. Same thing with the average Palestinian bomber (again, IMHO). I'll bet he can spout the latest rhetoric, but would he have a real grasp of the conflict? Would he care? Or would he know all about the issues, as long as it centred around hatred of Jew/Israelis and Martyrdom? I think you'd find that suicide bombers would use this conflict as an excuse to kill Jews/Israelis and martryr themselves at the same time. It's convenient.



Be careful there.  That's the type of argument people use when they're looking to demonize their opponents instead of accepting that there are multiple motivating factors for every side in a conflict.  It's like the lefties insisting that Bush only invaded Iraq because of the oil.

Yes Himmler hated jews and wanted to exterminate as many as possible.  Does that mean that every single German foot soldier felt the same way?  Or did they fight (at least initialy) because they saw their war as a struggle to return the German people to their rightful place in the world?  As has been pointed out on these forums in the past, people in middle eastern countries seem to have dificulty accepting responsibility for their actions and failiures.  It's much easier for them to blame their problems on Israel than it is to say "yeah guys, ok, we're poor because we screwed up somewhere, let's try and fix this".  Because of that, those who attack Israel, and even the bombers who attacked the US, all see themselves as fighting for their people.  Some of them are doubtless unbalanced and would like nothing better than to wipe out all Jews and Americans, but there aren't many groups which have that as their stated goal.  Most of them like to think that they're fighting their opressors in order to bring prosperity back to their people.  They're absolutely wrong ofcourse, but acusing them of doing it out of pure hatred is a little shallow.


----------



## dutchie

Re:"Yes Himmler hated jews and wanted to exterminate as many as possible.   Does that mean that every single German foot soldier felt the same way?"

That is why I said 'Himmler', and not 'German soldiers in WW2' or even 'Nazis'. There was a clear difference between the Whermacht and the SS. And within the SS, there was also a difference between individual soldiers, Junior Officers, and Senior Officers. I was very cafefull to indicate an obvious racist/biggot, and not paint the entire German Army with one brush.


They're absolutely wrong ofcourse, but acusing them of doing it out of pure hatred is a little shallow.

So accusing suicide bombers of being racist hate-mongers who's primary goal is the extermination of an entire race is shallow? I guess I'm shallow then. Only a moron would think that suicide bombing furthers the cause of Palestinians struggling for independance. So either every single suicide bomber is a moron, or they know it sets back the cause of the Palestinians but want to kill Jews anyway. 

 Some of them are doubtless unbalanced and would like nothing better than to wipe out all Jews and Americans, but there aren't many groups which have that as their stated goal.

That IS the stated goal of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, and was obviously the goal of the PLO in days past (and probably still is to some within that group). Do you actually believe that Hamas wants peace with Israel, with or without Palestinian independance? 

By that definition, all muslim terrorists are sociopaths.   Causing pain to others and having no remorse do not make you a sociopath

I will address this later...once I consult my old Psych texts for the definition of sociopathy so we can move past the Columbine thing.


----------



## combat_medic

An excellent deifnition of Sociopathy:

By definition these people are at least temporarily very successful in society. They achieve their success by socially unacceptable means and at the expense of the community and its citizens. As Robertson et al pointed out in 1996 a number of entrepreneurs seem to have these characteristics.

These people tend to embrace a particular and often limited belief system to the exclusion of others. They have no doubts. Typically these belief systems have an internal logic. Actions based on the belief system often produces the desired and predicted outcomes. Their views do not stand up to criticism when alternative understandings are used. Views applicable to some activities in society may be given universal relevance and applied to activities where they are clearly inappropriate. These views or their application should not be acceptable to society but society frequently identifies uncritically with their logic and fails to challenge them.

Sociopathic individuals are extremely self-confidant, intelligent, charismatic and persuasive of others as well as themselves. They inspire those around them and create a dysfunctional culture, - often dizzy and disoriented by its success. Success is proof of the accuracy of any claim they make. Words and sometimes bizarre ideas become a substitute for reality. They surround themselves by supporters who worship them and believe they can do no wrong. These loyalties persist even when their world collapses around them. The community admires them. The system of justice seldom pursues them.

They have enormous drive and ambition but few qualms about how they accomplish their objectives. They are focussed. They deal with conflicting evidence, by selective perception, compartmentalising, rationalising, by attacking its credibility, or by demonising the messenger. They are more likely to develop patterns of thought which allow them to indulge in criminal activity or to disregard the interests of others. They can be very successful entrepreneurs.

They surround themselves with admirers. When a group identifies with dysfunctional ideas and adopts these patterns of thinking then they reinforce each other. Dissenters leave or are ostracised. A subculture or even a culture forms. When this culture is very successful, when there are adverse outcomes for individuals or for sections of society as a consequence of beliefs and actions, and when the culture is deaf to reason or facts then I call this process successful sociopathy. We have ready examples in apartheid and the holocaust. Once a successful culture is established it assumes an independent momentum and spreads rapidly. Its acquires a legitimacy and an unquestioned and self evident correctness, which few dare challenge. Nothing is as convincing as success.

The nature of these sociopaths make the empires which they create extremely fragile and vulnerable - a spectacular house of cards which at times comes tumbling down amidst revelations of misconduct.

When these people hold the floor they are persuasive but their ideas do not stand up to critical scrutiny or questioning. They talk only to the converted. They seldom engage in open debate or give press interviews where they are confronted by critics. They employ trained PR firms to present their point of view.

While I wouldn't say that all killers, terrorists, or suicide bombers are sociopaths, I would argue that a far greater percentage of them are than in regular society, and certainly people with sociopathic tendancies would be far more attracted to these kinds of extremism than your average Joe. Were the Columbine kids clinical sociopaths? Perhaps, perhaps not, but they certainly displayed a lot of the textbook signs of sociopathy.


----------



## Infanteer

It seems that many organized criminal gangs would be filled with sociopaths as well.


----------



## McG

combat_medic said:
			
		

> While I wouldn't say that all killers, terrorists, or suicide bombers are sociopaths, ...


Based on your description, I would suspect that the terrorist leadership is likely sociopaths.


----------



## a_majoor

Heck, by that definition the Liberal Party of Canada also fits the bill...


----------



## dutchie

Combat Medic: Where did you get that definition of Sociopathy? It seems to me (with my limited education) that this definition is a combination of Sociopathy, Psychopathy, and Borderline Personality Disorder. 

In short and in 'layman's' terms, Sociopaths are not bound by social norms/rules, and enjoy causing pain and suffering to others. Most people the media calls 'Psychos' are actually Sociopaths (serial killers/rapists). Psychopaths are ambitious, and will cause pain to others if it gives them some gain, but don't do it solely for pleasure, as they take no pleasure in it. There is a theory that the most successful tycoons in the world are Psychopaths, as in order to achieve that level of success, you have to have no regard for others. BPD is characterized by unstable relationships, impulsivity, unstable self-image, fear of being alone, and manipulative behavior. Violence towards loved ones in men, and promiscuity to gain acceptance in women is common.

I think perhaps you have defined 'Anti-social Personality Disorder', which can be sociopathy or psychopathy.


I would say that there is a really good chance that suicide bombers, islamic executioners (like that Jordanian fellow), etc are sociopaths. Those Columbine kids may have had anti-social personality disorder, but primarily acted within the 'Mob Mentality' - separated, they may not have done anything, but together, their instability and hatred fed each other.

Regardless, we can't diagnose people posthumously, from 1000's of miles away, and without PhDs, so my ideas (and yours) mean squat in the real world. 

Needless to say, suicide bombers are nutbars, and pose a new threat to the US forces. It changes the rules when your enemy has no problem dying, as long as he takes one or two of the 'enemy' with him. Similar to Japanese Kamikazes in WW2 I suppose.

How do you feel the US has handled this new kind of threat? Could they do more to protect themselves? Have they gone too far already?


----------



## combat_medic

I can't find the exact link, but it was from a graduate thesis on sociopathy and personality disorders.


----------



## mdh

Perhaps this observation has already been made, but isn't the example of Imperial Japan the closest historical analogy we have to modern Islamo-fascism? There are a few parallels: the bushido death cult, ritual suicide, the obession with Emperor worship (a deistic entity), uncompromising xenophobia, I'm not sure that we'll get too far categorizing today's suicide bombers as a sociopathic phenomenon.


----------



## dutchie

An interesting comparison, and I don't think it has been mentioned so far. Some differences, however:

Japan had imperialistic goals, the Islamo-Fascists do not. 
Imperial Japan was united and very well organized. The Islamo-fascists are organized, but not overly so, and are definitely not united.
Imperial Japan had a conventional army/military, although they fought in sometimes unconventional ways. The Islamo-fascists definitely do not have a conventional army, and fight in almost exclusively unconventional ways.

Re:"I'm not sure that we'll get too far categorizing today's suicide bombers as a sociopathic phenomenon." - I'm not sure I characterized them as a Sociopathic Phenomenon. The discussion on sociopathy came about as a response to comparisons to suicidal north american teens and suicide bombers.


----------



## M16

Goober said:
			
		

> Mr. Martin won't send troops to Iraq.



We do have troops in Iraq.


----------



## Ex-Dragoon

We do do we? Try doing some research before making such ridiculous statements. Granted we had troops in there as part of the Foreign Exchange Program but there are no Canadian units there.


----------



## jmackenzie_15

Re: Canadian Troops To Iraq? 
 « Reply #27 on: December 06, 2004, 20:11:13  »   

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If they send troops to Iraq, which I hope they do, I just hope they wait a couple of years so that I'm old enough to deploy with that force. 
A nice, light LAV based force would be one heck of a contribution.

obviously you're too young to know what you're talking about.Canada stands nothing to gain or benefit from going to that hellhole.Untill the US really reaches out and begs for help, which I might add, that day will never come, i highly HIGHLY doubt you will see Canadian combat troops in iraq.I would sooner quit the CF than join in on an american crusade through the middle east for no particular reason , other than the fake one we've been told to oust, and I quote, "evil doers". Right on Batman.

Now if Iran is proven to have nuclear weapons, we could go there.If north korea makes good on its threats, we could go there.If Sudan gets totally out of control, hell we MIGHT even go there.Iraq is probobly the last place we'd end up.Our troops are too valuable to us to be wasted in a place like Iraq.Thats Bush's ugly closet monster, not ours.Untill some part of that mess threatens us, or requires a peacekeeping mission which likely wont happen anytime soon, dont even count on it.


----------



## McG

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> I would sooner quit the CF than join in on an american crusade through the middle east for no particular reason ,


Put some thought into why you are in now.  If the order comes to deploy, you won't be given the option to quit at that time; you will go.



			
				jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> an american crusade through the middle east for no particular reason , other than the fake one we've been told to oust, and I quote, "evil doers". Right on Batman.


Shake your head.  The war is over but the fighting is not, and unfortunately the struggle in Iraq has been allowed to become symbolic, for both sides, in the war on terror (even though it may be a stretch to link the initial invasion to fighting terror).  You may not agree with the reasons for the initial invasion, but it happened and if the west does not win in the aftermath, then Islamic extremism will have won.


----------



## jmackenzie_15

theres no doubt in my mind that the americans will inevitably crush the insurgents.Its a matter of time.Then again, it is costing them a crapload of money. 

 "but it happened and if the west does not win in the aftermath, then Islamic extremism will have won."

thats the thing, fanatacism never dies.You could kill every last man in that country and the last living one would still fight you.It will go on forever, regardless.


----------



## McG

That is why the Iraq effort requires more than just combat troops hunting down insurgents.  It must include reconstruction of the infrastructure and institutions of a democratic state.


----------



## jmackenzie_15

If thats the case, lets just tell every other country in the world that doesnt have the same culture as north america and 'install democratic states'. If the way the iraqis were living was wrong and needed to be corrected so badly that required war, then well we have alot of work to do in other places dont we.


----------



## 1feral1

mazda3mazdaspeed said:
			
		

> I believe Canadian troops should NOT go to Iraq currently for the US war against terror.



Do you even know what this war is all about?? Although the US and UK may be leading it, its a war between radical Islam vs the west, which includes Canada. Even positions agaisnt the war has not stopped problems in France. So if you think being neutral is going to save ya, think again!

I don't know where you are getting your information. A lot of them   'poor local people' (as you put it) are carrying RPGs and AKs, and would KILL you because not who you are, but who you represent. The west.

There is more good things going on in Iraq than you think, but the one sided media are too keen for stories on body counts and collateral deaths, than to report the good overall majority of people who are thankful Saddam has been crushed.

Take the fight to the EN before its on your shores, and don't get me wrong, the EN is already within the Canadian populus right now, and you don't believe that, somethings wrong.

Wes


----------



## jmackenzie_15

I still stand by attacking saudi arabia over anybody else first.If this 'war on terror' is really about fighting terrorism, shouldnt you start with the place most of the terrorist hijackers came from in the first place? isnt that country still full of them and al qaeda links that the US wont admit because it would hurt business? what about egypt? syria?


----------



## McG

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> If thats the case, lets just tell every other country in the world that doesnt have the same culture as north america and 'install democratic states'.


No.   However, we cannot turn a blind eye to state sanctioned torture and represion of its civilian population.   I don't imagine you think it is okay to allow states to employ WMD against their ethnic minoreties.   However, this is irrelevant as you are trying to drag the conversation back to the causes of the invasion.   Why the US invaded is now irrelevant.

The reason that reconstruction is required in Iraq is to enable the Iraqi people to look after thier own affairs and move forward under a system that respects individual rights.


----------



## McG

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> I still stand by attacking saudi arabia over anybody else first.If this 'war on terror' is really about fighting terrorism, shouldnt you start with the place most of the terrorist hijackers came from in the first place?


Again, this is no longer relevant.   You cannot change the past and current realities have moved the struggle to Iraq.


----------



## 1feral1

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> Re: Canadian Troops To Iraq?
> « Reply #27 on: December 06, 2004, 20:11:13  »
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Canada stands nothing to gain or benefit from going to that hellhole..... I would sooner quit the CF than join in on an american crusade through the middle east for no particular reason



Benifit? Bloody heck Mackenzie! Sheesh, what about letting the world know we too will not be held ransom by a bunch of terrorists. In for a penny, in for a pound. Sorry, I disagree with that comment, and the next one really has me wondering about your own integrity. 

I suggest quit sooner than later (tomorrow?), as I would not want anyone with an attitude like that in my section, as you'd get someone of value killed. 

Wake up!

Shakes head in TRUE disgust.


Wes


----------



## jmackenzie_15

okay, for the last time, correct me if Im wrong, how many terrorists are there in iraq? i dont see any... oh wait, thats because those are , from their persepctive, freedom fighters.Quite frankly id do the same thing if a foreign power came into my town and started telling me how to live. But i forgot that anyone that opposes the US military is a 'terrorist'. At least in afghanistan there was a legitimit reason to be there, and a tactical reason, being al qaeda operated there quite heavily. Going there to remove them, would make sense.There ARE no enemies in iraq that are worth sending our military over there, compared to the countries I listed earlier, and if you had taken the time to pay attention to what I was saying, being , we should be prioritizing countries with the highest level of terrorist activity first (saudi arabia, egypt, syria,).Wouldnt that make sense? or are we just saving the best for last, and everybody wants to practice in iraq first? the new military sandbox?


----------



## jmackenzie_15

and Wes, you do realize by benefit canada , I meant benefit us by destroying threats to our people.Thats a benefit.You assumed i was talking about money.We will help NOTHING by going to iraq, and thats the point ive been trying to make all along.Thats the americans problem, theyll deal with it.IMO, it has very little to do with actual terrorism.Its a symbolic battle of west vs east.Id rather spend our time attempting to locate the actual threats than 'stickin it to the brown guys'.


----------



## 1feral1

Tell me something Mack, if the US had sat back and did nothing, and Iraq ended up being held responsible for a 'big event' in the west, which killed thousands, say maybe even in Toronto or another city in Erope, than what would you be saying? Answer the question, and don't waffle.

The invasion of Iraq has truly saved us all from something sinister in the future, along with the fact that a terrible dictator has been taken out, and countless thousands are now free, and are experiencing freedom for the first time in a generation.




Wes


----------



## Acorn

MacKenzie, I think it may well be easy for you. You won't have to volunteer for any Canadian deployment to Iraq. However, many of us do not have that option, nor do we choose to make political statements. The fact is, any decision to provide Canadian military participation in Iraq is a political one, and not your place to criticize as a member of the CF (reg or res).

As for the list of countries you think should be a higher priority, you haven't a clue what you are talking about. Egypt and Syria? 

Acorn


----------



## McG

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> okay, for the last time, correct me if Im wrong, how many terrorists are there in iraq? i dont see any...


That's right, chopping heads of reconstruction workers & executing humanitarian aid workers the publishing the videos to terrorize an enemy is not terrorism.



			
				jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> we should be prioritizing countries with the highest level of terrorist activity first (saudi arabia, egypt, syria,).Wouldnt that make sense?


The west has political influence that Saudi Arabia and Egypt respond to.   Should we invade before the political avenues are exhausted?



			
				jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> Its a symbolic battle of west vs east.


No.   It is symbolic of West vs Islamic extremism.


----------



## 1feral1

Acorn said:
			
		

> As for the list of countries you think should be a higher priority, you haven't a clue what you are talking about. Egypt and Syria?
> 
> Acorn



You took the words right out of my mouth.

Cheers,

Wes


----------



## jmackenzie_15

Are you kidding me? you sir, were sold.

Iraq never had the capacity to do ANYTHING, its nuclear weapons program had been shut down after the first invasion, (which crippled their entire country I might add, people were still dying from lack of water and food and access to medical equipment to the day before the invasion.) and no traces of it being reactivated, chemical weapons or biological were found by the IAEA.Hussein's regime had also not been suspected of funding any terrorist organizations either... so, then we're just as likely to be attacked by anyone then.

Again, for the 3rd time, go after the countries responsible, and the ones making the threats, and the ones harboring terrorists.The allies didnt bomb norway to fight germany.

Acorn, Egpyt and Syria are known to have connections to Al Qaeda, and many 'suspected terrorists' that have already been arrested or sought after are from these countries.Is that not worth investigating?


----------



## 1feral1

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> and Wes, you do realize by benefit canada , I meant benefit us by destroying threats to our people.Thats a benefit.You assumed i was talking about money.We will help NOTHING by going to iraq, and thats the point ive been trying to make all along.Thats the americans problem, theyll deal with it.IMO, it has very little to do with actual terrorism.Its a symbolic battle of west vs east.Id rather spend our time attempting to locate the actual threats than 'stickin it to the brown guys'.



Money? Not! Canada's contribution might be small if sent to Iraq, but its the stand that takes, and the message it sends. I don't give a dirty great big giant shyte about dosh (money), and i don't even see how that even came up?

'In for a penny, in for a pound' means 'all or nothing', and has got nothing to do with $$$ whatsoever.

Whatca smokin?

Wes


----------



## McG

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> Again, for the 3rd time, go after the countries responsible, and the ones making the threats, and the ones harboring terrorists.


Are you still saying we should use a military solution in other countries before exhausting the political options?


----------



## jmackenzie_15

Since i specifically said "INVADE" instead of "prioritize"... oh wait, I didnt.

West vs East, i didnt think I had to elaborate because i was referring to what you said earlier about western society vs islamic extremeism, but good on you.

"That's right, chopping heads of reconstruction workers & executing humanitarian aid workers the publishing the videos to terrorize an enemy is not terrorism."
- exploiting our media, knowing how much influence it has over our society, is a pretty sound strategy in waning public support for the invasion.Their goal is to end the American
occupation of their country, theyre doing what they have to.And by the way, Napalming people isnt very nice either, and dont say it didnt happen, dozens and dozens of people, some of them english reporters, dont just make up stories about bombs filled with gas that melts your skin off.

Wes you said you questioned my ethics or something because I said we stood nothing to benefit from sending troops to the country.I Dont see how thats an ehtically bad thing to say, shouldnt our goal as country at this point be to protect ourselves and our allies? ... anything beneficial .... 'beneficial' to that cause, would be a good thing would it not.


----------



## jmackenzie_15

I never said we should just use military action and invade, i was implyingt hey should be dealt with. However that needs to be done, get it done.If you can get it done by offerring them bananas to stop funding terrorists, then go ahead and do that.The method isnt as important as accomplishing the goal which is supposed to be exterminating terrorism.


----------



## 1feral1

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> Are you kidding me? you sir, were sold.
> 
> Iraq never had the capacity to do ANYTHING,


One can do this by sponsoring and/or paying for a terrorist attack, you don't need a nuke to have an a PL of extremeists go into shopping centres with back-pack bombs on to kill thousands on a Thu night shopping day before Christmas in any western city. There is a million other ways too. Think about it.

We have one Islamic terr right here in Sydney who is on trail for planning bombing plots in Sydney, at an military establishment, and power grids, plus he had a host of other plots too, and he was/is not working alone. Over 125 Australians have been killed already by terrorist attacks outside Australia since 11 Sep 00.

Try www.dfat.gov.au right now to see the warnings as we expect more JI terr attacks on western targets in the Australiasian perimiter. It was only a matter of weeks ago that our embassy in Jakarta was attacked with the deaths of 9 innocent people. Plus the Kuta beach bombings in Bali, which killed 89 Aussies ( many local girls from my neighbourhood - all under 30 yrs old) and even a Canadian man from Wynyard, Saskatchewan.

BTW, You did not answer my question if the US had done nothing.

Well, I and we are waiting.....

Wes


----------



## McG

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> Since i specifically said "INVADE" instead of "prioritize"... oh wait, I didnt.


But how are these Arab state relevant to your argument if they would not tie up military & reconstruction resources that we could send to Iraq?


----------



## jmackenzie_15

In conclusion, before you jump all over evreything I say, let me clarify exactly what it is im trying to say, so we all understand:

1.Canada would not achieve anything by sending a military force to iraq.The troops could be better served elsewhere, or at home training for the inevitable larger problem.However, I am in favor of sending aid workers and other personnell from Canada to rebuild the country and establish infrastructure.

2.Instead of focusing our attention on looking for threats from withing Iraq, /I/ Think that we should be investigating alot of other places first.Ie, Saudi Arabia, whom the majority of the hijackers were born from.Other countries like syria and egypt also have extensive terrorist links.


----------



## Acorn

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> Acorn, Egpyt and Syria are known to have connections to Al Qaeda, and many 'suspected terrorists' that have already been arrested or sought after are from these countries.Is that not worth investigating?



No, young feller, they are not "known" beyond the fact that Egyptian and Syrian citizens have been implicated in A-Q terrorism, primarily in Afghanistan and Iraq. Of course, citizens of Morocco, Tunisia, Lebanon, Israel(Palestine), the UK, US, Indonesia ad nauseum have also been so implicated. Why aren't they on your list?

Do you have any concept of the politics of the Egyptian and Syrian governments? The greatest irony in your assumption is the greater similarity between the Syrian and Iraqi Baath aprties and yet somehow Iraq is a mistake, and Syria is a more important enemy. Top that with Egypt's very secular, somewhat socialist, albeit undemoocratic, government and I can only conclude that your knowledge derives from some rather single minded propaganda pieces published in some very biased news sources.

In the words of Yoda: clue, you do not have.

Acorn


----------



## jmackenzie_15

Wes, if the US had not invaded, likely nothing would have happened.In fact, i think the chances of another foreign attack on north america are significantly increased.This war is creating sympathizers.Like I said, according to the CIA and the IAEA, Iraq had no massive weapon capability, were building any, or were planning to attack the united states or its allies, or funding terrorists.So that being said, I dont think invading has really done much in the way of harming the terrorist organization.

IMHO, and a controversial one, Bush took this opportunity to attack Iraq, more specifically Saddam Hussein, whom he seems to have taken a personal fight with or something."This is the guy that tried to kill my dad at one time". Not to mention the amount of money to be made by Bush himself, and by Dick Cheney.Their oil and contruction companies are making BILLIONS. You cant say that didnt influence any of the presidents decesions AT ALL. Maybe he did think iraq was a security risk, but id bet he was also eyeing up a chance at revenge and a good peice of change.


----------



## jmackenzie_15

By the way, your refferring to me as 'Young Feller' perhaps taking a stab at my maturity, yet your the one quoting star wars to support an argument.


----------



## McG

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> Wes, if the US had not invaded, likely nothing would have happened.In fact, i think the chances of another foreign attack on north america are significantly increased.


But they did invade, so you can stop arguing as though a world where that never happened is still a possibility.   If the efforts in Iraq are done right & succeed, there will be no increased chance of terrorism.


----------



## 1feral1

Did you know that the US has had over 1200 KIA, and thousands WIA many left without limbs,etc? That 1200+ KIA is twice the amount Canada and Australia lost in Korea, and twice the amount we lost in a 10yr battle in Viet Nam.

One day this war is gonna end, the sheer determination of the west will see it through. Again the price of YOUR freedom and security is paid with their blood, as you sit back, and do nothing but critisise whats going on. Sadly maybe only when this gets personal for you, you might see the truth rather than leftist gobbledygook.

Try saying what you are saying to the mates of the fallen, or parents of the local girls who were murdered in cold blood by Islamic terrorsts on 12 Oct 01. 

   : Wes

McDonalds can offer you a career too.


----------



## Kirkhill

Michael Moore,  You Have a Heck of a lot to Answer for................ : :rage: ???


----------



## 1feral1

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> Wes, if the US had not invaded, likely nothing would have happened.
> Bush took this opportunity to attack Iraq, more specifically Saddam Hussein,



Mate, I think one of two things:

a) you have really lost the plot
b) a troll just wanting to stir the shye pot

I think you     :blotto: have been sitting in a leftest uni pub reading leftist   articles, maybe smoking dope and sipping warm beer with a bunch of others with the same views. And you are a member of the CF? Or are you? 

Why, why, why did I 'bite'. I guess I should have known better. Another ostrich with his head in the sand. Don't worry this bad naughty war will go away.


----------



## jmackenzie_15

"But they did invade, so you can stop arguing as though a world where that never happened is still a possibility.   If the efforts in Iraq are done right & succeed, there will be no increased chance of terrorism."
^ I was answering a direct question, you're obviously just out for an argument since thats the second time you tried to pick a point out of nothing.



			
				Wesley H. Allen said:
			
		

> Did you know that the US has had over 1200 KIA, and thousands WIA many left without limbs,etc? That 1200+ KIA is twice the amount Canada and Australia lost in Korea, and twice the amount we lost in a 10yr battle in Viet Nam.
> 
> ^ Irrellevant totally
> 
> One day this war is gonna end, the sheer determination of the west will see it through. Again the price of YOUR freedom and security is paid with their blood, as you sit back, and do nothing but critisise whats going on. Sadly maybe only when this gets personal for you, you might see the truth rather than leftist gobbledygook.
> 
> ^Alot of people will say the insurgent fighters are a hell of a lot more determined than we are.The american people see a few dead soldiers on tv and public support drops.How many family members have the iraqis lost, yet they fight on.I just got home from work, if im not mistaken it was training for this exact type of scenario I may have to participate in the near futute, gotta love OBUA.In case your doubting the legitamacy of the reserves, 3 of the guys from my company alone returned from aghan in february.Oh wait, I do nothing but sit around and criticize between working in the reserves and going to school to get a policing degree.Yes, I am a lazy, lazy citizen.It became personal enough for me when someone I knew was killed in new york, and a Corporal who lived down the road from me was killed in afghanistan.
> 
> Try saying what you are saying to the mates of the fallen, or parents of the local girls who were murdered in cold blood by Islamic terrorsts on 12 Oct 01.
> 
> ^Bombing hospitals and schools full of kids isnt cold blooded though.Neither is napalming them.Thats war, people die.Quit being sucked in by the media. " cold blooded evil terrorists, damn them".If they had the media power we did, Youd see alot of other ugly things.Ill assume your forgetting all about Gitmo and Abu Gharib for starters.
> 
> : Wes
> 
> McDonalds can offer you a career too.
> 
> ^ so can Carolyn Parrish



Its a good sign that youve lost the argument when you start throwing in random derrogatory comments, and attempting to put together statements to sound important that have absolutely nothing to do with the topic at hand. Hmm terrorism versus casualties in korea... yes, I can see the links.


----------



## jmackenzie_15

I think you    have been sitting in a leftest uni pub reading leftist  articles, maybe smoking dope and sipping warm beer with a bunch of others with the same views. And you are a member of the CF? Or are you? 

^ Because you dont agree with my opinion, which i clearly stated that it was to begin with, lets see, im a left winged dope smoking alchoholic.Wes, with all due respect, you're a 
jackass.end of conversation.


----------



## 1feral1

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> "
> 
> Its a good sign that youve lost the argument when you start throwing in random derrogatory comments, and attempting to put together statements to sound important that have absolutely nothing to do with the topic at hand. Hmm terrorism versus casualties in korea... yes, I can see the links.



I've lost nothing, but you have made a fool of yourself and lost your own intregity and respect. I reckon when you grow up, you might understand the facts.


----------



## jmackenzie_15

Since respect always goes out to people who when they can think of nothing to support their argument, resort to insults.You're full of it.Have a good night.


----------



## 1feral1

BTW the casualty figures I posted represent loss and determinatation to win, but what do you know? After all you thought in for a penny, in for a pound was about money. I have a lot of respect for todays youth in general, but you got a long row to hoe.

Many insurgents are foreigners with a hatred for the west.

Attack all you want, personally I thrive on being insulted. Who do you think you are talking too? I am 45 yrs old ( not a 19 yr old uni student), January 2005 marks 29 yrs service in two different armies, once you get some TI maybe you will stop seeing things how you do now, and realise how mislead you have been in the past.

I don't need to take shtye from a snotty nosed kid with an attitude, so F.O.


----------



## jmackenzie_15

Arent you supposed to be the wise adult ? your egging on the argument based on what? I have nothing more to say to you, again, GOOD NIGHT.


----------



## McG

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> exploiting our media, knowing how much influence it has over our society, is a pretty sound strategy in waning public support for the invasion.Their goal is to end the American occupation of their country, theyre doing what they have to.


No.   Thier goal is to re-establish conditions for a regiem in which a minorety oppresses the majority of the states populace.   Likely, they are also trying to establish a system that will accomodate extreemist Islam.   The coalition reconstruction efforts are the primary barrier to them.

. . . and it is still terrorism and targeting non-combatants.



			
				jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> And by the way, Napalming people isnt very nice either, and dont say it didnt happen, dozens and dozens of people, some of them english reporters, dont just make up stories about bombs filled with gas that melts your skin off.


How is this more relevant than Korean war casualties?  The bombing of the media convoy was an accident.  The coalition forces have been going after combatants, not civillian aid works.


----------



## Infanteer

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> I would sooner quit the CF than join in on an american crusade through the middle east for no particular reason , other than the fake one we've been told to oust, and I quote, "evil doers".



Looks like you can hang out with Jeremy Hinzman then.

You're doing your regiment proud....


----------



## 1feral1

;D ROTF and seriously LMHO! Bloody helll Infanteer!

However, if he says who he is????? Too bad his views couldnt be forwarded on to his CSM, or worse his 'mates'

Cheers (and beers),   

Gotta go, caroles on the beach tonight (Dunningham Park, Cronulla Beach), and we'll light candles on the memorial to our local girls killed at Kuta.

Wes


----------



## jmackenzie_15

Looks like you can hang out with Jeremy Hinzman then.

You're doing your regiment proud....

I take it you werent around when the vast majority of canadians said No to going to iraq then? just in case you werent, yeah, it did happen.


----------



## McG

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> I take it you werent around when the vast majority of canadians said No to going to iraq then? just in case you werent, yeah, it did happen.


I must have been sick that day.  Nobody asked me.

However, you've missed his point (and ignored others that have raised this point).  You are a member of the CF, and you have told us you will jump ship if you don't agree with the political arguments behind a mission that the CF deploys on.


----------



## a_majoor

If these posters are examples of the reasoning against the war in Iraq, how do you think these people will respond to nuclear provocation by Iran or North Korea? I can see the tie in to the "What's wrong with University" thread already...

Wes, you are dealing with another "Disillusioned", who will ignore or deny any fact, argument or proof you might care to bring to the table. I thought of one of the first Westerners to be publicly beheaded for TV; Daniel Pearl, a journalist who thought that his "rapport" and "understanding" of the jihadi viewpoint would gain him access. What he failed to realize until he was dragged out of the car was that the Jihadis did not care about his sympathy of point of view, to them he was only an American and a Jew, and the only point they had for him was at the end of a knife.

It is my devout hope that people like "Disillusioned" or your new friend NEVER are subjected to such barbaric  treatment, but people like us will have to hold their hands and protect them from traffic and matches until such time as they learn. This must be the real definition of the "Nanny State".


----------



## 1feral1

Cole, he is just a boy in a mans uniform trying to deliberatly stir up shyte (probably not even really in), Don't bit like I did. A classic example of why some animals in the wild eat their young.

I think he needs a spanking.

Wes


----------



## jmackenzie_15

I would rather jump ship, but i wouldnt
even though we will never send combat troops to iraq.You can write it down.Not unless theres some kind of crisis that requires UN intervention.If the UN decrees it as being necessary, then I will support it and trust in their wisdom.Im not a fan of the cowboy gung ho invade and bomb cities on tv during primetime CNN tactic the americans have adopted.

Not to hark on the troops, i love alot of those guys and its a shame theyre being wasted.


----------



## Infanteer

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> I take it you werent around when the vast majority of canadians said No to going to iraq then? just in case you werent, yeah, it did happen.



Actually, I was deployed abroad.

However, what does that have to do with the fact that you're willing to sell your teammates out because of your political (mis)conceptions.   Reading through your posts on this thread, I've noticed you've brought up:

1) The notion of invading Saudi Arabia.

2) The notion of Yankee Imperialists hungry for Oil.

3) Several misconceptions of the current geopolitical situation.

Something tells me that you have only a vague understanding of the concepts you are trying to debate here.


----------



## Infanteer

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> If the UN decrees it as being necessary, then I will support it and trust in their wisdom.



....and that my friends, has sealed the deal for Mr Mackenzie and his arguements being taken seriously.

ignore...<click>


----------



## jmackenzie_15

for the record, my arguments were nevre taken seriously to begin with.

secondly, Im inclined to trust in the United Nations security council over donald rumsfeld, im sorry I dont share your sense of... however the hell it is you guys 'think'. catch yah later.


----------



## 1feral1

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> I would rather jump ship, alot of those guys and its a shame theyre being wasted.



WASTED! WASTED! - Shame on ya! I can't believe what I just read!

You are nothing but a fu**ing COWARD! You make me want to vomit!

Get bloody rooted! And get off this great site!

Now I am totally disgusted, too bad ya didnt live local!

Out!


----------



## Acorn

mackenzie,

Son, and I can call you son, I'm old enough to be your father, you have dodged the "Egypt and Syria issue" due to a diversion. I called you "young feller' 'cause that gives you an out for not knowing yer arse from yer boots.

There may well be an argument against Canadian participation in Iraq, but you aren't making it. 

Maybe quoting a Star Wars character implies a lack of maturity on my part. Hell, I usually think of myself a a big kid (my wife is the one who stops me from buying the BMW M3 cabriolet). Whatever - as your genration might say.

Anyway, young feller, any comments on my points, or are you the typical 18 y/o who can't make an argument to save his life? Wanna get into a logical fallacy argument with the likes of me (a 40-something soldier with spotty university education)?

Acorn


----------



## Canuck_25

Well, after reading this thread, ill offer my oppinon.

 I would agree with sending Canadian troops to Iraq, IF AND I MEAN IF, the U.N. assumes controll of military and reconstruction operations. I would prefere to see a similar operation to the suez crises, a replacement of american troops by U.N. troops. Now, i recognize the U.S. cant leave Iraq prematurly nor can we (the world) watch the U.S. waste billions and destroy its economy, and thus bringing the world into an economic recession.


 Now, the U.S. invaded Iraq for all the wrong reasons. Hell, more good would have been done by invading Iran, they are the ones with a real nucleur weapons program.


----------



## Acorn

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> for the record, my arguments were nevre taken seriously to begin with.
> 
> secondly, Im inclined to trust in the United Nations security council over donald rumsfeld, im sorry I dont share your sense of... however the hell it is you guys 'think'. catch yah later.



Holy crap laddie. Do you have any understanding of the composition and limitations of the UNSC? I can say I'm no fan of Rumsfeld, but the UN?!!? Tabernac.

Acorn


----------



## 48Highlander

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> for the record, my arguments were nevre taken seriously to begin with.
> 
> secondly, Im inclined to trust in the United Nations security council over donald rumsfeld, im sorry I dont share your sense of... however the hell it is you guys 'think'. catch yah later.



Most of us like to 'think' for ourselves instead of blindly trusting in a moraly bankrupt institution or Rumsfeld.  You'd be surprised how different things look when you do a little research and actually take the time to consider what it implies.




			
				Wesley H. Allen said:
			
		

> WASTED! WASTED! - Shame on ya! I can't believe what I just read!
> 
> You are nothing but a fu**ing COWARD! You make me want to vomit!
> 
> Get bloody rooted! And get off this great site!
> 
> Now I am totally disgusted, too bad ya didnt live local!
> 
> Out!



Take it easy Wes.  "Get bloody rooted", while effectively expressing the way I'm sure many of us feel towards this individual, really isn't very productive.


----------



## CivU

"I don't know where you are getting your information. A lot of them   'poor local people' (as you put it) are carrying RPGs and AKs, and would KILL you because not who you are, but who you represent. The west."

I find this interesting.   Perhaps what we represent, as the west, is rooted in our history.   Whether this invasion of Iraq is ostensibly based on fighting terrorism or a struggle between the West and extremist Islam as some have suggested, the vision of the West (a term used to essentially describe Christianity) is based around a history of crusades that led to bloodshed, torture and widespread destruction of then Middle East by devout Christians on a pilgrimage to the holy land...For there to exist a resentment should not surprise anyone...We resent terrorists we associate with extremist Islam for murdering our people in our land; we cannot not ignore the hypocrisy of simply labelling it extremism as the only reason for the tension...


----------



## 1feral1

Sorry 48. 'Stains' like this 'boy' really set me off like a bank of claymores ( no, Mackenzie 'bank' has got nothing to do with money either)!

Wes


----------



## McG

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> If the UN decrees it as being necessary, then I will support it and trust in their wisdom.





			
				jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> Im inclined to trust in the United Nations security council over donald rumsfeld.


That is fine, but you are not in the UN Forces and the US Forces.   You are in the CF and the Canadian government will decide where you go (even if the UN does not involve itself).   Are you sure you want to be in the Canadian Forces?

CivU,
"The West" is not "essentially Christianity"


----------



## jmackenzie_15

All I meant to bring up about egypt and syria was that they were examples of countries with terrorist organizations IN them. Iraq never had one, so whats the deal? thats all im saying.IMO, <- for clarification, not the in my opinion abbreviation, the invasion was a mistake, a waste of resources that could have been better spent.. not to mention the loss of human life already at ridiculous numbers.

Currently, I agree iraq needs to be stabilized, but i dont think its something the americans arent able to handle but only time will tell.The americans are in it for the long haul anyway, theres no feisable way they could withdraw anytime soon.If they want canadians to help organize elections? good.If they want us to help distribute humanitarian aid? great.Just dont send our troops into harms way when its not necessary.This is all kindof theoretically speaking anyway, since I doubt we have the capacity to deploy any combat troops overseas for an extended time period anyway =/

in theory there is no right or wrong.We have our culture, they have theirs.And im fully aware they would attack me just as soon as an american.Theyre brown, we arent.They see whitey, they go on a warpath. the end.I just think there must be a more effective way of dismantling this terrorist network than sending combat troops to iraq to battle insurgents, thats all.

I like to think I live in a country of educated and morally and ethically sound people.The Prime Minister is supposed to speak for the people.If the majority of the country decided to send us to iraq, then it would be my duty to do so, as a canadian, to defend the interests of the country.Although I really do not see it happening =p


----------



## Infanteer

CivU said:
			
		

> I find this interesting.   Perhaps what we represent, as the west, is rooted in our history.   Whether this invasion of Iraq is ostensibly based on fighting terrorism or a struggle between the West and extremist Islam as some have suggested, the vision of the West (a term used to essentially describe Christianity) is based around a history of crusades that led to bloodshed, torture and widespread destruction of then Middle East by devout Christians on a pilgrimage to the holy land...For there to exist a resentment should not surprise anyone...We resent terrorists we associate with extremist Islam for murdering our people in our land; we cannot not ignore the hypocrisy of simply labelling it extremism as the only reason for the tension...



Spare us the quote from your sociology textbook and get to the point.

Are you assuming that everything revolves around the Crusades, despite the fact that:

1) The Crusades were merely one of a series of bloody invasions of the Middle East during the Middle Ages (why hasn't a Jihad been called against the Mongolians?)

2) Most of the Islamic World wasn't involved in the Crusades (By this time, the schism of Islam was moving along quite well).

3) Conflict, bloodshed, torture, and widespread destruction were perpetrated by all groups, both on each other and upon themselves (4th Crusade ring a bell?), throughout centuries.   How do the Crusades determine outlook when struggles in Spain and the Balkans were equally as brutal.   To assume that the Crusades have some mythical value to people in the Middle East is dumbing down a complex issue.

But I guess this fits with you beloved "It's All The West's Fault" theory, doesn't it   :


----------



## 1feral1

CivU said:
			
		

> "I don't know where you are getting your information. A lot of them   'poor local people' (as you put it) are carrying RPGs and AKs, and would KILL you because not who you are, but who you represent. The west."
> 
> I find this interesting.   Perhaps what we represent, as the west, is rooted in our history.   Whether this invasion of Iraq is ostensibly based on fighting terrorism or a struggle between the West and extremist Islam as some have suggested, the vision of the West (a term used to essentially describe Christianity) is based around a history of crusades that led to bloodshed, torture and widespread destruction of then Middle East by devout Christians on a pilgrimage to the holy land...For there to exist a resentment should not surprise anyone...We resent terrorists we associate with extremist Islam for murdering our people in our land; we cannot not ignore the hypocrisy of simply labelling it extremism as the only reason for the tension...



If they will MURDER an English born 60yr old female CARE worker (married to an Iraqi), who has lived in Iraq for 30 yrs, this is another example of hatred for westerners pure and simple.

Amoung many other reasons, its a hatred against what we have and how we do things. I have lived it all too often, had my GF spat at and called a slut for dressing western, and other confrontations, sadly right here in my own country, where residents are forced away from their favourite haunts by large groups of muslims with VERY bad attitudes.

Dont get me wrong, I am not tarring the whole lot, as most here in Australia just want what we do, jobs, harmony and and family, and the normal things in life.

We have many radical Islamic terrs in gaol right now, and one currently on trail. we know we are targeted, with our own PM saying its not if, but when. The govt has taken the threat seriously, and we are at an elevated threat right now.

The 89 Aussies murdered at the Sari and Paddy's nightclubs were chosen for the music, dress, and booze, and our culture in general, all of which RADICALl Islam hates with extreme prejudice, and this was before our involvement in Iraq. It was also for our large involvment in Timor L'este, which the CF also was in on too.
Anyways, I must get going or Nancy (Super Sunray) will be on my case. Gotta by some wine a pick up two Pizzas from Gillies on the Kingsway.

Anti-westernism or Anti-Australianism is alive and well right here in our own country.

Wes


----------



## Acorn

OK, my final point tonight.

Apparently you are misinformed about terrorism and organisations in certain countries. Yes, Syria has a few terrorist orgs HQ'ed in Damascus. There are also terrorist orgs in Syria and Egypt which are against the present gov'ts - the Muslim Brotherhood in both cases.

A point worth noting is that Saddam's gov't provided $25000US cash to the families of suicide bombers. As well, a number of terrorist leaders (Abu Nidal, for example) were granted sanctuary in Baghdad.

As to your loyalties, I would recommend getting out of the mob. One of the things we have to accept is civilian control. That may well mean descisions that we don't agree with. If you aren't able to do your duty should the elected gov't of Canada order you to Iraq I would suggest that you are deluded about your profession.

Acorn


----------



## Infanteer

Wesley H. Allen said:
			
		

> The 89 Aussies murdered at the Sari and Paddy's nightclubs were chosen for the music, dress, and booze, and our culture in general, all of which RADICALl Islam hates with extreme prejudice, and this was before our involvement in Iraq. It was also for our large involvment in Timor L'este, which the CF also was in on too.



In an effort to switch gears....

Interesting enough, perhaps that is not the case, at least not according to "Anonymous":

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1574888498/qid=1103264233/sr=2-1/ref=pd_ka_b_2_1/104-5532402-6336758

I've yet to read the book, although I am going to pick it up for the fact that it is a different approach to the issue from a person who has dealt with it first-hand.


----------



## 48Highlander

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> All I meant to bring up about egypt and syria was that they were examples of countries with terrorist organizations IN them. Iraq never had one, so whats the deal? thats all im saying.IMO, <- for clarification, not the in my opinion abbreviation, the invasion was a mistake, a waste of resources that could have been better spent.. not to mention the loss of human life already at ridiculous numbers.



    Actually there WERE terrorists organizations training in Iraq, but they weren't closely linked to Sadam like the US implied.  In addition, once the war got rolling, the majority of the "insurgents" were foreigners who came to Iraq to fight the US.



			
				jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> in theory there is no right or wrong.We have our culture, they have theirs.And im fully aware they would attack me just as soon as an american.Theyre brown, we arent.They see whitey, they go on a warpath. the end.I just think there must be a more effective way of dismantling this terrorist network than sending combat troops to iraq to battle insurgents, thats all.



    Just when I think you've hit bottom, you start digging again.


----------



## CivU

"Spare us the quote from your sociology textbook and get to the point.

Are you assuming that everything revolves around the Crusades, despite the fact that:

1) The Crusades were merely one of a series of bloody invasions of the Middle East during the Middle Ages (why hasn't a Jihad been called against the Mongolians?)

2) Most of the Islamic World wasn't involved in the Crusades (By this time, the schism of Islam was moving along quite well).

3) Conflict, bloodshed, torture, and widespread destruction were perpetrated by all groups, both on each other and upon themselves (4th Crusade ring a bell?), throughout centuries.   How do the Crusades determine outlook when struggles in Spain and the Balkans were equally as brutal.   To assume that the Crusades have some mythical value to people in the Middle East is dumbing down a complex issue.

But I guess this fits with you beloved "It's All The West's Fault" theory, doesn't it "



I see you easily confuse history and sociology, but as you suggest to many people on this forum, I think there's enough information out there to differentiate between the two so I'm certain someone who spends as much time on the internet as you can easily find it...

As far as the crusades being the only piece in a complicated puzzle, I never suggested this; however, I did offer one reason for the ongoing conflict between "The West" and "Extremist Islam", and while I understand that the West is not essentially Christianity, I do believe that is a significant point of contention between the two forces at work...

Our history plays a significant part in this conflict, not unlike the present events will undoubtedly play a significant role in perpetuating this tension long into the future.   And while you insist on ridiculing anyone whose views are not consistent with yours, which tends to take away from the potential for intelligent debate that exists on this forum, I feel that pointing out that the West is not without fault in the present conflicts that exist between "The West" and any other contentious forces around the globe is neither a radical leftist view, nor is it unrealistic by any means.   I'm reminded of the George Santyana quote, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

As far as, "Theyre brown, we arent.They see whitey, they go on a warpath. the end."

While you had some things to say that were worth consideration, this inarticulate rant absolves your statements of any credibility.  For me, a persons skin pigmentation does not initiate a violent episode, if this is the case for you, then I hope the end implies the conclusion of your messages...


----------



## 1feral1

jmackenzie_15 said:
			
		

> They see whitey, they go on a warpath.



Why am I responding to an idiot?

Do you really think all Iraqis are brown, or Muslim? Plenty of Christians there too (or havent you heard some of their churchs have been bombed by insurgents and plenty have been murdered).

Muslims like all religions come in more than the colour brown   :, and they are found in every corner of the world. There are plenty of white and asian muslims too. No matter what colour, its the radical extremist who hates us, and there has been many white radicals extremists too.


----------



## jmackenzie_15

As to your loyalties, I would recommend getting out of the mob. One of the things we have to accept is civilian control. That may well mean descisions that we don't agree with. If you aren't able to do your duty should the elected gov't of Canada order you to Iraq I would suggest that you are deluded about your profession

^ In reality would I do it, yes.Would I hate it for the rest of my life assuming i wasnt killed, yes.Just as many of the marines over there already hate every second of it and dont beleive in anything theyre doing over there.

It's a matter of time before Canada is severely attacked by terrorists, our security is simply.. well, almost non existant in some places, and I fail to beleive that enemies of western culture would simply pass up such a target.I live in the maratimes, a place not really defended very well in terms of security from terrorism, and includes many valid targets.International shipping ports, internation airports, ... the halifax waterfront is also one of the least guarded ports on the eastern side of north america.The crappy thing is, you cant really deploy somewhere to fight these people, therye everywhere and nowhere.

It's just a big pile of crap that I cant even begin to explain, it would take forever to even try to understand it all and frankly it makes my head hurt.I think it's going to get a lot worse before it get's any better, but ive never really been much of an optimist.

I'm powerless to affect the spinning of the earth and the happenings that are giong to happen , so Im just blowing hot air like everyone else.Might as well just let it happen and deal with it when it comes.

The things you start to say at 2am.Whatever.Have a good night.


----------



## jmackenzie_15

Wes, you would think that someone of such a higher intellect than I, you would understand the concept of a generalization.Obviously im aware not all muslims or arabs are brown etc, theres no need to get super critical over ... you know what, forget it.I thought you had to go pick up a pizza?


----------



## Infanteer

CivU said:
			
		

> I see you easily confuse history and sociology, but as you suggest to many people on this forum, I think there's enough information out there to differentiate between the two so I'm certain someone who spends as much time on the internet as you can easily find it...



I'm touched, thanks for pointing out the deepest inadequacies of my life.



> As far as the crusades being the only piece in a complicated puzzle, I never suggested this; however, I did offer one reason for the ongoing conflict between "The West" and "Extremist Islam", and while I understand that the West is not essentially Christianity, I do believe that is a significant point of contention between the two forces at work...
> 
> Our history plays a significant part in this conflict, not unlike the present events will undoubtedly play a significant role in perpetuating this tension long into the future.   And while you insist on ridiculing anyone whose views are not consistent with yours, which tends to take away from the potential for intelligent debate that exists on this forum, I feel that pointing out that the West is not without fault in the present conflicts that exist between "The West" and any other contentious forces around the globe is neither a radical leftist view, nor is it unrealistic by any means.   I'm reminded of the George Santyana quote, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."



For the sake of satisfying your lofty position on the top of the moral and intellectual pyramid, I'll bite.

I won't argue against the notion that history plays a significant role in determining present behaviours.   I've argued for it before - heck, I've seen it first hand, listening to some Croat yammer on about murdering Serbs to avenge some long-held grudge.   

But the fact that your point revolved around the idea that current attitudes are _"based around a history of crusades that led to bloodshed, torture and widespread destruction of then Middle East by devout Christians on a pilgrimage to the holy land"_ seems to be nothing but an attempt to load culpability upon the United States (and the West in general) for the actions of marauding feudal warriors 8 centuries ago.   You follow that up with the point that _"For there to exist a resentment should not surprise anyone...We resent terrorists we associate with extremist Islam for murdering our people in our land; we cannot not ignore the hypocrisy of simply labelling it extremism as the only reason for the tension..."_ seems to be an "out" for fanatics - "They do it because we raped and pillaged them in during the Crusades."

Are you sure I'm the one confusing history here?   Is the Crusades the only event of "bloodshed, torture and widespread destruction" - if it isn't, why are you bringing it up as an indictment of "our hypocrisy"?

I would contend that contemporary events play a far bigger role in current attitudes.   Rather then reading Edward Said, I think insurgents or fanatics are apt to form a viewpoint based on what the mullah is yelling at them or what their corrupt leadership says to them as they oss them in the path of an oncoming Abrams tank.



> As far as, "Theyre brown, we arent.They see whitey, they go on a warpath. the end."
> 
> While you had some things to say that were worth consideration, this inarticulate rant absolves your statements of any credibility.   For me, a persons skin pigmentation does not initiate a violent episode, if this is the case for you, then I hope the end implies the conclusion of your messages...



For once, I agree.

J Mackenzie, quit while you are behind....


----------



## CivU

"seems to be an "out" for fanatics - "They do it because we raped and pillaged them in during the Crusades."

I'm not offering an out, I'm attempting to offer a possible reason, one of many, for the present tension between "The West" and "Extremist Islam."  It is ignorant to profess that we, the West, have done nothing to provoke the conflicts that persist and are merely innocent victims...While I believe both parties are culpable, we cannot deny our own provocation, regardless of whether using one such example, the Crusades, seems inadequate to you...


----------



## 48Highlander

CivU said:
			
		

> "seems to be an "out" for fanatics - "They do it because we raped and pillaged them in during the Crusades."
> 
> I'm not offering an out, I'm attempting to offer a possible reason, one of many, for the present tension between "The West" and "Extremist Islam."  It is ignorant to profess that we, the West, have done nothing to provoke the conflicts that persist and are merely innocent victims...While I believe both parties are culpable, we cannot deny our own provocation, regardless of whether using one such example, the Crusades, seems inadequate to you...



    Now, I'm no history buff mind you, but I'm pretty sure the US wasn't involved in the Crusades.  I could be wrong though.  I guess George Bush was looking for oil even in the 13th century.  Talk about planning ahead....

    How exactly has the West provoked the conflict?  Because of our "capitalist decadence" and "immoral behavior"?  Are you the sort of person who thinks a woman wearing a short skirt is provoking potential rapists?


----------



## Infanteer

CivU said:
			
		

> I'm not offering an out, I'm attempting to offer a possible reason, one of many, for the present tension between "The West" and "Extremist Islam." It is ignorant to profess that we, the West, have done nothing to provoke the conflicts that persist and are merely innocent victims...While I believe both parties are culpable, we cannot deny our own provocation, regardless of whether using one such example, the Crusades, seems inadequate to you...



Fair enough.   I won't argue with that.

I would only argue that we should focus on the more immediate _casus belli_ between "Radical Islam" and "The West" as, like I said earlier, I contend that current events play a much larger and more important role.   Nothing we can do can fix the Crusades or any other conflict of the past - however, what we do (or change) right now can have an immediate affect on behaviours and outlooks.

Cheers,

Infanteer


----------



## KevinB

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Now, I'm no history buff mind you, but I'm pretty sure the US wasn't involved in the Crusades.   I could be wrong though.   I guess George Bush was looking for oil even in the 13th century.   Talk about planning ahead....
> 
> How exactly has the West provoked the conflict?   Because of our "capitalist decadence" and "immoral behavior"?   Are you the sort of person who thinks a woman wearing a short skirt is provoking potential rapists?


 ;D 

I think CivU has a case of the Michael Moore'ims.


----------



## McG

CivU said:
			
		

> It is ignorant to profess that we, the West, have done nothing to provoke the conflicts that persist and are merely innocent victims...While I believe both parties are culpable, we cannot deny our own provocation,


There has got to be a host of better examples you could have used; imbalance of power, uneven distribution of wealth, explotation of developing nations' resources, etc.


----------



## Glorified Ape

MCG said:
			
		

> There has got to be a host of better examples you could have used; imbalance of power, uneven distribution of wealth, explotation of developing nations' resources, etc.



Are we actually coming up short on examples of direct western interference in these people's affairs? Need we go through all the coups and agitations organized and backed by Western powers? That's to say nothing of US backing of Israel. I'm not saying it necessarily excuses terrorist acts but it sure as heck plays a hefty part - moreso than inequalities of influence or wealth stemming from the international system, imo. The US, and thus in many people's minds, the West in general has seriously screwed with these people time and again - it's hardly surprising that some of them resort to terrorism as a means of retribution. I'm not saying sit there and get drilled, but we should at least acknowledge the role of the West in this stuff or we'll just devolve into jingoist rhetoric like the US has of late.


----------



## 48Highlander

Americans: The Jews of the World	
By Daniel G. Jennings
FrontPageMagazine.com | April 23, 2003

The popular 20th Century Jewish American novelist Edna Ferber once wrote "the United States seems to be the Jews among nations. It is resourceful adaptable, maligned, envied and feared... its peoples are travelers and wanderers by nature, moving shifting, restless."

Sadly enough, recent events have proven that Ferber was right. The Jewish people and the United States have a lot in common, both are successful, resourceful, adaptable, highly creative, inventive and hated. Like the Jews, Americans are increasingly the objects of hatred, fear, jealousy, bigotry, prejudice, violence and terror from all corners of the globe and the political spectrum. 

In particular, America and Americans are now the target of a vicious, irrational, destructive, well-organized, well-defined, popular and widespread campaign of hatred, prejudice and hysteria similar to that directed against the Jews before World War II. Anti-Americanism has become as popular and as widespread as anti-Semitism was in the 1920s and 30s and its effects could be just as destructive and as tragic as the wave of anti-Semitism that gave rise to Adolph Hitler and the Final Solution. 

The historical analogies between anti-Semitism in the first half of the 20th Century and anti-Americanism today are absolutely bone chilling. In the early 1920s, all of the world's problems were blamed on the Jews. The Jews had somehow started World War I, Jewish bankers had financed the Russian Revolution,  Communism was a Jewish conspiracy to enslave the world, the Jews had somehow engineered Germany's defeat in 1918, Jewish artists and intellectuals were responsible for the decline of culture and morality, Jewish businessmen were responsible for all the problems of capitalism and the troubles of the poor. This was nonsense but it was widely believed even by the most educated and respected of people.

Today, the problems of nations and peoples all over the world are blamed upon America. The collapse of the Argentine economy, human rights violations committed by Latin American dictators in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, vicious and oppressive governments in the Arab nations, starvation and poverty in Africa, are all blamed on America. The crack cocaine epidemic and the AIDS virus are both blamed upon the CIA. Some anti-American bigots even had the audacity to blame the Sept. 11, atrocity on the United States.

This nonsense is spread all over the world by the entertainment and news media. Many of these myths have become tenets of faith among the world's intellectuals. Hollywood movies, Arab newspapers, American network television and scholarly books are full of absurd anti-American conspiracy theories which are treated as historical facts. On a more basic level Americans and America are always portrayed as shallow, arrogant, imperialistic, violent and evil. 

Americans should be afraid of this anti-Americanism because the tolerance of anti-Semitism among respectable European society in the late 19th and early 20th centuries led to Nazism and the Holocaust. In the 1890s, educated and respectable Germans including the personal chaplain to Kaiser Wilhelm II, Germany's Emperor, promoted anti-Semitism. A decade later Austrian politicians were winning elections by blaming their nation's problems on the Jews. By the 1930s Nazi storm troopers were terrorizing Jews in the streets and Anti-Semitic laws were being passed. By the 1940s, Germans were herding hundreds of thousands of Jews into gas chambers and machine gunning hundreds of Jews outside Russian cities. 

Anti-Americanism, like anti-Semitism, has already led to irrational violence. On Sept. 11, 2001, Arab fanatics showed that they were willing to die for a chance to kill Americans.

And the Arab fanatics are far from alone. The American flag is burned regularly in the streets around the world and not just in Third World countries. In March 2003, the Stars and Stripes was publicly burned in the center of Paris. In other words thousands of people around the world are publically demonstrating their desire to destroy America and Americans. The Islamist idiots burning the American flag today would jump at the chance to burn Americans and American cities tomorrow. 

Like the Jews in the 1920s, Americans today should be afraid, very afraid. Just as the anti-Semites believed they could solve the world's problems by killing Jews, the Anti-Americans believe they can solve the world's problems by killing Americans. And they're willing to go to great lengths to do it. They will even sacrifice their own lives for a chance to kill us. 

It's time we Americans learned what the Jews learned during World War II: vicious and irrational prejudice can lead to genocide and that depending on the good faith of others is a sure way to end up at Auschwitz.

We Americans must take action now to stop anti-Americanism. For if we don't, our descendants may end up sharing something else with the Jews, mourning the deaths of millions of our people in a 21st Century Holocaust.


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

MCG said:
			
		

> There has got to be a host of better examples you could have used; imbalance of power, uneven distribution of wealth, exploitation of developing nations' resources, etc.



1980s: US intervention in Nicaragua, South America. In 1986, the United States was condemned by the World Court for "unlawful use of force." To present date, the United States is the only nation that has been condemned for international terrorism by the World Court.

1990s: The United States supports Turkey in the crushing of its own Kurdish population. The Clinton administration gave decisive support and supplied the Turkish army with 80 percent of its arms. This event represents the worst campaign of ethnic cleansing and destruction to occur in the 1990s.

President Bush really says it best: "In this conflict, there is no neutral ground. If any government sponsors outlaws and killers of innocent, they have become outlaws and murderers themselves."

Hey, if the shoe fits, America.

[This isn't specific to America, other states fit the protocol, as well. I pinpoint the United States because the topic of debate surrounds it.]


----------



## McG

Did the World Court say "unlawful use of force"  or "international terrorism"?

When do we see your report?


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

MCG said:
			
		

> Did the World Court say "unlawful use of force"   or "international terrorism"?
> 
> When do we see your report?



Both, actually.

Haha, when it's done. I have no incentive to get this report in, and you'll later understand why [that was by no means a reflection of the quality of work].
I think I'm onto my third week now...


----------



## McG

I hope our 15 pages (so far) have been giving you lots to think about.


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Have they ever. My mind is constantly running laps, which is why I'm usually up until the wee hours of the morning. I've actually really enjoyed reading through this thread, it's unnecessary to point out that there are some very intelligent individuals who contribute to these forums.


----------



## 48Highlander

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> 1980s: US intervention in Nicaragua, South America. In 1986, the United States was condemned by the World Court for "unlawful use of force." To present date, the United States is the only nation that has been condemned for international terrorism by the World Court.
> 1990s: The United States supports Turkey in the crushing of its own Kurdish population. The Clinton administration gave decisive support and supplied the Turkish army with 80 percent of its arms. This event represents the worst campaign of ethnic cleansing and destruction to occur in the 1990s.



Right.  In case you're not aware, let me remind you that Nicaraguans aren't generaly muslim or arab.  The Kurds are muslim but not arab, so I guess that example works....except that using Kurds as an example is kinda strange seing as how the US came to their aid in 91, and Kurds were fighting quite hapily alongside US soldiers during the recent war.  Not to mention the fact that Turks also happen to be muslim, so if the US really did aid them in slaughtering Kurds then there's a much larger group of Muslims who appreciated the assistance.  And the fact that Kurds weren't part of the 9/11 attack, the Taliban resistance in afghanistan, or the current insurgent attacks in Iraq.  In any event, if you're trying to provide examples of things that the US has done which would justify the hostility of people in that region towards the US, you're falling way short of your target.  Add 500, fire when ready.


----------



## Infanteer

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> 1980s: US intervention in Nicaragua, South America. In 1986, the United States was condemned by the World Court for "unlawful use of force." To present date, the United States is the only nation that has been condemned for international terrorism by the World Court.



If you think the US is the only state that has done that in the last 20 years, you're out to lunch.



> 1990s: The United States supports Turkey in the crushing of its own Kurdish population. The Clinton administration gave decisive support and supplied the Turkish army with 80 percent of its arms. This event represents the worst campaign of ethnic cleansing and destruction to occur in the 1990s.



Obviously, you've never been to the Balkans.

Besides, I think Rwanda holds that prize.

Wherever you're getting your information from stinks.


----------



## Bruce Monkhouse

Well, now I'm glad I went to bed early last night. :

_Quote from: jmackenzie_15 on Yesterday at 22:22:02
I would sooner quit the CF than join in on an american crusade through the middle east for no particular reason , _

I want a front row seat at the hearing when you claim political asylum in the good old US of A.


----------



## a_majoor

Hatred for the West is mostly a jealous rage against "who we are", and calling on the glories of the Andalusian state pre 1490, or blaming the United States for the Crusades is just window dressing.

The Jihadis can clearly see the West is internally peaceful and prosperous (no secret police dragging university students to the Abu Gharab prison for example), and cannot accept that _perhaps_ the reason the Arab world is not equally peaceful and prosperous is their own beliefs and culture. More damning to them is the fact that the Arab people are clearly interested in adopting elements of Western culture, wearing western clothes, watching western movies and TV, getting on the Internet etc. They have two choices; adapt or attempt to destroy the source of the "contagion". Osama Bin Laden issued a _Fatwa_ in the mid 1990s, long before most people had heard of him or George W Bush, calling on the Arab world to sever all ties to the West, all radio, television and printed matter from the West was to be prohibited, all manifestations of western culture was to be stamped out. Even today, the "internal" publications, audio cassettes and so on still preach the virtues of shunning the West and rooting out Western influence wherever it is found.

For those who feel a PC moment coming on, the reason I am characterizing this as a Arab movement is because it clearly is. Jihadi's are overwhelmingly from Arab nations. Followers of Islam from non Arab nations are in a distinct minority among the Jihadis, John Walker Lind and the Khaders being famous because of their "novelty" value. Jihadis have no restraints against attacking fellow Islamic nations like Indonesia or Turkey.

*The root cause of Terrorism is a lust for power*, and by stoking and fanning these flames of resentment, the Jihadi leaders gain power and prestige which is otherwise lacking. Their lieutenants gain power and a sense of self worth by wielding guns and knives against captive populations (such as the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, or areas of Fallujia prior to it being liberated by the Marines), and from there it is seemingly a small step to encourage people to take up arms to rid themselves of the "shame" caused by falling so far behind the rest of the world.


----------



## Infanteer

a_majoor said:
			
		

> The Jihadis can clearly see the West is internally peaceful and prosperous (no secret police dragging university students to the Abu Gharab prison for example), and cannot accept that _perhaps_ the reason the Arab world is not equally peaceful and prosperous is their own beliefs and culture. More damning to them is the fact that the Arab people are clearly interested in adopting elements of Western culture, wearing western clothes, watching western movies and TV, getting on the Internet etc.



I can sense I PC moment coming on as well, but I will step in to support this observation before it does.

When it comes down to it, humans have a primary urge to serve their own needs and the needs of their immediate family first; loyalty and attention will diffuse as it expands to higher levels (community, tribe, nation, state, species).

Quite frankly, Western civil society (the conglomeration of many cultural inputs) is simply better at providing the basic needs that humans want - security, clothing, food, shelter, education, and access to communal institutions.   This is not a theory, this is a demonstarable fact.   Take any aspect of these basic needs and compare access and supply in a Western liberal democracy to any other system and for the most part, you'll see that it's true.   Of course, people who abhor "materialism" and "capitalism" may take offence to this notion, but looking at people worldwide, you'll see that most are driven more by basic needs (which have a biological root) then by ideology.

Does this mean that cultures are "inferior" or "superior" or "civilized" or "barbaric" in a qualitative sense?   No.   Things like "Right" and "Wrong" for the most part are only applicable in the context in which groups of people accept them as normative values.

However, there is a bit of "Social Darwinism" at play here.   Different structures of civil society (the horizontal and vertical links between people within a group) compete when they come into contact with eachother.   Quite frankly, many aspects of the "West" are simply outdoing competitors in the game of evolution.   This is why you see Western clothes, Western music, Western democracy, and Western ideas slowly creeping around the globe.



> *The root cause of Terrorism is a lust for power*



Yup - anyway you want to cut it, power - that unmeasurable degree of influence over the will of others - is the basis of any conflict.


----------



## Bruce Monkhouse

Quote,
_The root cause of Terrorism is a lust for power_

You  stole my next post I was going to make with that line, however, me, not being a very good wordsmith, was going to say its basically the pout that happens when the little boys realize they can't compete with the big boys.
[hence why the USA is a popular target for those with genital envy]


----------



## 1feral1

a_majoor said:
			
		

> Hatred for the West is mostly a jealous rage against "who we are", and calling on the glories of the Andalusian state pre 1490, or blaming the United States for the Crusades is just window dressing.
> 
> *The root cause of Terrorism is a lust for power*


*

Right on the mark!


Cold beers (from a humid sunny morning),

Wes*


----------



## CivU

"however, what we do (or change) right now can have an immediate affect on behaviours and outlooks"

Infanteer, I'm interested in how this perspective, one I whole heartedly support, plays into the present involvements in Iraq and whatever pending intervetions loom...how does this fit into the varying opinions on why we have gone into particular countries and how are impact is going to positively and negatively affect the people there and their opinion of us...

48 Highlander, As far as the obscure reference to skirts provoking rape, I'm not sure that's even worth responding to...I don't know how my comments of admitting both parties have contributed to the present "West" vs. "Extremist Islam" conflict could be connected to a justification for a woman's dress instigating sexual assault.   Your attempt at reductio ad absurdum fell insultingly short...

And to clarify KevinB, I despise Michael Moore...his manipulative editing, distorted presentation of information, interviews with ignorant uninformed persons represented as authorities, use of shock and awe (for lack of a better term) and distractions with causally disconected relationships is about as useful as Fox News...The only benefit he offers is that on a very simplistic level he provides some initiation of discussion on important issues, Roger and Me - outsourcing of jobs/globalization, Bowling for Columbine - pervasiveness of violence, Fahrenheit 9/11 - US Foreign Policy.   He doesn't provide answers, but whether you agree with him or not, you cannot deny he certainly facilitates discussion...look at this forum.

If this is the case, "The root cause of Terrorism is a lust for power"

The is the root cause of US foreign policy and attempt to maintain their hegemonic power over everyone else...?


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

a_majoor said:
			
		

> Hatred for the West is mostly a jealous rage against "who we are", and calling on the glories of the Andalusian state pre 1490, or blaming the United States for the Crusades is just window dressing.



Hatred for the West has very little do to do, if anything with "who we are," it has everything to do with what we do.

The September 11 attacks were not targeting "free and prosperous" America, they were attacks on the major economic and military institutions within the United States, which dictate foreign policy to some extent. Had they been attacks on our values and freedom as individuals living within a democracy, they would have easily driven a plane through the Statue of Liberty.

Look further into the political violence that characterizes much of Latin America in this day and age. In 2000, Colombia generated 106 acts of political violence against the United States, Argentina generated 4, and Ecuador generated 4. Of those 114, 105 of them were directed at U.S. businesses, 1 was directed at the U.S. government, 3 were religiously provoked, and 5 were directed at private institutions. 

I don't understand how you could possibly conclude that anti-American incidents are directed at the freedom and prosperity that individuals enjoy in the West, if anything those generating the terrorist activity are struggling to obtain the very freedoms that characterize the West, and are reacting violently to years of foreign policy that has exacerbated the conditions of their lives (in political, social and economic terms). Delve a little deeper into foreign policy, specifically in Latin American, and you'll gain a better understanding of why these attacks occur so frequently. I use Latin America, because in 2000, the United States Department of State reports that 114 of the 177 anti-U.S. incidents occurred within the Western Hemisphere.

Political violence and terrorist activity targeting American symbols and institutions follow U.S. interference and foreign policy like a puppy dog. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that a large proportion of anti-U.S. incidents now occur in the new target at hand, the Middle East.


----------



## M16

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Of those 114, 105 of them were directed at U.S. businesses, 1 was directed at the U.S. government, 3 were religiously provoked, and 5 were directed at private institutions.



That's not targeting freedom.


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Infanteer said:
			
		

> If you think the US is the only state that has done that in the last 20 years, you're out to lunch.



My comment at the bottom went overlooked. Surprise, surprise.
I noted quite clearly that other states fit the shoe, but chose to focus on the United States, as this was the major country under debate.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Obviously, you've never been to the Balkans.
> 
> Besides, I think Rwanda holds that prize.
> 
> Wherever you're getting your information from stinks.



Rwanda may have taken its place. Regardless, that in no way undercuts the significance of the event, despite how poor you think my sources of information are. Furthermore, by making comment on my sources, and excluding comment on the issue altogether tells me that you're one of many that refutes to acknowledge, and or does away with information on the basis that "the information source must be poor," because it fails to fit into your line of thinking/argument.

Debate and critique the issue, don't try to to undercut my opinions on the basis of my sources (which are all strictly academic, as a result of research for my report).


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

M16 said:
			
		

> That's not targeting freedom.



My point exactly.

It's targeting the economic and political institutions that implement and reflect American foreign policy.


----------



## Infanteer

CivU said:
			
		

> _"however, what we do (or change) right now can have an immediate affect on behaviours and outlooks"_
> 
> Infanteer, I'm interested in how this perspective, one I whole heartedly support, plays into the present involvements in Iraq and whatever pending intervetions loom...how does this fit into the varying opinions on why we have gone into particular countries and how are impact is going to positively and negatively affect the people there and their opinion of us...



I am not to sure exactly what you're asking me here, but I'll try to answer it.

With regards to Iraq, I think going in was a good strategy.   The fundamental problems confronting the US after Sept 11 was a whole gamut of issues arising out of an area that is inherently unstable, unfriendly and occupying a key piece of geopolitical real-estate.   As such, America (and the rest of us, whether we like it or not) could not afford not to engage itself in the Middle East in an assertive manner for two reasons:

1) The preponderant importance of petroleum in sustaining our economic well-being.   If the strength of America (and the West) was to fade in the eyes of Jihadis, fundamentalists, tin-pot dictators, and slippery Saudi princes, then there was a real risk of losing the "cooperative" influence that the West possessed in the region.   Whether we like it or not, going to war for oil is necessary - if someone wishes to leave the well-being of close to a billion people in the hands of dictators and/or mullahs, then they're not thinking with their head.

2)   The nature of the threat demanded it (Props to Kirkhill for elaborating on this one to me one night).   In the last big geopolitical struggle, Containment was a strategy that worked because the ideology of Communism was sustained and propelled by the Red Army and the Red Army was sustained and propelled by a system that contained the seeds of its own demise (which George Kennan very keenly pointed out with the "X" Article).   The threat was very conventional, and as such could be penned in by conventional responses around the periphery of the Soviet Empire (hence "Containment")

We are now faced with a very different situation, as the attacks of September 11 brought to stark clarity.   The forces involved in this geopolitical struggle are "4th Generation" in nature.

http://d-n-i.net/second_level/fourth_generation_warfare.htm

How do you "contain" a threat that slips through your defences by using the freedoms that civil society guarantees?   How do you stop a threat that ignores your Carrier Battle Groups and takes down the symbol of your economic well-being with a set of box cutters and a ruthless will?   Obviously, containing the threat posed by terrorist forces cannot be accomplished by building a ring around their center of gravity - as our very way of living leaves the ring porous enough for enemy agents and cells to slip through.   That leaves America (and the West) with two alternatives:

1.   Disengagement (An immediate goal of the Jihadis).   Completely unworkable.   As I said above, the geopolitical nature of the Middle East will not allow us to do so until we can disengage our economy from petroleum dependency.   The world will not ignore the Middle East and the Middle East cannot spurn the world.   As well, like it or not, America has put itself firmly in the camp of Israel.   Considering a good proportion of the Middle East still officially refuses the right of the Jews to exist, we won't be leaving our ally high-and-dry - especially when they are now armed with nuclear weapons and the will to use them if faced with extinction.

2.   Intervention.   This is the policy I see the US currently engaging in, and on a general level, I support it.   This is how I see (and justify) the US invasion and occupation (lets not cloud words and intentions) of Iraq.

- The US invaded Afghanistan, a key center of gravity for the "Jihadis" (although I don't believe this term does complete justice to the enemy forces, I'll use it for simplicity's sake).   The Taliban regime was a key force in legitimizing and supporting AQ.   However, once that was initiated, the stark fact remained that the US was on the periphery of the geopolitical area that was hostile to it.   Staying in Afghanistan would be the equivalent of trying to undermine Communism by beating the Cambodians.

Where is a more focused "center of gravity" for Jihadi operations?   Here is my guesses:

-   Pakistan: Player in the Jihadi game.   However, Pervez Musharraf is generally friendly (in a Realpolitik kind of way) and realizes that the "radicalization" of Pakistani society by Zia in the '80's was a big mistake and a threat to his well being.   Plus, Pakistan has, despite an rocky relationship, traditionally been an ally of the West and the United States, and Musharraf wouldn't want to risk having America turn to India now that Militant Islam is enemy #1.   Best use what influence is still there to let things evolve rather then squandering a good political link through antagonising a General on a precarious throne.

-   Egypt: Very populous country pervaded by Jihadi elements.   However, the Mubarak government is very friendly to Western interests and is a agent for Middle East stability.   Attacking or coercing them would be unwise.

-   Syria: Still a bit player in the Jihadi game, but not so much anymore.   Assad Jr. can be turned if the West plays its cards right, meaning that the Syrian "monolith" of Assad Sr. is no more.   Better not to spoil the water by throwing force on this one - it may only act to alienate Assad and throw him into the corner of his fathers cronies.

-   Saudi Arabia: One of the big players in the Jihadi game - however, attacks on the Holy Land of Islam would be very foolhardy indeed.   Again, leveraging the side of the House of Saud that enjoys sports cars, yachts, and Ivy league universities is the way to go.

- Iran: Although you can't put Iran in the Jihadi camp (Wahabi's view Shi'ites as Jews in disguise) they contribute to a unfriendly geopolitical atmosphere due to their past state-sponsorship of terrorism, their fervent anti-Westernism, and their overt attempt to become the player in the Middle East.   However, Iran would be a really tough nut to crack and would not really do much in stemming the activities of groups like Al Qaeda (Attacking Irish Protestants will not do anything to the IRA).   Better to let the intelligent and energetic generation of young Iranians who are not to pleased with authoritarian Mullahs do the job from within.

This leaves us, with, surprise of surprises, Iraq.

- Iraq:   Although not a big player in the Jihadi game, Saddam certainly didn't mind helping to poke America and the West in the eye.   However, following September 11, Iraq started to look more and more like the perfect target for a strategy of intervention for the following reasons:

1) It was run by a tin-pot dictator who's time was up.   Not only did he succeed in isolating himself from his neighbours by attack east (Iran), west (Kuwait), and south (Saudi Arabia), but his attempt to be the "big-man" on the block had generally turned world opinion against him (unless you were the French or the Russians and you were making a pretty penny off him).   Despite the various prostrations of the anti-war crowd, no one can really offer a good reason for leaving Saddam on his throne.   He was much easier to take down then any other of the regimes of the middle-east

2) It contained a fractured (if any) civil society.   Just like Afghanistan - with its conglomerate populations of Pashtuns, Hazaris, Uzbeck, and Tajiks - Iraq was an artificial nation composed of Shi'ite's and Kurds living under the whip of a regime of Sunnis.   America and the West had little to fear from fracturing the State of Iraq as the complete lack of civil society meant that we would find willing and able friends.   Although they were a little suspicious at first, seeing how they were left high-and-dry in 1992, their opposition to the initial assault on the Ba'ath regime for the purpose of occupation was little to none (of course, the situation has now changed).   I think that attempting to go into a much more homogenized state with a more robust civil society would have proved to be a larger headache to American intervention efforts.

3) Iraq's key geopolitical position.   Look at a map of the Middle East - Iraq is the center peg.   If containing the periphery is not going to work, then you may as well go right to the center if you are going to attempt to intervene.   A strong Western presence in Iraq puts it in the "eye of the hurricane".   I am sure that attitudes of various Jihadi elements have changed now that there are over 100,000 angry American soldiers in Iraq.   Now that America has a credible force that is on the border with Syria, Saudi Arabia, and Iran and has shares in an key OPEC state, they are in a good position to enforce behaviour change that is geared towards the interests of the West.   It is this behaviour change that I believe is the key to going into Iraq and intervening in the Middle East in general.

However, I am skeptical of mixing the strategy of behaviour modification with some sort of attempt at the short-term spread of democracy - I call it _democracy on the end of a bayonet_.   I do not believe that a strategy of evangelism (for lack of any better term) is suited to Western interests.   Trying to force some facade of a liberal democratic order is about as useless an expression of Wilsonian idealism as there is.   This is why I am not sure I support active intervention in the civil society of Iraq.   It was fractured from the artifice of the Ba'athist regime, conflict was a foregone conclusion - Iraq would need some time to sort out its new state identity.   With America putting its units in Saddam's palaces and having bureaucrats and tanks moving about during this is the equivalent of sticking your hand in a hornets nest right after you pounded it with a stick.   End result, you get drawn in and two-bit chumps like Moqtada al-Sadr all of the sudden gain real currency as players in the game (which undermines the efforts of guys like Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani, who are generally friendly to your cause).   

As well, getting tangled up in the populations of Iraq leads to another issue that I believe affects attitudes - the fact that American soldiers in Iraq do draw Jihadis out like a magnet.   However valid soem may feel the theory of engaging Jihadi forces in Iraq rather then in America is, I am sure that the citizens of Iraq do not appreciate the fact that their houses, markets, and mosques are being used as a battleground by US and Jihadi fighters.   Sticking combat soldiers in cities seems to be burning more bridges then their building.

I often wonder if a strategy of "sitting back" in the ensuing scrum would have been a more effective way to go about things.   Leave the Tigris and Euphrates floodplain and move to the uninhabited desert of the West.   Let Iraq iron out itself - they can come to their own conclusions on how to rule themselves.   Someone was keen to point out that the people of Iraq were an ancient and complex civilization while we Westerners were living in huts and worshipping trees.   Offer help if asked and don't pick sides and don't put your military forces in someone else's fight.   Use Special Operations Forces to make forays into any Jihadi elements that can be identified and wipe them out quietly and effectively.

Make it clear to the people of Iraq that the West is not their on an "evangelist" mission (YOU WILL BE A DEMOCRACY - VOTE!), but are in the Middle East to intervene against a faction that is unfriendly our interests.   As well, make it clear to whoever comes out on top of the scrum that they have to play ball with the international community.   Use diplomacy - the "carrot and the stick" - to show Iraq that the West will not tolerate replacing Saddam with another despot who thrives off of nepotism and acts as a destabilizing force in the region.   The fate of Saddam Hussein should be proof enough that the West means what it says.   There was a good article in a recent issue of Foreign Affairs that pointed out how _Pax Romana_ and _Pax Britannica_ were built and sustained by assetive and yet subtle diplomacy along with the force to back it up.   As Teddy Roosevelt said - _"Walk Softly but Carry a Big Stick...."_

The occupants of the Middle East are a tough and proud people; they will recognize and respect the strength of Western and American might and resolve to undermine the threat of terrorism at it's center of gravity - the unstable geopolitical region of the Middle East.   However, I do not believe they will respect us if we use the might and resolve to attempt to rebuild Iraq in our image.

Well, I can't believe I nattered on for that long...enough geopolitics from me for now.



> _"If this is the case, "The root cause of Terrorism is a lust for power"_
> 
> Then is the root cause of US foreign policy and attempt to maintain their hegemonic power over everyone else...?



Foreign Policy is an expression of interests.   When foreign policies clash (with either state or sub-state actors), then you have a power struggle (politics...or war, which is merely an extention of politics by other means... ).   So sure, US Foreign Policy, like any other interaction between two competing groups, is essentially based upon power.

However, I don't think that US Foreign Policy is rooted in aggressive imperialism, which the tone of your question seems to suggest (if you weren't, then I apologize).   US policies, like the policies of any other state, are geared towards the promotion of self-interest.   As I said in the big spiel above, the US seems to be pursuing the policy of intervention in the Middle East to secure itself from attacks which could reach catastrophic proportions and to force behaviour modification in a region in a geopolitical region that has traditionally been unfriendly to Western interests.

However, they don't appear willing to want to stay in the Middle East any more then they were willing to expand control over previous conquests, almost all of which the pulled away from (Philippines, Cuba, etc, etc).

Assertive?   Yes.   Aggressive, expansionist, and imperialist?   No.


----------



## mdh

Debate and critique the issue, don't try to to undercut my opinions on the basis of my sources (which are all strictly academic, as a result of research for my report).

Actually MissMolsonIndy I would love to hear what these sources are - a few examples please? And I'm especially interested in the "strictly academic" ones.


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Foreign Policy is an expression of interests.   When foreign policies clash (with either state or sub-state actors), then you have a power struggle (politics...or war, which is merely an extention of politics by other means... ).   So sure, US Foreign Policy, like any other interaction between two competing groups, is essentially based upon power.



Absolutely.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> However, I don't think that US Foreign Policy is rooted in aggressive imperialism, which the tone of your question seems to suggest (if you weren't, then I apologize).   US policies, like the policies of any other state, are geared towards the promotion of self-interest.   As I said in the big spiel above, the US seems to be pursuing the policy of intervention in the Middle East to secure itself from attacks which could reach catastrophic proportions and to force behaviour modification in a region in a geopolitical region that has traditionally been unfriendly to Western interests.



I disagree. If the United States were pursuing the policy of intervention solely on the grounds of "securing intself from attacks which could reach catastrophic proportions and to force behaviour modification, in a region, in a geopolitical region that has traditionally been unfriendly to Western interests," then why has the United States not deemed it in its best interests to secure itself from political violence within its own hemisphere, where the majority anti-U.S. incidents have occured and continue to occur (most likely until the United States began to penetrate the Middle East)? I think that in addition to combatting terrorism, there are greater interests looming here, namely in the oil that drives an ever-expanding American industry, and this is largely seen through the selective nature of the United States in targeting terrorist activity. From a point-of-view that involves pure interests, you're right, why should the United States implement the same "war on terrorism" within Latin America? They would be filtering billions of dollars into a war that would gain them very little in return (in terms of material interests).

In short, I don't disagree with you that the United States is pursuing anti-terrorism tactics in the Middle East, I'm simply challenging the notion that that is all they in fact have interests in doing.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> However, they don't appear willing to want to stay in the Middle East any more then they were willing to expand control over previous conquests, almost all of which the pulled away from (Philippines, Cuba, etc, etc).
> 
> Assertive?   Yes.   Aggressive, expansionist, and imperialist?   No.



Only until their long-term interests in the war run short, and the situation has been deemed to have radically stabilized in the Middle East.

Assertive? Yes. Aggressive, expansionist and imperialist? Yes.

The West solemnly looks upon Western action and intervention as "aggressive, expansionist and imperialist," but are quick to label others as such: "we aren't destroying the lives of innocent civilians, we're liberating them from previous assault." While this may be true to a certain degree, it is commonly used straight across the board.

You have to understand, Infanteer, that more than just a Western perspective on American policy need be applied here. To those who do not fall within the West, American foreign policy is all of the above, and more, and for good reason.


----------



## Infanteer

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Hatred for the West has very little do to do, if anything with "who we are," it has everything to do with what we do.



"What we do" is defined by "who we are".



> The September 11 attacks were not targeting "free and prosperous" America, they were attacks on the major economic and military institutions within the United States, which dictate foreign policy to some extent. Had they been attacks on our values and freedom as individuals living within a democracy, they would have easily driven a plane through the Statue of Liberty.



Well, if you want to play the symbolism game, the WTC and the Pentagon represented the key institutions that underscored the preponderant military and economic power that the Western liberal democratic order possess.   By not only destroying them, but destroying them from within, the terrorists aimed for a moral victory against the West by showing the weakness of the infidel state.



> Look further into the political violence that characterizes much of Latin America in this day and age. In 2000, Colombia generated 106 acts of political violence against the United States, Argentina generated 4, and Ecuador generated 4. Of those 114, 105 of them were directed at U.S. businesses, 1 was directed at the U.S. government, 3 were religiously provoked, and 5 were directed at private institutions.



What does this have to do with the war on terror?   Pointing out that an apple is green has nothing to do with understanding the qualities of an orange.



> I don't understand how you could possibly conclude that anti-American incidents are directed at the freedom and prosperity that individuals enjoy in the West, if anything those generating the terrorist activity are struggling to obtain the very freedoms that characterize the West, and are reacting violently to years of foreign policy that has exacerbated the conditions of their lives (in political, social and economic terms).



Think about it for a second.   Look at the leaders of terrorist organizations.   Often wealthy, well-educated (often in the west), intelligent.   What do they care about the plight of the masses of individuals who toil under the boot of despots or the book of Mullahs.   The leaders of hostile groups are either bumbling crooks, like Yasser Arafat, or very smart and very cunning power players, like Osama bin-Laden.   If you think that the prime motive of terrorists is some sort of struggle for freedom and prosperity, then you should put the glue away.

As well, look at the tenets of the Wahabbi sect, which a good percentage of the Jihadi factions follow out to the point of immolating themselves to prove their point.   Sounds like a "struggle to obtain" freedoms to me   :.   Freedom to stone women who discard the burqa, hang a Shi'ites and Jews, and expell Westerners from the Middle East completely.

These organizations have interests at stake.   They see the involvement of the West - with, as I said in an earlier post, a more robust civil society that is better at providing basic needs to its citizens - as a direct threat to their nodes of power and influence and hence, their well-being.

They are either fanatical, like the Al Qaeda, which would see women banished from civil society, or it is criminal, like the PLO, who thrive off of the plight of the Palestinian who has been used, cajoled and sacrificed by his fellow "Muslims".

The dumb fighter at the bottom is merely a pawn who has bought into the premise that the sole source for their shitty lot in life is due to America and the Jews.   He has been offered the tonic of a fundamentalist faith and the goal of the wounding of Western society in order to improve his lot.



> Delve a little deeper into foreign policy, specifically in Latin American, and you'll gain a better understanding of why these attacks occur so frequently. I use Latin America, because in 2000, the United States Department of State reports that 114 of the 177 anti-U.S. incidents occurred within the Western Hemisphere.



Enlighten us to the nuances of Foreign Policy - or should I just read the latest Noam Chomsky trash on the market.

You seem to be assuming that all "anti-US incidents" are the same in terms of motive, execution, intended audience, etc, etc.



> Rwanda may have taken its place. Regardless, that in no way undercuts the significance of the event, despite how poor you think my sources of information are.



It undercuts your attempt to place complicity on the United States in what you state is _"the worst campaign of ethnic cleansing and destruction to occur in the 1990s."_



> Furthermore, by making comment on my sources, and excluding comment on the issue altogether tells me that you're one of many that refutes to acknowledge, and or does away with information on the basis that "the information source must be poor," because it fails to fit into your line of thinking/argument.
> 
> Debate and critique the issue, don't try to to undercut my opinions on the basis of my sources (which are all strictly academic, as a result of research for my report).



I am attacking your sources because you are trying to foist a statement upon us that is wrong.   The Turkish-Kurdish problem is not the worst episode of ethnic cleansing in the 90's, either in absolute terms (body count) - which I say Rwanda holds that claim - or qualitative terms (destruction of civil society) - which probably occured in the Former Yugoslavia.   As well, I know some US Special Forces soldiers who have a different outlook on the status of the Kurds, seeing that they worked side-by-side with them to usurp Ba'ath power in Northern Iraq.

I would attempt to debate the issue, but the only issue you seem to want to put forth is one that is based on "evidence" that is tarnished with the usual supply of anti-US and anti-Western rhetoric. Give me something original.


----------



## Infanteer

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> I disagree. If the United States were pursuing the policy of intervention solely on the grounds of "securing intself from attacks which could reach catastrophic proportions and to force behaviour modification, in a region, in a geopolitical region that has traditionally been unfriendly to Western interests," then why has the United States not deemed it in its best interests to secure itself from political violence within its own hemisphere, where the majority anti-U.S. incidents have occured and continue to occur (most likely until the United States began to penetrate the Middle East)?



When was the last time FARC murdered thousands of civilians in the US?

As well, you're ignoring important things like the US involvement in Columbia, the Patriot Act, and the Department of Homeland Defence - measures which all shoot down your theory that American policy is focused upon internal aggression.   Here is something you should look at:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/nss.html

Discount it as propaganda of "the Bush Regime" if you like, but the millions of people in the government of the United States who move both Foreign and Domestic policy along have to follow some semblance of doctrine, and this is what it is.

Unless they're all part of the Haliburton Conspiracy too.... :



> I think that in addition to combatting terrorism, there are greater interests looming here, namely in the oil that drives an ever-expanding American industry, and this is largely seen through the selective nature of the United States in targeting terrorist activity. From a point-of-view that involves pure interests, you're right, why should the United States implement the same "war on terrorism" within Latin America? They would be filtering billions of dollars into a war that would gain them very little in return (in terms of material interests).



Again, if the US Government was following some subversive attempt to corner global oil stocks, why did it take September 11 to trigger the US to embark on their assertive intervention in the Middle East.   Why didn't they do it before?   Since you seem to want to shift the argument to South America for some reason, why hasn't the 82nd Airborne dropped into Venezuela, an OPEC country, yet?

Remember, before 9/11 Bush was pegged as a President keen on disengagement from Clinton's "NWO exploits".   Perhaps Bush staged the attacks to further his own secret agenda.   Tin-foil hat time....



> In short, I don't disagree with you that the United States is pursuing anti-terrorism tactics in the Middle East, I'm simply challenging the notion that that is all they in fact have interests in doing.



Of course there are many interests - nothing is ever black and white.   But I will state, again, that intervention in response to terrorist threats is the over-arching driver of policy right now.



> Only until their long-term interests in the war run short, and the situation has been deemed to have radically stabilized in the Middle East.
> 
> Assertive? Yes. Aggressive, expansionist and imperialist? Yes.
> 
> The West solemnly looks upon Western action and intervention as "aggressive, expansionist and imperialist," but are quick to label others as such: "we aren't destroying the lives of innocent civilians, we're liberating them from previous assault." While this may be true to a certain degree, it is commonly used straight across the board.
> 
> You have to understand, Infanteer, that more than just a Western perspective on American policy need be applied here. To those who do not fall within the West, American foreign policy is all of the above, and more, and for good reason.



 ???

What are you trying to say here?


----------



## 48Highlander

CivU said:
			
		

> 48 Highlander, As far as the obscure reference to skirts provoking rape, I'm not sure that's even worth responding to...I don't know how my comments of admitting both parties have contributed to the present "West" vs. "Extremist Islam" conflict could be connected to a justification for a woman's dress instigating sexual assault.  Your attempt at reductio ad absurdum fell insultingly short...



    No problem man, I'll take the time to explain it to you.

"How exactly has the West provoked the conflict?  Because of our "capitalist decadence" and "immoral behavior"?  Are you the sort of person who thinks a woman wearing a short skirt is provoking potential rapists?"

    When you stated that "the west", this Monsterous and nevery clearly defined grouping of nations, had done it's part to provoke the attacks against the US, you adopted a strategy of blaimg the victim for the crime.  Claiming that the Crusades, which occured centuries ago and had nothing to do with America, are part of the justification for current attacks on the US, you....well, I have no idea how to classify such an accusation.  It seems that you beleive the actions of a third party hundreds of years ago can somehow justify violence today.  So, instead of taking it in that way, I offered to accept the possibility that maybe you considered "our 'capitalist decadence' and immoral behavior'" as justification for the war.  I know you never made such a statement, however, that's what the US is most often acused of by these people so I figgured if I was going to interpolate your position on what their justifications may be, I'd at least give you some credit for understanding their causes even if it did demonstrate a complete lack of morals.  It seems I gave you too much credit.  In either event, there's pretty much only two possibilities to be seen in your (and *Miss Molsons*) attempts to show that the US has done a lot to provoke these people.  And here they are:

1)  You beleive the claims of the leaders such as Sadam, Osama, and the various militant clerics, that the US is a decadent moraly bankrupt zionist backed impetrialist nation and must be attacked in order to be taught a lesson.  In which case you are blaming the extravagance of the victim for the crimes being perpetuated against her.

2)  You beleive that unrelated actions - such as the Crusades, the US invasion of Nicaragua, and the US backing of one group of Muslims against another - can somehow be considered justification for the violence perpetuated by the extremists against the US.  In which case you are taking turns at blaming quetsionable but unrelated actions of the victim and unrelated actions carried out by others for the crimes being perpetuated against her.

      I know you had problems earlier so just in case my phrasing is too confusing I'll offer examples of both:

1)  This is where my question about blaming the woman for being raped comes in.  Some men in North America still beleive that a woman who is openly flirtatious, promiscuous, or dresses too revealingly, deserves to be raped.  Doubtless the muslim extremists would agree, judge her to be immoral and stone her to death.  If you agree with their view that the US deserves to be attacked for being immoral and decadent, then perhaps you'd like to grab a couple stones and join in.

2)  I can't really come up with a decent example for this because I can't even grasp what logic-loops a mind must run itself through to accept something like this as a possibility.  Still, here goes.  I go over to your house at some random evening, and detonate a 500lb bomb in your driveway.  I then go on to make a public statement blaming my actions on the following:
  - Last week you started a bar fight.  I didn't know the people involved, but that's not important.
  - The week before that you gave my friend Bob a large stick, which he then proceeded to use to beat the crap out of Fred.  I wanted to kill Fred myself too, but that's not important either.
  - Some guy with the same last name as you killed my great-great-grandfather in 1837.  You're probably barely related, but that's not important either.

    So anyway, I'd really appreciate it if you'd tell me which of these possbilites is the one that you and *Miss Molson* are getting at.  I guess I'm not edymecated enough for her to bother responding to, and I certainly don't expect you to answer for her, but I'd be curious to know what your opinion is anyway.


----------



## McG

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> In short, I don't disagree with you that the United States is pursuing anti-terrorism tactics in the Middle East, I'm simply challenging the notion that that is all they in fact have interests in doing.


It was interests of national and international security that lead the US into Iraq.   Any other interests, which may have been reached through the war, were tangent to the objective (and not a part of it).


----------



## Britney Spears

Question to all the Pro Iraq Invasion types: Suppose that GWB decided to invade Iraq on Sep. 11th 2000, Would Sept. 11th 2001 still have happened?


----------



## McG

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Question to all the Pro Iraq Invasion types: Suppose that GWB decided to invade Iraq on Sep. 11th 2000, Would Sept. 11th 2001 still have happened?


That trivializes things a bit don't you think?

The US could have invaded Afghanistan on 11 Sept 2000 and still have been attacked a year later.  That is because the attack had been planned so far in advance and the wheels had started turning years before.


----------



## Infanteer

The "What If" game is irrelevent.

You could play it forever and nothing would come out of it.   "Suppose the American's never supported Tel Aviv - would September 11th have happened?"

However, I can divine the point you're trying to get to.

As I said above, the Invasion of Iraq is a response to Sept 11, part of a larger strategy to reduce the threat terrorism poses to Western interests.

Have we had any more incidents of large scale terrorist attacks since:

A) September 11, 2001?

B) The Iraq War (March 2003)?


----------



## Britney Spears

Meh, i remember in the aftermath of Sept 11th, there was some speculation in the popular press that perhaps, Iraq could be a possible target for military intervention. 

"Huh? What drivel!" I thought, everyone knows that Iraq was the only Arab nation without a powerful fundementalist clergy, the only Arab nation where Shar-ia law was considered a throwback to the 11th century, where women could drive, go to university...... This was just an attempt to feed ignorant "all them ay-rabs are the same" racism. They must think the US public to be fools! Good thing I know better. 

and boy, was I right or what?   




> Have we had any more incidents of large scale terrorist attacks since:
> 
> A) September 11, 2001?
> 
> B) The Iraq War (March 2003)?



Well, I don't watch TV or read the newspaper when I'm not in Wainright, but Madrid and Istanbul come to mind after a few seconds of thought. Should I go do a google search too?


----------



## McG

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> This was just an attempt to feed ignorant "all them ay-rabs are the same" racism. They must think the US public to be fools! Good thing I know better.


Are you blaming the US New/Entertainment media for the invasion of Iraq?


----------



## 48Highlander

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> "Huh? What drivel!" I thought, everyone knows that Iraq was the only Arab nation without a powerful fundementalist clergy, the only Arab nation where Shar-ia law was considered a throwback to the 11th century, where women could drive, go to university...... This was just an attempt to feed ignorant "all them ay-rabs are the same" racism. They must think the US public to be fools! Good thing I know better.



They replaced Shair-ia law with Sadam law, which, while not as discriminatory towards women, was quite a bit more arbitrary and oppressive.

They had no powerful fundamentalist clergy because Sadam had a nasty habit of killing anyone he didn't directly control who started to get too powerful.


----------



## Infanteer

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Well, I don't watch TV or read the newspaper when I'm not in Wainright, but Madrid and Istanbul come to mind after a few seconds of thought. Should I go do a google search too?



Sorry, I should have specified against the US, a followup to the September 11 attacks.  As this thread is oscillating between US Policies and definitions of the West, wires are getting crossed.


But you're right - terrorism hasn't subsided in it's lethality or its capability - but uprooting Al Qaeda did nothing to decisively stop it either.
Obviously, the campaign ahead will be long and tedious.


----------



## Britney Spears

> Are you blaming the US New/Entertainment media for the invasion of Iraq?



Well, I think we can agree that prominent sectors of the US media have more than just fair and objective reporting in mind.

But no, that wasn't my point, I was merely musing about a forecast which in late 2001 sounded absolutely ridiculous actually coming true.


----------



## mdh

Obviously, you've never been to the Balkans.

Besides, I think Rwanda holds that prize.

Wherever you're getting your information from stinks

I quote Infanteer in another attempt to get MissMolsonIndy to reveal her sources - especially the "strictly academic" ones.


----------



## McG

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> I was merely musing about a forecast which in late 2001 sounded absolutely ridiculous actually coming true.


It does sound foolish when put into your pristine bubble with no mention of US political efforts to force Iraq to meets its obligations imposed by the UN after the first Gulf War, or that Afghanistan was the state that actually first felt the wrath of a post 11 Sept 01 United States.


----------



## Britney Spears

> They replaced Shair-ia law with Sadam law, which, while not as discriminatory towards women, was quite a bit more arbitrary and oppressive.



So what on earth does this have to do with The War Against Terrorism (TWAT)? Last time I checked iwe were fighting fundamentalist Islam, and not arbitrary and oppresive regimes in general yes?



> They had no powerful fundamentalist clergy because Sadam had a nasty habit of killing anyone he didn't directly control who started to get too powerful.



Who is it we're suppose to be fighting again? I could have sworn it had SOMETHING to do with fundementalist clergy...... I guess it's a relief that when Saddam killed Mohammed Al-Sadr, he didn't follow through and take out the whole family.


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Infanteer said:
			
		

> "What we do" is defined by "who we are".



On an individual level, I couldn't agree more: the actions that one pursues reflect the values, principles and customs that one adheres to.

In making that statement, however, what you have just presented paves the road to justifying the slaughter of innocent civilians who have no decision-making power in foreign policy; on a much larger scale, "what we do," does not define "who we are." A small governmental sector of American society that dictates America's course of action in the global arena, reflects which candidate/political backdrop the American populace voted for in the most recent election. While it is true that American values, beliefs and attitudes are the driving force behind selecting a candidate in the electoral process, and therefore many American values are indirectly represented in foreign policy and political intervention, American citizens cannot be held accountable for policies they had no hand in.

By insisting that "what we do," determines "who we are," on the larger political spectrum, only justifies the bombing of Joe Blow on the streets of New York, because the U.S. government executed orders to bomb thousands of innocent civilians in a country that most wouldn't be able to even pronounce.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> What does this have to do with the war on terror?   Pointing out that an apple is green has nothing to do with understanding the qualities of an orange.



Anti-U.S. terrorism that happens to be situated in other parts of the globe has everything to do with a war on terror that isn't specific to the Middle East. Make note that President Bush set forth the "war on terror" as having the mandate to combat terrorism on all continents. I'm not comparing apples and oranges, here, I'm comparing anti-American incidents on different continents that happen to have roots in American foreign policy. Terrorism is terrorism, simple as that.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Enlighten us to the nuances of Foreign Policy - or should I just read the latest Noam Chomsky trash on the market.



The sarcastic undertones in your statement reveal that you would not even be willing to hear or acknowledge information presented, and would most likely dismiss it like the rest of the "trash on the market" that counters your opinion. I never made the claim that all terrorist activity is in direct response to foreign policy and political intervention, but you'd be alarmed to learn how much of it actually is, particularly in Latin America. If you want statistics, fact, and academic opinion on the matter, I'd be more than happy to fire it your way, but if you already have your heart sold on the issue, then you're truly wasting everyone's time by asking me to present you with alternative information.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> You seem to be assuming that all "anti-US incidents" are the same in terms of motive, execution, intended audience, etc, etc.



See above. Not all anti-U.S. incidents are the same in terms of motive, execution and intended audience. Many of these incidents do, however, reveal similar underlying patterns, particularly with respects to American foreign policy abroad: I fail to see the "coincidental nature" of terrorist activity directed at American political and economic institutions abroad.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> I am attacking your sources because you are trying to foist a statement upon us that is wrong.   The Turkish-Kurdish problem is not the worst episode of ethnic cleansing in the 90's, either in absolute terms (body count) - which I say Rwanda holds that claim - or qualitative terms (destruction of civil society) - which probably occured in the Former Yugoslavia.   As well, I know some US Special Forces soldiers who have a different outlook on the status of the Kurds, seeing that they worked side-by-side with them to usurp Ba'ath power in Northern Iraq.



I agree with you, the Turkish-Kurdish episode may not have been the worst episode of ethnic cleansing in the 1990s, and in that respect, my statement is clearly invalid and my source incorrect, but you are using the "invalidity" of one aspect of my statement to dismiss the entire purpose of the claim: the United States has in the past sponsored the elimination of one or more groups of people, and has therefore perpetrated terrorist activity itself. What I thoroughly enjoy about your posts is that you tend to draw out the specifics in an attempt to disprove the picture at large. Meaning: while it may be incorrect that this particular episode may not have been "the worst episode" to occur in the 1900s, it still occured, and the U.S. head of state actively sponsored the slaughter of innocent civilians in another state.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> I would attempt to debate the issue, but the only issue you seem to want to put forth is one that is based on incorrect evidence that is heavily-laden with anti-US and anti-Western rhetoric.



First and foremost, one aspect of the statement was false, an aspect that I believe had little effect on the overall significance of the larger picture. The issue that I have, and continue to put forth is that the sponsoring of terrorist activity is not something the United States, and many other states in the West have been excluded from. Debates cease to be productive when the other party colours all of history to suit their viewpoint, and otherwise deems it incorrect, and or pickled with "anti-U.S. and anti-Western rhetoric."


----------



## Britney Spears

> It does sound foolish when put into your pristine bubble with no mention of US political efforts to force Iraq to meets its obligations imposed by the UN after the first Gulf War, or that Afghanistan was the state that actually first felt the wrath of a post 11 Sept 01 United States.



So then, you're claiming that the US invasion of Iraq was an effort to force iIraq to meet its UN obligations? I'm afrad I'm not really versed in what exactly those obligations are, but I don't think that's relevent in our current context, is it.

And I never denied that "Afghanistan was the state that actually first felt the wrath of a post 11 Sept 01 United States.". So what?


----------



## 48Highlander

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Who is it we're suppose to be fighting again? I could have sworn it had SOMETHING to do with fundementalist clergy...... I guess it's a relief that when Saddam killed Mohammed Al-Sadr, he didn't follow through and take out the whole family.



Sorry, I didn't make myself clear.  I'm not suggesting the US invaded Iraq because of those things.  I'm simply pointing out that the reason for Iraq's lack of "fundamentalist clergy" and Shair-ia law was not that they were a progressive country championing personal freedoms in the Arab world, but rather an opressive regime which refused to share power.  So I fail to see why you think the lack of those two things was relevant to the US invasion.  The Americans clearly stated their reasons for going in, and nowhere in their declaration will you find the words "fundamentalist clergy" or "Sahir-ra law".


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

mdh said:
			
		

> Obviously, you've never been to the Balkans.
> 
> Besides, I think Rwanda holds that prize.
> 
> Wherever you're getting your information from stinks
> 
> I quote Infanteer in another attempt to get MissMolsonIndy to reveal her sources - especially the "strictly academic" ones.



I have no problem presenting my sources. Give me some time, and I will gather them together for you.

Something to think about:

Why is it that I need to justify the accountability of my sources, when many others (particularly those with opions running concurrent to mine) have made claims that equally should have been backed by sources, and nothing has been demanded of them? Like others, I am drawing on opinion and fact of third-party sources, and not wholy on personal opinion.

Furthermore, what more will presenting my sources provide you with other than another set of grounds upon which you will discredit a perspective that runs counter to yours, by "dismissing" my sources as "nonacademic", "biased", "unaccountable", and or plainly "incorrect"?


----------



## Britney Spears

> Sorry, I didn't make myself clear.  I'm not suggesting the US invaded Iraq because of those things.  I'm simply pointing out that the reason for Iraq's lack of "fundamentalist clergy" and Shair-ia law was not that they were a progressive country championing personal freedoms in the Arab world, but rather an opressive regime which refused to share power.  So I fail to see why you think the lack of those two things was relevant to the US invasion.  The Americans clearly stated their reasons for going in, and nowhere in their declaration will you find the words "fundamentalist clergy" or "Sahir-ra law".



In which case, the US should stop labeling the Iraqi insurgents as "terrorists", or imply that they are somehow linked to Al-Qaida or the Sept. 11th attacks, or that OIF has somehow made the US/Canada safer from terrorism.

Shall we agree then, that the US invasion of Iraq is based completely upon a desire for regional dominance and control of oil supplies, and at most, is only tangentially related to TWAT?


----------



## 48Highlander

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Meaning: while it may be incorrect that this particular episode may not have been "the worst episode" to occur in the 1900s, it still occured, and the U.S. head of state actively sponsored the slaughter of innocent civilians in another state.



Alright, let's sort this out right now.

Do you REALLY beleive that arms sales to Turkey represent "actively sponsoring" the slaughter of Kurds?  And do you really beleive that it is one of the causes of the attacks against the US?  If so, why hasn't Russia, which has sold weapons to pretty much every country and organization in the world, come under fire as well?  In fact, while we're at it, if US actions in Nicaragua are one of the causes as well, why hasn't Russia been attacked for invading Afghanistan and interfereing in the internal politics of just as many if not more soverign states as the US?  Why is that the only group currently carrying out terrorist actions in Russia are Chechnians?  Your line of logic stinks, but I'm willing to listen if you think you have an explanation for this discrepancy.


----------



## McG

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> So then, you're claiming that the US invasion of Iraq was an effort to force iIraq to meet its UN obligations? I'm afrad I'm not really versed in what exactly those obligations are, but I don't think that's relevent in our current context, is it.


There was an obligation to allow UN arms inspectors freedom to look for WMD and an obligation to destroy pre-existing stocks (something that Iraq inexplicably could not demonstrate was done).


----------



## 48Highlander

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> In which case, the US should stop labeling the Iraqi insurgents as "terrorists", or imply that they are somehow linked to Al-Qaida or the Sept. 11th attacks, or that OIF has somehow made the US/Canada safer from terrorism.



In case you haven't been paying attention to the news, large numbers of the "insurgents" who first started attacking Americans were foreigners from a number of Arab states.  Wether they're terrorists or not I don't know, but it seems likely.  In any eventl, detonating large bombs outside of Mosques and beheading civilians doesn't seem like conventional warfare tactics to me.  I could be wrong though.



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Shall we agree then, that the US invasion of Iraq is based completely upon a desire for regional dominance and control of oil supplies, and at most, is only tangentially related to TWAT?



No we deffinitely shall not.  While regional dominance and control of oil supplies certainly played a factor, there were numerous other issues at stake.  WMD which turned out not to exist were considered by everyone a serious threat at the time.  The fact that they were never found doesn't invalidate the fact that nearly the entire world beleived that Sadam was in possesion of them.  Sadams sponsorship of Palestinian terrorists is certainly a good reason as well.  As was the fact that, while not numerous, terrorist training camps did exist in Iraq.


----------



## mdh

Why is it that I need to justify the accountability of my sources, when many others (particularly those with opions running concurrent to mine) have made claims that equally should have been backed by sources, and nothing has been demanded of them? Like others, I am drawing on opinion and fact of third-party sources, and not wholy on personal opinion.

Furthermore, what more will presenting my sources provide you with other than another set of grounds upon which you will discredit a perspective that runs counter to yours, by "dismissing" my sources as "nonacademic", "biased", "unaccountable", and or plainly "incorrect"?
I think you're skating here, but in fact I agree: everyone should be able to back up their arguments when challenged. Still doesn't let you off the hook though. After all you were the one suggesting we "delve" into US foreign policy in Latin America.   All right, I'm ready to ready to do that on your suggestion, but one or two references would be a good starting point.


----------



## Britney Spears

> There was an obligation to allow UN arms inspectors freedom to look for WMD and an obligation to destroy pre-existing stocks (something that Iraq inexplicably could not demonstrate was done).



I do not doubt the accuracy of your statements, but I think we can agree that those particular events leave a lot of room for debate. Whether the inspectors really had freedom of the country, whether they have found anything, etc. If you're claiming that these were grounds enough to justify the invasion, I must repsectfully disagree.


----------



## McG

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> In which case, the US should stop labeling the Iraqi insurgents as "terrorists", or imply that they are somehow linked to Al-Qaida or the Sept. 11th attacks, or that OIF has somehow made the US/Canada safer from terrorism.


Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who has been called the mastermind of the insurgency, is known to have ties with AQ.  Even if we did not know of this link, what do you call publicly (through electronic media) beheading or otherwise executing civilians in order to instill fear as a weapon?  



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Shall we agree then, that the US invasion of Iraq is based completely upon a desire for regional dominance and control of oil supplies, and at most, is only tangentially related to TWAT?


No.  It was about WMD (and their potential to get into anti-western hands) and continued frustrations from an Iraq that was not living up to UN imposed obligations.


----------



## CivU

"If you agree with their view that the US deserves to be attacked for being immoral and decadent, then perhaps you'd like to grab a couple stones and join in."

When did I say that the US deserved to be attacked?   I suggested that the attacks on the US were not based simply on blind hatred of "Extremist Islam" but instead, that conglomerate of nations we refer to as "The West" had acted violently and aggressively in the past toward the Middle East and were therefore not completely absolved from participating in the growing tensions that fuelled this conflict. The crusades, executed by those who represented "The West" at the time were just one such example.   I hardly think this is comparable to your analogy of blaming the victim, using the case of rape no less (which we actually call sexual assault in Canada), as both parties are guilty of contributing to the tensions that exist between "The West" and "Extremist Islam".   

"So anyway, I'd really appreciate it if you'd tell me which of these possbilites is the one that you and Miss Molson are getting at"

I can't speak for Miss Molson, but I believe you've presented a logically false dilemma.   There exists other options for the attacks on the United States beyond the two you've suggested.   When you describe, "The week before that you gave my friend Bob a large stick, which he then proceeded to use to beat the crap out of Fred.   I wanted to kill Fred myself too, but that's not important either" it reminds me of the involvement of the United States and Israel.   Except that the US would be giving Bob (Israel) the large stick and Bob would be beating Fred (any Middle East nation or group Israel aggresively opposes) with it...Perhaps the aggression of Islam that is widely touted here is a result of US military involvement in the region on the side of Israel.   If you doubt their presence in the Middle East, I suggest you look into the number of countries where the United States has military installations...

"WMD which turned out not to exist were considered by everyone a serious threat at the time.   The fact that they were never found doesn't invalidate the fact that nearly the entire world beleived that Sadam was in possesion of them.   Sadams sponsorship of Palestinian terrorists is certainly a good reason as well."

If the entire world believed Iraq to posses these weapons, why did they continue to insist the United Nations find evidence before anyone beyond the United States and Britain would involve themselves.   If everyone was certain they existed, why is the present "Coalition of the Willing" lacking Canada, France, Russia, etc.   What about the American sponsorship of Israel and its actions against Palestinians, how does that fit into "The West" versus "Extremist Islam" paradigm?
As far as, "It seems I gave you too much credit"   Don't worry, I would hardly concern myself about what someone on a internet forum would assume about me as a person...

Since MissMolson and I have been grouped together, and someone asked for information or sources on American intervention in Latin America, I offer some I just used in a paper discussing the continuities between the fight against communism, drugs and terrorism by the US.

Kumar, Saitsh. 1981. CIA and the Third World. Vikas Publishing House Ltd: Delhi.

Blum, William. 1986. CIA - A Forgotten History â â€œ US Global Interventions Since World War II. Zed Books Ltd: London.

Blum, William. 2000. Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower. Common Courage Press: Monroe, ME.

Cameron, Fraser. 2002. US Foreign Policy after the Cold War: Global Hegemon or Reluctant Sherrif? Routledge: London.


----------



## 48Highlander

MCG said:
			
		

> Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who has been called the mastermind of the insurgency, is known to have ties with AQ.  Even if we did not know of this link, what do you call publicly (through electronic media) beheading or otherwise executing civilians in order to instill fear as a weapon?
> No.  It was about WMD (and their potential to get into anti-western hands) and continued frustrations from an Iraq that was not living up to UN imposed obligations.



As much as I appreciate the support, is it really neccesary to repeat what I said?  ;D


----------



## Infanteer

Ha...I can't even keep up with the tangents running on this thread.

It is officially a gong-show.


----------



## Bert

There may be another scale to the debate.   Before the invasion of Iraq, 9/11 occured that
basically scared the crap out of the Americans and set in motion a series of events and
consequences. 

The US invaded Afganistan and defeated the Taliban in order to destroy Al-Qaeda.
It was unsuccessful insofar as defeating the central core of the organization and was
unable to influence various groups that supported Al-Qaeda from that position. The US, 
for reasons heard in official speeches, press releases, and ancedotal media, invaded Iraq.   
Around the time of the invasion, the US labelled three countries in the axis of evil and 
had been going after Al-Qaeda for some time.

It is clearly debatable as noted in this thread the US's justifications for war/invasion has a 
shakey foothold in the context of only Iraq, Saddam, and WMD intelligence.   What is overlooked
is the US's influence in the region around Iraq and the effects on Al-Qaeda.   In other words,
the US may have reason for invading Iraq but it had another goal of entering the region 
and influencing Al-Qaeda activities which is the primary enemy.   How would the American
public or even world opinion take to a tactic of invading a soverign country to influence
a terrorist organization that is not directly tied to a government but is supported by various
groups in the region?    

To get an overall perspective, one may have to consider the point of views of the USA,
Al-Qaeda leadership, a member of the Saud Royal family, the average Iraqi, the Iranian
government, and Pakistan.   I don't know whether considering "right or wrong" will
win any points but its the understanding that all of these players have their own
goals and their willing to go to lengths to achieve them.

This is an old Stratfor special written almost two years ago but it's perspective rings true 
of the situation facing the USA in my opinion.      

http://army.ca/forums/threads/19326/post-103617.html#msg103617


----------



## 48Highlander

CivU said:
			
		

> When did I say that the US deserved to be attacked?  I suggested that the attacks on the US were not based simply on blind hatred of "Extremist Islam" but instead, that conglomerate of nations we refer to as "The West" had acted violently and aggressively in the past toward the Middle East and were therefore not completely absolved from participating in the growing tensions that fuelled this conflict. The crusades, executed by those who represented "The West" at the time were just one such example.  I hardly think this is comparable to your analogy of blaming the victim, using the case of rape no less (which we actually call sexual assault in Canada), as both parties are guilty of contributing to the tensions that exist between "The West" and "Extremist Islam".



    Alright, let's leave the crusades out of it since I'm sure that, if you'll just look at your staitmen and be honest for a second, you'll realise that a couple crazy brits running around with swords centuries ago really can't be used to explain 747's flying into American buildings.

    I accept that there are other examples in more recent history where the US, or even "The West", have acted violently and agressively towards the Middle East.  I'm not going to go into wether those attacks were justified or not.  You're right in that you never said the US deserves to be attacked.  So the question I put to you now is this.  If you DON'T think that attacks against the US have been justified, what exactly are you trying to prove?  Why bring up possible motives for such attacks if you don't think that those motives justify the attacks themselves?

    And just to go off-topic for a sec, yes I know it's called "sexual assault" in Canada.  Just like shell-shock is known as "post-traumatic stress disorder", stewaredesses are known as "flight attendants", doctors are known as "healthcare delivery specialists", and soldiers are known as "peace-delivery proffesionals".  Yeah, I made up the last one, but I really hate euphemisms.  Rape is a direct term describing a specific act.  Sexual assault is a blanket term covering everything from fondling to anal penetration with a 6 foot barbed dildo.  I prefer being direct.



			
				CivU said:
			
		

> I can't speak for Miss Molson, but I believe you've presented a logically false dilemma.  There exists other options for the attacks on the United States beyond the two you've suggested.



    Yes but neither of you has talked about any of the other options.  I therefore assumed you primarily beleived in the two I described.



			
				CivU said:
			
		

> When you describe, "The week before that you gave my friend Bob a large stick, which he then proceeded to use to beat the crap out of Fred.  I wanted to kill Fred myself too, but that's not important either" it reminds me of the involvement of the United States and Israel.  Except that the US would be giving Bob (Israel) the large stick and Bob would be beating Fred (any Middle East nation or group Israel aggresively opposes) with it...Perhaps the aggression of Islam that is widely touted here is a result of US military involvement in the region on the side of Israel.  If you doubt their presence in the Middle East, I suggest you look into the number of countries where the United States has military installations...



    I see.  It's those damned zionists again.

    It's quite clear to anyone not completely intoctrinated by left-wing rhetoric that Israel has on numerous occasions attempted to make peace with it's Arab neighbours.  It is also quite clear that in most cases they've succeeded.  If they really wanted to "beat Fred", they'd have wiped out Palestine entirely by now.  That the Americans support a nation of allies which is surrounded by countries which have attempted to destroy it on several occasions is hardly surprising.  Maybe Arabs consider that ground for attack, but their opinion is irrelevant because the only alternative is for the US to leave an ally to be destroyed.  I don't know about you, but I wouldn't leave a buddy to get killed in a bar fight just because I might get a bloody nose for helping him, especially when he's doing his best to resolve the situation without violence.



			
				CivU said:
			
		

> If the entire world believed Iraq to posses these weapons, why did they continue to insist the United Nations find evidence before anyone beyond the United States and Britain would involve themselves.  If everyone was certain they existed, why is the present "Coalition of the Willing" lacking Canada, France, Russia, etc.  What about the American sponsorship of Israel and its actions against Palestinians, how does that fit into "The West" versus "Extremist Islam" paradigm?
> As far as, "It seems I gave you too much credit"  Don't worry, I would hardly concern myself about what someone on a internet forum would assume about me as a person...



    Do a little research.  You'll find plenty of material which states quite clearly that the UN beleived Iraq to be in possesion of WMD.  The reason the UN didn't act?  Why didn't they also act in Rwanda?  Well, the UN hates to act.  They love talking though.  Long pointless circular discussions which go on for days, weeks, or months, and generaly end with a resolution which promises more talks later on.  Some of it's member nations also like taking kickbacks on various UN projects.  But let's not get into that debate again, I don't have the energy.


----------



## mdh

Ah yes, William Blum, an interesting choice - he makes Michael Moore sound like William F. Buckley.
For the rest of those interested in where some of these ideas are coming from here is an example of Mr. Blum's "reasoned" discourses on US foreign policy:

I quote from his website:

On December 3, 1996, the Justice Department issued a list of 16 Japanese citizens who would be barred from entering the United States because of "war crimes" committed during the Second World War. Among those denied entry were some who were alleged to have been members of the infamous "Unit 731", which, said the Justice Department, "conducted inhumane and frequently lethal pseudo-medical experiments -- on thousands of ... prisoners and civilians," including mass dissections of living humans. (1)
This action appeared to be rather hypocritical in light of the fact that after the war the man in charge of the Unit 731 program -- whose subjects included captured American soldiers -- General Shiroshii, along with his colleagues, had been granted immunity and freedom in exchange for providing the United States with details about the experiments. Moreover, their crimes were not to be revealed to the world. The justification for this policy, advanced by American scientists and military officials, was, of course, the proverbial, ubiquitous "national security".{2}
There is another reason the 1996 policy is hypocritical. The Japanese, if they wished to, could issue a list of Americans barred from Japan for "war crimes" and "crimes against humanity". Such a list might include the following:
George Bush, for the murder of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians, including many thousands of children, in attacks upon Iraq and Panama.
Colin Powell, for his prominent role in the attacks on Iraq and Panama.
General Norman Schwarzkopf, for his military leadership of the Iraqi carnage.
Ronald Reagan, for the death, destruction, and torture inflicted upon the people of El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Grenada by his military and political policies.
Elliott Abrams, for his key participation in Reagan's obsessive and paranoid "anti-communist" crusade.
Oliver North, for being a prime mover behind the contras, whose atrocities are legendary, and for his role in the invasion of Grenada, which took the lives of hundreds of innocent civilians.
Henry Kissinger (who has successfully combined two careers: socialite and war criminal), for his Machiavellian, amoral, immoral roles in the US interventions into Angola, Chile, East Timor, Vietnam, and Cambodia which brought unspeakable horror and misery to the peoples of those lands.
Gerald Ford, for giving his approval to Indonesia to use American arms to brutally suppress the people of East Timor.
Robert McNamara, for his responsibility in the slaughters in Indochina and the suppression of popular movements in Peru.
John Deutch, for his callous coverups of Gulf War Syndrome at the Defense Department and drug complicity at the CIA.
Bill Clinton, for his unprovoked rocket attacks upon the people of Iraq and his continual military aid to the governments of Turkey, Peru, Colombia and Mexico, which use the weapons to arm death squads and to carry out wholesale massacres of their own people.

Nothing like to trying draw moral equivalence between Tojo and Bill Clinton...


----------



## Britney Spears

> Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who has been called the mastermind of the insurgency, is known to have ties with AQ.  Even if we did not know of this link, what do you call publicly (through electronic media) beheading or otherwise executing civilians in order to instill fear as a weapon?





> In case you haven't been paying attention to the news, large numbers of the "insurgents" who first started attacking Americans were foreigners from a number of Arab states.  Wether they're terrorists or not I don't know, but it seems likely.  In any eventl, detonating large bombs outside of Mosques and beheading civilians doesn't seem like conventional warfare tactics to me.  I could be wrong though.



This is circulus in demonstrando. What exactly are the purposes of the insurgency? What are the demands of those kidnapping civillians? 



> WMD which turned out not to exist were considered by everyone a serious threat at the time.  The fact that they were never found doesn't invalidate the fact that nearly the entire world beleived that Sadam was in possesion of them.



This is an argument to ignorance. Rest assured that if Saddam had any reservations about delivering those hypothetical WMDs to "the terrorists", the invasion would have dispelled those reservations.



> Sadams sponsorship of Palestinian terrorists is certainly a good reason as well.  As was the fact that, while not numerous, terrorist training camps did exist in Iraq.



Since no Palestinian terrorist group has ever attacked the US, or made any claims of responsibility for such attacks, I fail to see the "good reason". If it were such a "good reason", wouldn't invading the West Bank have been a more effective measure? 

I think the "numerous training camps" you speak of belonged to a kurdish group, answar al-islam i believe it was called, which DID have ties to Al-Qaida, but whose principle goal was the deposition of Saddam Hussein. It is only natural that a secular military dictatorship such as Saddam's, or that of Musharef in Pakistan,  is the worst enemy of religious fundementalists, so I'm hardly suprised.


Infanteer:

If you're still reading, I apologize for stretching out the correlation/causation fallacy longer than it was needed, but I simply HAD to poke you with the Madrid/Istanbul thing. 
My point, of course, was not to claim that a pre - 9/11/2001 invasion of Iraq would have prevented 9/11/2001 or not, but rather to point out the absurdity of the Iraq invasion prior to 9/11, vs the succeptibility of the US public to fearmongering and propaganda after the fact.


----------



## Michael Dorosh

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> My point, of course, was not to claim that a pre - 9/11/2001 invasion of Iraq would have prevented 9/11/2001 or not, but rather to point out *the absurdity of the Iraq invasion prior to 9/11, vs the succeptibility of the US public to fearmongering and propaganda after the fact. *



You mean like after Pearl Harbor and Hong Kong, when Canada forced thousands of its own citizens of Japanese descent into concentration camps?


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Alright, let's sort this out right now.



Sure thing.



			
				48Highlander said:
			
		

> Do you REALLY beleive that arms sales to Turkey represent "actively sponsoring" the slaughter of Kurds?



Indirectly, yes. In an effort to profit, the United Stated provided well over three-quarters of the arms to another state, which had a clear-cut mandate of annihiliating a population that happened to reside within Turkish borders. Please explain to me how providing another state with the tools to slaughter a portion of the population, knowing full and well of their intentions, is not supporting the slaughter of a population?



			
				48Highlander said:
			
		

> And do you really beleive that it is one of the causes of the attacks against the US?



No. I never made the assertion to begin with. I simply stated that a proportion of terrorist activity is largely due in part to foreign policy throughout history that has directly and indirectly affected the lives of the civilians in a negative manner, and that furthermore has neither been forgiven or forgotten.   



			
				48Highlander said:
			
		

> If so, why hasn't Russia, which has sold weapons to pretty much every country and organization in the world, come under fire as well?



A) I never suggested the above was true: the United States found itself under attack because it sold weapons to another state. In fact, you incorrectly inferred that from my statement. The detail that the United States sold weapons to Turkey throughout the 1990s reveals no more than the fact that the United States, like many states, has indirectly/directly supported the annihilation of groups of individuals throughout history.

B) It is necessary to look at the impact that American/Western foreign policy has had on the areas that generate political violence and terrorist activity. You'll notice that it has, by-and-large, been a negative one in certain areas, generating extreme sentiments of hatred for the West.    



			
				48Highlander said:
			
		

> In fact, while we're at it, if US actions in Nicaragua are one of the causes as well, why hasn't Russia been attacked for invading Afghanistan and interfereing in the internal politics of just as many if not more soverign states as the US?   Why is that the only group currently carrying out terrorist actions in Russia are Chechnians?



Let me clarify, because you are seemingly melding your assumptions of what you think I said, with what I actually said. U.S. policy, intervention, and economic/business ethics in Nicaragua, Colombia, Honduras and much of Latin America have resulted in much, not all, of the political violence and terrorist activity directed against American symbols and institutions in Latin America. How you have associated this with the events in the Middle East, I don't know. I simply made the connection between the political violence that has characterized many of the continents, but not all, in which the United States has executed direct and indirect policy, intervention and business practices. This isn't coincidence.

Why wasn't Russia attacked for interfering in the politics of another sovereign nation: Afghanistan? Keep in mind that the Cold War was still ongoing, and that the main threat to Western civilization was Communism. With the onset of Russian intervention in Afghanistan in December of 1979, the United States maintained pro-longed interests in combatting Soviet Expansionism, even if it meant intruding on another state's political landscape. 

The National Security Archive reports:

"Fighting between CIA-funded Afghans and the Russians with their Khalq allies continued through 1988. At that time Moscow, having suffered substantial losses and incurred excessive costs in the country, decided to withdraw. The last Soviet forces left Afghanistan in early 1989, but warfare continued as the rebel forces contested with the Khalq regime for control of Kabul. The CIA ended its aid in 1992, the Russians sometime later, and the pro-Russian government in Kabul fell."

It is clear why the United Stated didn't intervene, and in recognizing the bipolarity of the world throughout the Cold War, it is also clear why Western allies, who were also combatting the communist threat, did not intervene either. Why didn't states of the Eastern bloc intervene? Who knows. The risk of hot conflict?

Lastly, in order to understand the full extent of the violence that is occuring between the Chechnyans and the Russians, one must look back into history. While I do not know enough on the issue to make a statement in certainty, it is my understanding that Russian forces have been slaughtering innocent Chechnyans for decades.



			
				48Highlander said:
			
		

> Your line of logic stinks, but I'm willing to listen if you think you have an explanation for this discrepancy.



Only because you don't agree with it. My line of logic stinks no more/no less than yours.


----------



## 48Highlander

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> This is circulus in demonstrando. What exactly are the purposes of the insurgency? What are the demands of those kidnapping civillians?



    I would imagine that the demands of those kidnapped civilians go something like this:   "please please plase don't kill me!"

    If you meant to ask what the demands of the terrorists are, does it matter?  Youi stated that the US should stop calling the insurgents "terrorists".  We responded that, as long as they use terrorist tactics, we'll  keep calling them terrorists.  What do their demands matter to what we call them?



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Since no Palestinian terrorist group has ever attacked the US, or made any claims of responsibility for such attacks, I fail to see the "good reason". If it were such a "good reason", wouldn't invading the West Bank have been a more effective measure?



    You don't think funding terrorists is a good reason to go after someone?  Well, I don't really have much to say in response to that.  I'll just point out that Bush did promise to go after ALL terrorist groups, not just those attacking the US.



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> I think the "numerous training camps" you speak of belonged to a kurdish group, answar al-islam i believe it was called, which DID have ties to Al-Qaida, but whose principle goal was the deposition of Saddam Hussein. It is only natural that a secular military dictatorship such as Saddam's, or that of Musharef in Pakistan,  is the worst enemy of religious fundementalists, so I'm hardly suprised.



    I'll admit I don't know exactly who the camps belonged to.  I'll look into it.


----------



## Britney Spears

> You mean like after Pearl Harbor and Hong Kong, when Canada forced thousands of its own citizens of Japanese descent into concentration camps?



Well, that wasn't quite the analogy I had in mind, but you could put it that way, in this sense, I think  many less progressive Americans support the Invasion of Iraq soley on the basis that the Sept.11 hijakcers were Arabs, OBL is an Arab, the Iraqi's are Arabs, and thus we should invade Iraq sort of reasoning. 

This is not to say that any of the posters here make such a claim, in fact they've outlines a number of good, internationally acceptable reasons for the invasion, e.g. the weapons inspectors, that Saddam was a mean old jerk, etc  I'll concede that those reasons exist, but apparently they were not nearly reason enough in a pre- 9/11 world, hence my first point.


----------



## Jarnhamar

Red writing hurts my eyes. mdh can you try a soothing blue or something?


----------



## 48Highlander

MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Indirectly, yes. In an effort to profit, the United Stated provided well over three-quarters of the arms to another state, which had a clear-cut mandate of annihiliating a population that happened to reside within Turkish borders. Please explain to me how providing another state with the tools to slaughter a portion of the population, knowing full and well of their intentions, is not supporting the slaughter of a population?



So now they're indirectly-acitvely supporting the slaughter of Kurds?    I understand where you're coming from, but that's not much of a reason for the attacks against the US.  And, as your following statements make clear, you agree with that.  So let's continue.



			
				MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> No. I never made the assertion to begin with. I simply stated that a proportion of terrorist activity is largely due in part to foreign policy throughout history that has directly and indirectly affected the lives of the civilians in a negative manner, and that furthermore has neither been forgiven or forgotten.



Then why bring up examples which "terrorist activity" ISN'T "largely due" to?  I thought we were discussing examples of why muslims decided to attack the US.  If your example isn't in that categroy, there's no reason to bring it up.



			
				MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Let me clarify, because you are seemingly melding your assumptions of what you think I said, with what I actually said. U.S. policy, intervention, and economic/business ethics in Nicaragua, Colombia, Honduras and much of Latin America have resulted in much, not all, of the political violence and terrorist activity directed against American symbols and institutions in Latin America. How you have associated this with the events in the Middle East, I don't know. I simply made the connection between the political violence that has characterized many of the continents, but not all, in which the United States has executed direct and indirect policy, intervention and business practices. This isn't coincidence.



    Once again, I'm not really sure why you brought up Latin america.  I haven't seen any Latin Americans flying planes into American buildings.



			
				MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Why wasn't Russia attacked for interfering in the politics of another sovereign nation: Afghanistan? Keep in mind that the Cold War was still ongoing, and that the main threat to Western civilization was Communism. With the onset of Russian intervention in Afghanistan in December of 1979, the United States maintained pro-longed interests in combatting Soviet Expansionism, even if it meant intruding on another state's political landscape.
> .....
> It is clear why the United Stated didn't intervene, and in recognizing the bipolarity of the world throughout the Cold War, it is also clear why Western allies, who were also combatting the communist threat, did not intervene either. Why didn't states of the Eastern bloc intervene? Who knows. The risk of hot conflict?



    You misunderstood.  I didn't ask why the US hasn't intervened.  I asked why no terrorist activity has been aimed at the Russians.  If as you state American foreign policy is a principal precipitator for terrorist activity, then Russian foreign policy should have had the same, if not a more drastic, effect.



			
				MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Lastly, in order to understand the full extent of the violence that is occuring between the Chechnyans and the Russians, one must look back into history. While I do not know enough on the issue to make a statement in certainty, it is my understanding that Russian forces have been slaughtering innocent Chechnyans for decades.



    Once again you misunderstand and I guess it's my fault.  I know why the Chechnians are fighting the Russians.  That case is fairly clear-cut.  What I'm asking is why they're the ONLY terrorist groups operating against the Russians.



			
				MissMolsonIndy said:
			
		

> Only because you don't agree with it. My line of logic stinks no more/no less than yours.



You're right, your logic is fine and I can see that now that you've clarified a few points for me.  What I thought was faulty logic is just excessive information which isn't relevant to the discussion of the arab-US conflict.


----------



## Britney Spears

> If you meant to ask what the demands of the terrorists are, does it matter?  Youi stated that the US should stop calling the insurgents "terrorists".  We responded that, as long as they use terrorist tactics, we'll  keep calling them terrorists.  What do their demands matter to what we call them?



Umm, yes, that would be my question, which I shall repeat here: What are the demands of those kidnapping civillians? 

Their demands are that a foreign army of occupation leave their homeland. Since there is no doubt that the US occupation is just that, their demands don't seem to me to be so horribly unreasonable. Its a matter of semantics I suppose, but as they say, one man's terrorist is another man's....



> You don't think funding terrorists is a good reason to go after someone?  Well, I don't really have much to say in response to that.  I'll just point out that Bush did promise to go after ALL terrorist groups, not just those attacking the US.



No, I think going after terrorists who are an actual threat the the security of the US (and by extension, Canada) is probably a more pressing concern. While the eradication of all forms of terrorism world wide is a noble ideal, I don't think we're quite "there" yet. You're also implying that the Palestinian cause is completely illegitimate, which is, well, debatable. Considering that the vast majority of funding for Palestinian terrorist groups come from <a href=http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/media/levitt/levitt082503.htm>Saudi Arabia</a> , this isn't even on the chart as long as we're talking about "reasons to invade Iraq".


Oh, and this one goes out to my # 1 fan, *Ghost778*


----------



## 48Highlander

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Their demands are that a foreign army of occupation leave their homeland. Since there is no doubt that the US occupation is just that, their demands don't seem to me to be so horribly unreasonable. Its a matter of semantics I suppose, but as they say, one man's terrorist is another man's....



    Welll, considering that a lot of them afre foreigners themselves, I'd say that such a demand coming from those factions IS pretty unreasonable.  "This isn't my country, but I want you out!".  As for the rest....the US has already promised to get out once they've helped restore some semblance of order and a polytical system.  What those insurgents are really demanding is for the US to get out RIGHT NOW so that the political or religious groups which the insurgents support can go about killing Iraqis and attempting to set themselves up as the ruling power.  Which, while not unreasonable, isn't a good thing, and deffinitely isn't something the US should allow.



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> No, I think going after terrorists who are an actual threat the the security of the US (and by extension, Canada) is probably a more pressing concern. While the eradication of all forms of terrorism world wide is a noble ideal, I don't think we're quite "there" yet. You're also implying that the Palestinian cause is completely illegitimate, which is, well, debatable. Considering that the vast majority of funding for Palestinian terrorist groups come from <a href=http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/media/levitt/levitt082503.htm>Saudi Arabia</a> , this isn't even on the chart as long as we're talking about "reasons to invade Iraq".



    You're right, going after terrorists who are a threat to the US is a more pressing concern.  I didn't say that Sadam's funding of Palestinian terrorists was the only reason the US went into Iraq, I just said it was a good reason.  One of many.  So unless you think that Sadam was right to fund Palestinian terrorism, I'd say you agree with my statement.  Right? 

    I will agree though that Saudi Arabia is a problem.  Osama is Saudi after all.  The US would have probably had more of an affect on world terrorism if they had gone into Saudi Arabia.  Invading Iraq was easier to justify though, and it was still an important target.  Can you imagine the reaction if they'd tried invading Saudi Arabia instead?


----------



## CivU

"a couple crazy brits running around with swords"

Does this accurately describe the crusades? I think not...

"If you DON'T think that attacks against the US have been justified, what exactly are you trying to prove?   Why bring up possible motives for such attacks if you don't think that those motives justify the attacks themselves?"

I didn't state whethere the attacks are justified or not; however, without acknowleding that the US has implications in the tensions and conflicts that surround the attacks, we cannot begin to determine why they would have happened.

"I'll just point out that Bush did promise to go after ALL terrorist groups, not just those attacking the US."

I don't see Bush attempting to address the presence of terrorists within America who might be involved in such atrocities as the Oklahoma City Bombing, such as Christian Fundamentalists/Extremists.

"For the rest of those interested in where some of these ideas are coming from here is an example of Mr. Blum's "reasoned" discourses on US foreign policy:"

If America is justified in attacking any persons who aid and abbet terrorists, then how are a number of people on Mr. Blum's list not also culpable in the same acts.   Anyone involved in the Reagan administrations anti-communist sweep of Latin America or the massacres in East Timor certainly have as much blood on their hands as does Saddam Hussein...they supported violent campaigns financially and militarily, not unlike the persons who support Al Qaeda the War on Terror presently persues.


----------



## Fishbone Jones

CivU said:
			
		

> "I'll just point out that Bush did promise to go after ALL terrorist groups, not just those attacking the US."



Sheesh. Give 'em a chance. It's like being a friend of Bill's. One day at a time, man. One day at a time. This won't be over in our lifetime. Friggin' "I want it now generation" needs to learn the meaning of patience. Like the old punchline. "Why run down the hill and get one, when we can walk down the hill and get them all".


EDIT: Sorry, pasted the wrong quote. Certain responses are so confusing and unfounded, it's easy to make a mistake. :


----------



## McG

CivU,
Are you defending that entire list of "war criminals"? Like this entry: 
"General Norman Schwarzkopf, for his military leadership of the Iraqi carnage"


----------



## Britney Spears

> Welll, considering that a lot of them afre foreigners themselves, I'd say that such a demand coming from those factions IS pretty unreasonable.



Sure, there are foreigners amongst them, but unless you're claiming that the Iraqi insurgency is a completely foreign intervention (by whom? the Syrians? Al-qaida?), my point still stands.  



> What those insurgents are really demanding is for the US to get out RIGHT NOW so that the political or religious groups which the insurgents support can go about killing Iraqis and attempting to set themselves up as the ruling power.  Which, while not unreasonable, isn't a good thing, and deffinitely isn't something the US should allow.



You're doing it(the circular argument) again. The only reason this is happening is because of the US invasion!  Do you see now why it was such a *Bad Idea For Everyone(tm)*?  




> I will agree though that Saudi Arabia is a problem.  Osama is Saudi after all.  The US would have probably had more of an affect on world terrorism if they had gone into Saudi Arabia.  Invading Iraq was easier to justify though, and it was still an important target.  Can you imagine the reaction if they'd tried invading Saudi Arabia instead?



Now you're dangling a red herring. "because we don't have an excuse( well, other than that whole Bin Laden-/9/11 thing) to invade Saudi Arabia" is not a reason for invading Iraq.


----------



## McG

> Iraq casts wary eye at neighbours
> Associated Press
> POSTED AT 5:37 AM EST
> Wednesday, Dec 15, 2004
> Globe & Mail
> 
> Baghdad â â€ Iraq's defence minister on Wednesday accused neighbouring Iran and Syria of supporting terrorists in his war-ravaged country.
> 
> Hazem Shaalan also accused Iran of backing the al-Qaeda in Iraq terrorist group headed by Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and said his country's opponents want â Å“turbaned clerics to rule in Iraq.â ?
> 
> Mr. Shaalan said Iraqi authorities obtained information about Iran's role in Iraqi's insurgency after last month's arrest of the leader of the Jaish Mohammed (Mohammed's Army) terrorist group during U.S.-led operations in Fallujah.
> 
> â Å“When we arrested the commander of Jaish Mohammed we discovered that key to terrorism is in Iran, which this the number one enemy for Iraq,â ? Mr. Shaalan told reporters in Baghdad.
> 
> On Nov. 15, Iraq's interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said American forces detained Jaish Mohammed members, including the organization's leader, Moayad Ahmed Yasseen, also known as Abu Ahmed, during the military operation to uproot insurgents based in Fallujah, west of Baghdad.
> 
> Mr. Allawi has said the group was known to have co-operated with Jordanian terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and al-Qaeda and Saddam loyalists and has claimed responsibility for killing and beheading a number of Iraqis, Arabs and foreigners in Iraq.
> 
> The U.S. military has said in the past that Jaish Mohammed appears to be an umbrella group for former intelligence agents, army, security officials, and Baath Party members.
> 
> Mr. Shaalan accused Iranian and Syrian intelligence agents, plus operatives of deposed leader Saddam Hussein's security forces, of â Å“co-operating with the al-Zarqawi group to run criminal operations in Iraq,â ? adding that Syria and Iran was providing funds and training.
> 
> Both countries have previously rejected U.S. and Iraqi claims that they are supporting insurgents in Iraq. Damascus, however, has said it is unable to fully close its long, porous border with Iraq.
> 
> â Å“They are fighting us because we want to build freedom and democracy and they want to build an Islamic dictatorship and have turbaned clerics to rule in Iraq,â ? he said, providing no further details.


----------



## 48Highlander

CivU said:
			
		

> Does this accurately describe the crusades? I think not...



Correct me if I'm wrong but the number of crusaders was far inferior to the number of Muslims, and the Brits got their butts handed to 'em.  My description may be a wee bit inaccurate, but the sentiment wasn't.



			
				CivU said:
			
		

> I didn't state whethere the attacks are justified or not; however, without acknowleding that the US has implications in the tensions and conflicts that surround the attacks, we cannot begin to determine why they would have happened.



Does it matter?  Yeah it's good to know the motivation of those who want to kill you, but only in order to stop them.  If someone shoves a gun in my face, I don't really care what his motivations are.  I can either comply with his demands and hope he doesn't kill me anyway, or I can attempt to fight back.  What do I care wether he wants to kill me because I'm a decadent capitalist, or because he wants my wallet?  As long as I know his attack on me is unjustified, all I'm concerned with is removing the threat.



			
				CivU said:
			
		

> I don't see Bush attempting to address the presence of terrorists within America who might be involved in such atrocities as the Oklahoma City Bombing, such as Christian Fundamentalists/Extremists.



Timmy was arrested, tried, and concivted.  He wasn't part of an organization.  Case closed.

Police forces in the US deal with terrorism, Bush doesn't need to create new policy for it.  They also deal with religious nutbars all the time.  Remember Wako?



			
				CivU said:
			
		

> If America is justified in attacking any persons who aid and abbet terrorists, then how are a number of people on Mr. Blum's list not also culpable in the same acts.  Anyone involved in the Reagan administrations anti-communist sweep of Latin America or the massacres in East Timor certainly have as much blood on their hands as does Saddam Hussein...they supported violent campaigns financially and militarily, not unlike the persons who support Al Qaeda the War on Terror presently persues.



If you start going back through history you'll come to the conclusion that every nation on earth is guilty of the same thing.  Just depends on how far back you go.  What matters to Bush is the here and now.  As long as the US isn't currently engaged in sponsoring terrorist activity, that's good enough for me.  If on the other hand Bush decides to start making donations to the IRA tomorrow, I'll be right beside you yelling for his head.  I'm not a big fan of hypocrisy either, but blaming Bush for something that happened during the Reagen administration is a little foolish.


----------



## 48Highlander

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> You're doing it(the circular argument) again. The only reason this is happening is because of the US invasion!  Do you see now why it was such a *Bad Idea For Everyone(tm)*?



Negative.  Ofcourse that's the only reason it's happening.  That's what happens whenever an opressive government is overthrown.  Does that mean all oppressive governments should be left alone?



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Now you're dangling a red herring. "because we don't have an excuse( well, other than that whole Bin Laden-/9/11 thing) to invade Saudi Arabia" is not a reason for invading Iraq.



Now you're the one doing the selective hearing bit   I didn't say it was a reason for invading Iraq, I said it was a reason for NOT invading Saudi Arabia.  I listed plenty of reasons for attacking Iraq.


----------



## McG

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Considering that the vast majority of funding for Palestinian terrorist groups come from Saudi Arabia , this isn't even on the chart as long as we're talking about "reasons to invade Iraq".


This is your red herring.   That something needs to be done in Saudi Arabia is not in dispute.   However, Iraq is not to be excused because there was a worse offender.   Political relations between Saudi Arabia and the west are much better than were the relations with Iraq.   With Saudi Arabia there were (and still are) political options available.   Those options had failed in Iraq and it was time for a military solution.


----------



## Fishbone Jones

CivU,

I've got a question for you. You're an OCdt, going through ROTP. IF the Canadian government ever decides to back the US in this, what, as an Officer in the CF, will you do about it? What will be your choice?


----------



## Britney Spears

> That's what happens whenever an opressive government is overthrown.



Cite?



> Now you're the one doing the selective hearing bit Tongue  I didn't say it was a reason for invading Iraq, I said it was a reason for NOT invading Saudi Arabia.  I listed plenty of reasons for attacking Iraq





> This is your red herring.  That something needs to be done in Saudi Arabia is not in dispute.  However, Iraq is not to be excused because there was a worse offender.  Political relations between Saudi Arabia and the west are much better than were the relations with Iraq.  With Saudi Arabia there were (and still are) political options available.  Those options had failed in Iraq and it was time for a military solution.



Take a step back here. It was YOUR assertion that Saddam's funding of Palestinian terrorist groups was a reason for the invasion of Iraq. I dispute this on the basis that if our purpose was to fight Palestinian terrorism in Israel, then invading Iraq is probably the worst way of doing it ever, not to mention that Palestinian terrorism poses no threat to the security of the US/Canada. 
Shall we agree, then, that the "Palestinian" reason is no longer viable?


----------



## CivU

CivU,
Are you defending that entire list of "war criminals"? Like this entry: 
"General Norman Schwarzkopf, for his military leadership of the Iraqi carnage"

No, I'm not.   I did mention the Reagan administration and those involved with East Timor as specifically deplorable examples.   The invasion of Panama by George H.W. Bush could also fall under the aforementioned category...As for Schwarzkopf, from what I gather of Mr. Blum's argument it is largely based around his use of Uranium depleted ammunition and the horrific effects it has had on both American troops and continues to have within Iraq itself.   I do not think a General's leadership in an invasion itself can be considered a war crime.

As for Timotyh McVeigh, he was actually affiliate with several groups through the Elhom City compound, an anti-government sanctuary.   These groups included the Aryan Republican Army and the Christian Identity movements.   In fact, they all refferred to the same gospel, a book known as the "Turner Diaries" written by William Pierce.   I guess it isn't case closed.

"As long as the US isn't currently engaged in sponsoring terrorist activity, that's good enough for me"

America continues to train Latin American para-military forces at the Fort Benning, Georgia, School of the Americas to carry out repressive acts in Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua and to this day, Colombia.   If you look into the American involvement in Colombia you may see that the United States is currently engaged in sponsoring terrorist activity.   

"I've got a question for you. You're an OCdt, going through ROTP. IF the Canadian government ever decides to back the US in this, what, as an Officer in the CF, will you do about it? What will be your choice?"

I will follow my orders as given to me through my chain of command.


----------



## 48Highlander

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> cite?



Well, how about Haiti for one?  It's self evident really.  I don't see the need to go look up multiple examples, but, just to name a few of the top of my head:

Haiti, Rwana, Somalia, Yugoslavia

Any time a government loses control of it's country, it results in fighting between different groups within that country.



			
				CivU said:
			
		

> Take a step back here. It was YOUR assertion that Saddam's funding of Palestinian terrorist groups was a reason for the invasion of Iraq. I dispute this on the basis that if our purpose was to fight Palestinian terrorism in Israel, then invading Iraq is probably the worst way of doing it ever, not to mention that Palestinian terrorism poses no threat to the security of the US/Canada.
> Shall we agree, then, that the "Palestinian" reason is no longer viable?



Are you kidding?  So if a drug dealer grows 1,000 lbs of marijuana and you only grow 5, those 5 lbs aren't a good enough reason for the cops to go after you?  There were MANY reasons for invading Iraq.  Saudi Arabia wasn't a viable target for many reasons, although they do fund terrorism.  As has been pointed out, it's better to use political channels at this stage to deal with them.  Iraq WAS a viable target and no political channels existed for dealing with them.  Are you starting to understand any of this?


----------



## 48Highlander

CivU said:
			
		

> As for Timotyh McVeigh, he was actually affiliate with several groups through the Elhom City compound, an anti-government sanctuary.  These groups included the Aryan Republican Army and the Christian Identity movements.  In fact, they all refferred to the same gospel, a book known as the "Turner Diaries" written by William Pierce.  I guess it isn't case closed.



    I'm DEFFINITELY not going that far off topic.  Suffice it to say I disagree.



			
				CivU said:
			
		

> America continues to train Latin American para-military forces at the Fort Benning, Georgia, School of the Americas to carry out repressive acts in Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua and to this day, Colombia.  If you look into the American involvement in Colombia you may see that the United States is currently engaged in sponsoring terrorist activity.



    Really.  So you've been through the training at Fort Benning personaly then, and can gaurantee that they have a course called "Oppressing your people through terrorists tactics 101".

    I've seen the claims about the school and about american involvement in Latin America.  Once again, I'm not going that far off topic but I don't agree with you there either.  This conversation's getting out of control so if you're going to start jumping all over the board I'm gonna bow out.


----------



## McG

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Take a step back here.


That's right, step back.  It was you that pointed at Saudi Arabia with the argument that they were the greater sinner (in one area of concern).

The fact that Iraq was giving money to terrorism showed a willingness to support terrorism against states that it had conflict with.


----------



## Britney Spears

> Well, how about Haiti for one?  It's self evident really.  I don't see the need to go look up multiple examples, but, just to name a few of the top of my head:
> 
> Haiti, Rwana, Somalia, Yugoslavia
> 
> Any time a government loses control of it's country, it results in fighting between different groups within that country.



Your original words were "oppressive goverment", the implication being that whenever an unpopular native goverment has been overthrown by foreign intervention,  an armed insurrection against their supposed liberators is bound to begin. None of your examples fit this criterea. 



> Are you kidding?  So if a drug dealer grows 1,000 lbs of marijuana and you only grow 5, those 5 lbs aren't a good enough reason for the cops to go after you?  There were MANY reasons for invading Iraq.  Saudi Arabia wasn't a viable target for many reasons, although they do fund terrorism.  As has been pointed out, it's better to use political channels at this stage to deal with them.  Iraq WAS a viable target and no political channels existed for dealing with them.  Are you starting to understand any of this?



Hey, lets leave marijuana out of this OK? 

You're still making 2 assertionss: 1) the invasion of Iraq had an apprieciable effect on the activities of Palestinian terrorist groups, or have made the US/Canada somehow safer from those same groups (to use your analogy, it will be like driving a tank through my house  and through the houses of my neighbours on either side, to get at my 5 lbs of marijuana), and 2) That we should be concerning ourselves with palestinian terror groups when Al-qaida had just killed thounsands of people.( Your analogy: Doing the aforementioned tank stunt, when there's a crazed serial sniper picking people off at gas stations down the road.)  

I disagree with both.


----------



## Britney Spears

> The fact that Iraq was giving money to terrorism showed a willingness to support terrorism against states that it had conflict with.



And with this, you justify the invasion? Sorry, gentlemen, but the assetion that Iraq MAY be willing to support a group of religious fundamentalists who share none of their goals, and who  had previosuly been their worst enemies, while impossible to prove false, is simply not a good enough reason, and the rest of the world seems to agree (incidently, the rest of the world seems to think the idea is batshit insane, but I'll stay on topic). I'll concede that you are factually correct with this assertion, but I don't think that by invading Iraq we are coming out ahead.


----------



## 48Highlander

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> You're still making 2 assertionss: 1) the invasion of Iraq had an apprieciable effect on the activities of Palestinian terrorist groups, or have made the US/Canada somehow safer from those same groups (to use your analogy, it will be like driving a tank through my house  and through the houses of my neighbours on either side, to get at my 5 lbs of marijuana), and 2) That we should be concerning ourselves with palestinian terror groups when Al-qaida had just killed thounsands of people.( Your analogy: Doing the aforementioned tank stunt, when there's a crazed serial sniper picking people off at gas stations down the road.)



Argh.  Ok, this is the last time I'm going to try explaining this.  I know you said to leave the ganja out of this, but I'm going to use it as part of a theoretical scenario I'm constructing here.

Ok, so we have two hypothetical criminal.  Mr Green and Mr Blue.  Both are known to police, and we have the following facts on them:

Mr Green has in his possesion 1,000 lbs of marijuana.

Mr Blue has in his posession 5 lbs of marijuana.  He also has 100 kilos of cocaine, 10,000 tabs of extacy, 10 stolen vehicles, 5 pistols, 10 shotguns, a granade launcher, and thousands of round of ammunition.  He also pimps out 5 girls.  And 2 guys.  He is a suspect in 3 murders, 4 hit-and-runs, 10 sexual assaults, and 5 kidnappings.

So, the ETF storms Mr Blue's house and arrest him.

Now me and you decide to have a conversation about it.

Me:  Well, he was arrested because he had a whackload of weapons, lots of extacy and marijuana, and was a known criminal.

You:  Yeah, but Mr Green is also a known criminal and he has a lot more Marijuana, and the cops aren't doing anything about him.

Me:  Yeah, that's true, but they're still doing surveilance on Mr Green, so it wasn't a good idea to arrest him.  Mr Blue was a much better target.

You:  Well now you're dangling a red herring.  "because we're doing surveilance on Mr Green" isn't an excuse to arrest Mr Blue.

Me:  I didn't say it was a reason for arresting Mr Blue.  I said it was a reason NOT to arrest Mr Green.

You:  Take a step back here.  It was YOUR assertion that Mr Blue's possesion of Marijuana was the reason he was arrested.  If their reason for arresting Mr Blue was to limit marijuana distribution then it was probably the worst way of doing it ever.  Not to mention that he wasn't selling marijuana to the cops.  Shall we agree then that "marijuana" is no longer viable?

Me:  There were MANY reasons for arresting Mr Blue.  Arresting Mr Green wasn't a good idea, it's better to keep surveilance on him for now.  Arresting Mr Blue on the other hand IS a good idea.  You getting this?

You:  You're still making two assertions:  1) the arrest of Mr Blue had an appreciable effect on marijuana distribution.  2) That we should be concerning ourselves with marijuana when drunk driving kills WAY more people.



Now if you don't understand the point of my little scenario, well, I'm sorry, I tried.  I'll call it quits.  Otherwise, please accept the fact that there were multiple reasons for invading Iraq, and that the fact that another country was worse at one of those things doesn't immediately invalidate that as a reason.  If you're willing to acknowledge that then continue with whatever point you may have been trying to make, otherwise I wish you a good night.


----------



## a_majoor

Log off for a few hours and look what happens!



> The root cause of Terrorism is the lust for power



I think a lot of the tangents about who did what to whom should be stamped out and all posters forced to contemplate this statement for a year or two. Personal power lust may end up helping us, as the Jihadis begin to fragment into competing groups under our assault: http://www.nationalreview.com/robbins/robbins200412170838.asp

In Cyprus, I would sometimes ask the locals why they had it in for the other side. "Why, they killed my great grandfather's uncles goat! I hate them forever!" In former Yugoslavia, the Serbian population would reffer to the battle of Kossovo Polje in terms that made it sound contemporaneous to "Operation Storm". Kossovo Polje was fought on June 28, 1389. As long as people are fed distorted versions of history and encouraged to nurse grudges like that, rational discourse is not an option. The ruling elites sponsor and encourage this as a means of maintaining their hold on power, and people who would like to be elites run the same rackets. As Ralph Peters puts it;" If we possessed the data to calculate an "information deposit coefficient" for the populations of cities such as the greater Boston area (winner) and Bombay (loser), we would probably be astonished at the per capita informational advantage in Boston. Compounding the problem, the information that is available in the world's loser cities is not only scarce, but generally inaccurate, episodic, and deformed by local prejudice."http://carlisle-www.army.mil/usawc/parameters/97autumn/peters.htm (This gives me some disquieting evenings when I think of our own educational system).

The question as to what the jihadis are demanding is multi-faceted, since they are not a homogeneous "nation" or even organization. Osama Bin Laden wants to overthrow the House of Saud and establish a new Caliphate, ideally protected against Jews and Crusaders" by the threat of nuclear weapons and control over the supply of oil. (Saddam Hussein and the current Iranian regime shared the nuclear weapons and control of oil ambition). Down in the weeds, much of the action in the Tikrit triangle region is thought to be associated with Sunni Arab notions of shame and guilt, i.e. the fact that a foreign power had to come in and clean house is intensely shameful for for these people, and the fact that the Sunnis have been knocked from their elevated perch under Saddam makes it even more galling. See http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/vincent200412160838.asp for a more detailed discussion. (This should also be posted on the 4GW thread, if I can ever find it...).  

Finally, the lead quote is not applicable to the United States. Terrorism is the "asymmetrical" response of a weak party attempting to intimidate the opposition. The British knew this well long before Northern Ireland; in Kenya and Malaysia, the "man with the knife" who lived in the villiage was the most feared opponent, since he would kill people who were seen or thought to be cooperative with the government or government forces. Since the "force to space" ratios were favorable, the British could send sections or even platoons of soldiers to live in threatened villiages, hunting for "the man with the knife" at close quarters until he was either caught by the soldiers, or more commonly, turned in by the now confident villiagers. While this is much more difficult in a densly populated urban environment, I have seen some internet "blogs" which seem to indicate similar things happened in Fallujia during the battle, locals turning out to indicate where Jihadi strongpoints were located. (This is a development to look into.). The United States deploys its power openly to support the national interest. American fire power is focused to the extent possible by current technology on the enemy, while collateral damage is regrettable, can anyone here seriously doubt the Americans have the ability to simply erase Fallujia and any other city or town from the face of the earth, ensure every living creature is killed and sow salt into the earth?

Finally, as has been pointed out, the Jihadis have carried out an attack on the US homeland, and several other mass attacks against the West (Madrid and Bali, the two biggest), while the "Shining path" and similar organizations have not. Even with the US economy growing at 5% compounded annually, there is simply not enough money or manpower to fight every enemy at once. (If and when a "friction free" system of economics is invented, things will change). To use an analogy, I will be better off dealing with the guy coming in through the window now, than dealing with the biker club-house across town. Anyway, there are probably more people interested in gaining a 5% compounded annual growth rate than can be murdered by any conceivable army of Jihadis, so time is ultimately on our side. This will be the work of a generation at least.


----------



## McG

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> And with this, you justify the invasion?


You know this is not the only argument.   Failure to comply with UN sections, support for terrorism, acts of genocide, torture of citizens, represion of rights, etc.




			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Sorry, gentlemen, but the assetion that Iraq MAY be willing to support a group of religious fundamentalists who share none of their goals, and who had previosuly been their worst enemies, while impossible to prove false, is simply not a good enough reason,


Again, it is not the only reason.   However, your assumption (that any terrorist Iraq could have supported in an attack on the US would have previously been Iraq's worst enemy) cannot be supported.   First, attacking the US would have been the shared goal.   Secondly, AQ is not the only terrorist group out there.


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## 48Highlander

Excellent post a_majoor.  You've very eloquently phrased something that should be self-evident to everyone.  Terrorism as a whole isn't motivated by any clear objective other than the amassing of power by those in control, and those wishing some day to be in control.  The only way to fight it is to destroy those who cannot be reasoned with, while offering the rest a better alternative.


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## Britney Spears

> Now if you don't understand the point of my little scenario,



I understand your scenario perfectly.  Problem is,  in your rather strained analogy, the EFT works for free, there are no other crimes to contend with, and Mr. Green has no friends and doesn't shoot back, not even with the grenade launchers and whatnot.


In a strictly legal sense, both 5lbs and 100lbs are equally criiminal acts(in essence, I realize there are different categories and whatnot, but the crime is the same) and so there is no difference to the police officer  untill the grenade launchers come out. So the obvious lesson for the police officer is that you can't use this model for countries too!


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## mdh

Well I have to give some credit to CivU for trying to remain consistent while living in the same intellectual slum as William Blum. It takes considerable moral gymnastics to equate Reagan, Clinton and Norman Swartzkopf with Japanese war criminals. Miss Molson has so far failed to produce any of her "strictly academic" sources so we can safey assume she has none. Just to round out the entertainment here's a piece by Christopher Hitchens, a re-knowned journalist and polemicist, who broke with his leftist friends after hearing too much of this stuff and supported the war against Islamo-fascism:

Bush's Secularist Triumph
The left apologizes for religious fanatics. The president fights them.
By Christopher Hitchens
Posted Tuesday, Nov. 9, 2004, at 7:34 AM PT 


Many are the cheap and easy laughs in which one could indulge at the extraordinary, pitiful hysteria of the defeated Democrats. "Kerry won," according to one e-mail I received from Greg Palast, to whom the Florida vote in 2000 is, and always will be, a combination of Gettysburg and Waterloo. According to Nikki Finke of the LA Weekly, the Fox News channel "called" Ohio for Bush for reasons too sinister to enumerate. Gregory Maniatis, whose last communication to me had predicted an annihilating Democratic landslide, kept quiet for only a day or so before forwarding the details on how to emigrate to Canada. Thus do the liberals build their bridge to the 20th century.        

Who can care about this pathos? Not I. But I do take strong exception to one strain in the general moaning. It seems that anyone fool enough to favor the re-election of the president is by definition a God-bothering, pulpit-pounding Armageddon-artist, enslaved by ancient texts and prophecies and committed to theocratic rule. I was instructed in last week's New York Times that this was the case, and that the Enlightenment had come to an end, by no less an expert than Garry Wills, who makes at least one of his many livings by being an Augustinian Roman Catholic.      

I step lightly over the ancient history of Wills' church (which was the originator of the counter-Enlightenment and then the patron of fascism in Europe) as well as over its more recent and local history (as the patron, protector, and financier of child-rape in the United States, and the sponsor of the cruel "annulment" of Joe Kennedy's and John Kerry's first marriages). As far as I know, all religions and all churches are equally demented in their belief in divine intervention, divine intercession, or even the existence of the divine in the first place. 

But all faiths are not always equally demented in the same way, or at the same time. Islam, which was once a civilizing and creative force in many societies, is now undergoing a civil war. One faction in this civil war is explicitly totalitarian and wedded to a cult of death. We have seen it at work on the streets of our own cities, and most recently on the streets of Amsterdam. We know that the obscene butchery of filmmaker Theo van Gogh was only a warning of what is coming in Madrid, London, Rome, and Paris, let alone Baghdad and Basra.         

So here is what I want to say on the absolutely crucial matter of secularism. Only one faction in American politics has found itself able to make excuses for the kind of religious fanaticism that immediately menaces us in the here and now. And that faction, I am sorry and furious to say, is the left. From the first day of the immolation of the World Trade Center, right down to the present moment, a gallery of pseudointellectuals has been willing to represent the worst face of Islam as the voice of the oppressed. How can these people bear to reread their own propaganda? Suicide murderers in Palestineâ â€disowned and denounced by the new leader of the PLOâ â€described as the victims of "despair." The forces of al-Qaida and the Taliban represented as misguided spokespeople for antiglobalization. The blood-maddened thugs in Iraq, who would rather bring down the roof on a suffering people than allow them to vote, pictured prettily as "insurgents" or even, by Michael Moore, as the moral equivalent of our Founding Fathers. If this is liberal secularism, I'll take a modest, God-fearing, deer-hunting Baptist from Kentucky every time, as long as he didn't want to impose his principles on me (which our Constitution forbids him to do).           

One probably should not rest too much on the similarity between Bin Laden's last video and the newly available DVD of Fahrenheit 9/11. I would only say that, if Bin Laden had issued a tape that with equal fealty followed the playbook of Karl Rove (and do please by all means cross yourself at the mention of this unholy name), it might have garnered some more attention. The Bearded One moved pedantically through Moore's bill of indictment, checking off the Florida vote-count in 2000, the "Pet Goat" episode on the day of heck, the violent intrusion into hitherto peaceful and Muslim Iraq, and the division between Bush and the much nicer Europeans. (For some reason, unknown to me at any rate, he did not attack the President for allowing the Bin Laden family to fly out of American airspace.)           

George Bush may subjectively be a Christian, but heâ â€and the U.S. armed forcesâ â€have objectively done more for secularism than the whole of the American agnostic community combined and doubled. The demolition of the Taliban, the huge damage inflicted on the al-Qaida network, and the confrontation with theocratic saboteurs in Iraq represent huge advances for the non-fundamentalist forces in many countries. The "antiwar" faction even recognizes this achievement, if only indirectly, by complaining about the way in which it has infuriated the Islamic religious extremists around the world. But does it accept the apparent corollaryâ â€that we should have been pursuing a policy to which the fanatics had no objection?           

Secularism is not just a smug attitude. It is a possible way of democratic and pluralistic life that only became thinkable after several wars and revolutions had ruthlessly smashed the hold of the clergy on the state. We are now in the middle of another such war and revolution, and the liberals have gone AWOL. I dare say that there will be a few domestic confrontations down the road, over everything from the Pledge of Allegiance to the display of Mosaic tablets in courtrooms and schools. I have spent all my life on the atheist side of this argument, and will brace for more of the same, but I somehow can't hear Robert Ingersoll* or Clarence Darrow being soft and cowardly and evasive if it came to a vicious theocratic challenge that daily threatens us from within and without.


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## Infanteer

_"Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Whose gonna do it? You? You, Lt. Weinburg? I have more responsibility here than you could possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago, and you curse the Marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know. That Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And that my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives. I know deep down in places you dont talk about at parties, you don't want me on that wall, you need me on that wall. We use words like honor, code, loyalty. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom I provide, then question the manner in which I provide it. I prefer you said thank you, and went on your way, Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon, and stand to post. Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you are entitled to!"_


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## MissMolsonIndy

mdh said:
			
		

> Miss Molson has so far failed to produce any of her "strictly academic" sources so we can safey assume she has none.



Monash University outlines the criteria for academic literature:



> Literature that meets these criteria is often academic:
> 
> the publication is peer reviewed
> the publication is published/edited by a university or scholarly society
> the author of the article is from a university or scholarly society
> the publication reports research
> the publication contains a bibliography and references other works
> the publication is written by more than one author
> the paper was presented at a conference, particularly an international conference, and definitely if the papers were peer reviewed



The following is a working bibiliography:

Alexander, Yonah & Dean C. Alexander. Terrorism and Business: the Impact of September 11, 2001. New     York: Transnational Publishers Inc., 2002.

CBS News. What We Saw: the Events of September 11, 2001--In Words, Pictures, and Video. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2002.

Chomsky, Noam. 9-11: An Open Media Book. New York: Seven Stories Press, 2001.

Ed. Coady, Tony & Michael O'Keefe. Terrorism and Justice: Moral Argument in a Threatened World. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2002.

Ed. Feffer, John. Power Trip: U.S. Imperialism and Global Strategy after September 11. New York: Seven Stories Press, 2003.

Ed. Hershberg, Eric & Kevin W. Moore. Critical Views of September 11: Analyses from Around the World. New York: New York Press, 2002.

Ed. McGuckin, Frank. Terrorism in the United States. New York: the H.W. Wilson Company, 1997.

Nye, Jr., Joseph S. Soft Power: the Means to Success in World Politics. New York: Public Affairs, 2004.

Parenti, Michael. Terrorism Trap: September 11 and Beyond. San Francisco: City Lights Books, 2002.

Public Affairs Section Canada. Mission of the United States of America. Vancouver: US Embassy in Canada, 2004.

Satloff, Robert B. War on Terror: the Middle East Dimension. Washington: the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 2002.

Simon, Jeffrey D. The Terrorist Trap: America's Experience with Terrorism. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1994.

Smith, Dennis. Report from Ground Zero: the Story of the Rescue Efforts at the World Trade Center. New      York: the Penguin Group, 2002.

Snow, Captain Robert L. The Militia Threat: Terrorists Among Us. New York: Plenum Trade, 1999.

Stern, Jessica. The Ultimate Terrorists. Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1999.

Zulaika, Joseba & William A. Douglass. Terror and Taboo: the Follies, Fables, and Faces of Terrorism. New York: Routledge, 1996.

[Select pamphlets from the United Stated Department of State]:

"Political Violence Against Americans 2000."

"Iraq: A Population Silenced."

"Iraq: From Fear to Freedom."

[Select pamphlets from the United States Agency for International Development]:

"Iraq's Legacy of Terror: Mass Graves."

"A Year in Iraq: Restoring Services, Reopening Schools, Building Democracy and Vaccinating Children."


----------



## Infanteer

If you want, I can list a stack of books too....


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## MissMolsonIndy

Infanteer said:
			
		

> If you want, I can list a stack of books too....



Forgive me if I'm reading into this wrong, but cut the sarcasm, you asked me to present my sources, and that is exactly what I have done.


----------



## Infanteer

Well, what do you expect me to say.   You rip a list of books from somewhere and expect this to suddenly validate your arguments?   When you were asked to show your sources, I would expect that you would use the sources to provide objective substance to claims that have been repeatedly been shot to dust on this thread (among others).   Am I suddenly to say "Ooohhh...look at the citations, she must be right...."


----------



## MissMolsonIndy

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Well, what do you expect me to say.   You rip a list of books from somewhere and expect this to suddenly validate your arguments?   When you were asked to show your sources, I would expect that you would use the sources to provide objective substance to claims that have been repeatedly been shot to dust on this thread (among others).


  
Which is the purpose of my report. Objective substance to my arguments will be provided within the context of an academic report. I have been repeatedly asked to "list off" the academic sources that I have drawn from, which is exactly what I have done, and I am still getting dirt kicked in my face. My intentions in listing off my sources were not to "validate my arguments," but instead to show that I have been consulting academic sources in the course of my research, which I have been accused of not doing, several times over.

Furthermore, I thoroughly enjoy how standards specifically apply to myself, and not to others. What about the claims that you have made, and others have made that have been repeatedly shot to dust on this thread and others? Also, why has nobody else been asked to provide concrete sources to back their claims?

Don't single me out, when the same consistencies should apply to everyone on this forum.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Am I suddenly to say "Ooohhh...look at the citations, she must be right...."



I don't expect you or anyone else to suddenly agree with anything that I have to say. I am not here to have my own values and beliefs confirmed. However, on the grounds of debate, I expect that you and all others will remain consistent in the manner in which you approach the issues under debate, and treat the opinions brought to the table by all memebers of this forum, in a free and fair manner. On a further note, I ask that snide comments and rude remarks be left outside of the debating arena.


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## CivU

Infanteer,

I guess we can agree that A Few Good Men is a good film?

If I live, "in the same intellectual slum" then it is a well populated and fairly expensive slum.  Interesting how I didn't refer to your viewpoints as being consistent with the dregs of society; however you seem content with associating anything that doesn't connect with your opinion as worthless.  Is this how you feel about everyone who isn't exactly like you?

If you actually read my posts I didn't "equate Reagan, Clinton and Norman Swartzkopf" but in fact associated a few persons on that list I felt stood out, and provided one reason why a specific action by Swartzkopf, the use of depleted uranium ammunition, should be seen as horrific. I did not state he was a war criminal...

As far as your article MDH, people switch sides all the time, but with the energy for argument on this forum I don't see any epiphanies approaching anytime soon...


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## Michael Dorosh

Lyndsay - in light of the fact that I went out of my way to assist you by answering your questionnaire, and your promise to discuss my answers in full, I find it hard to fathom why you would be here exchanging barbs with Infanteer if you are really doing anything more than trolling for a reaction.

Presenting laundry lists of books is one thing; if you are asked to present your sources, that generally implies using one or two good quotes from those sources and explaining how they led you to a conclusion.  You can't just list the authors and titles and expect it to have any meaning, since we are unlikely to have either read them, or even if we have, cannot read your mind and extract the reasoning behind your conclusions from 200 or 300 pages of text.

I'd suggest taking a deep breath and presenting more of an x-to-y analysis.  Dumb it down, if that is a better way for me to put it.  It's easy to get so wrapped up in the material you assume everyone else will relate to it the same way you did.  Not so.  Stand away from it, and talk us through your analysis.


----------



## Infanteer

As well, quit whining about getting picked on here.

This is an Army site, and the soldiers gathered here back their argument with action when they throw their boots on in the morning and stand on the wall.   As such, they aren't exactly thrilled to listen to the ranting of a 20-year old college student who comes out to tell them that their mission and their sacrifice has been for nothing but a morally bankrupt cause that serves some ulterior motives.

The onus is on you to prove that the actions of the US and Allied nations (that's us) in the War on Terror are wrong because as far as we are concerned, our actions validate our viewpoints everyday.   Like it or not, Canada is an active participant in the War on Terror - we have been since the beginning and the effort of our services on the land, the sea, and the air hasn't slacked since then.   Just as disagreements between execution of campaigns in the Pacific and in Europe arose in WWII and yet never diminished the combined assault on Fascism, disagreements over prosecution of the Iraq War will not alter our unified efforts to defeat those that deign to undermine our way of life by attacking us in our homes and our places of work.

You speak of the United States promoting terrorism and aggrandizement abroad - have you ever BEEN on a military operation?   Do you know the level of accountability and professionalism that drives the actions of our military forces?   Why don't you look at what guys like Mark C and Devil39 have to say about that - after all, they were the ones who chased terrorist fighters through the mountains of Southern Afghanistan.   Or why don't you listen to PBI, who right now works alongside our American brothers to support the War on Terror.   Ask them about their "terrorist war" in the Middle East?

You say Iraq is an attempt to grab oil - do you know the intricacies of the US military presence in Iraq?   Why don't you look at what Matt Fisher has to say, since he is a Marine who performed his duty honourably there.   Do you think he occupied oil wells and pumping stations there?   No - he chased around people who behead aidworkers and would like nothing better then to kill you too.   Ask him about his "real motives" for "illegally subverting" the Iraqi people.

You say that the presence of the US and its Coalition allies does nothing but spread misery and oppression wherever it goes - do you have any idea what the day-to-day operations of our Forces are like?   Why don't you listen to guys like Bossi or Recceguy, both who served as CIMIC officers and put their lives on the line everyday to go out among the shattered ruins of Afghan society and "build bridges."   Ask them about their "operations to oppress" the citizens of the countries we've went into.

Now, I hope you can see why no one here cares to take your act seriously anymore - infact, your act is getting rather stale.   I am sure you can go find where the recently departed "Disillusioned" hangs out and the two of you can harangue on America and its Allies and reveal their duplicitous actions to an awe-struck crowd of fellow college students and Starbucks employees.   Don't worry about us, we'll continue to get up in the morning and climb the wall so that you can do so.

I am sure you can point to the latest book or explain to us what your college professor revealed to you that points out the inadequacies of our current war, but those soldiers on the wall have neither the time nor the inclination to answer to the bleating of the sheep because they stand on a line which means death to us and those we protect if we should falter in our convictions.   

If you want to stay here, why don't you just suck back, observe, and listen to why soldiers have taken the time to explain to you why they support the general effort to defeat the terrorist on the terrain of our choice - that is why we have this Bulletin Board.   The soldiers here have earned their right to their outlook because they've backed it with blood, sweat, and tears.   Until then, look this one up:

_"It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by the dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions and spends himself in a worthy course; who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who, at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly; so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat."
Theodore Roosevelt _


----------



## Slim

Good advice from someone who's been there and knows the score...

For those of you who need to do some learning...Time to take the cotton out of your ears and put it in your mouth!

Slim


----------



## McG

Infanteer said:
			
		

> You speak of the United States promoting terrorism and aggrandizement abroad - have you ever BEEN on a military operation?


To be fair, I don't think MMI has made any comments on the technical side of the military operations at the tactical level and I think she has been staying in her lane of politics.  That being said, if all you are trying to tell her is that the critical piece of understanding she is missing can only be gained through being in _the $hit_, there are still other avenues.  I'd even be so bold as to say there are more than a few members of the ICRC that has spent more time _in the $hit_ than many of the soldiers we've sent operations.  Maybe a tour with Medecins sans Frontieres?


----------



## Jarnhamar

My personal opinion is that it's easy to for example judge the americans in iraq and a accuse them of any number of things simply going off what you see on the news.   Their commiting attrocities. They are promoting terrorisim. They are doing whatever.   I'd agree people don't have to be in the shit to know what is going on. I'd even go so far as to say sometimes the guys on the ground can be as situationally unaware as someone back home.   That said I still feel someone gets a much more accurate representation of whats going on when they are either directly involved (Military operation) or on the same continent or in the same country.

The media isn't a concrete platform to base opinions on. While I'm not saying anyone here does specifically, a lot of people do that i've seen. They see it on cnn or the news and it's straight fromt he bible.   
The media doesn't always check their facts and their not too quick to publicize when they screw up. A good example is of that american soldier who made up a bullshit story about being the youngest special forces sniper complete with classified rank and picture of him holding a hunting rifle. A journalist (or whatever) from a military town completly bought this story that i'm sure even army cadets would call BS on. The reporter didn't have any reason to disbelieve the story so he didn't bother checking the facts. The news paper and soldiers CO/CSM and guys family got probbaly hundreds of calls and emails.

In any case, I don't think someone can paint a fair picture of whats going on "abroad" unless they themselves go abroad as a soldier, back packer, aid worker, student etc..

In regards to people playing nice and others seemingly getting upset over comments.   Sometimes the world isn't a very nice place and if someone can't take a few heated words in an argument about *politics*, on a* military web page*, maybe they would be happier arguing on some kind of politically centered forum.   No one likes to be called names or be the target of sarcasim. Big deal. If an adult can't take a little sarcasim or stick up for themselves then I'm personally going to think that much less of their opinion when it comes to the real world and terrorisim.


----------



## Infanteer

MCG said:
			
		

> To be fair, I don't think MMI has made any comments on the technical side of the military operations at the tactical level and I think she has been staying in her lane of politics.   That being said, if all you are trying to tell her is that the critical piece of understanding she is missing can only be gained through being in _the $hit_, there are still other avenues.   I'd even be so bold as to say there are more than a few members of the ICRC that has spent more time _in the $hit_ than many of the soldiers we've sent operations.   Maybe a tour with Medecins sans Frontieres?



You are right with regards to claims on tactical operations.   However, my challenge is against the general notion of equating US and Coalition actions with terrorist actions that has pervaded this entire thread.   Since the military is the tip of the Foreign Policy spear, the underlying conclusion is that the armed forces have a share part-and-parcel in the accusations of terrorist activities.   As I've alluded to, there are plenty of people on these forums who've been on the tip of the Foreign Policy spear (both in the US and Canada) and have yet to admit to criminal acts of terrorism.

And you're right about the NGO's.   Often, while military forces barricade themselves off in large bases for Force Protection measures, these guys live out in the middle of things.   They have their "boots to the ground" just as much as a soldier would.   I'd love to hear the perspectives of doctors, aid workers, and other NGO's if they came to this site.   Despite the fact that their overall perceptions may be limited compared to the wide-reaching capabilities of a military force, their journey to the coal-face gives them a valid (and sometimes different) perspective on things.

However, most of the criticism seems to be coming from neither area.   All I'm asking is for people to get their boots muddy before telling us that ours are covered in shit.


----------



## a_majoor

After reading this, you should be asking yourself why "the War on Terror" is in quotes

Most everyone on the blogosphere has probably followed the Glenn Reynolds link to a Mosul chaplain's blog. More than 20 people, including US military and civilian personnel, were killed in a mortar attack on a base mess tent in Mosul. Chaplain Lewis was at the site. His narrative of the followup attack on the wounded and the medical personnel who responded stood out.

    Regardless of what some may say, these are not stupid people. Any attack with casualties will naturally mean that eventually a very large number of care givers will be concentrated in one location. They took full advantage of that. In the middle of the mayhem the first mortar round hit about 100 to 200 meters away. Everyone started shouting to get the wounded into the hospital which is solid concrete and much safer than being in the open. Soon, the next mortar hit quite a bit closer than the first as they "walked" their rounds toward their intended target...us. Everyone began to rush toward the building. I stood at the door shoving as many people inside as I could. Just before heading in myself, the last one hit directly on top of the hospital. I was standing next to the building so was shielded from any flying shrapnel. In fact, the building, being built as a bunker took the hit with little effect. However, I couldn't have been more than 10 to 15 meters from the point of impact and brother did I feel the shock. That'll wake you up! I rushed inside to find doctors and nurses draped over patients, others on the floor or under something. I ducked low and quickly moved as far inside as I could. After a few tense moments people began to move around again and the business of patching bodies and healing minds continued in earnest.

This suggests that the target was under observation so either the first firing team, or a second enemy mortar team tasked with a followup attack could adjust their fire until they hit the hospital. It will be interesting to see whether the enemy fire originated from a populated area, preventing counterbattery. Many American bases are routinely patrolled by RPVs that run a circuit around possible firing positions. Mortar or rocket positions in the open would be easily detected. But there is no data and it would be useless to speculate on what actually happened. However, it is safe to say that the attack demonstrates assymetrical warfare in action. The enemy chose the weakest point he could find to attack; exploited the known limitations of the American response; and understood that he was to all intents and purposes exempted from the condemnation attendant to attacking the wounded and medical personnel. The chaplain and the medical personnel knew this and did not mill around expecting the Geneva Convention to protect them from those who have never heard of it, except as it applies to their own convenience. They knew the true face of the enemy; a face which bore no resemblance to the heroic countenance often presented by the media to the world.

Of the first three factors, the advantage of choosing the weakest point of attack has been a combatant's right from time immemorial. That is a purely military condition. But the enemy ability to exploit the limits of American response and attack medical personnel with public relations impunity are examples of military advantages that arise from political restraints. To the extent the blogosphere can dispel the propaganda cover willingly provided by the Left, people on the home front can help the soldiers in the field. It is necessary to link the war criminal behavior of the enemy with the studied blindness of 'sophisticates' towards their most heinous crimes. They are twinned; with the former made possible by the latter. The Daily Telegraph describes how some European agencies actually refuse to look at mass grave sites to avoid being party to the punishment of war criminals.

    Lack of European experts has held up the excavation of mass graves in Iraq, according to an American human rights lawyer working on the investigation. Greg Kehoe said the experts were not joining in because evidence might be used to sentence Saddam Hussein to death. ...

    Capital punishment is not permitted within the European Union which discourages its use elsewhere. EU countries also routinely refuse to extradite people to the United States and other countries unless they receive guarantees that detainees will not be executed. The Iraqi Special Tribunal has identified a further nine mass graves to be examined for evidence of the former Saddam regime's crimes against humanity. Human rights groups estimate that 300,000 people were killed. Mr Kehoe, who spent five years investigating mass graves in Bosnia for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, said he wanted to have collected far more evidence by now, and cited the delay as one reason why the IST has yet to issue formal charges against Saddam and 11 other former regime leaders.

Enemy mortar teams lying in wait to attack doctors are one aspect of a coin which features the blind eye of some media and 'progressive' institutions on the other. Mark Glaser observed that:

    For way too long, it has been the mainstream media (MSM) that's played God with the American public, telling everyone what's news and what's not, what to play up and what to downplay. But 2004 was the year the power started shifting, that the Little People, if you will, started to tell the gods of media what the public really wanted.

They can start by looking at the mass casualty station in Mosul and then glancing down at their hands.


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## a_majoor

*Leave Rumsfeld Be*
He is not to blame for our difficulties.

The Washington Post recently warned that doctors are urging interested parties of all types to get their flu shots before the "scarce" vaccine is thrown out. But how is such a surfeit possible when our national media scared us to death just a few months ago with the specter of a national flu epidemic, corporate malfeasance, and Bush laxity? That perfect storm of incompetence and skullduggery purportedly combined to leave us vulnerable to mass viral attack. So how can the Post now characterize something as "scarce" that is soon to be discarded for a want of takers? Was there too much or too little vaccine?

The answer, of course, is the usual media-inspired flight from reason that overwhelms this country at various times â â€ hype playing on our fears and groupthink to create a sudden story when there really is none. And now with the renewed attack on Donald Rumsfeld we are back to more of the flu-shot hysteria that has been so common in this war. Remember the pseudo-crises of the past four years â â€ the quagmire in week three in Afghanistan or the sandstorm bog-down in Iraq?

Let us not forget either all the Orwellian logic: Clinton's past deleterious military slashes that nevertheless explained the present win in Afghanistan, or his former appeasement of bin Laden that now accounts for the successful doctrine of fighting terror. Or recall the harebrained schemes we should have adopted â â€ the uninvited automatic airlifting of an entire division into the high peaks of Islamic, nuclear Pakistan to cut off the tribal fugitives from Tora Bora? Or have we put out of our memories the brilliant trial balloons of a Taliban coalition government and the all Islamic post-Taliban occupation forces?

So it is with the latest feeding-frenzy over Donald Rumsfeld. His recent spur-of-the-moment â â€ but historically plausible â â€ remarks to the effect that one goes to war with the army one has rather than the army one wishes for angered even conservatives. The demands for his head are to be laughed off from an unserious Maureen Dowd â â€ ranting on spec about the shadowy neocon triad of Wolfowitz, Feith, and Perle â â€ but taken seriously from a livid Bill Kristol or Trent Lott. Rumsfeld is, of course, a blunt and proud man, and thus can say things off the cuff that in studied retrospect seem strikingly callous rather than forthright. No doubt he has chewed out officers who deserved better. And perhaps his quip to the scripted, not-so-impromptu question was not his best moment. But his resignation would be a grave mistake for this country at war, for a variety of reasons.

First, according to reports, the unit in question had 784 of its 804 vehicles up-armored. Humvees are transportation and support assets that traditionally have never been so protected. That the fluid lines in Iraq are different not just from those in World War II or Korea, but even Vietnam, Gulf War I, Mogadishu, and Afghanistan became clear only over months. Yet it also in fact explains why we are seeing 80 to 90 percent of these neo-Jeeps already retrofitted. In an army replete with Bradleys and Abramses, no one could have known before Iraq that Hummers would need to become armored vehicles as well. Nevertheless all of them will be in a fleet of many thousands in less than 18 months. Would that World War II Sherman tanks after three years in the field had enough armor to stop a single Panzerfaust: At war's end German teenagers with cheap proto-RPGs were still incinerating Americans in their "Ronson Lighters."

Second, being unprepared in war is, tragically, nothing new. It now seems near criminal that Americans fought in North Africa with medium Stuart tanks, whose 37-millimeter cannons ("pea-shooters" or "squirrel guns") and thin skins ensured the deaths of hundreds of GIs. Climbing into Devastator torpedo bombers was tantamount to a death sentence in 1942; when fully armed and flown into a headwind, these airborne relics were lucky to make 100 knots â â€ not quite as bad as sending fabric Brewster Buffaloes up against Zeros. Yet FDR and George Marshall, both responsible for U.S. military preparedness, had plenty of time to see what Japan and Germany were doing in the late 1930s. Under the present logic of retrospective perfection, both had years to ensure our boys adequate planes and tanks â â€ and thus should have resigned when the death toll of tankers and pilots soared.

Even by 1945 both the Germans and the Russians still had better armor than the Americans. In the first months of Korea, our early squadrons of F-80s were no match for superior Mig-15s. Early-model M-16 rifles jammed with tragic frequency in Vietnam. The point is not to excuse the military naiveté and ill-preparedness that unnecessarily take lives, but to accept that the onslaught of war is sometimes unforeseen and its unfolding course persistently unpredictable. Ask the Israelis about the opening days of the Yom Kippur War, when their armor was devastated by hand-held Soviet-made anti-tank guns and their vaunted American-supplied air force almost neutralized by SAMs â â€ laxity on the part of then perhaps the world's best military a mere six years after a previous run-in with Soviet-armed Arab enemies.

Third, the demand for Rumsfeld's scalp is also predicated on supposedly too few troops in the theater. But here too the picture is far more complicated. Vietnam was no more secure with 530,000 American soldiers in 1968 than it was with 24,000 in 1972. How troops are used, rather than their sheer numbers, is the key to the proper force deployment â â€ explaining why Alexander the Great could take a Persian empire of 2 million square miles with an army less than 50,000, while earlier Xerxes with 500,000 on land and sea could not subdue tiny Greece, one-fortieth of Persia's size.

Offensive action, not troop numbers alone, creates deterrence; mere patrolling and garrison duty will always create an insatiable demand for ever more men and an enormously visible American military bureaucracy â â€ and a perennial Iraqi dependency on someone else to protect the nascent democracy. Thus if the argument can be made that Rumsfeld was responsible for either disbanding the Iraqi army or the April stand-down from Fallujah â â€ the latter being the worst American military decision since Mogadishu â â€ then he deserves our blame. But so far, from what we know, the near-fatal decision to pull-back from Fallujah was made from either above Rumsfeld (e.g., the election-eve White House) or below him (Paul Bremmer and the Iraqi provisional government).

In truth, the real troop problem transcends Iraq. Our shortages are caused by a military that was slashed after the Cold War and still hasn't properly recouped to meet the global demands of the war against Islamic fascism â â€ resulting in rotation nightmares, National Guard emergencies, and stop-order controversies. The amazing victories in Afghanistan and Iraq not only set up unrealistic expectations about the ease of implementing post-bellum democracy among tribal Islamic societies, but also allowed the public, the Congress, and the president not to mobilize to confront the strategic challenges facing the United States that now pose a more serious threat than did the 1980s Soviet Union.

We are left with an unhinged nuclear dictatorship in North Korea threatening an increasingly appeasing and pacifistic South. Taiwan could be swallowed up in days or destroyed in hours by a bullying, resource-hungry China staking out a new co-prosperity sphere in the Pacific, one every bit as ambitious as imperial Japan's. Iran's nukes will soon be able to hit a triangulating Europe, and Islamists seek our destruction at home while we implement liberal governments in Iraq and Afghanistan.

All this peril came on us suddenly and without warning â â€ at a time of recession and following the vast arms cuts of the 1990s, a trillion in lost commerce and outright damage from 9/11, oil spikes, huge trade deficits, increased entitlements, and tax cuts. If Mr. Rumsfeld is responsible for all that, perhaps then we can ask him to step aside as culpable for our present absence of enough soldiers in the U.S. military.

In reality, he has carefully allotted troops in Iraq because he has few to spare elsewhere â â€ and all for reasons beyond his control. If Senator Lott or kindred pundits first show us exactly where the money is to come from to enlarge the military (tax hikes, cuts in new Medicare entitlements, or budgetary freezes?), and, second, that Mr. Rumsfeld opposes expanding our defense budget â â€ "No, President Bush, I don't need any more money, since the Clinton formula was about right for our present responsibilities" â â€ then he should be held responsible. So far that has not happened.

Fourth, we hear of purportedly misplaced allocations of resources. Thus inadequate Humvees are now the focus of our slurs â â€ our boys die while we are wasting money on pie-in-the-sky ABMs. But next month the writs may be about our current obsession with tactical minutiae â â€ if Iran shoots off a test missile with a simultaneous announcement of nuclear acquisition. So then expect, "Why did Rumsfeld rush to spend billions on Humvee armor, when millions of Americans were left vulnerable to Iran's nukes without a viable ABM system come to full completion?"

Fifth, have we forgotten what Mr. Rumsfeld did right? Not just plenty, but plenty of things that almost anyone else would not have done. Does anyone think the now-defunct Crusader artillery platform would have saved lives in Iraq or helped to lower our profile in the streets of Baghdad? How did it happen that our forces in Iraq are the first army in our history to wear practicable body armor? And why are over 95 percent of our wounded suddenly surviving â â€ at miraculous rates that far exceeded even those in the first Gulf War? If the secretary of Defense is to be blamed for renegade roguery at Abu Ghraib or delays in up-arming Humvees, is he to be praised for the system of getting a mangled Marine to Walter Reed in 36 hours?

And who pushed to re-deploy thousands of troops out of Europe, and to re-station others in Korea? Or were we to keep ossified bases in perpetuity in the logic of the Cold War while triangulating allies grew ever-more appeasing to our enemies and more gnarly to us, their complacent protectors?

The blame with this war falls not with Donald Rumsfeld. We are more often the problem â â€ our mercurial mood swings and demands for instant perfection devoid of historical perspective about the tragic nature of god-awful war. Our military has waged two brilliant campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq. There has been an even more inspired postwar success in Afghanistan where elections were held in a country deemed a hopeless Dark-Age relic. A thousand brave Americans gave their lives in combat to ensure that the most wicked nation in the Middle East might soon be the best, and the odds are that those remarkable dead, not the columnists in New York, will be proven right â â€ no thanks to post-facto harping from thousands of American academics and insiders in chorus with that continent of appeasement Europe.

Out of the ashes of September 11, a workable war exegesis emerged because of students of war like Don Rumsfeld: Terrorists do not operate alone, but only through the aid of rogue states; Islamicists hate us for who we are, not the alleged grievances outlined in successive and always-metamorphosing loony fatwas; the temper of bin Laden's infomercials hinges only on how bad he is doing; and multilateralism is not necessarily moral, but often an amoral excuse either to do nothing or to do bad â â€ ask the U.N. that watched Rwanda and the Balkans die or the dozens of profiteering nations who in concert robbed Iraq and enriched Saddam.

Donald Rumsfeld is no Les Aspin or William Cohen, but a rare sort of secretary of the caliber of George Marshall. I wish he were more media-savvy and could ape Bill Clinton's lip-biting and furrowed brow. He should, but, alas, cannot. Nevertheless, we will regret it immediately if we drive this proud and honest-speaking visionary out of office, even as his hard work and insight are bringing us ever closer to victory.

â â€ Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.


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## a_majoor

Opening of wider fronts?

*Values and Interests*
The â Å“insurgencyâ ? and the future of the Middle East.

The notion that we are fighting an "insurgency" largely organized and staffed by former elements of Saddam Hussein's Baathist regime is now fully enshrined as an integral piece of the conventional wisdom. Like earlier bits of the learned consensus â â€ to which it is closely linked â â€ it is factually wrong and strategically dangerous.

That it is factually wrong is easily demonstrated, for the man invariably branded the most powerful leader of the terrorist assault against Iraq â â€ Abu Musab al Zarqawi â â€ is not a Baathist, and indeed is not even an Iraqi. He is a Palestinian Arab from Jordan who was based in Iran for several years, and who â â€ when the West Europeans found he was creating a terror network in their countries (primarily Germany and Italy) and protested to the Iranians â â€ moved into Iraqi Kurdistan with Iranian protection and support, as the moving force in Ansar al Islam.

You cannot have it both ways. If Zarqawi is indeed the deus ex machina of the Iraqi terror war, it cannot be right to say that the "insurgency" is primarily composed of Saddam's followers. Zarqawi forces us to think in regional terms rather than focusing our attention on Iraq alone. Unless you think that Iraqi Defense Minister Shaalan is a drooling idiot, you must take seriously his primal screams against Iran and Syria ("terrorism in Iraq is orchestrated by Iranian intelligence, Syrian intelligence, and Saddam loyalists"). Indeed, there has been a flood of reports linking Syria to the terror war, including the recent news that the shattered remnants from Fallujah have found haven and succor across the Syrian border. Finally, the Wahabbist component carries the unmistakable fingerprints of the quavering royal family across the border in Saudi Arabia.

The terror war in Iraq was not improvised, but carefully planned by the four great terror masters (Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Saudi Arabia) during the infuriatingly long run-up to the liberation. They made no secret of it; you have only to go back to the public statements of the Iranian mullahs and the Syrian Baathists to see it, for top Iranian officials and Bashir Assad publicly announced it (the mullahs in their mosques, Bashir in a published interview). They had a simple and dramatic word for the strategy: Lebanon. Assad and the mullahs prepared to turn Iraq into a replay of the terror war they had jointly waged against us in Lebanon in the 1980s: suicide bombings, hostage-taking, and religious/political uprisings. It could not have been more explicit.

Some of our brighter journalists have recently written about Iraqi documents that show how Saddam instructed his cohorts to melt away when Coalition forces entered Iraq, and then wage the sort of guerilla campaign we now see. But neither they nor our buffoonish intelligence "community" have looked at the documents in the context of the combined planning among the four key regimes. Anyone who goes back to the pre-OIF period can see the remarkable tempo of airplanes flying back and forth between Damascus, Baghdad, Tehran, and even Pyongyang (remember the Axis of Evil?), as military and intelligence officials worked out their strategies. Some of those flights, as for example those between Saddam's Baghdad and the mullahs' Tehran, were a kind of man-bites-dog story, since in the past such flights carried armaments to be dropped on the destination, whereas in 2002 and early 2003 they carried government officials planning the terror war against us in Iraq.

The myth of the Baathist insurgency is actually just the latest version of the old error according to which Sunnis and Shiites can't work together. This myth dominated our "intelligence" on the Middle East for decades, even though it was known that the Iranian (Shiite) Revolutionary Guards were trained in (Syrian-dominated, hence secular Baathist) Lebanon by Arafat's (Sunni) Fatah, starting as early as 1972. The terror masters worked together for a long time, not just after the destruction of the Taliban. But we refused to see it, just as today we refuse to see that the assault against us is regional, not just Iraqi.

Many of the statements emerging from official (that is, both governmental and media) Washington nowadays reflect yet another error, a corollary of the axiom that sees the region hopelessly divided between Shiites and Sunnis. The corollary has it that the impending electoral victory of the Iraqi Shiites will greatly increase Iranian leverage in Iraq. The truth, as Reuel Gerecht so eloquently demonstrated in the Wall Street Journal last week, is precisely the opposite, because the Shiite leaders in Iraq are fundamentally opposed to the Iranian doctrine that places a theocratic dictator atop civil society. The Iraqis adhere to the traditional Shiite view that people in turbans should work in mosques, leaving civil society to secular leaders, and therefore their victory in Iraq will threaten the sway of the mullahs across the border. We should not view all Shiites as a coherent community, and we should welcome a traditional Shiite society in Iraq, and recognize that it is a valuable weapon in the war against the terror masters in Tehran.

The mullahs know this well. They dread the success of traditional Shiites in Baghdad, and they are desperately trying to foment a Sunni/Shiite clash of civilizations. That is the explanation of the resumption of suicide-bombing attacks in the holy Shiite cities of Najaf and Karbala, which the mullahs' intelligence agents had terminated when previous bombings intensified anti-Iranian (rather than the hoped-for anti-Sunni) passions. As many Iraqi leaders have observed, the recent attacks in the holy places demonstrate desperation, not growing "insurgent" strength.

The clear strategic conclusion remains what it should have been long before Coalition troops entered Saddam's evil domain: No matter how strongly we wish it to be otherwise, we are engaged in a regional war, of which Iraq is but a single battlefield. The war cannot be won in Iraq alone, because the enemy is based throughout the region and his bases and headquarters are located beyond our current reach. His power is directly proportional to our unwillingness to see the true nature of the war, and our decision to limit the scope of our campaign.

The true nature of the war exposes yet another current myth: that we are at greater risk because we failed to send sufficient troops into Iraq. More troops would simply mean more targets for the terrorists, since we are not prepared â â€ nor should we be â â€ to establish a full-scale military occupation and to "seal off" the borders with Iran, Syria, and Saudi Arabia. Hell, we can't even seal off the Mexican border with the United States, an area we know well. How can we expect to build a wall around Iraq?

No, we can only win in Iraq if we fully engage in the terror war, which means using our most lethal weapon â â€ freedom â â€ against the terror masters, all of them. The peoples of Syria, Iran, and Saudi Arabia are restive, they look to us for political support. Why have we not endorsed the call for political referenda in Syria and Iran? Why are we so (rightly and honorably) supportive of free elections in the Ukraine, while remaining silent about â â€ or, in the disgraceful case of outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell, openly hostile to â â€ free elections in Iran and Syria? Why are we not advancing both our values and our interests in the war against the terror masters?

Faster, please.

â â€ Michael Ledeen, an NRO contributing editor, is most recently the author of The War Against the Terror Masters. He is resident scholar in the Freedom Chair at the American Enterprise Institute.


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## Brad Sallows

War Criminals (and Humanitarian Criminals).

OK, let's get this out of the way.  If we follow the letter of the law of all the conventions, definitions, treaties, agreements, charters, and so forth currently extant, I am prepared to stipulate we can probably find an excuse to try every politician and soldier involved in a war or other indignity against people for some crime.

Now let's have a dose of reality.

"Criminal" is when you systematically set out to round up and exterminate people.

"Criminal" is when you conduct medical experiments without informed consent.

"Criminal" is when you issue orders that enemy combatants are to be executed when captured.

When you have evidence that the political leadership of today in any particular country has engaged in crimes on the scale of the WWII German or Japanese leadership, by all means let's have trials.

When you have evidence that the military leadership of today in any particular country has engaged in crimes on the scale of the WWII German or Japanese military high command or selected commanders - executions of airmen, death marches, widespread maltreatment and misuse of PoW, sanctioned executions of noncombatants - by all means, let's have trials.

When you have evidence that someone is conducting ethnic cleansing - executions, deportations and dislocations, seizure of assets - by all means let's have trials.

Until then, get a grip and ponder until you come up with a satisfactory explanation of the moral difference between someone who dies as a result of an international affair or conflict and someone who dies due to matters "essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state".


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## devil39

I am a huge VDH fan, and have posted some of his articles to this site.   I admire his intellect.

However I feel that, as of late, VDH is starting to lose any objectivity that he previously had.

Rumsfeld has many decisions to answer for, not he least of which being his penchant for decreasing "boots on the ground" for high tech, "RMA" solutions to his military issues.

High tech RMA solutions are great, and most effective, when the enemy is going to meet you on the open plains and go at you force on force.   Meet you and fight to your strengths.     Not the case anymore.

My understanding is that the US military was ready and able to put more troops in the field initially, to allow them to quell the after effects of a regime change situation such as occured in Iraq.   The intent was that stability would be acheieved earlier, allowing for much smaller garrison requirements down the road (where we are now!).

Rumsfeld, enamoured with a   half finished and half successful regime change in Afghanistan, extrapolated that (flawed) model to the Iraq conflict.   The errors in this thinking have been compounded in a much more complex theatre of operations. 

I am a Rumsfeld fan too.   I think his liabilities outweigh his utility though.

Obviously this is a half informed and very personal opinion.


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## a_majoor

devil39 said:
			
		

> Rumsfeld has many decisions to answer for, not he least of which being his penchant for decreasing "boots on the ground" for high tech, "RMA" solutions to his military issues.
> 
> High tech RMA solutions are great, and most effective, when the enemy is going to meet you on the open plains and go at you force on force.  Meet you and fight to your strengths.   Not the case anymore.



The transformation effort has been underway since the early 1990's, both to cash in on the "peace dividend" by having less boots, but also because of the quantitative change in weapons and communications technology, and organizational theory. The institutional leadership of the American Military did not want to do "Somalia" over again, and took many steps to "transform" itself into a force not suitable for LIC, PSO or Constabulary type operations. Today it is undergooing a "countertransformation" (which will take a lot of time).



> My understanding is that the US military was ready and able to put more troops in the field initially, to allow them to quell the after effects of a regime change situation such as occured in Iraq.  The intent was that stability would be acheieved earlier, allowing for much smaller garrison requirements down the road (where we are now!).



The military establishment wanted to replay Gulf War one with an application of 300,000 troops, a six week "Desert Storm II" and an armoured "Desert Sabre II" lunge into Baghdad.(Go with what you know) The arguments for and against would fill volumes, but a quick summary of why it went down as a 100,000 man invading force was the need to achieve operational surprise ("What do you mean, they are invading now?) and logistical considerations (apparently, there is only one suitable port in Kuwait, which limited the flow of supplies). Tommy Franks is also a much bolder commander than "Storming Norman", since he was willing to accept the risks of going in early, fast and "light".



> Rumsfeld, enamoured with a  half finished and half successful regime change in Afghanistan, extapolated that (flawed) model to the Iraq conflict.  The errors in this thinking have been compounded in a much more complex theatre of operations.



Afghanistan worked out very well indeed, but the circumstances were very different, since the Northern Alliance provided the "boots on the ground", and B-52 and F-15E Strike Eagles supplied the firepower. There is no doubt "some" Afghanistan thinking influenced the planning for Iraq, but military art is always uncertain (the enemy gets to vote), and after all, the initial operation was a success. Now we have to secure the victory and see things through to the end.


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## Kirkhill

Question: 

Which of these tactics are acceptable? All are illegal and/or contrary to civilized norms. Stipulated that all actions are taken on "suspicion".  Are they any more "right" if politicians actions are approved by Supreme Court Justices?  All attack the Centre of Gravity of terrorist organizations by decapitation of the leadership - thus they conform to OIF strategy of attacking the centre directly (Saddam and his government) rather than working through layers of defenses slowly putting pressure on the centre and forcing negotiation and capitulation.

Stopping bank accounts
"James Bond" type assassinations with a Beretta .22
Assassination by rifle
Assassination by planted bomb
Assassination by Apache 64 raid
Assassination by B2 Raid 
Assassination by Predator strike

Is assassination justified?

Should we engage?

Is assassination more or less morally reprehensible than collateral damage to civilians?  Is it worth reducing collateral damage if it puts a Canadian soldier's life at increased risk?


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## jmackenzie_15

kind of on a side note... this has always confused me... if WW IV is the global war on terror.... did I sleep through ww3? or are you guys considering the cold war ww3 =/


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## Kirkhill

The Cold War, which was very hot in places with quite a few million killed, is now considered by some to have been World War III.


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## a_majoor

Kirkhill said:
			
		

> Question:
> 
> Which of these tactics are acceptable? All are illegal and/or contrary to civilized norms. Stipulated that all actions are taken on "suspicion". Are they any more "right" if politicians actions are approved by Supreme Court Justices? All attack the Centre of Gravity of terrorist organizations by decapitation of the leadership - thus they conform to OIF strategy of attacking the centre directly (Saddam and his government) rather than working through layers of defenses slowly putting pressure on the centre and forcing negotiation and capitulation.
> 
> Stopping bank accounts
> "James Bond" type assassinations with a Beretta .22
> Assassination by rifle
> Assassination by planted bomb
> Assassination by Apache 64 raid
> Assassination by B2 Raid
> Assassination by Predator strike
> 
> Is assassination justified?
> 
> Should we engage?
> 
> Is assassination more or less morally reprehensible than collateral damage to civilians? Is it worth reducing collateral damage if it puts a Canadian soldier's life at increased risk?



Given the current position of the US military, attempting to disrupt or decapitate enemy organizations; including governments; by such means may be the only viable option in the short to mid term. Messing with bank accounts and other economic disruption is fairly easy, while direct action would have to be very carefully considered; i.e. could it be done?, could it be pinned on someone else? could the US manipulate the outcome to put their preferred candidates into the vacated positions of power?

Openly attacking with Predators or B-2s has the negative effect of calling attention to who is responsible,  and all such operations suffer from the 1920-30 era "airpower" fallacies. No matter how many of them you kill, the effect is not permanent unless you are physically on the ground to direct the results. Israel assassinates leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah with alarming ease and regularity, but the only actions that have effectively slowed down the terrorism has been physical incursions into Gaza and the West Bank.

So in the end, there may be waves of assassinations and decapitating attacks with the short term goal of causing disruption of enemy organizations, but this can only be effective in the long term if followed up by the physical invasion and occupation of enemy territory.


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## Kirkhill

But what if the enemy holds no ground? Or if it does so only fleetingly or in small numbers - sometimes only individuals.

Has no physical presence? Only "concentrates forces"on the objective?  Otherwise is a virtual organization with no physical structure, no logistics train? It is the ultimate in "economy of effort" operations - operating "offensively" with "speed" and "surprise".   Small manpower force whose morale is hard for outsiders to influence, easy for commanders to maintain.

If you haven't already read it Art try and get ahold of a copy of "Ghost Force: the secret history of the SAS" by Ken Connor - 23 years SAS ranker.

After describing feats of derring-do over a lifetime he has this to say about the future of the SAS "It's the perfect moment to disband the SAS".

The primary benefit of the SAS to HMG is/was not its military operations (long range patrols, stay-behind recce), CT work, CQB, raids, - they did it well but more conventional forces could do that as well. Not training of foreign forces  and body guard work - also equally well done but now done by ex-SAS types on the Govt payroll as military consultants.   It was its covert operations in support of HMG or friendly governments.

"There will be no more deployments fo heavily armed miltary personnel transiting through overseas bases (Connor explains it can't be done now by Britain because it doesn't have the bases). There will be no military aircraft over-flying other countries in wet-suits, no figures in black balaclavas abseiling down cliffs or buildings.  There will be no missiles, no smart bombs, no mortars or artillery, no machine-guns, no grenades, automatic rifles or even pistols.  There will be no hearts and minds programmes, no painstaking learning of local languages and dialects, no paramedic training.

"The economic warriors of tomorrow will be civilians.  They will arrive in civilian clothes, on civilian flights, carrying nothing more threatening than an American Express card.  They will be women as well as men, speaking English.......

"Their weapons will be the sort of tools and equipment that can be bought in any High Street hardware shop, but the impact of their attacks  will be enormous, causing economic damage running into millions of pounds....... The victim country will probably not even know which country has attacked them." p.346.

Now while I think that Connor might be a bit premature in predicting the demise of the need for the "conventional" SAS (black balaclavas, overflights, wetsuit) he was accurately describing a low cost strategy for bringing down a 1st World government.

What he failed to include in his analysis was the likelihood that such strategies could also be employed by NGO's like Al-Qaeda, that they might have State-sponsors and that the Target governments might have need for an organisation that can clandestinely tackle the NGOs so that neither the Target government nor the State sponsor are unduly embarassed.  Al-Qaeda supplied a new lease on life for the SAS as a covert unit.

So, if you take a look at the British SF organization I see a steady progression from conventional tankers, infanteers, engineers and gunners, through para and marine qualified troops, through pathfinders, mountain and arctic warfare cadre, STA batteries and LR Sigs Sqns and now SAS-Lite, through SAS LR operations on a conventional battlefield, to CT, CQB and "covert raids" on high value targets (comms, missile sites, oil platforms, Al-Qaeda training camps) to quietly knocking off bin Laden, or more likely the owner of a particular bar in the Iraqi quarter of Damascus.  The skills employed at any given stage are common across many levels.  Proficiency increases and demands on the person increase.  Selection of personnel is critical.  Having a large pool of qualified candidates is also critical.

I don't see Canada being in the business of bringing down governments just yet - so the civilian warrior business-man is probably not in our cards.  But I do see JTF-2 being a useful tool for building foreign credits for our government.  And that suggests to me a pyramidical structure of units, skills and proficiencies, funneling into the JTF-2 would be no bad thing for our military.

Like much of the Cold War this GWOT, which will also be protracted, will be characterized by quiet violence occuring under the radar.  Unknown people dying mysteriously in unknown places.

The battle will be to secure bases of operations and deny the enemy ponds to swim in by winning "hearts and minds" through the provision of security (economic as well as physical) and strike rapidly and "discretely" when the opportunity presents itself.  

This is not a recipe for a force structure capable of refighting the Battle of Kursk.  It is a light infantry, light cavalry force with a significant "covert" capability.


----------



## a_majoor

I will have to disagree with you on one major point: terrorist organizations do not have the ability to operate independently of some sort of sponsoring/sheltering agency for very long. 

Consider the PIRA. There may have been no more than 250 "shooters", but they could operate because they could shelter in people's houses, use taxis and public transit, get money orders from front organizations in the US using wire transfers, train in Lybian terrorist training facilities (and using air and sea born commerce to get there and back). All these things and more are only possible with a functioning civil society, either providing active support (i.e. Lybia, US front organizations), or living parasitically off the infrastructure of the society they are fighting.

Even the idea of a person in a business suit armed with an AMEX card presupposes a banking system, and a very sophisticated one at that.

Soldiers and police or security agents who are in physical control of the area can examine suspects, control access and movement, establish cordons or take offensive action depending on the circumstances. A helicopter launching a missile might kill a suspect, but a company of Infantry arriving in Achzarits and supported by Merkavas can not only kill or capture the suspect, but also sweep the area for associates, forensic evidence, record all the people who live and work in the area for the database, scoop up the bank records and store receipts....

Laws like the USA Patriot act are another step, since they allow the police and intelligence organizations to coordinate and search for the traces people leave as they go through their lives. 

You need to _be_ there to find those traces.


----------



## Kirkhill

> I will have to disagree with you on one major point: terrorist organizations do not have the ability to operate independently of some sort of sponsoring/sheltering agency for very long.
> 
> Consider the PIRA. There may have been no more than 250 "shooters", but they could operate because they could shelter in people's houses, use taxis and public transit, get money orders from front organizations in the US using wire transfers, train in Lybian terrorist training facilities (and using air and sea born commerce to get there and back). All these things and more are only possible with a functioning civil society, either providing active support (i.e. Lybia, US front organizations), or living parasitically off the infrastructure of the society they are fighting.



I agree that "shooters" need support and need pond to swim in.  I just don't happen to think the pond needs to be very deep these days and can be spread very wide.  Maybe a better analogy is a metastasized cancer - clumps of cells, widely scattered in healthy tissue, connected by very fine, often unobservable, filaments.  Very deadly.  These lads don't need semtex or AKs.  They can buy a ticket any place and buy wire cutters, wrenches, matches and if necessary go to a local hoodlum or sporting goods shop and buy a variety of very serviceable firearms.



> Even the idea of a person in a business suit armed with an AMEX card presupposes a banking system, and a very sophisticated one at that.



I really question that when barristas at Starbucks are skimming debit cards and ATMs in banks have fake card readers installed by the local hoods.  The banking support necessary can be pretty marginal to finance a $5000 operation like that school in Russia.



> Soldiers and police or security agents who are in physical control of the area can examine suspects, control access and movement, establish cordons or take offensive action depending on the circumstances. A helicopter launching a missile might kill a suspect, but a company of Infantry arriving in Achzarits and supported by Merkavas can not only kill or capture the suspect, but also sweep the area for associates, forensic evidence, record all the people who live and work in the area for the database, scoop up the bank records and store receipts....



I agree with your points here but with these caveats.  Too many Achzarit/Merkava raids will not make the locals particularly happy and cooperative.  More flies caught with honey than vinegar.  Also this course of action presupposes that conventional forces are on the ground.  What about when a cell is present in a host country, with or without that country's knowledge and it doesn't act either through lack of ability or lack of desire.  I agree the best situation would be to get a couple of Canadian "stability ops" battalions into the country and make friends but sometimes a quick in and out operation by person or persons unknown might be better received by the host country and be more useful in the short term.



> Laws like the USA Patriot act are another step, since they allow the police and intelligence organizations to coordinate and search for the traces people leave as they go through their lives.



Agree, but again this assumes that the nasty chaps are operating in places with police, courts and lawyers.  And many places don't.



> You need to be there to find those traces.



Agree again.  Whether or not you are allowed to be there is the issue.

Cheers.


----------



## Acorn

a_majoor said:
			
		

> Openly attacking with Predators or B-2s has the negative effect of calling attention to who is responsible,   and all such operations suffer from the 1920-30 era "airpower" fallacies. No matter how many of them you kill, the effect is not permanent unless you are physically on the ground to direct the results. Israel assassinates leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah with alarming ease and regularity, but the only actions that have effectively slowed down the terrorism has been physical incursions into Gaza and the West Bank.


Israel's policy of "targetted assassination" is an example of what can be done with quality intelligence. I disagree that the physical incursions were the only actions that slowed down the terrorists. A noticable dip in capability and activity was observed when "the gloves came off" and the likes of Rantisi and Yassin were whacked. Despite the rhetoric of revenge, HAMAS was unable to launch a credible operation for some months. The suggestion that refuge in Damascus for the likes of Khaled Mish'al would not be enough to keep HAMAS leaders alive also caused chaos (a recent car bombing in Damascus targetting a HAMAS leader was atributted to Israel, and the Israelis didn't do much to deny it).

In fact, I would argue that the incursions into Gaza and West Bank zones produce the wrong effect - despite slowing terrorist activity it also generates new terrorists at a much more rapid rate than collateral damage from targetted assassination. As well, as long as good int on terrorist leaders is available, the targetted assassinations have proven more effective in disrupting the terrorist networks.

However, success is also predicated on the terrorist orgs retaining their top-down structure. That is likely to continue as it is not easy to train suicide bombers in an environment that encourages independent thought and action.

Physical occupation would work if Israel could take the additional steps of expelling Palestinians or assimilating them into the State (not bloody likely given the population expansion differences between Israelis and Palestinians). That's a step they cannot take, so things like the barrier and targetted assassinations have become necessary stop-gaps.

Acorn


----------



## a_majoor

The argument about the efficiency of targetted assasination is very murky, partly because it is an exercise in "what if", and partly because of the propaganda and rhetoric that surrounds the issue. I have been attempting to reserch that topic, and so far it "seems" incursions and physical occupation do work better than just assasinations. The number of suicide bombings dropped dramatically after the invasion of the West Bank, since soldiers could control movement and physically root out the "bomb factory" infrastructure.

There is a secondary consideration as well; getting "good intelligence" on the leadership is very difficult, but the proximity of military and security forces to the local populations allows for the gathering of intelligence, through observation, personal contacts and even the development of a network of agents and operators in the controlled area, once again difficult to do by "remote control".

It comes down to the fact that many overlapping resources must be deployed in order to achieve the goal of eliminating terrorists. Cutting off their funding and supporting infrastructure is one of the best ways to keep the number of terrorists down and prevent their activities, getting into the areas which shelter and support them gives you a means of finding them in person, and of course, direct action prevents them from carrying out operations in the first place.


----------



## Kirkhill

As in any "battle" the more avenues of attack that are utilized, the more the opposition has to disperse resources, is kept on the defensive and has difficulty organizing counter-strokes or offensives.  Terrain and force availability often limit the avenues that are open and can be exploited, and lack of accurate intelligence results in some avenues being dead ends or diversions, sucking up available resources.

So it is not an unreasonable statement to note that in this conflict that there will be occasions where strategic bombardment threats are useful, where armoured air-land assaults are useful, where stability interventions are useful (with or without the active cooperation of the locals), where covert direct action is useful, where civil, legal and diplomatic actions are useful.  This is to state the obvious in some ways.

I think the issue here is that, unlike the Cold War (which provides a contemporary analogy for a modern, protracted conflict) that the "enemy/enemies" have concluded that conventional battles cannot be won, that conventional forces are a drain on the treasury and can only be afforded by bodies with vast pockets (Governments and Corporations) and that in fact even popular risings have their limitations.  Vietnam, much like Britain, won the war but lost the peace.  The Intifada has not achieved success (by any measure) for its architects.

The enemy these days is probably taking more cues from the Mafia and looking at its long term success as an organization and culture and ability to roll with the punches and survive and metamorphose.

What we are seeing is an organization with the usual combination of venality and ideology amongst the leadership but sustained by the ideology of its supporters and employing the techniques of the Mafia, the Medellin Cartel and the PIRA, the IZL  and the FLQ.

There won't be that many hard targets to destroy with high intensity conflict.  To win this war, if it is winnable, then every effort must be used to bring leadership icons to justice in open court.  This demonstrates that adherence to rule of law is effective as well as tending to reduce the stature of the people on trial.  Converts them from Icons to Persons.  However, it must also be recognized that problems with jurisdictions, access or just the plain threat risk and time constraints may force the use of "other means" to maintain or generate security.

As the Iraqis are demonstrating on a daily basis, have been since the looting after the fall of Saddam's statue, security trumps all other needs.  Freedom, Peace, Order, Good Governance, even Energy, Food and Water are all trumped by a need for a secure environment.  Bullets and bombs kill quicker than a lack of water and far quicker than a lack of freedom.

So while I continue to believe in the need for conventional forces, and I continue to believe in the need for "stability operations" in both permissive and hostile environments I believe also that the best use of available resources for those that believe in maintaining the supremacy of the Westphalian system of sovereign states (not necessarily nation-states) will be found in investing more in forces like the US Marines,  the Italian Carabinieri and the SAS.  As well the encouragement of local police and paramilitary forces no matter the risk of corruption. In line with the Iraqi call for security, an effective - if corrupt cop - is better than no cop at all.  Or put another way a Warlord that can be influenced is better than anarchy.

Longterm then the strategy must be first to impose and support order in order to generate a secure environment. Then to convert the "governors" to the advantages of "Good Governance" through running a "Just Society" in order to maintain "Peace".  And "Peace" is profitable - for all parties - and thus the desirable endstate.  Profits put bread on the table and supply circuses keeping people happy.

(Have I missed a cliche? I do try so hard to employ as many as possible - it is quite a challenge)

Cheers.


----------



## c4th

NMPeters said:
			
		

> The Cold War.



Pretty funny.  I remember publications up to the end of the cold war and later 'predicting' WWIII.  I guess it's an honorary lifetime achievment award.  Maybe HonWWIII would be more appropriate, followed by WWIV (Application pending).


----------



## a_majoor

The expanding battlespace is being defined....

http://www.nationalreview.com/ledeen/ledeen200501100715.asp

*Circle Squared*
Iran, Iraq, Syria.

Last week, Alhurra â â€ an Arabic-language television station that is funded by our government â â€ broadcast a taped interview with a terrorist named Moayad Ahmed Yasseen, the leader of Jaish Muhammad (Muhammad's Army). He was captured nearly two months ago in Fallujah during the liberation of the city.

Yasseen had been a colonel in Saddam's Army, so he was a fighter of some importance. He told Alhurra that two other former Iraqi military officers belonging to his group were sent "to Iran in April or May, where they met a number of Iranian intelligence officials." He said they also met with Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and were provided with money, weapons, "and, as far as I know, even car bombs" for Jaish Muhammad.

Yasseen also said he was told by Saddam himself, after the liberation of Iraq in the spring of 2003, to cross into Syria and meet with a Syrian intelligence officer to ask for money and weapons.

So here we have a high-ranking member of the "insurgency," a textbook case of the sort of Saddam loyalist said to compose the bulk of those fighting against the Coalition. And what does he tell us? He tells us that he has been working closely with Iran and Syria, and that this close working relationship was directed by Saddam. Moreover, his organization, Jaish Muhammad, is an ally of Abu Musab al Zarqawi, himself a longtime resident of Tehran.

In other words, while there are certainly plenty of Saddam loyalists among the terrorists fighting against us, they are receiving support from Damascus and Tehran. Yasseen's testimony is one of the first bits of intelligence from the Fallujah campaign to reach the public. If we had truly investigative journalists out there, they would be all over this story, which is only one of many that came out of Fallujah. About a month ago, a letter from an Army officer who had fought in Fallujah circulated on the net, and, like Yasseen's tape, it helps dispel some of the myths clouding our strategic vision.

"In Fallujah," we learn, "the enemy had a military-type planning system...Some of the fighters were wearing body armor and Kevlar, just like we do. Soldiers took fire from heavy machine guns (.50 cal) and came across the dead bodies of fighters from Chechnya, Syria, Libya, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Afghanistan, and so on. No, this was not just a city of pi**ed off Iraqis, mad at the Coalition for forcing Saddam out of power. It was a city full of people from all over the Middle East whose sole mission in life was to kill Americans. Problem for them is that they were in the wrong city in November 2004."

We killed more than a thousand terrorists in Fallujah, and nearly an equal number surrendered, many of whom provided our military with useful information. Presumably Yasseen's information has been exploited before letting the Syrians and Iranians know that he has told us all about them.

Perhaps these revelations will help outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell get on the right side of history before he rejoins civil society. Last September, in an interview with the Washington Times, he said "I don't think there's any doubt that the Iranians are involved and are providing support (for the terrorists in Iraq). How much and how influential their support is, I can't be sure and it's hard to get a good read on it."

Perhaps now he's got a better read. But of course, he chose not to know many things about Iran. He insisted that the Bush administration shut down a channel to a source of information about Iran, even though he knew that the source was reliable, and that information from that source â â€ information concerning Iranian support for anti-American terrorists â â€ had saved American lives in Afghanistan. Had the flow of information continued, we might have had a better picture of our enemies' intentions and capacities. And such a picture might have convinced Powell that Iran was not, as his deputy Richard Armitage put it, "a democracy," but a bloodthirsty tyranny that delights in killing Americans, Iraqis, and its own citizens.

Yet, in his final weeks in office, Secretary Powell has unfortunately continued to chant his mantra, "we are not working for regime change in Iran," as if he were proud of it. He, and his colleagues at State, the National Security Council, the Pentagon, and the CIA, should be ashamed. The mullahs are active supporters of terrorism all over the world, including Iraq, and we cannot expect to win this war so long as they remain in power.

Let's hope that Dr. Rice is paying close attention to the Yasseen confession, and the many others that will help her realize that there is no escape from the regional war in which we are engaged.

Faster, please.

â â€ Michael Ledeen, an NRO contributing editor, is most recently the author of The War Against the Terror Masters. He is resident scholar in the Freedom Chair at the American Enterprise Institute.


----------



## a_majoor

Meanwhile, other tools are being deployed to ferret ou the terrorist threat here in North America:

http://www.nationalreview.com/mccarthy/mccarthy200501140818.asp


> *A Nominee and the Attack*
> Michael Chertoff's experience.
> 
> In its eminently fair profile on Wednesday of Judge Michael Chertoff, President George W. Bush's extraordinarily able nominee to become the second secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, the New York Times touches on two controversial aspects of the Justice Department's tactical response in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks: the detentions of material witnesses and of immigration violators. Viewed objectively, these widely misunderstood initiatives were not merely sound; to have taken any other course would have been irresponsible.
> 
> REMEMBERING 9/11
> Any sensible assessment requires the nigh-impossible: returning oneself to the mindset that had gripped law enforcement by about 10 A.M. on September 11, 2001. The nation had been attacked, and government had been caught flat-footed, having failed from an intelligence standpoint to anticipate, and from a military standpoint to be instantly prepared to deal with, a domestic attack on the continental United States that converted civilian airliners into weapons of mass destruction. Over three years later, having heard about a million times the mantras of "four airplanes" and "19 hijackers," it is easy to forget that, on that awful morning and the weeks that followed, we didn't have a clue whether it was only four planes and only 19 hijackers, or whether what we had been subjected to was the full assault or just the first wave.
> 
> Unlike the other 300 million stunned Americans, the communities of law enforcement, intelligence, and the military were stunned Americans with a mission: to stop it from happening again. Now.
> 
> In less-developed societies where the privileges and immunities we take for granted do not exist, preventive measures may be undertaken in utter disregard for personal rights. Here, thank God, they may not. Even in a crisis marked by crumbling skyscrapers and countless dead (and it is worth recalling that, on the morning of September 11, estimates of the total number killed were larger by a factor of six or seven than the ultimate figure of 3,000), government is obligated to proceed within a framework of deference to civil liberties. It may be aggressive, but it must be ever mindful that it exists to serve the American people, not to rule them.
> 
> INVESTIGATIVE IMPERATIVES
> A responsible investigation of the September 11 attacks, such as the one that was conducted under the leadership of Mike Chertoff and several other experienced hands, had immediately to do several things. First, given that we did not know whether more attacks were to follow, it was imperative to break down the preparations of the identified 19 hijackers, determine any patterns of behavior, and match such patterns to all available information for indicators of other potential terrorism.
> 
> Second, given that it was manifest that the 19 had acted with the support of an international infrastructure that had assisted them in entering the U.S., training for the mission, finance, transportation, lodging and extensive planning, it was crucial to conduct a no-stone-unturned investigation of each of the identified terrorists â â€ to glean whatever was to be gleaned from everyone, complicit or not, from the hijackers' closest associates to the maid who may have cleaned one of their hotel rooms. Without disruption, the network was certain to strike again. And from that morning forward, the mission was to prevent it from striking again, not to prosecute after the mass-murder of more Americans.
> 
> Finally, given that it was plainly al Qaeda that had struck us, and given that we had operated for several years under self-imposed constraints â â€ including a procedural "wall" that had obstructed communications between intelligence and criminal investigators, and had thus obscured the true threat mosaic â â€ it was vital to review and re-analyze everything we thought we already knew about Osama bin Laden's international network of militant Islamic terror battalions, this time with the walls down.
> 
> Here is the problem: Such an investigation would necessarily yield countless leads and torrents of information. Far more of it would raise suspicion than establish ironclad proof of terrorist activity. If we were probing, say, a scheme to defraud or engage in the inside trading of stock, this would present no difficulty: Investigators would bide their time until ironclad proof developed. Terrorism does not provide that luxury â â€ mistakes, temporizing, and failures to act on suspicion can result in the deaths of those it is government's first mission to secure.
> 
> The cycle, moreover, is a vicious one: Act vigorously, and the civil-liberties lobby, in its best hyperbole-mode, limns you as a cabal of jack-booted thugs; miss something by not being vigorous enough, and Monday-morning-quarterbacks, in their best revisionist-mode, portray you as a sleepy incompetent and your unconnected dots as if they had been screaming neon warnings. The only certainty you have is that there will be high-pressure, time-sensitive judgment calls for human beings to make. Mistakes, involving people's lives and liberties, will be inevitable.
> 
> SORTING IT OUT
> From that landscape, categories of concern emerged. Some people raised instant red flags. They were those long suspected, wholly apart from any known connection to the events of 9/11, of ties to the terror network. Often, the suspicions were based on evidence that could not be used publicly â â€ information that was classified because it came from sensitive sources whose revelation would endanger both those sources and the lives consequently protected. Almost always, the usable evidence was not enough to satisfy probable cause for arrest on a terrorism charge.
> 
> Next were people who appeared to have had contacts with the hijackers. Some of these were intimate contacts that signaled possible culpability in the plot. Some were sure to be happenstance contacts â â€ perhaps a temporary landlord or a travel agent â â€ that were unlikely to stem from complicity, but that might prove significant in stitching together other important events and players. That it was essential to derive information from or about all these sources was obvious â â€ especially with respect to those who might be thought threatening. But mere association with criminals â â€ even terrorists â â€ is not a crime in this country, and, again, the state of information at this stage was not sufficient (and in most instances would probably never be sufficient) to level terrorism charges.
> 
> Finally, there was the murkiest of categories: Potential conspirators who had gotten on the government's radar screen over the years, whose known behavior had raised concerns, but who had not been scrutinized closely enough to make a reasoned judgment. Were they threats? Might they be scheming to kill Americans? Recall, on September 10, 2001, we had known next to nothing about the 19 hijackers. Given that dearth, could anyone have responsibly concluded on September 12, or in the weeks immediately thereafter, that we now knew so much about a plot that had been years in the making that any reasonably suspect person had not been involved?
> 
> So the question arose: How does one legally take off the streets people who might pose a lethal threat, or who might possess vital information that could be lost, under circumstances where there is inadequate usable evidence to support an arrest on a terrorism charge? In that crucible, two stratagems surfaced.
> 
> MATERIAL-WITNESS ARRESTS
> Federal law (and the law of most states) has long provided a process to arrest and detain as "material witnesses" persons who possess information that is germane even to minor crimes. The theory behind this is straightforward. A thriving democratic society is existentially reliant on the rule of law. If there is to be rule of law, the laws must be enforced, and grand juries and courts must be entitled to each person's evidence â â€ even if that evidence must be compelled by the temporary deprivation of liberty.
> 
> In this, the most important investigation in the history of the United States, the Justice Department prudently and sparingly made use of this tool. Several people who were identified as having information that was relevant to the investigation, and as to whom there was reason to believe they might become unavailable if not held, were detained as material witnesses. This detention, it should be stressed, was not a judgment of complicity in the plot. It was a judgment of relevant information about the plot.
> 
> A material-witness arrest warrant is not, as has repeatedly been suggested, a legal black hole. Those who were arrested were treated with the same due process that other arrestees (including material witnesses) typically enjoy. People were not arrested on the Justice Department's whim; in each instance the arrest had to be approved by a U.S. district judge. Each witness was furnished with counsel, at public expense if necessary. Each was brought promptly before the court so that the arrestee could be advised by a detached authority about the basis for the arrest, and so that the court could be informed of, and could monitor, the detention. Although there is reason to question whether arrestees in such circumstances are actually entitled to be apprised of the information presented to the court in support of the arrest warrant, counsel for these arrestees were provided with that information.
> 
> Material-witness warrants, moreover, are not a limitless license to detain. Detainees were held for a reasonable and brief period â â€ usually just a few days â â€ that was necessary for their information to be provided. If, in the interim, evidence that they had committed crimes developed (if, for example, it became clear that they had lied to federal agents), they were then charged publicly with those crimes â â€ in the normal course and under the ordinary procedures applicable to arrested defendants.
> 
> Much is also made of the purportedly sinister secrecy of these material-witness proceedings, but this too is overblown. Grand-jury proceedings are secret by law. Investigations should be secret for two critical reasons. First, they are not apt to succeed if those being investigated are alerted to all their details. Second, the mere fact of an investigation, and the suspicion it suggests, can unfairly besmirch an innocent person, causing him grievous personal and professional damage. It was absolutely proper, legally and ethically, that these detentions were not publicized. Lest we forget, in the aftermath of 9/11, the Justice Department had every incentive to demonstrate to the public that it was doing something. It was primarily the interest of the witnesses that was served by discretion â â€ as it should have been.
> 
> IMMIGRATION ARRESTS
> The other strategy employed was reliance on the immigration laws to detain persons of interest. Here, it is necessary to confront some uncomfortable facts.
> 
> First, simply stated, much of crime has an ethnic component. Criminal syndicates do not deem themselves bound by Title VII. The Latin Kings tend to be, well, Latin. When we investigate the Mafia, we do not seek its operatives out among the Dutch. In the 1980's, all those of Irish descent on Manhattan's West Side were not members of the Westies, but the Westies were indisputably an Irish gang. And militant Islam happens to be universally Islamic and predominantly Arab. While an alphabet's soup of activist organizations would have us pretend otherwise, that reality is relevant to an investigator's consideration but comes very far from meaning that ethnicity and religiosity, without more, render one under suspicion for crimes.
> 
> A second fact is that the terrorist support network is not a figment of governmental imagination. Militant Islam has been prosecuted repeatedly in the U.S. for over a decade. Numerous people, overwhelmingly Arab and Muslim, have been convicted by impartial juries in fair judicial proceedings for crimes related to terrorism and its facilitation. Others have pled guilty, openly acknowledging these crimes.
> 
> A third fact: The support network has tentacles in what is, objectively, an immigrant population. Again, contrary to activist propaganda, this does not mean that entire communities are suspected of criminality. But it does mean that investigations, if they are to be competent, must tread into those communities, and are sure, as night follows day, to encounter people who are of interest (whether as subjects or incidental witnesses) and who are in violation of the immigration laws.
> 
> Fact four: Violation of the immigration laws is not a trifle. An alien who has entered the U.S. illegally or has overstayed his lawful warrant is both committing a crime and bereft of legal entitlement to be here. Islamic interest groups and the rest of the immigration lobby have energetically sought to turn these presumptions on their heads. They invert terrorism investigations into a virtual immunity from immigration enforcement, such that if an illegal alien attracts investigative attention because of terrorism, and government is unable to establish that he is complicit in terrorism, government is somehow duty-bound to overlook the immigration violation. Were that so, of course, it would not only make a mockery of the law but would encourage lawlessness. Why would anyone play by the rules? Why would any immigrant honorably comport with the rigorous steps prescribed for lawful status and eventual citizenship if effortless illegality were the norm â â€ placed beyond prosecution by, of all things, the proper attention of criminal investigators.
> 
> So yes, as the Times reports, the Justice Department ended up "detaining more than 700 illegal immigrants after the Sept. 11 attacks, most of whom turned out to have no connections to terrorism." They were detained, however, because they were illegal aliens. Their arrests would have been proper â â€ however unlikely â â€ even if 9/11 had never happened. Nor is there a suggestion that they were not given the due process legally required for suspected immigration violators. What they got for not being provably connected to terrorism was precisely what they were entitled to get: they weren't prosecuted for terrorism.
> 
> Undoubtedly, this rid the country of some percentage â â€ perhaps a tiny one â â€ of people who might have been a threat but could not be proved a threat. Is this insignificant? How could it be? Thousands of lives, untold billions in damages, and a war were among the incalculable costs of only 19 people who shouldn't have been here in the first place â â€ i.e., less than three percent of 700.
> 
> The post-9/11 detentions were lawful, ethical, strategically appropriate, and involved an infinitesimal portion of the Muslim population in the United States. To have conducted the investigation in any other manner would have been grossly irresponsible. Secretary-designate Chertoff's involvement in that effort is a further credit to his distinguished legacy of service to the United States.
> 
> â â€ Andrew C. McCarthy, who led the 1995 terrorism prosecution against Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and eleven others, is a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.


----------



## Wizard of OZ

This thread is an excellent read.

majoor never ceases to have facts for every issue at hand.

And all the others have backed there opinion very well.  It is nice to see an educated debate, instead of a verbal bashing.

This new war WWIV i don't think will ever be won.  There are to many factions in to many different areas of the globe.  Check out TKB.org

But it is a battle that must be waged.  It will stretch from our shores to those in Europe and Asia as well as beyond. This "war against the Muslims" has been going on since the Dark Ages and the Crusades what makes you think that we can finally stop or win it now?

What role will Canada play, very limited in my opinion.  Until a direct attack happens here, our government will keep its head buried in the sand.  On page two of this thread someone mentioned King during WWII.  That is the type of personality needed now in government.  But we will have to make due with those that continue to Cover Their A..  while the world moves on without us.  It is sad when one frustrates allies to the point of verbal embarrassment.


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## dutchie

I agree with you Oz, but careful:

"This "war against the Muslims" '

It's not a War against Muslims, it's a war against terrorist states (eg, Afghanistan). I won't get into what the war in Iraq is, but needless to say I don't feel it fits exactly in that category.

You wouldn't want someone saying the War Against Christians would you?


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## a_majoor

Caesar said:
			
		

> It's not a War against Muslims, it's a war against terrorist states (eg, Afghanistan). I won't get into what the war in Iraq is, but needless to say I don't feel it fits exactly in that category.
> 
> You wouldn't want someone saying the War Against Christians would you?



The Jihadis are openly calling for war against the "Jews and Crusaders", which pretty much answers the arguments about us having to be "sensitive' and 'multicultural". Of course they also have little hesitation about killing felow Muslims either, the ideal multicultural murderers.......


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## dutchie

a_majoor said:
			
		

> The Jihadis are openly calling for war against the "Jews and Crusaders", which pretty much answers the arguments about us having to be "sensitive' and 'multicultural". Of course they also have little hesitation about killing felow Muslims either, the ideal multicultural murderers.......



So we must answer there barbarism with barbarism of our own? We must kill all muslims, as they have called for the death of all Christians and Jews? 

Sensitive? Since when is the opposition to the call for war against an entire religion 'sensitive'? I call it human. 

Multicultural? Like it or not, we live in a multicultural society. If you want homogenous society, go to Saudi Arabia, Rwanda, or Croatia, or any other number of places that people flee from to come here.


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## Edward Campbell

I want to reinforce the point that we are not _*at war*_ with Muslims or with Islam ... nor are we _*at war*_ with terror or terrorism - both being the traditional tactics of many weak insurgents.

Our enemy _du jour_, (*our* referring to the American led West) is an fairly loose and eclectic mix of _movements_ which, generally, share four attributes; they are:

"¢	Arabic;

"¢	Extremist;

"¢	Fundamentalist; and

"¢	Islamic.

That being said, many, most Muslims are neither of the middle two and a very large number are not even Arabic.

The problem which confronts us arises when *all four* are combined.   We, many of us, may find _fundamentalist_ religious and social views unpalatable not matter what the source.   Canadian _public intellectual_ or _gadfly_ or, in her own words, _Muslim Refusenik_ Irshad Manji uses a phrase I like to describe part of the problem: Arab foundamentalism. (See: http://www.muslim-refusenik.com/ )   What she means is that too many Muslim teachers and leaders insist that Islam, the *faith*, can only be practiced in the 21st century by honouring the _Arab_ social and cultural traditions of the 12th.   Many people - Muslims or not - can and do have serious problems with trying to impose thousand year old social mores on anyone, anywhere - especially in Austria or Belgium, Canada,   Denmark or England and so on.   This leads to a backlash which, in turn, provides _propaganda_ for the _*extremists*_ amongst the Arab (socio-cultural) and Islamic (religious) fundamentalists.   They can, do and will twist our words and deeds (and some of them do not need much twisting) to suit their purposes which is to lead disaffected young Muslims to some sort of _jihad_ - a holy war against the West and all things Western, especially social, cultural, political and religious liberalism.

These people are willing to fight us anywhere.   It is my view that the war in Iraq has provided them, temporarily, with a _happy hunting ground_ - some hope that they can tie America down in a long, drawn out, dirty counter-insurgency operation; each day will provoke Americans and their surrogates to harsher and harsher measures which, in turn, will provoke more and more Muslims, especially, Arabs to take up the Arab extremist, fundamentalist Islamic _cause_.

There is no alternative, for the American led West, to engaging and defeating the Arab extremist, fundamentalist Islamic _movements_ and this is the work of generations - work which must go on while we deal with a constantly changing strategic environment in which much of the world is indifferent to 'our' struggle, but not, necessarily, supportive of our enemy, either.

It is important to bear in mind that this is a *war*.   The issue is to defeat an enemy, not to bring criminals to justice.

I would like to pick up, also, on some of the ideas discussed in the _*Transformation*_ thread, up above, in The Canadian Army.   We, Canadians, need to take a full, fair and responsible share in this *war*.   We will need to apply all of our power - political, socio-cultural, economic and military - to two parallel tasks:

1.	Defeating the Arab extremist, fundamentalist Islamic challenges - wherever and whenever, including in Arabia; and

2.	Securing the global peace by helping our friends and neighbours in the West to adapt to the inevitable rise of competitors, even opponents, from the East without turning them into *enemies*.

We must be prepared to:

"¢	Help secure our continent - this goes beyond just looking after our own economic best interests, it involves acting like a mature nation-state.   We should not _offer_ improved security in hope of receiving favourable trade treatment in return; we should provide good, solid security because that is what mature nation-states do;

"¢	Help defeat the Arab extremist, fundamentalist Islamic challenges - in Canada and overseas, too;

"¢	Help to keep the peace - in all those places where it is threatened by a whole wide range of political miscreants; and

"¢	Help to win the other _war_ - the one which seeks to prevent the rigid polarization of the world into two warring camps.

We will need highly _adaptable_ (flexible) and readily _available_ armed forces which are also _appropriate_ in capability for a nation which, by any fair and reasonable measure ranks - and will continue to rank for most of the next century - amongst the top 10% of all the nation-states on earth.   Those forces also need to be _affordable_.   I have referred to this before, noting that while we may not and should not aspire to be in the military major leagues we are a _*Tripe A, plus*_ country and we ought to have _Triple A+_ armed forces to promote and protect our vital interests *and* to promote our values and to help those who cannot help themselves.

These forces must be supported by a truly first rate intelligence and security apparatus - some of which should be part of and responsible to the Canadian Forces.

We need _balanced_ forces - we must not _draw down_ our naval and air capabilities to patch holes in the army; not even as a temporary expedient.   If the Minister of Finance will not give General Hillier the resources he needs then Hillier must resign, saying that he will not put ill-equipped, ill-supported Canadian military personnel into harm's way; he may have to be followed by other admirals and generals who also serve only short tours as CDS before resigning in a huff until the Prime Minister and his party are embarrassed and feel some political *heat* from Canadians - that has not happened, yet; that's why Paul Martin pooh-poohed Stephen Harper's _aircraft carriers_ and offered some nebulous, way off in the future _peacekeeping brigade_: he *knew* that Canadians care little and know less about the armed forces and will not care any more until they perceive a crisis.

We may not, for a long, long time, deploy anything much larger than a large battle group or mini-brigade but we still need a good, sound, professional logistics _tail_ which goes all the way back to depots and vendors.   It doesn't all have to be military; it may not be the most desirable thing but we may have to rely upon contracted support - including heavy air lift - for quite some time.   There may be some hard choices - cap badge choices - such as reducing the artillery to a _light_ role with a good sized training cadre (and a few real howitzers) in the militia; ditto the armoured corps.   We could, for example, keep some tanks - even obsolete or light tanks - in the militia and we could, also, reopen and expand our exchange programme with the UK so that armoured and artillery officers and NCOs get to serve in modern, regular units.

What we *must not* do is _transform_ our military into a _peacekeeping_ force - which will, inevitable and in short order, stumble and fall, when it meets a _fighting_ task, disgracing the country in the process and leading to the disarming of Canada and, consequentially, international irrelevance and something akin to colonial status.

We need units - ships, squadrons and battalions/regiments - which can, *right now* gather intelligence, survey our territory, contiguous waters and the airspace over both, detect, identify, intercept and (appropriately) deal with intruders: smugglers, illegal aliens, etc.   We need units - ships, squadrons and battalions/regiments - which can, right now, deploy, quickly, anywhere in the world and apply our national power to a wide range of _targets_ - enemies and threats to the world peace and even threats to people who are too weak to help themselves.

Sorry this is long, repetitive and disjointed - I have been reading, reading, reading army.ca since I got back from a foreign visit and I probably tried to get too many thoughts into one post.   Anyway we are at war: with a real, definable enemy.   It will be a long, long, low intensity war - not overly popular, low intensity wars never are ... we still need adequate forces to *fight* the current war *and* keep the peace *and* help others *and* deter emerging powers, *and ... and ... and* and all that costs money, money most Canadians want spent on health care, child care, educations, industrial subsidies, old age pensions, minor hockey ...


----------



## Kirkhill

Hear, Hear ROJ.

Hopefully, it doesn't come to Hillier or others quitting.  The problem that I have with that is the age old one of the fact that the very people that care enough to quit are the ones we need in the positions.

Other than that, can't agree more.

Cheers.


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## Infanteer

I'll second that motion.  ROJ, we need you in Cabinet - I hear there is a spot open in the Citizenship and Immigration portfolio....


----------



## a_majoor

A long post from an American Task Force commander on the "media war"



> Aiding and Abetting the Enemy: the Media in Iraq
> By LTC Tim Ryan, CO, 2/12 Cav, 1st Cav Div
> 
> What if domestic news outlets continually fed American readers headlines like: "Bloody Week on U.S. Highways: Some 700 Killed," or "More Than 900 Americans Die Weekly  from Obesity-Related Diseases"?  Both of these headlines might be true statistically, but do they really represent accurate pictures of the situations?  What if you combined all of the negatives to be found in the state of Texas and used them as an indicator of the quality of life for all Texans?  Imagine the headlines: "Anti-law Enforcement Elements Spread Robbery, Rape and Murder through Texas Cities." For all intents and purposes, this statement is true for any day of any year in any state. True -- yes, accurate -- yes, but in context with the greater good taking place -- no!  After a year or two of headlines like these, more than a few folks back in Texas and the rest of the U.S. probably would be ready to jump off of a building and end it all. So, imagine being an American in Iraq right now.
> 
> I just read yet another distorted and grossly exaggerated story from a major news organization about the "failures" in the war in Iraq.   Print and video journalists are covering only a small fraction of the events in Iraq and more often than not, the events they cover are only the bad ones. Many of the journalists making public assessments about the progress of the war in Iraq are unqualified to do so, given their training and experience. The inaccurate picture they paint has distorted the world view of the daily realities in Iraq.  The result is a further erosion of international public support for the United States' efforts there, and a strengthening of the insurgents' resolve and recruiting efforts while weakening our own.  Through their incomplete, uninformed and unbalanced reporting, many members of the media covering the war in Iraq are aiding and abetting the enemy.
> 
> The fact is the Coalition is making steady progress in Iraq, but not without ups and downs.  War is a terrible thing and terrible things happen during wars, even when you are winning. In war, as in any contest of wills with capable opponents, things do not always go as planned; the guys with the white hats don't always come out on top in each engagement. That doesn't mean you are losing.  Sure, there are some high profile and very spectacular enemy attacks taking place in Iraq these days, but the great majority of what is happening in Iraq is positive.  So why is it that no matter what events unfold, good or bad, the media highlight mostly the negative aspects of the event?  The journalistic adage, "If it bleeds, it leads," still applies in Iraq, but why only when it's American blood?
> 
> As a recent example, the operation in Fallujah delivered an absolutely devastating blow to the insurgency.  Though much smaller in scope, clearing Fallujah of insurgents arguably could equate to the Allies' breakout from the hedgerows in France during World War II. In both cases, our troops overcame a well-prepared and solidly entrenched enemy and began what could be the latter's last stand.  In Fallujah, the enemy death toll has already exceeded 1,500 and still is climbing.  Put one in the win column for the good guys, right?  Wrong. As soon as there was nothing negative to report about Fallujah, the media shifted its focus to other parts of the country.  Just yesterday, a major news agency's website lead read: "Suicide Bomber Kills Six in Baghdad" and "Seven Marines Die in Iraq Clashes." True, yes. Comprehensive, no.  Did the author of this article bother to mention that Coalition troops killed 50 or so terrorists while incurring those seven losses? Of course not.  Nor was there any mention about the substantial progress these offensive operations continue to achieve in defeating the insurgents.  Unfortunately, this sort of incomplete reporting has become the norm for the media, whose poor job of presenting a complete picture of what is going on in Iraq borders on being criminal.
> 
> Much of the problem is about perspective, putting things in scale and balance.  From where I sit in my command post at Camp Fallujah, Iraq, things are not all bad right now. In fact, they are going quite well.  We are not under attack by the enemy; on the contrary, we are taking the fight to him daily and have him on the ropes.  In the distance, I can hear the repeated impacts of heavy artillery and five hundred-pound bombs hitting their targets in the city.  The occasional tank main gun report and the staccato rhythm of a Marine Corps LAV or Army Bradley Fighting Vehicle's 25-millimeter cannon provide the bass line for a symphony of destruction. Right now, as elements from all four services complete the absolute annihilation of the insurgent forces remaining in Fallujah, the area around the former stronghold is more peaceful than it has been for more than a year. The number of attacks in the greater Al Anbar Province is down by at least 70-80% from late October -- before Operation Al Fajar began.  The enemy in this area is completely defeated, but not completely gone. Final eradication of the pockets of insurgents will take some time, as it always does, but the fact remains that the central geographic stronghold of the insurgents is now under friendly control. That sounds a lot like success to me.  Given all of this, why don't the papers lead with "Coalition Crushes Remaining Pockets of Insurgents" or "Enemy Forces Resort to Suicide Bombings of Civilians"? This would paint a far more accurate picture of the enemy's predicament over here.  Instead, headlines focus almost exclusively on our hardships.
> 
> What about the media's portrayal of the enemy?  Why do these ruthless murderers, kidnappers and thieves get a pass when it comes to their actions?  What did the media not show or tell us about Margaret Hassoon, the director of C.A.R.E. in Iraq and an Iraqi citizen, who was kidnapped, brutally tortured and left disemboweled in streets of Fallujah?  Did anyone in the press show these images over and over to emphasize the moral failings of the enemy as they did with the soldiers at Abu Ghuraib?  Did anyone show the world how this enemy had huge stockpiles of weapons in schools and mosques, or how he used these protected places as sanctuaries for planning and fighting in Fallujah and the rest of Iraq?  Are people of the world getting the complete story?  The answer again is no!  What the world got instead were repeated images of a battle-weary Marine who made a quick decision to use lethal force and who now is being tried in the world press.  Is this one act really illustrative of the overall action in Fallujah?  No, but the Marine video clip was shown an average of four times each hour on just about every major TV news channel for a week.  This is how the world views our efforts over here and stories like this without a counter continually serve as propaganda victories for the enemy.  Al Jazeera isn't showing the film of the CARE worker, but is showing the clip of the Marine.  Earlier this year, the Iraqi government banned Al Jazeera from the country for its inaccurate reporting.  Wonder where they get their information now?  Well, if you go to the Internet, you'll find a web link from the Al Jazeera home page to CNN's home page. Very interesting.
> 
> The operation in Fallujah is only one of the recent examples of incomplete coverage of the events in Iraq. The battle in Najaf last August provides another. Television and newspapers spilled a continuous stream of images and stories about the destruction done to the sacred city, and of all the human suffering allegedly brought about by the hands of the big, bad Americans.  These stories and the lack of anything to counter them gave more fuel to the fire of anti-Americanism that burns in this part of the world. Those on the outside saw the Coalition portrayed as invaders or oppressors, killing hapless Iraqis who, one was given to believe, simply were trying to defend their homes and their Muslim way of life.
> 
> Reality couldn't have been farther from the truth.  What noticeably was missing were accounts of the atrocities committed by the Mehdi Militia -- Muqtada Al Sadr's band of henchmen. While the media was busy bashing the Coalition, Muqtada's boys were kidnapping policemen, city council members and anyone else accused of supporting the Coalition or the new government, trying them in a kangaroo court based on Islamic Shari'a law, then brutally torturing and executing them for their "crimes."  What the media didn't show or write about were the two hundred-plus headless bodies found in the main mosque there, or the body that was put into a bread oven and baked. Nor did they show the world the hundreds of thousands of mortar, artillery and small arms rounds found within the "sacred" walls of the mosque. Also missing from the coverage was the huge cache of weapons found in Muqtada's "political" headquarters nearby. No, none of this made it to the screen or to print.  All anyone showed were the few chipped tiles on the dome of the mosque and discussion centered on how we, the Coalition, had somehow done wrong.  Score another one for the enemy's propaganda machine.
> 
> Now, compare the Najaf example to the coverage and debate ad nauseam of the Abu Ghuraib Prison affair.  There certainly is no justification for what a dozen or so soldiers did there, but unbalanced reporting led the world to believe that the actions of the dozen were representative of the entire military. This has had an incredibly negative effect on Middle Easterners' already sagging opinion of the U.S. and its military.  Did anyone show the world images of the 200 who were beheaded and mutilated in Muqtada's Shari'a Law court, or spend the next six months talking about how horrible all of that was?  No, of course not.  Most people don't know that these atrocities happened. It's little wonder that many people here want us out and would vote someone like Muqtada Al Sadr into office given the chance -- they never see the whole truth.  Strange, when the enemy is the instigator the media does not flash images across the screens of televisions in the Middle East as they did with Abu Ghuraib.  Is it because the beheaded bodies might offend someone? If so, then why do we continue see photos of the naked human pyramid over and over?
> 
> So, why doesn't the military get more involved in showing the media the other side of the story? The answer is they do. Although some outfits are better than others, the Army and other military organizations today understand the importance of getting out the story -- the whole story -- and trains leaders to talk to the press. There is a saying about media and the military that goes: "The only way the media is going to tell a good story is if you give them one to tell." This doesn't always work as planned.  Recently, when a Coalition spokesman tried to let TV networks in on opening moves in the Fallujah operation, they misconstrued the events for something they were not and then blamed the military for their gullibility. CNN recently aired a "special report" in which the cable network accused the military of lying to it and others about the beginning of the Fallujah operation.  The incident referred to took place in October when a Marine public affairs officer called media representatives and told them that an operation was about to begin.  Reporters rushed to the outskirts of Fallujah to see what they assumed was going to be the beginning of the main attack on the city.  As it turned out, what they saw were tactical "feints" designed to confuse the enemy about the timing of the main attack, then planned to take place weeks later.
> 
> Once the network realized that major combat operations wouldn't start for several more weeks, CNN alleged that the Marines had used them as a tool for their deception operation.  Now, they say they want answers from the military and the administration on the matter. The reality appears to be that in their zeal to scoop their competition, CNN and others took the information they were given and turned it into what they wanted it to be.  Did the military lie to the media: no. It is specifically against regulations to provide misinformation to the press.  However, did the military planners anticipate that reporters would take the ball and run with it, adding to the overall deception plan? Possibly. Is that unprecedented or illegal? Of course not.
> 
> CNN and others say they were duped by the military in this and other cases. Yet, they never seem to be upset by the undeniable fact that the enemy manipulates them with a cunning that is almost worthy of envy.  You can bet that terrorist leader Abu Musab Al Zarqarwi has his own version of a public affairs officer and it is evident that he uses him to great effect.  Each time Zarquari's group executes a terrorist act such as a beheading or a car bomb, they have a prepared statement ready to post on their website and feed to the press. Over-eager reporters take the bait, hook, line and sinker, and report it just as they got it.
> 
> Did it ever occur to the media that this type of notoriety is just what the terrorists want and need?  Every headline they grab is a victory for them. Those who have read the ancient Chinese military theorist and army general Sun Tsu will recall the philosophy of "Kill one, scare ten thousand" as the basic theory behind the strategy of terrorism. Through fear, the terrorist can then manipulate the behavior of the masses. The media allows the terrorist to use relatively small but spectacular events that directly affect very few, and spread them around the world to scare millions.  What about the thousands of things that go right every day and are never reported?  Complete a multi-million-dollar sewer project and no one wants to cover it, but let one car bomb go off and it makes headlines.  With each headline, the enemy scores another point and the good-guys lose one. This method of scoring slowly is eroding domestic and international support while fueling the enemy's cause.
> 
> I believe one of the reasons for this shallow and subjective reporting is that many reporters never actually cover the events they report on. This is a point of growing concern within the Coalition. It appears many members of the media are hesitant to venture beyond the relative safety of the so-called "International Zone" in downtown Baghdad, or similar "safe havens" in other large cities. Because terrorists and other thugs wisely target western media members and others for kidnappings or attacks, the westerners stay close to their quarters. This has the effect of holding the media captive in cities and keeps them away from the broader truth that lies outside their view.  With the press thus cornered, the terrorists easily feed their unwitting captives a thin gruel of anarchy, one spoonful each day.  A car bomb at the entry point to the International Zone one day, a few mortars the next, maybe a kidnapping or two thrown in. All delivered to the doorsteps of those who will gladly accept it without having to leave their hotel rooms -- how convenient.
> 
> The scene is repeated all too often: an attack takes place in Baghdad and the morning sounds are punctuated by a large explosion and a rising cloud of smoke.  Sirens wail in the distance and photographers dash to the scene a few miles away.  Within the hour, stern-faced reporters confidently stare into the camera while standing on the balcony of their tenth-floor Baghdad hotel room, their back to the city and a distant smoke plume rising behind them.  More mayhem in Gotham City they intone, and just in time for the morning news. There is a transparent reason why the majority of car bombings and other major events take place before noon Baghdad-time; any later and the event would miss the start of the morning news cycle on the U.S. east coast. These terrorists aren't stupid; they know just what to do to scare the masses and when to do it.  An important key to their plan is manipulation of the news media.  But, at least the reporters in Iraq are gathering information and filing their stories, regardless of whether or the stories are in perspective.  Much worse are the "talking heads" who sit in studios or offices back home and pontificate about how badly things are going when they never have been to Iraq and only occasionally leave Manhattan.
> 
> Almost on a daily basis, newspapers, periodicals and airwaves give us negative views about the premises for this war and its progress. It seems that everyone from politicians to pop stars are voicing their unqualified opinions on how things are going. Recently, I saw a Rolling Stone magazine and in bold print on the cover was, "Iraq on Fire; Dispatches from the Lost War."  Now, will someone please tell me who at Rolling Stone or just about any other "news" outlet is qualified to make a determination as to when all is lost and it's time to throw in the towel? In reality, such flawed reporting serves only to misshape world opinion and bolster the enemy's position.  Each enemy success splashed across the front pages and TV screens of the world not only emboldens them, but increases their ability to recruit more money and followers.
> 
> So what are the credentials of these self proclaimed "experts"?  The fact is that most of those on whom we rely for complete and factual accounts have little or no experience or education in counter-insurgency operations or in nation-building to support their assessments.   How would they really know if things are going well or not?  War is an ugly thing with many unexpected twists and turns.  Who among them is qualified to say if this one is worse than any other at this point?  What would they have said in early 1942 about our chances of winning World War II?  Was it a lost cause too?  How much have these "experts" studied warfare and counter-insurgencies in particular?  Have they ever read Roger Trinquier's treatise Modern Warfare: A French View on Counter-insurgency (1956)?  He is one of the few French military guys who got it right.  The Algerian insurgency of the 1950s and the Iraq insurgency have many similarities.  What about Napoleon's campaigns in Sardinia in 1805-07? Again, there are a lot of similarities to this campaign. Have they studied that and contrasted the strategies? Or, have they even read Mao Zedung's theories on insurgencies, or Nygen Giap's, or maybe Che' Gueverra's?  Have they seen any of Sun Zsu's work lately?  Who are these guys?  It's time to start studying, folks. If a journalist doesn't recognize the names on this list, he or she probably isn't qualified to assess the state of this or any other campaign's progress.
> 
> Worse yet, why in the world would they seek opinion from someone who probably knows even less than they do about the state of affairs in Iraq?  It sells commercials, I suppose.  But, I find it amazing that some people are more apt to listen to a movie star's or rock singer's view on how we should prosecute world affairs than to someone whose profession it is to know how these things should go. I play the guitar, but Bruce Springsteen doesn't listen to me play.  Why should I be subjected to his views on the validity of the war?  By profession, he's a guitar player. Someone remind me what it is that makes Sean Penn an expert on anything.  It seems that anyone who has a dissenting view is first to get in front of the camera.  I'm all for freedom of speech, but let's talk about things we know. Otherwise, television news soon could have about as much credibility as "The Batchelor" has for showing us truly loving couples.
> 
> Also bothersome are references by "experts" on how "long" this war is taking.  I've read that in the world of manufacturing, you can have only two of the following three qualities when developing a product -- cheap, fast or good. You can produce something cheap and fast, but it won't be good; good and fast, but it won't be cheap; good and cheap, but it won't be fast. In this case, we want the result to be good and we want it at the lowest cost in human lives.  Given this set of conditions, one can expect this war is to take a while, and rightfully so. Creating a democracy in Iraq not only will require a change in the political system, but the economic system as well. Study of examples of similar socio-economic changes that took place in countries like Chile, Bulgaria, Serbia, Russia and other countries with oppressive Socialist dictatorships shows that it took seven to ten years to move those countries to where they are now.  There are many lessons to be learned from these transformations, the most important of which is that change doesn't come easily, even without an insurgency going on.  Maybe the experts should take a look at all of the work that has gone into stabilizing Bosnia-Herzegovina over the last 10 years. We are just at the eighteen-month mark in Iraq, a place far more oppressive than Bosnia ever was. If previous examples are any comparison, there will be no quick solutions here, but that should be no surprise to an analyst who has done his or her homework.
> 
> This war is not without its tragedies; none ever are. The key to the enemy's success is use of his limited assets to gain the greatest influence over the masses.  The media serves as the glass through which a relatively small event can be magnified to international proportions, and the enemy is exploiting this with incredible ease. There is no good news to counteract the bad, so the enemy scores a victory almost every day.  In its zeal to get to the hot spots and report the latest bombing, the media is missing the reality of a greater good going on in Iraq.  We seldom are seen doing anything right or positive in the news.  People believe what they see, and what people of the world see almost on a daily basis is negative.  How could they see it any other way?  These images and stories, out of scale and context to the greater good going on over here, are just the sort of thing the terrorists are looking for.  This focus on the enemy's successes strengthens his resolve and aids and abets his cause. It's the American image abroad that suffers in the end.
> 
> Ironically, the press freedom that we have brought to this part of the world is providing support for the enemy we fight. I obviously think it's a disgrace when many on whom the world relies for news paint such an incomplete picture of what actually has happened. Much too much is ignored or omitted. I am confident that history will prove our cause right in this war, but by the time that happens, the world might be so steeped in the gloom of ignorance we won't recognize victory when we achieve it.



Today, we have "bloggers", including soldiers in the theater who provide reports like this which goes a small way towards countering both openly hostile media like Al Jazeera as well as the MSM which is seemingly to lazy or incompetent to do the leg work required to get the story. This is the story which should be on the front pages, and should be forwarded to PAO's everywhere.


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## Wizard of OZ

a_majoor

You and i both know that the American press only reports bad news after any conflict.  It is the stuff that sells.  Because it is still purchased by those who oppose the war in the first place.  Those who support it are done(not in all cases) but they have seen the fruit of their labour and victory was achieved.  Those who failed to stop can only grasp at these straws to show see "we were right and should not have been there in the first place".  That is the problem with the Media.  And yes if it Bleeds it leads.  You never see the stories of new wells being dug and towns being rebuilt in Iraq do you?

No cause nobody wants to read that we live in a depressing time my friend where death and destruction rule.

The sad part is the media is playing into the hand of the enemy (much the same as in Vietnam) where for every story they report the more chaos is unlesashed.  If they stopped reporting the negative or slanted stories i bet the future would brighten up alot faster over there.  Tough to sell paradise when it is not on the news.

Further my last post it was not meant as slander to "Muslims" it was meant as a generic term from the Crusades i guess i could have chose a different word such as extremists or fanatic.

I do aplogize for this slander i meant no harm by it.


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## a_majoor

Focusing on the battlefront in Iraq:

http://www.nationalreview.com/lowry/lowry200501180829.asp



> January 18, 2005, 8:29 a.m.
> Been There, Done That
> Iraq's not foreign territory.
> 
> As the drumbeat of bad news continues in Iraq and calls for a U.S. withdrawal begin to take hold, a popular cliché will get increased currency: that it is impossible to win a war against a guerrilla insurgency. This is the historical inaccuracy that Vietnam wrought. Americans assume that since they lost a war that had a guerrilla aspect in Vietnam â â€ never mind that it was a conventional North Vietnamese army that ultimately conquered the south â â€ everyone must always lose guerrilla wars.
> 
> Among other things, this ignores the American victory over an insurgency in the Philippines in the 1950s, the Greek triumph over a Communist insurgency after World War II, El Salvador's defeat of Communist guerrillas in the 1980s, Peru's smashing of a terrorist insurgency in the 1990s, the recent qualified victory of the British over the Irish Republican Army, and Israel's continuing upper hand over terrorists in the West Bank and Gaza. Most importantly, the insurgents-always-win school skips over the textbook example of successful counterinsurgency, the British victory in Malaysia in the 1950s over a communist guerrilla movement.
> 
> The British experience is related in John Nagl's cult-classic book Counterinsurgency Lessons From Malaya and Vietnam. It has become must reading for high-level officers in Iraq because its lessons seem so directly applicable to the situation there. Nagl himself, an Army major, has been in Iraq, where we still can duplicate the British experience in Malaysia of stumbling initially, but prevailing through innovation, stick-to-itiveness and shrewd political maneuvering.
> 
> Communist guerrillas in Malaysia took up arms in the late 1940s, murdering Europeans, sabotaging industry and using terror to try to strengthen the insurgency's base among the country's Chinese minority. Given their colonial history, the British had plenty of experience with such low-intensity conflicts, but had forgotten it after the conventional warfare in Europe of World War II. The Brits at first considered the insurgency primarily a military problem, and tried to take the guerrillas on in conventional military formations. These tactics not only failed to engage the guerrillas, who easily evaded the large jungle sweeps, but their heavy-handedness alienated the local population.
> 
> The British were losing. One observer thought the guerrillas were "probably equal to that of government in the matter of supplies and superior in the matter of intelligence." Guerrilla attacks had been fewer than 100 a month in mid-1949, but spiked to more than 400 a month by mid-1950. This is when, had the Brits operated in our media and political environment, New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd would have witheringly declared all lost, and calls from across the political spectrum would have gone up to quit.
> 
> With a patience born of fighting many "small wars" in dusty parts of the world, the British simply set about fixing what they had done wrong. Most fundamentally, they realized that counterinsurgency depends on winning a political battle for "hearts and minds" (a famous phrase that originated in the Malaysia fight). Military operations were conducted on a smaller scale. The Chinese population was secured from guerrilla influence. A Malaysian army was built, with Chinese involvement. Elections were organized and independence promised. Slowly, the air went out of the insurgency, which was officially declared over in 1960, 12 years after it began.
> 
> Iraq is not the same as Malaysia, of course, but it presents a very similar problem. The Malaysian example has been on the Pentagon's mind from the beginning, and is one reason it has placed such an emphasis on training Iraqi troops. Ultimately, just as important as establishing security in Iraq is having a political program more attractive than that of our revanchist enemies. Which is why â â€ just as in Malaysia â â€ holding elections and maintaining a glide path to full sovereignty are so crucial.
> 
> We should be clear-eyed about the fearsome difficulties in Iraq. But we shouldn't give in to despair, let alone an unjustified metaphysical despair about the possibility of ever defeating a stubborn insurgency. It's been done before.
> 
> â â€ Rich Lowry is author of Legacy: Paying the Price for the Clinton Years.
> 
> (c) 2004 King Features Syndicate


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## Edward Campbell

This very good study of the Malaya operations is still available, I'm pleased to say: http://www.selectbooks.com.sg/titles/34873.htm 

It should have been required reading in Leavenworth and Carlisle back in the '60s and 70s and it should be required, in 2001, there, and in Kingston, Toronto and Camberley too.


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## a_majoor

The reality of Iraqi operations taking place in an expanded regional theater:

http://www.nationalreview.com/lerner/lerner200501190749.asp


> *Setting Sights on Syria*
> How to win in Iraq, and regionally.
> 
> By Barbara Lerner
> 
> The carnage from terrorist attacks in Iraq is discouraging many, and unless we make some unexpected new move, no one expects it to stop, even after a successful election on January 30. The Islamofascists who are blowing us up and butchering Iraqis won't quit, as long as they believe that if they keep it up long enough they can drive us out and gain control of the country. Our main attackers, after all, are Baathist thugs and Islamist jihadis. Together, branches of these two groups succeeded in driving us out of neighboring Lebanon in the pre-9/11 years. They control it still, and they boast that they will drive us from Iraq too.
> 
> President Bush's answer is that in the post-9/11 world, we must prove them wrong by staying the course, before and after the Iraqi election, doing more of what we are already doing, but doing it better, every day, making steady progress in spite of all obstacles â â€ toughing it out until an elected Iraqi government commands Iraqi forces that are capable of maintaining their own security. Most of our troops agree. It's the true-grit answer, and they see it as right and necessary for America's long-term security. Despite their losses, morale remains high. Our guys are determined to defeat the Islamofascists in Iraq as they did in Afghanistan, pushing back the tide of terror that struck us on 9/11 until it no longer threatens our safety or the peace of the world. That's the president's basic plan; our troops support it, and in the long run, it's what most Americans and Iraqis want.
> 
> But in the short term, what majorities in both countries want most is a more effective response to the ongoing carnage, some new action we can take that will seriously de-grade the enemy's ability to kill and maim us. Is this just an impossible dream, or is there in fact some new move we can make that will weaken our enemies, sap their confidence in ultimate victory, and cut way down on our casualties?
> 
> A Regional War
> 
> Our Defense secretary thinks there is such a move, and he has been seeking a go-ahead to make it since at least mid-2003. But the camera-hogging chorus of Rumsfeld critics has no clue. More armor? The last few pieces were being hammered into place before the criticism started, and while they give our troops a slight defensive edge, they do nothing for the embattled Iraqi people. More troops? Wrong again, and chutzpah besides. Chutzpah, because the same congressmen who cut divisions from our military in the 1990s are berating Rumsfeld now for not overwhelming the enemy with those vanished divisions. Wrong, too â â€ as active generals like Richard Myers, retired generals like Thom-as McInerney and Paul Vallely, military historians like Victor Davis Hanson, and intelligence experts like Herbert Meyer keep telling us â â€ because the best defense is a good offense. The bottom line is that it's not how many troops we have, but how aggressively we use them. And in its first term, the Bush administration was divided about the aggressive use of offensive military force.
> 
> Rumsfeld and others wanted to bring down Saddam Hussein's regime without first spending months telegraphing our punches in the U.N. That would have given us the advantage of surprise, making it much harder for Iraq's Baathists and jihadis to set up bases in neighboring countries and transfer billions of dollars and large loads of unknown weapons and supplies there before the war. Key players in the State Department and the CIA opposed the invasion of Iraq altogether, and passionately opposed doing it without U.N. approval. Tony Blair was also passionate about the U.N., and President Bush split the difference. He gave the go-ahead for General Tommy Franks's daring shock-and-awe offensive for the liberation of Iraq, but not before he gave the U.N. every chance to take effective action first. When it came to running Iraq in the interim between the liberation and a new, elected, and empowered Iraqi government, control of American policy once again reverted, for the most part, to State and CIA. Key players there favored a long, slow transition, a major effort to woo hostile elements in both the Shiite and Sunni communities, and a conciliatory stance toward Iraq's predatory neighbors. Threats to arrest Muqtada al-Sadr with no follow-through; the aborted attack on the Iraqi terror-center of Fallujah in April 2004; and the long resistance to imposing sanctions on Syria: All these are examples of State-CIA policy in action. At Fallujah especially, our troops chafed under it. It was the site of the first gross, triumphant, in-your-face public lynching of American civilians, and our fighting men did not want to negotiate with the lynchers' frontmen. They wanted to crush them, to send the life-saving message: If you butcher Americans, you die. Their orders, instead, were to withdraw. In all these instances and more, Rumsfeld differed with his colleagues at State and CIA, and with a clique of military officers who agreed with them.
> 
> But perhaps the most important, least-recognized difference between Rumsfeld and his opponents has to do with our stance toward the countries that surround Iraq. Rumsfeld recognized, early on, that the terror war in Iraq is sustained by the critical support it gets from terror-sponsoring neighboring states, and he wanted to take offensive action against them, too. He focused especially on Iraq's western neighbor, asking for approval to pursue terrorists across the border, into the heart of today's terror network in Syria. Once again, major players at State and CIA were opposed, and they prevailed; we continued to fight what is, in fact, a regional war in one country only.
> 
> Bush's Decision
> 
> That was then; this is now. After giving both camps a fair chance to show what their methods could accomplish, President Bush appears to have made a far-reaching decision. In November, he gave our military the green light to go back on the offensive against the terrorists in Fallujah and finish the job. Since then, we have stayed on the offensive inside Iraq, pursuing terrorists aggressively throughout Anbar province and in Mosul. Most of the top anti-offensive players at CIA and State are gone now, or about to go, and an offensive against Syria may be next, because now, evidence that Syria and Syrian-controlled Lebanon provide the critical support that sustains the terror war in Iraq is overwhelming.
> 
> For starters, leaders of both the Iraqi Baathists and the foreign jihadis use Syrian-controlled turf as a safe haven and base of operations. Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, the Iraqi general who directs the Baathist butchers, lives there; Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Palestinian terrorist who runs the foreign jihadis, flits back and forth across the border. Both men rely on the terror-training camps in Syria and Syrian-controlled Lebanon, camps that have replaced the ones al Qaeda maintained in Afghanistan as the places hate-crazed Muslims go to learn to kill Westerners and moderate Muslims. Hezbollah, the Iranian-run terror group that killed 241 of our marines, still controls large parts of Lebanon and runs some of these training camps; Hamas, the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, the organization that assassinated Anwar Sadat and spawned al Qaeda and a host of other terrorist groups, runs other camps. Some, like Ain al-Hilwe, are heavily infiltrated by al Qaeda and Taliban terrorists. Iranian agents brought them there, after we defeated them in Afghanistan. Syria and Iran both control other, less-well-known terror groups and training camps. Whatever changing names they use, all of these groups act as proxies for Syrian and Iranian aggression against us and against Iraq. Only Hezbollah and Hamas are out front, hiding in plain sight, under a false flag that reads: We're not a threat to America or the West; we have nothing to do with Iraq or al Qaeda â â€ we only attack Israel.
> 
> Much of the money that sustains the jihadis' war in Iraq â â€ money from Saddam Hussein's illicit oil-deals; from terrorist financiers in Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Gulf states; and from terrorist drug gangs â â€ is parked in Syria and Lebanon too. Every once in a while, when State Department diplomats turn up the pressure on Syria to stop being the terror world's most convenient ATM, Syria turns a little of this money over to us, like a parent distracting a child with a sweet. But these little fiscal treats do nothing to change the fundamentals. Tougher sanctions? Even if we could get enough other countries to go along to do noticeable damage to Syria's basket-case economy, Iran has already promised to compensate Syria, and the usual terror-financiers in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf will also pony up. All pay, because all have major stakes in the continued existence of terror-central in Syria. The rise of a Shiite-dominated Arab democracy in Iraq is a threat to all the region's dictators and terrorists, Sunni and Shia alike, and Alawite-run Syria-Lebanon is the regional center, the place where all their interests merge and combine to wage and sustain the terror war against us in Iraq. Recruitment of terrorists to fight in Iraq is an open secret in Syria; and, although the volunteers come from all over the Muslim world, most of them get their training in these camps and enter Iraq from Syrian-controlled turf.
> 
> Syria, in sum, is terror central, not because it is the only Middle Eastern nation that threatens us or even the most powerful one â â€ it's the weakest â â€ but because Syria rents space to them all, playing a critical enabling role for all of the Islamofascist terrorists who are attacking us in Iraq and threatening our interests in a host of other places. As long as we permit this terrorist mecca to operate unmolested, the terror war in Iraq can probably sustain itself indefinitely, taking its bloody toll, year after year. That's why Secretary Rumsfeld has been arguing, all along, for cross-border attacks, and why the president is likely to approve such attacks soon. Pursuing terrorists across the border into Syria is the idea Rumsfeld expressed in mid-2003, but it is unlikely to be his only idea about how America should deal with Syria.
> 
> Handling Syria
> 
> My own idea for Syria was spelled out in NRO over a year ago, and it seems to me even more relevant now. I argued that we should pound home the message that diplomatic pressure failed to deliver by launching a sudden and new shock-and-awe campaign, aimed at demolishing all the terror training camps on Syrian-controlled turf. No ground troops would be needed because:
> If ever a task was tailor-made for air power alone, this is it. Syria has no oil...and no significant air defense system. What it does have in places like the Bekaa Valley and the parts of Lebanon that Syria leases out to Hezbollah and its many subleasees is a super-abundance of terrorists from many groups, massed together in places where there are few or no innocent civilians. Here, we don't have to limit ourselves to hunting down terrorists one by one, inevitably losing American lives and the lives of our friends in the process. Here, our bombs can take out large numbers of Islamofascist terrorists all at once, scoring another victory in the war against terror... a victory that will dry up the flow from Syria, and make Saudi Arabia and the mad mullahs who misrule Iran understand at last that they, too, must stop funneling terrorists into Iraq [and otherwise aiding the insurrection there]. It will give new hope to the millions of Iranians who are dying to overthrow the corrupt clerics who oppress them and dishonor their religion, and it will have a sobering effect on all those who harbor terrorists, anywhere in the world.
> 
> If President Bush decides to do this, it would, of course, be wishful thinking to expect all the carnage in Iraq to stop immediately afterwards. It won't, but without a never-ending supply of money, training camps, fresh recruits, and safe havens, it is reasonable to expect that terrorist attacks inside Iraq will diminish significantly, along with terrorist morale, allowing Iraqi forces to establish control of their own security in a year or two, and allowing our troops and those of our Coalition partners to come home, leaving behind a freer Iraq and a safer world.
> 
> Will Turtle Bay and Brussels resound with denunciations of America's reckless unilateralism? Of course, but not as loudly or with as much unity as professional doomsayers like Brent Scowcroft and Michael Moore predict. They won't get the message, but it will be received, loud and clear, on the Arab street and in Arab palaces alike: Uncle Sucker is no more, and the price to pay for treating George W. Bush's America like one is more than they can afford. As for opinion at home, whenever this president made a bold military move in the past, big majorities of Americans rallied around him, strongly. Americans don't run from a battle, as long as we believe our leaders are clear about what it will take to win and determined not to stop short of it.
> 
> â â€ Barbara Lerner is a freelance writer in Chicago.


----------



## a_majoor

The lineup of enemies just keeps growing.....

http://powerlineblog.com/


> The U.N. at work
> 
> In a column that the Wall Street Journal has restricted to subscribers, Dore Gold writes about another U.N. scandal -- one that has received almost no attention. Gold writes:
> 
> In 2003 and 2004, the Israel Defense Forces captured documentation showing how the U.N. Development Program was regularly funding two Hamas front organizations: the Tulkarm Charity Committee and the Jenin District Committee for Charitable Funds. The donations varied -- sometimes $4,000 and sometimes $10,000. Receipts and even copies of thank-you notes to UNDP were discovered. The U.N. should have exercised considerable caution with transfers of this sort, considering that in 2002, Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement described Jenin as "the capital of the suicide bombers." Nonetheless, one might ask, how was the U.N. to know that these were actually Hamas front groups?
> 
> Here's how: In June 2003, the Office of the Coordinator of the Activities of the Israel Defense Forces in the West Bank and Gaza Strip asked UNDP to stop all assistance to the Jenin District Committee because of its Hamas connection. Israel knew that Hamas operatives ran the charity; its deputy director had been a member of the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the elite terrorist unit of Hamas. Timothy Rothermel, UNDP's special representative in Jerusalem, turned down the Israeli request.
> 
> Another disturbing revelation from captured documents is the support provided by the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for the "Koran and Sunna Society" of Kalkilya. UNRWA has been heavily penetrated by Hamas for years; Hamas members dominate many of its unions, including the teachers union. But this new link represented a further deterioration in the U.N.'s connections, for the "Koran and Sunna Society" defines itself as salafi -- it adopts doctrines from militant Islam. Indeed, the "Koran and Sunna Society," which has six branches in the West Bank, distributes pamphlets published in Saudi Arabia that are often written by radical Wahhabi clerics. References to the value of martyrdom and jihad are not uncommon in these materials. One of the Society's schools, called "The Martyrs of the Al-Aqsa Intifada," received payments from UNRWA for educating children of Palestinian refugees in March and June of 2004.
> 
> Gold adds: "Besides getting to the bottom of the Oil-for-Food scandal, it is equally vital to get the U.N. to halt its backing of recognized international terrorist groups." He notes that the Bush administration gave the U.N. a special status in the Arab-Israeli peace process by making it part of the multilateral "Quartet" -- along with the U.S., the EU and Russia. Isn't this an organization that needs to be sidelined for the good of, well, the world?


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## a_majoor

More on the leaders of the Western Coalition:




> *Idealism and Its Discontents*
> Thinking on the neoconservative slur.
> 
> Neo- is a prefix that derives from the Greek adjective veos - "new" or "fresh" - and in theory it is used inexactly for those conservatives who once were not - or for those who have reinterpreted conservatism in terms of a more idealistic foreign policy that eschewed both Cold War realpolitik and the hallowed traditions of American republican isolationism.
> 
> But the accepted definition has given way in practice to refer to the more particular proponents of the use of military action to remove threatening governments, and to replace them with democratic systems - hence the occasional sobriquets of "neo-Wilsonian." But for a number of detractors, "neoconservative" is also little more than generic disparagement, and (off-the-record) it is synonymous with American Jews who seek to alter American foreign policy to the wishes of the right-wing Likud party of Israel.
> 
> Yet note the misinformation about its meaning and usage. The five most prominent makers of American foreign policy at the moment - George Bush, Dick Cheney, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, and Donald Rumsfeld - are (1) not Jewish, (2) hard-headed and not easily bamboozled by any supposed cabal, and (3) were mostly in the past identified with the "realist" school and especially skeptical of using the military frequently for anything resembling Clintonian peace-keeping.
> 
> So, for example, while Secretary Rumsfeld signed the now-infamous 1998 letter to President Clinton calling for the de-facto preemptive removal of Saddam Hussein, George Bush, Dick Cheney, and Condoleezza Rice did not. Yet Richard Armitage - considered a stalwart in the Colin Powell camp - was a signatory. Thus there seems no hard ideology or past litmus test to neoconservatism other than a coalescence of once-differing views after September 11.
> 
> Second, this new version of neoconservativism was predicated on the end of the Cold War, at least in its present approach to foreign policy. Nearly thousands of nukes pointed at the United States, coupled with global Communist-inspired national-liberation movements, did not leave much room for American idealism - or at least it was so felt. But with the fall of the Berlin Wall, former realist conservatives deduced that the advocacy of democracy was both practicable and in the long-term interest of the United States, as part of its promotion of international free markets and consensual government. Meanwhile, some liberals saw military action as not so odious if aimed at right-wing authoritarians rather than Communists masquerading as socialists (e.g., Noriega, Milosevic, the Taliban, or Saddam Hussein rather than Castro). Why the latter were not called neoliberals is unexplained.
> 
> Third, Iraq is not the sole touchstone of neoconservative thought. Many traditional conservatives, both Democrats and Republicans, who favor balanced budgets, an end to illegal immigration, and more sober judgment on entitlements, came to the conclusion after September 11 that the many lives of Saddam Hussein had run out. Indeed, one of the ironies of this war is the spectacle of many who called for the removal of Saddam Hussein in the late 1990s now turning on the war, while many who would have never supported such preemption before 9/11 insist on giving the administration full support in the midst of the present fighting.
> 
> Fourth, traditional conservatives especially distrust neoconservatives because, well, they are not entirely conservative and confuse the public about the virtues of the hallowed native reluctance to spend blood and treasure abroad for dubiously idealistic purposes. In contrast, progressives dislike them because their promotion of democracy can complicate liberalism, as if it were a fine and noble thing to insist on elections in the former Third World, even if need be through force. And every ideology saves its greatest venom for the perceived apostate: Thus Zell Miller infuriates liberals in the way John McCain or Chuck Nagel does conservatives.
> 
> Fifth, the battlefield adjudicates perceptions. Before the Iraqi invasion, neoconservatives took a beating in the acrimonious lead-up to the war about which scenarios were proffered about millions of refugees and thousands of American dead. Yet after the three-week victory, even television hosts were boasting, "We are all neoconservatives now." Then the messy post-bellum Iraqi reconstruction brought back disdain, while successful elections and a consensual government could well win admiration. For most, ideology or belief matters not nearly as much as impressions of being judged as smart, successful, and "cutting-edge" - a constantly changing and amorphous image that in Washington is predicated on the 24-hour news cycle.
> 
> Finally, radical foreign-policy changes always upset the status quo and beg for conspiratorial exegesis. After 1948, the Cold Warriors were felt to have appropriated the Democratic party from the Henry Wallace wing, and they suffered abuse both from the naÃƒÂ¯ve Left who saw them as veritable McCarthyites, and from the isolationist Right who did not want to continue the sacrifices of internationalism endlessly on into the postwar peace.
> 
> The old border-state pragmaticism of Lincoln was felt to have been hijacked by the "Black Republicans," when the bumpkin candidate "came east" to get briefed. In such conspiracy thinking, clever abolitionists from their New England pulpits and snooty colleges saw Lincoln as a suitable and naÃƒÂ¯ve emissary of their radical agenda. Indeed, in some sense almost all the charges that the Texas realist George Bush was brainwashed by neoconservative Israeli apologists are not that different from the writ against Lincoln.
> 
> My favorite example of castigating idealism is far older and from fourth-century B.C. Greece. By the 370s B.C. idealists were firmly in control of the government of conservative ancient Thebes, and turned an oligarchic Boeotian Confederacy into a real democracy. Convinced after their victory at Leuktra (371 B.C.) that a wounded Sparta was still a perennial threat, the new Boeotian democrats mobilized a Hellenic coalition of the willing to drop the old realist idea of containment or of just waiting for Sparta to attack.
> 
> Thus they embraced the preemptive act of invading Sparta and freeing 250,000 Laconian and Messenian indentured serfs or helots ("those taken"). The preemptory invasion was aimed at bringing freedom and democracy to Greeks heretofore deemed less than fully Hellenic and thought incapable of self-governance. Indeed, over the past century thousands of helots had been arbitrarily executed and routinely tortured and humiliated by their Spartan overlords. The Boeotians thought that by freeing the helots and creating autonomous democracies on Sparta's borders they could remake the Peloponnese and end the old pathology in which a professional Gestapo-like military coerced their neighbors and meddled abroad, while fed and supported by a veritable nation of serfs.
> 
> The subsequent successful invasion led by the general Epaminondas was one of the few military operations of the ancient world that had real elements of idealism. Yet the circle around Epaminondas was also suspected of being influenced by the Pythagoreans, zealots who had fallen under the spell of the subversive and dangerous teachings of Pythagoras. The latter purportedly had promulgated weird notions, ranging from the equality of women to vegetarianism, and his work seems to have influenced Plato. Perhaps, Pythagoras was an ancient bogeyman not unlike the contemporary Leo Strauss, and was used to explain the otherwise inexplicable fact that the Boeotians of all people went into the heart of darkness to free the people of the Peloponnese.
> 
> One last thing about such appreciation of idealism in foreign policy: After Epaminondas emasculated Sparta, liberated the helots, and fostered a democratic Peloponnese, the Thebans, far from hailing the hero, put the returning commander on trial for usurping his prescribed tenure.
> 
> The more things change, the more they...
> 
> - Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.


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## Wizard of OZ

This battle will never be over.  There will always be someone who wants to strike the West.  It is in human nature to be jelous of what our neighbour has. Be it for religous or economic or vengence reasons.  The Coaliton may slow it down or make it harder, but were there is a will there is a way.  With the West made up of a Tossed Salad of migrates from other culters, the US is no longer the melting pot it used to be.  Not all who imigrate there buy into the dream.  Some have hopes, goals and dreams of thier own.  

Trying to solve the problem by forcing democracy to those who do not want it is not the answer. Spreading peace through violence is not the answer either.

My thoughts.


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## a_majoor

Wizard of OZ said:
			
		

> This battle will never be over. There will always be someone who wants to strike the West. It is in human nature to be jealous of what our neighbour has.



The ancient Greeks understood this very well:
"If these words are judged useful by those who want to understand clearly the events which happened in the past and which (human nature being what it is) will at some time or other and in much the same way, be repeated in the future."



> With the West made up of a Tossed Salad of migrates from other cultures, the US is no longer the melting pot it used to be. Not all who immigrate there buy into the dream. Some have hopes, goals and dreams of their own.



The problem is we in the West seem bent on talking down the achievements of our own culture in favor of bogus "Multiculturalism" (bogus in the sense that when put to the test, only we cannot speak on our behalf, and are supposed to sit silent while listening to the virtues of such "culturally neutral" ideas as suicide bombing; female bondage or enslavement; female genital mutilation; oppressing of races or cultures so long as the oppressors are not white....you know) Most migrants to the west are here because they want to participate in "the American Dream" or its equivalent



> Trying to solve the problem by forcing democracy to those who do not want it is not the answer. Spreading peace through violence is not the answer either.



Who does not want democracy? The oppressed masses or the thugs who hold the reigns of power? Will the thugs quietly walk away, or do they have to be removed from their seats of power? I think a reading of history will quickly answer these questions.


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## a_majoor

Some more analysis on what drives the Jihadis

http://www.strategypage.com/fyeo/qndguide/default.asp?target=urbang.htm


> *TERRORISM: At Least Make it Look Good...*
> 
> January 21, 2005: Al Qaeda is all about symbolism, not reality. The basic idea that propels Islamic terrorists is the belief that Islam is under attack by infidels (non-Moslems). This attack comes in the form of ideas, including democracy, that are, or should be, abhorrent, to a true believer in Islam. The United States is considered the principal enemy, because America produces most of the video, audio and intellectual "attacks" that the Islamic radicals find so distasteful. At first, Islamic terrorists sought to overthrow the â Å“corruptâ ? governments in existing Islamic nations, and create Islamic republics. All of these â Å“trueâ ? Islamic nations would then unite to reconstitute the Caliphate that existed over a thousand years ago, the last (and only) time all Islamic countries were united. That unity didn't last because people, and countries, are different, and Islam was not enough to keep them all united. That has not changed.
> 
> But many Islamic terrorist leaders, like Osama bin Laden, concluded in the 1990s that it would be better to go after the United States, and the infidel West in general, first. The basic idea is to somehow force the West to get out of Islamic nations. Exactly how this would work is left vague. Many of the plans of Islamic terrorists get pretty murky if you try and look too far ahead. Taking on the West appears more as an act of despair. After all, Islamic radicals took control of Iran and Afghanistan, and brought nothing but misery. In actual fact, most Islamic terrorists are still trying to overthrow the existing governments in Islamic nations. International terrorism, against Western targets, was always a lot more difficult, and thus rather rare. But the September 11, 2001 attacks gave many Islamic terrorists the idea that they could actually bring down the West. The fact that there has not been another attack in the United States since 911, and only one in Western Europe, is often overlooked. Symbolism is powerful. If you can't deal with reality, call in al Jazeera and show them your best symbolism. This approach made al Qaeda stand out, even though it was but one of many Islamic radical organizations.
> 
> The battle against Moslem governments has not been going so well either. But this really doesn't matter, because Islamic terrorists have their hands full carrying out any attacks at all anywhere. The American invasion of Iraqi in 2003 enraged many Islamic radicals, and caused them to launch more attacks inside Islamic countries. The main result of this was to reveal how weak the Islamic terrorists actually were, how shallow their support was among Moslem populations, and how effective the governments in Moslem nations were in fighting back. The media likes to portray governments in Moslem nations as weak and getting weaker because of terrorist attacks. But the history of the Islamic world makes it clear that "Islamic Republics" are very much the exception, which various kinds of ruthless police states are very much the rule.
> 
> What the Islamic terrorists are really fighting for is a solution to the problems most Islamic nations face. Even with all the oil wealth, the Arab world has made little economic progress versus the infidels in the last half century. Most Moslems feel the problem is inefficient governments, and a society that does not place enough emphasis on the two elements that have fueled economic growth in the rest of the world; education and honest government. Those two items allow people to start new businesses, run them efficiently, and grow economically. Islamic terrorists believe the solution is honest government and scrupulous adherence to Sharia (Islamic law.) Unfortunately, there are no working examples of this, either currently or historically. But when you're on a Mission From God, you don't need a working example. God's Word is enough.


----------



## a_majoor

Some updates as to what we are facing 


> *The War's Far from Won*
> Harvey Kushner hones in on the home front.
> 
> Q&A by Kathryn Jean Lopez
> 
> "If we don't wake up to this, we could lose it all," that's Harvey Kushner's message to Americans â â€ and American intelligence officials.
> 
> Harvey Kushner is a familiar face to many Fox viewers. The terrorism expert is a frequent TV commentator. In his full-time work in terrorism prevention, he has been a consultant to major government agencies including the FBI, INS, and U.S. Customs.
> 
> Kushner's most recent book is Holy War on the Home Front: The Secret Islamic Terror Network in the United States, written with Bart Davis.
> 
> Kushner recently answered some of NRO editor Kathryn Jean Lopez's questions. Kushner weighed in on the Patriot Act ("essential"), Michael Chertoff (he is less enthused than NR), and, of course, the secret Islamic terror network in the United States.
> 
> National Review Online: Boston, New York, Philly, D.C., Miami, Detroit, Cincinnati, St. Louis, Houston, Denver, L.A. (and more) â â€ Hamas, al Qaeda, and Hezbollah are operating out of major U.S. cities today?
> 
> Harvey Kushner: Holy War on the Home Front is the first book to publish *the "Charter of the Center of Studies, Intelligence and the Information." The "Charter" was handwritten in Arabic and dated 1981. It is a militant Islamic organizational plan for terrorism, with every cell, division, agent, and objective clearly defined. One expert's opinion regarding the original Arabic is that the document could have originated from the ranks of the Muslim brotherhood, the originator of all contemporary militant Islamic movements. *
> 
> Also published in Holy War>/I> is a hand-drawn map of the United States and Canada that accompanies the "Charter." The map is divided into four sections: the Western Region, the Central Region, the Eastern Region, the Canadian Region. For example, the Eastern Region has dots over the cities of Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Raleigh, and Miami. In 1981, few, if any, terrorist groups were in the cities labeled in Arabic on the map. Today, however, there are terrorist groups in every city shown on the map, proof of how far the secret Islamic terror network has spread.
> 
> While interviewed about Holy War on the radio by a former official in the Reagan administration, she said that she had been briefed about the Charter in the early 1980s. She was shocked that it took more than two decades for someone to publish this telling document about the secret Islamic network operating in the United States.
> 
> NRO: Tom Ridge is done with DHS as of last week. You report DHS officials saying the agency won't be functional until next year. Was it a mistake? What can be done?
> 
> Kushner: As I write in my book, high-level sources within the Department of Homeland Security say DHS won't even be "somewhat functional" until 2006. This disturbing progress report aside, the creation of DHS was no mistake. It was necessary to create an agency responsible for coordinating protection of the homeland. One agency responsible for assuring the seamless transfer of terrorist information into one database looms high on the DHS agenda. DHS would then transfer real-time terrorist data to local law enforcement. Until now, however, this has not taken place and it will be "job-one" for the new DHS secretary, Michael Chertoff.
> 
> The Harvard-educated Chertoff does not appear to have the managerial skills to unite the more than 180,000 DHS personnel from some 22 agencies into one cohesive unit devoid of their past organizational cultures. Nor does he seem to have the management experience to make DHS the point-of-contact for the 87,000 local jurisdictions across our nation. Moreover, Judge Chertoff credentials are not likely to impress the law-enforcement personnel under his jurisdiction. It is well-known that judges and lawyers often have little appreciation, albeit understanding, of the work of the men and women of law enforcement.
> 
> Secretary Chertoff needs to bring about unification with DHS and transfer real-time terrorist information to the locals. Accomplishing this will make DHS an effective unifying entity as well as protector of the homeland. Unfortunately, I'm not sanguine about his chances of accomplishing this; however, I wish him well.
> 
> NRO: Would you ditch the color-coded alert system? Does it hurt more than help?
> 
> Kushner: Every time we change colors and alert the public I'm reminded of Aesop's popular fable, "The Boy Who Cried Wolf." You can't keep alerting the people to the possibility of the wolf at your doorstep that never shows up without running the risk of making them "alert weary." I'm not advocating that it is necessary to have some horrific terrorist event occur to prove the color-coded system worthy. Instead, I would like to see implemented a system that balances high alert with a meaningful educational program to train the public in the ways of terrorism prevention.
> 
> NRO: You report a lot that is very wrong, but we haven't been attacked since 9/11 â â€ isn't that some sort of relatively good sign?
> 
> Kushner: Absolutely not. *Always remember that Islamic terrorists will strike at American assets both here and abroad according to their own schedule, not ours. If history is a guide, it took more than eight years for Islamic terrorists to destroy the World Trade towers, the first attack occurred in February 26, 1993. Moreover, the tale of the Bedouin chief who took 40 years to avenge a personal insult and was chided for acting so hastily speaks to the Islamic-terrorist mindset and warns us of things to come.*
> 
> Lopez: The Patriot Act gets people on both the Left and Right riled up. But it's been effective, hasn't it?
> 
> Kushner: Yes, it sure has. *The Patriot Act deserves credit for the arrest of members of terrorist cells in Buffalo, Seattle, Portland, and Detroit, and investigations of terrorist have frozen more than $125 million in terrorist assets and over 600 bank accounts around the world. I believe the Patriot Act has the right balances in the sometimes-competing interests of the war on terror and our civil liberties. If we are to prevent a terrorist attack of major proportions, it is essential. Usually, in law enforcement we wait until a crime is committed, and then we act. America cannot afford to wait until a terrorist act is committed to go after the terrorists who commit them.*
> 
> Roving wiretaps are necessary in an age of cellular-phone technology. They were illegal until the Patriot Act. The old laws worked when the cord on the black metal family phone wouldn't let you move more than a couple of feet. Roving wire taps are necessary to intercept and track terrorists using satellite phones.
> 
> NRO: How are judges hurting the war effort?
> 
> Kushner: My book documents how a federal judge sentenced an illegal alien convicted of smuggling heroin, later referred to the FBI for suspicions of terrorist links, to 30 months in jail, three years on probation, a 100-dollar special assessment, and 200 hours of community service. What sort of community service does a convicted heroin smuggler suspected of being a terrorist get? He was assigned to help out in the Queens Botanical Gardens.
> 
> Hey, I can't make this stuff up; it sound too much like a Mel Brooks movie, something that would damage the credibility of some involved in counterterrorism. Nevertheless, it clearly illustrates how liberal federal judges contribute to our war effort. They don't.
> 
> NRO: Folks like John Kerry claim we are no safer today post-Iraq war. Is that true?
> 
> Kushner: If the question refers to our involvement in Iraq, then the answer is "no" inasmuch as we have removed a despot who sponsored terrorism. The Bush administration should have made Iraq's well-known support of Middle Eastern terrorists of all stripes a major issue before the liberation of the Iraqi people. Focusing specifically on weapons of mass destruction was clearly a mistake because they haven't turned up. Rather, a free Iraq begins the process of removing all sponsors of terrorism aimed at the United States and her allies and changes the very fabric of the greater Middle East. This should have been presented to the American public right from the get-go.
> 
> If we go back, however, to 9/11 then I would agree that we are no safer today. And that's why I wrote Holy War. Why? Because for all the money we've spent in the past three years on "security," Americans are no safer. Government agencies are still sloppy, negligent, or worse. For years, liberal federal judges have been probating illegal aliens who are "known or suspected terrorists" back onto our streets. Khat, a drug worth billions of dollars a year, is being smuggled into this country by a Middle Eastern-African-British network, but no one is investigating it â â€ or its links to terrorism. The USCIS Asylum Offices get applications from Middle Easterners who testify to involvement with terrorism, but can't reject them because the FBI won't return their phone calls. Don't believe it? Sorry, my book has the documents to back up these strong assertions.
> 
> NRO: How can INS, such that it is, be fixed?
> 
> Kushner: The answer to this question is rather simple, it can't. No matter how many resources we devote to what is now INS, they won't be enough *unless we fix our will to deal with illegal aliens inside our country.* In other words, there has to be a concerted effort from the Bush administration right down to the public itself to get beyond the paralyzing effects of political correctness and crack down on illegal aliens. I'm not only referring to those that committed felons but to those who cross our borders without permission.
> 
> NRO: You write, "We need to "make sure that none of the 7 million ocean cargo containers coming to the United States contains a weapon of mass destruction." How is that even possible?
> 
> Kushner: We should not be put off by the numbers. There is still time to fix things. America is better at crash programs than any nation in the world. It's as simple as this: We need to quickly develop the technology to inspect ocean cargo containers. All it takes is money and sometimes that's no easy task.
> 
> NRO: Complaining about political correctness feels very knee-jerk right-wingy. But is it actually an obstacle in fighting the war on terrorism?
> 
> Kushner: It sure is [an obstacle in fighting the war]. As I stated in Holy War, "The only explanation as to why we continue to ignore the secret Islamic terror network in America is that the demands of political correctness have made us so afraid of being branded racists that we force ourselves to be color blind, identity blind, and gender blind till we end up, quite simply, totally blind."
> 
> As I discuss in my book, one of the problems with "profiling," a concept anathema to the PC police, is that liberals have made it almost impossible to use and as a consequence we aren't very good at it. One suburban New York police academy created a terrorist profile derived from the "Al Qaeda Training Manual." The latter is a fascinating document â â€ and frightening, considering the level of preparation it indicates. Unfortunately, [it's not] what's taught to rookies at the police academy in their manual titled "Terrorism: Awareness, Prevention." Response becomes sanitized by the PC police. As a result, police officers wind up looking for an armed American-looking type carrying a fake ID who lives in a first-floor apartment in the middle of a new complex or an old tenement, has no phones but new locks, and likes to draw and take pictures.
> 
> The 9/11 hijackers don't fit that profile. Terrorists like Khalid "Shaikh" Mohammed don't fit that profile. Neither does Osama bin Laden. In fact, except for being armed, the people it most fits are college kids below the drinking age.
> 
> This kind of training gives the street cop very little useful information, and most complain there is simply no way to know what job to do, or how to do it. The intuition his or her experience has bred is unnerved by conflicting social, political, and legal forces. He figures a Muslim terrorist might look Middle Eastern or Arabic, but he's told that thinking like that is profiling, and it's wrong.
> 
> NRO: How are we fighting the war on militant Islam with a Cold War mentality? Why are we?
> 
> Kushner: In the winter of 2004, as I was completing my research for Holy War, a former CIA agent with a direct pipeline to Homeland Security arranged for me to have a combined briefing from a group of federal security, intelligence, and law-enforcement agencies in Washington, D.C. My briefing group can be identified only as including career CIA officers who had worked inside Syria and Iran; a State Department officer previously stationed in the Middle East, now with the FBI; government-security experts; and several others with long experience in intelligence and foreign service. Also in attendance was a casually dressed Middle-Eastern man. He was special ops and knew terrorists. He had infiltrated their organizations; he had killed terrorists before they could strike innocents.
> 
> During our conversations it became clear that my hosts were hung up on the graying secular terrorist of the past, the ones the Soviets supported, not the al Qaeda I knew that could explode without notice. One assured me, "Significant inroads have been made into damaging al Qaeda. This is proved by the fact there hasn't been another 9/11-type attack."
> 
> My hosts also believed that every terrorist organization had a single "head," and eliminating that head would destroy the group's ability to harm us. The prime example was that killing Osama bin Laden would end al Qaeda and the war on terrorism.
> 
> *What my hosts did not understand was that al Qaeda has become more than itself. It is a "state of mind" that can give rise to the "lone wolf" terrorist who suddenly adopts the al Qaeda philosophy of jihad, for reasons of his own. That kind of terrorist is even harder to predict than the card-carrying member of the Soviet era because he will give almost no warning of his intent. Al Qaeda's most dangerous feature is this predisposition to be brought into militant Islam that can be triggered by exposure to something in a mosque, or on the Internet, or through media coverage of an event.*
> 
> It became crystal clear to me that my hosts, who were in a position to help shape the war on terrorism, were giving advice that was based on models of terrorist activities tied to the Cold War era. That's one frightening scenario, isn't it?
> 
> NRO: Should we be calling it the war on militant Islam instead of the war on terror? Less beating-around-the-bush?
> 
> Kushner: You bet. In point of fact, we are not at war with a variety of terrorist organizations active throughout the world. I don't mean to indicate, however, that I approve or condone such behavior. A terrorist by any other name is still a terrorist. The terrorists that pull triggers, plant bombs, and blast holes in the New York skyline all have the same thing in common â â€ they are simply terrorists.
> 
> I wrote Holy War to drive home the point that *we are at war with militant Islam,* not a concept like terrorism per se. A war against militant Islam is war against a tangible enemy we can defeat. We must also realize that battle against militant Islam is here in America. If we don't wake up to this, we could lose it all. That's why I wrote Holy War on the Home Front: The Secret Islamic Terror Network in the United States.
> 
> You can purchase Holy War on the Home Front: The Secret Islamic Terror Network in the United States via the NR Book Service here or through Amazon.com here.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/interrogatory/kushner200502070740.asp


----------



## a_majoor

Stability OPs for the long term



> *Go-Go Iraq*
> Democracy works.
> 
> By Derek Reveron
> 
> President George W. Bush continues to insist that ending tyranny in the world is in the national interest â â€ a notable goal. Democracy is superior to other forms of governance and promoting democracy is the right and good thing to do. In his State of the Union address last week, the president said:
> 
> Our aim is to build and preserve a community of free and independent nations, with governments that answer to their citizens, and reflect their own cultures. And because democracies respect their own people and their neighbors, the advance of freedom will lead to peace.
> 
> Democracy is desired not only for the peace it brings (democracies do not militarily fight one another), but because President Bush thinks it is the best political arrangement between a government and a people. He not only has U.S. diplomatic history on his side, but also a large body of empirical evidence that says good governance brings stability, prosperity, and peace.
> 
> The emphasis placed on democracy promotion is not new for President Bush or the U.S. In his 2002 National Security Strategy, President Bush gave primacy to human dignity:
> 
> These values of freedom are right and true for every person, in every society â â€ and the duty of protecting these values against their enemies is the common calling of freedom-loving people across the globe and across the ages.
> 
> Democracy promotion has been a part of U.S. foreign policy for decades. During the Cold War, democracy was promoted as an alternative to Communism. It wasn't simply enough to militarily oppose Communism as we did in various parts of the world, but a viable alternative had to be presented to fledgling states after World War II. Through political and economic liberalization policies, the United States created a community of democratic nations â â€ a community that does not wage war against its members, benefits from international trade, and draws upon each other in times of crisis.
> 
> For democracy promotion to be successful, timing matters. When Gorbachev released the Soviet grip on Central and Eastern Europe, American foreign-policy actors were presented with an opportunity to support advocates for open societies. President H. W. Bush responded with legislation to give former Warsaw Pact members and Soviet states the necessary assistance to navigate through the dangers of democratic transition. Fifteen years later, results are mixed in the region (Hungary vs. Belarus), but generally favor democracy. The important lesson from the region is that democratic transition is risky, but once consolidated, democracies are very stable.
> 
> Under the Clinton administration, democracy promotion as a foreign policy goal was institutionalized and was furthered by President George W. Bush. This dimension of U.S. policy echoes Pericles of Athens who said in 431 BC,
> 
> Our form of government does not enter into rivalry with the institutions of others. We do not copy our neighbors, but are an example to them
> 
> .
> 
> President Bush said as much last Wednesday night and challenged America's friends and allies to fight the common threat of terror and encourage a higher standard of freedom. The United States does not intend to impose American democracy on the world. Those that insist U.S. policies of political imperialism underlie the Administration's efforts should only look at how democracy was promoted in Afghanistan and Iraq. Two very different approaches to democracy were used in two very different places. A Loya Jirga was convened to launch Afghan democratization. Or the Iraqi legislature was elected by voting for party lists, not individual candidates as in the United States. The United States is flexible enough and experienced enough with democracy to guide democratization in a way that it will take root according to local conditions.
> 
> For those that are skeptical of democracy promotion and its motive, know that social-science research supports it. Good governance matters.
> 
> For the last several years, researchers sponsored by the CIA have been attempting to understand why some countries are consistently stable, prosperous, and democratic, and other countries are plagued by revolution, poverty, and authoritarianism. Driving the CIA's inquiry is to understand why some states fail, so the U.S. government can preempt the humanitarian disasters or civil wars that accompany state collapse. The Political Instability Task Force (formerly known as the State Failure Project) identified that economic, ethnic, and regional effects have just a modest impact on a country's risk for political instability. The most important factor is the type of government. Democracies are more resilient than other forms of government (this characteristic is explored in detail by Jack Goldstone and Jay Ulfelder in The Washington Quarterly).
> 
> Though it was popular in the 1990s to characterize various conflicts as a clash of civilizations, bad governments are to blame for instability and violence, not ethnicity. The Political Instability Task Force's findings suggest nationalist leader Milosevic's politics are more responsible for genocide in Bosnia-Hercegovina, not a historic animosity emanating from the 14th century battle at Kosovo Polje or any civilizational fault line. It was the kleptocratic regime of Mobutu Sese Seko in Kinshasa that inspired a revolution in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo). And it was decades-long Indonesian repression in East Timor that led to that province becoming the first independent country of the 21st century. These regimes could not deal with the pressures created by social, economic, and political challenges.
> 
> The key to maintaining stability and peace appears to lie in democratic institutions. Democracy promotes open competition of ideas, channels dissent into peaceful discourse, and constrains power-hungry tendencies (Recall Madison: If men were angels government wouldn't be necessary). Democracy provides for the peaceful resolution of conflict. Without the means to express grievances, violence will likely occur and authoritarian governments will fail.
> 
> Data shouldn't necessarily drive policy choices, but there is clear evidence to support President Bush's efforts to energize democracy promotion. Bad governance in Iraq kept Iraqis impoverished, vulnerable, and afraid. Supporters and detractors of the war agree on that. When we forget that, we should remember the name of the military operation's name: Iraqi Freedom. Though WMDs were the rationale for war, the military campaign has been about freedom since day one. And when the mission is accomplished and Iraqis are free, the world will not only be a better place without the Iraqi dictator, but because there is another democracy in the world.
> 
> â â€ Derek Reveron is the editor of America's Viceroys: the Military and U.S. Foreign Policy, associate professor of national-security affairs at the Naval War College, and a former intelligence analyst for the FBI.


  	 





  	
http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/reveron200502090752.asp


----------



## Kirkhill

It seems to me that, as far as the Forces are concerned and their role on this war, after they have secured the domestic sanctuary that stability revolves around Strategic offence, Operational defence and Tactical Aggressive defence.

In other words the ability to project force at long range to secured UNcontested ground (Strategic Offence), create sanctuaries where the INNOCENT and/or VICTIMS can find refuge (Operational defence) and then defend the sanctuaries with the usual combinations of prepared defences, mutual support and Offensive Action in the form of agressive patrols of the region around the sanctuary.

Perhaps Yugoslavia but with political will.


----------



## a_majoor

Some more thoughts on long term stability ops



> *Why Democracy?*
> Ten reasons to support democracy in the Middle East.
> 
> Neoconservatives hope that a democratic Iraq and Afghanistan can usher in a new age of Middle Eastern consensual government that will cool down a century-old cauldron of hatred. Realists counter that democratic roots will surely starve in sterile Middle East soil, and it is a waste of time to play Wilsonian games with a people full of anti-American hatred who display only ingratitude for the huge investment of American lives and treasure spent on their freedom. Paleoconservatives prefer to spend our treasure here at home, while liberals oppose anything that is remotely connected with George W. Bush or refutes their own utopian notions of a world to be adjudicated by a paternal United Nations. All rightly fear demonocracy â â€ the Arafat or Iranian unconstitutional formula of "one vote, one time."
> 
> Yet for all its uncertainties and dangers in the Islamic Arab world, there remain some undeniable facts about democracy across time and space that suggest with effort and sacrifice it can both work in the Middle East and will be in the long-term security interests of the United States. So why exactly should we support the daunting task of democratizing the Middle East and how is it possible?
> 
> 1. It is widely said that democracies rarely attack other democracies. Thus the more that exist in the world â â€ and at no time in history have there been more such governments than today â â€ the less likely is war itself. That cliché proves, in fact, mostly true. There are gray areas of course in such blanket generalizations: The Confederates, British, Boers, and Prussians all had parliaments of sorts, but were clearly not as democratic as their adversaries in 1861, 1812, 1899, and 1914. While modern forms of democracy are sometimes hard to define, we more or less know them when we see them: *All citizens are eligible to vote and hold office, a free press flourishes, and the rule of constitutional law trumps fiat.* Thus should Iraq become a true constitutional government, it is less likely to invade a Kuwait, pay subsidies to suicide murderers, send missiles into Israel and Saudi Arabia, or gas its own people.
> 
> 2. More often than not, democracies arise through violence â â€ either by threat of force or after war with all the incumbent detritus of humiliation, impoverishment, and revolution. The shame of the Falklands debacle brought down the Argentine dictatorship in the same manner that Portugal's imperial disasters in Africa steered it from fascism to republicanism. Japan, Germany, and Italy arose from the ashes of war, as did South Korea and in a sense Taiwan as well.
> 
> Most likely Ronald Reagan's arms build-up of the 1980s bankrupted the Soviet Empire and freed both its "republics" and the enslaved states of Eastern Europe. So the birth pangs of democracy are often violent, and we should pay little attention to critics who clamor that the United States cannot prompt reform through regime change. *Instead, let skeptical Americans (who were not given their own liberty through debate) adduce evidence that freedom is usually a result of mere petition or always indigenous.* Even the Philippines and South Africa were the dividends of diplomatic strong-arming, the cessation of U.S. support, and veiled threats that continued autocracy would lead to disaster.
> 
> 3. Democracies are more likely to be internally stable, inasmuch as they allow people to take credit and accept blame for their own predicaments. They keep their word, or as Woodrow Wilson once put it, "A steadfast concert for peace can never be maintained except by a partnership of democratic nations."
> 
> A Hitler, Mussolini, shah, or Pinochet can hijack for a time weak democracies, but they offered no real improvement and only led the people to disaster. Some in desperation talk of the need for a "good" Saddam-like strongman to knock a few heads in the Sunni Triangle â â€ but that vestigial idea from the Cold War would only bring a few months or years of stability at the price of decades of unrest. Sooner or later every people has a rendezvous with freedom.
> 
> 4. The democratic idea is contagious. We once worried about the negative Communist domino theory, but the real chain reaction has always been the positive explosion of democracy. Once Epaminondas curbed Spartan autocracy, suddenly Mantinea, Megalopolis, and Messenia went democratic and the entire Peloponnese began to adopt consensual governments. When Portugal and Spain flipped, it had an enormous positive effect on moving change forward in the Spanish-speaking world of Latin America â â€ as liberty spread, once-right-wing Chile and left-wing Nicaragua were freed. The Soviet republics and Eastern European satellites without much warning imploded in succession â â€ more quickly even than the Russians had once enslaved them in the late 1940s.
> 
> It is not a neocon pipedream, but historically plausible that a democratic Israel, Palestine, Turkey, Afghanistan, and Iraq can create momentum that Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, and eventually even a Syria or Iran would find hard to resist. Saudi Arabia's ballyhooed liberalization, Mubarak's unease about his successor, Libya's strange antics, Pakistan's revelation about nuclear commerce, and the Gulf States' talk of parliaments did not happen in a vacuum, but are rumblings that follow from fears of voters in Afghanistan and Iraq â â€ and a Mullah Omar dethroned and Saddam's clan either dead or in chains.
> 
> 5. *In the case of the Muslim world, there is nothing inherently incompatible between Islam and democracy.* Witness millions in India, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Turkey who vote. Such liberal venting may well explain why those who blow up Americans are rarely Indian or Turkish Muslims, but more likely Saudis or Egyptians. The trick is now to show that Arab Muslims can establish democracy, and thus the Palestine and Iraq experiments are critical to the entire region.
> 
> 6. *Democracy brings moral clarity and cures deluded populaces of their false grievances and exaggerated hurts.* The problem in the Middle East is the depressing relationship between autocracies and Islamists: Illiberal governments fault the Americans and Jews for their own failure. Thus in lieu of reform, strongmen deflect popular frustration by allowing the Wahhabis, al Qaedists, and other terrorists to use their state-controlled media likewise to blame us rather than a Mubarak, Saudi Royal Family, or Saddam Hussein. Yet j*ust as crowded Germans today do not talk of the need for lebensraum and resource-less Japanese have dropped dreams of a Greater Co-Prosperity Sphere, so too a democratic Middle East will more likely look inward at tribalism, patriarchy, fundamentalism, religious intolerance, and polygamy rather than automatically at Israel and the United States when their airliners crash or a car bomb goes off.*
> 
> 7. We fret rightly about the spread of weapons of mass destruction. But the truth is that we worry mainly about nukes in the hands of autocracies like China, Iran, or North Korea. No American loses sleep that the UK or France has deadly missiles. A Russia that used to paralyze American foreign policy by virtue of it atomic arsenal poses little threat as long as President Putin can be persuaded not to destroy his consensual government. We should of course try to keep the number of nuclear nations static. Yet the next-best course is to ensure that Pakistan or China can evolve into free societies, and hope that should Iran obtain such weapons, its mullahs can be overthrown and their successors can follow the course of a South Africa whose new democracy dismantled its inherited arsenal. We cannot expect a successful democratic Germany or Japan to sit back and watch criminal states like Iran and North Korea go nuclear without expecting them to do the same â â€ thus the need now to support democratic agitation in Tehran and elsewhere.
> 
> 8. The promotion of democracy abroad by democracy at home is internally consistent and empowers rather than embarrasses a sponsoring consensual society. *All sensible Europeans and Americans eventually ask themselves why freedom is fine for us but not for others. *And if the novel orthodoxy of the post-Cold War era demanded that democracies must cease their support for rightist thugs, the subsequent wisdom is that they should be even more muscular, actively supporting democratic change rather than postfacto politely clapping after its establishment.
> 
> 9. By promoting democracies, Americans can at last come to a reckoning with the Cold War. If it was wrong then to back a shah or Saudi Royal family ("keep the oil flowing and the Commies out") or to abandon Afghanistan after repelling the Soviets, it is surely right now not to repeat the error of realpolitik â â€ especially when there is no longer the understandable excuse of having thousands of Soviet nuclear weapons pointing at the heart of America. Since 1946 the United States has had to check the Soviet Union, attempt to save millions from its state slavery, and then liberate its subjects. That messy and brutal task is mostly accomplished, and now we can at least attempt to provide freedom to those states in the past we once neglected.
> 
> 10. Like it or not, a growing consensus has emerged that consumer capitalism and democracy are the only ways to organize society. We are not at the end of history yet â â€ wars and revolutions may well plague us for decades. But if we cannot achieve universal democracy, we can at least get near enough to envision it. I doubt whether George Bush's vision of ending tyranny in our lifetime is possible, but he is to be congratulated for grasping that in our lifetime most of the world agrees that it should be. The Arab world so far has missed the bus of history. The success of democratic reform in parts of Africa, Latin America, and Asia is a daily reminder of the decades lost in the Middle East, and how endemic Arab envy, jealousy, and excuses â â€ which so repel or bore the world â â€ can be ameliorated only by a new maturity and responsibility that are the wages of democratic government.
> 
> Democracy is not faultless. *The Left sees it as selfish individualism at the expense of equality of result â â€ a desired egalitarianism that can only be achieved by undemocratic government coercion. The extreme Right at best sees democracy as a devolving concept of dumbing society down to its lowest common element â â€ Plato's notion that eventually even the animals would be given equality â â€ as a prelude to the rule of the rabble.*
> 
> In response, our politicians and pundits constantly try to fine-tune democracy, to tinker with voting, redistribute wealth, turn to legislative plebiscites, gerrymander, and use the courts to trump popular sovereignty. Ancient political thinkers likewise bickered in their definition of democracy, and provided unworkable typologies that ranged from oligarchic republicanism to mob rule.
> 
> Democracy was not our first, but rather out last choice in the Middle East. For decades we have promoted Cold War realpolitik and supported thugs whose merit was simply that they were not as bad as a murderous Saddam or Assad (true enough), while the Arab world has gone from kings and dictators to Soviet puppets, Pan-Arabists, Islamists, and theocrats. Democracy in some sense is the last chance. It alone offers constitutional guarantees of free speech, minority rights, and an independent judiciary â â€ a framework, a system, a paradigm in which naturally savage humans, prone to all sorts of awful things, as the 20th century attests, can somehow get along. Given the savagery of the modern Middle East that would say quite a lot.
> 
> â â€ Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson200502110738.asp


----------



## a_majoor

Identifying players and preparing for the end game



> *Watersheds*
> We live in a time of democratic revolution.
> 
> Has there ever been a more dramatic moment than this one? The Middle East is boiling, as the failed tyrants scramble to come to terms with the political tsunami unleashed on Afghanistan and Iraq. The power of democratic revolution can be seen in every country in the region. Even the Saudi royal family has had to stage a farcical "election." But this first halting step has fooled no one. Only males could vote, no political parties were permitted, and only the Wahhabi establishment was permitted to organize. The results will not satisfy any serious person. As Iraq constitutes a new, representative government, and wave after wave of elections sweep through the region, even the Saudis will have to submit to the freely expressed desires of their people.
> 
> The tidal wave has even reached into the planet's darkest corners, most recently shaking the foundations of the North Korean hermit kingdom. A new leader is announced at the same time the monsters in Pyongyang whisper "We've got nukes" and demand legitimacy from George W. Bush. Given the opacity of the country, and the irrationality of its leaders, nobody seems to know whether the Dear Leader is still alive, or, if he is, why the transition has been proclaimed. But the North Koreans, as tyrants everywhere on the planet, are acting like a regime no longer confident in its own legitimacy. Notice that the world's longest-running dictator, old man Castro, is conjuring up the illusion of American assassination teams planning the murder of his buddy in Venezuela, even as Fidel promises death to anyone who has the nerve to propose popular validation of his own failed tyranny. Such is the drama of our time.
> 
> Free elections do not solve all problems. The fascist tyrants of the last century were enormously popular, and won huge electoral victories; Stalin was truly loved by millions of oppressed Soviets; and fanatics might win an election today in some unhappy lands. But this is a revolutionary moment, we are unexpectedly blessed with a revolutionary president, and very few peoples will freely support a new dictatorship, even one that claims Divine Right.
> 
> But the wheel turns, as ever. Such moments are transient, and if they are not seized, they will pass, leaving the bitter aftertaste of failure in dry mouths and throttled throats. The world looks to us for more action, not just brave words, and we must understand both the quality of this moment and the revolutionary strategy we need to adopt to ensure that the revolution succeeds. Above all, we must applaud those who got it right, starting with the president, and discard the advice of those who got it wrong, including some of our "professional experts."
> 
> The two great elections of recent months were held in Iraq and Ukraine. In both cases, the conventional wisdom was wrong. The conventional wisdom embraced the elitist notion that neither the Ukrainians nor the Iraqis were "ready" for democracy, because they lacked one or another component of the so-called requirements for a free society. Their alleged limitations ranged from historical tradition and internal conflicts to a lack of education and culture and insufficient internal "stability." How I hate the word stability! Is it not the antithesis of everything we stand for? We are the embodiment of revolutionary change, at home and abroad. Most of the time, those who deplore a lack of stability are in reality apologizing for dictators, and selling out great masses of people who wish to be free. And even as those un-American apologists invoke stability, we, as the incarnation of democratic capitalism, are unleashing creative destruction in all directions, sending once-great corporations to history's garbage heap, voting once-glorious leaders into early retirement, and inspiring people everywhere to seek their own happiness by asserting their right to be free.
> 
> The Ukrainians are now in control, but the Iraqis still have to contend with the discredited meddlers and schemers who never believed in their democracy, and still seek to place failed puppets in positions of power in Baghdad. Anyone who reads the dozens of blogs from Iraq â â€ which express a wide range of political opinion â â€ must surely see that the Allawi interregnum has failed. The results of the election speak clearly: The Allawi list was outvoted five to one by its major opponents, even though Allawi commanded a treasure chest vastly greater than that of the others. Ambassador Negroponte, Secretary of State Rice, and DCI Goss should tell their "experts" to admit error, and cease their efforts to install a president and prime minister who reflect the consensus of Foggy Bottom rather than the will of the Iraqi people. If they persist in attempting to dictate the makeup of the new Iraqi government, and continue to meddle in the drafting of the new Iraqi constitution, they will turn the majority of Iraqis against us. Despite countless errors of judgment and commission, we have, for the moment at least, won a glorious victory. We should be smart enough, and modest enough, to accept it.
> 
> *This glorious victory is due in large part to the truly heroic performance of our armed forces, most recently in that great turning point, the battle of Fallujah. Our victory in Fallujah has had enormous consequences, first of all because the information we gathered there has made it possible to capture or kill considerable numbers of terrorists and their leaders. It also sent a chill through the spinal column of the terror network, because it exposed the lie at the heart of their global recruitment campaign. As captured terrorists have told the region on Iraqi television and radio, they signed up for jihad because they had been told that the anti-American crusade in Iraq was a great success, and they wanted to participate in the slaughter of the Jews, crusaders, and infidels. But when they got to Iraq â â€ and discovered that the terrorist leaders immediately confiscated their travel documents so that they could not escape their terrible destiny â â€ they saw that the opposite was true. The slaughter â â€ of which Fallujah was the inescapable proof â â€ was that of the jihadists at the hands of the joint coalition and Iraqi forces.
> 
> Thirdly, the brilliant maneuvers of the Army and Marine forces in Fallujah produced strategic surprise. The terrorists expected an attack from the south, and when we suddenly smashed into the heart of the city from the north, they panicked and ran, leaving behind a treasure trove of information, subsequently augmented by newly cooperative would-be martyrs. Above all, the intelligence from Fallujah â â€ and I have this from military people recently returned from the city â â€ documented in enormous detail the massive involvement of the governments of Syria and Iran in the terror war in Iraq. And the high proportion of Saudi "recruits" among the jihadists leaves little doubt that the folks in Riyadh are, at a minimum, not doing much to stop the flow of fanatical Wahhabis from the south.*
> 
> Thus, the great force of the democratic revolution is now in collision with the firmly rooted tyrannical objects in Tehran, Damascus, and Riyadh. In one of history's fine little ironies, the "Arab street," long considered our mortal enemy, now threatens Muslim tyrants, and yearns for support from us. That is our immediate task.
> 
> It would be an error of enormous proportions if, on the verge of a revolutionary transformation of the Middle East, we backed away from this historic mission. It would be doubly tragic if we did it because of one of two possible failures of vision: insisting on focusing on Iraq alone, and viewing military power as the prime element in our revolutionary strategy. Revolution often comes from the barrel of a gun, but not always.* Having demonstrated our military might, we must now employ our political artillery against the surviving terror masters. The great political battlefield in the Middle East is, as it has been all along, Iran, the mother of modern terrorism, the creator of Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad, and the prime mover of Hamas. When the murderous mullahs fall in Tehran, the terror network will splinter into its component parts, and the jihadist doctrine will be exposed as the embodiment of failed lies and misguided messianism.
> *
> The instrument of their destruction is democratic revolution, not war, and the first salvo in the political battle of Iran is national referendum. Let the Iranian people express their desires in the simplest way possible: "Do you want an Islamic republic?" Send Lech Walesa and Vaclav Havel to supervise the vote. Let the contending parties compete openly and freely, let newspapers publish, let radios and televisions broadcast, fully supported by the free nations. If the mullahs accept this gauntlet, I have every confidence that Iran will be on the path to freedom within months. If, fearing a massive rejection from their own people, the tyrants of Tehran reject a free referendum and reassert their repression, then the free nations will know it is time to deploy the full panoply of pressure to enable the Iranians to gain their freedom.
> 
> The time is now. Faster, please.
> 
> â â€ Michael Ledeen, an NRO contributing editor, is most recently the author of The War Against the Terror Masters. He is resident scholar in the Freedom Chair at the American Enterprise Institute.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/ledeen/ledeen200502140945.asp


----------



## a_majoor

The MSM perspective, explained?



> *Merchants of Despair*
> Sort of for the war, sort of...
> 
> 
> Much of the recent domestic critique of American efforts in the Middle East has long roots in our own past â â€ and little to do with the historic developments on the ground in Iraq
> 
> 1. "It's America's fault."
> 
> Some on the hard left sought to cite our support for Israel or general "American imperialism" in the Middle East as culpable for bin Laden's wrath on September 11. Past American efforts to save Muslims in Kosovo, Bosnia, Somalia, Kuwait, and Afghanistan counted for little. Even less thanks were earned by billions of dollars given to Egypt, Jordan, and the Palestinian Authority. *The Islamofascist vision of a Dark Age world run by unelected imams â â€ where women were in seclusion, homosexuals were killed, Jews were terrorized, Christians were routed, and freedom was squelched â â€ registered little, even though such visions were by definition at war with all that Western liberalism stands for.*
> 
> This flawed idea that autocrats supposedly hate democracy more for what it does rather than for what it represents is not new. On the eve of World War II isolationists on the right insisted that America had treated Germany unfairly after World War I and wrongly sided with British imperialism in its efforts to rub in their past defeat. "International Jewry" was blamed for poisoning the good will between the two otherwise friendly countries by demanding punitive measures from a victimized Germany. Likewise, poor Japan was supposedly unfairly cut off from American ore and petroleum, and hemmed in by provocative Anglo Americans.
> 
> By the late 1940s things had changed, and now it was the turn of the old Left, which blamed "fascists" for ruining the hallowed American-Soviet wartime alliance by "isolating" and "surrounding" the Russians with hostile bases and allies. The same was supposedly true of China: We were lectured ad nauseam by idealists and "China hands" that Mao "really" wanted to cultivate American friendship, but was spurned by our right-wing ideologues â â€ as if there were nothing of the absolutism and innate thuggery in him that would soon account for 50 million or more murdered and starved.
> 
> Ditto the animosity from dictators like Ho Chi Minh and Fidel Castro. The Left assured us instead that both were actually neo-Jeffersonians whose olive branches were crushed by Cold Warriors, and who then â â€ but only then â â€ went on to plan their own gulags in Vietnam and Cuba.
> 
> 2. "Americans are weak."
> 
> Before we went into Afghanistan, we were hectored that the country's fierce people, colonial history, rugged terrain, hostile neighbors, foreign religion, and shattered infrastructure made victory unlikely. *We also forget now how the Left warned us of terrible casualties and millions of refugees before the Iraq war, and then went dormant until the insurgents emerged. At that point it resurfaced to assure that Iraq was lost and precipitate withdrawal our only hope, only to grow quiet again after the recent Iraqi election* â â€ a cycle that followed about the same 20-month timetable of military victory to voting in Afghanistan.
> 
> *Now a new geopolitical litany has arisen: The reserves are "shattered"; North Korea, Syria, and Iran are untouchable while we are "bogged down" in the Sunni Triangle; a schedule for withdrawal from Iraq needs to be spelled out; there is no real American-trained Iraqi army; the entire Arab world hates us; blah, blah, blah...* (_interjection by me; this is not to say there are serious issues involved with attempts to deal with Syria, Iran etc._)
> 
> In 1917, "a million men over there" was considered preposterous for a Potemkin American Expeditionary Force; by late 1918 it was chasing Germany out of Belgium. Charles Lindbergh returned from an obsequious visitation with Goering to warn us that the Luftwaffe was unstoppable. Four years later it was in shambles as four-engine American bombers reduced the Third Reich to ashes.
> 
> Japanese Zeroes, supposed proof of comparative American backwardness in 1941-2, were the easy targets of "Turkey Shoots" by 1944 as American fighters blew them out of the skies. Sputnik "proved" how far we were behind the socialist workhorse in Russia, even as we easily went to the moon first a little over a decade later. The history of the American military and economy in the 20th century is one of being habitually underestimated, even as the United States defeated Prussian imperialism, German Nazism, Italian fascism, Japanese militarism, and Stalinist Communism.
> 
> Nor in our more recent peacetime were we buried by stagflation, Jimmy Carter's "malaise," Japan, Inc., and all the other supposed bogeymen that were prophesized to overwhelm the institutional strength of the American state, its free-enterprise system, and the highly innovative and individualistic nature of the American people.
> 
> 3. "They are supermen."
> 
> When suicide murderers dominated the news of the Intifada, followed by the car bombers and beheaders of the Sunni Triangle, many in the West despaired that there was no thwarting such fanatics. Perhaps they simply believed more in their cause than we did in ours. How can you stop someone who kills to die rather than merely dying to kill?
> 
> *That Ariel Sharon in two years defeated the Intifada by decapitating the Hamas leadership, starting the fence, announcing withdrawal from Gaza, and humiliating Arafat was forgotten. In the same manner few now write or think about how the United States military went into the heart of darkness in Fallujah and simply destroyed or routed the insurgents of that fundamentalist stronghold in less than two weeks, an historic operation that ensured a successful turnout on election day and an eventual takeover by an elected Iraqi government. *
> 
> So this paradox of exaggerating the strength of our weaker enemies is likewise an American trademark. Spiked-helmeted Prussians were considered vicious pros who would make short work of doughboy hicks who had trained with brooms and sticks. Indeed, the German imperial army of World War I may have been made up of the most formidable foot soldiers of any age. Still, it was destroyed in less than four years by supposedly decadent and corrupt liberal democracies.
> 
> The Gestapo was the vanguard of a new Aryan super-race, pitiless and proud in its martial superiority. How could soda-jockeys of the Depression ever fight something like the Waffen SS with poor equipment, little training, and a happy-go-lucky attitude rather than an engrained death wish? Rather easily as it turned out, as the Allies not only defeated Nazism but literally annihilated it in about five years. Kamikazes were also felt to be otherworldly in their eerie death cult â â€ who, after all, in the United States would take off to ram his Corsair or Hellcat into a Japanese ship? No matter â â€ the U.S. Navy, Marines, and Army Air Corps were not impressed, and rather quickly destroyed not merely the death pilots but the very culture that launched them.
> 
> 4. "We are alone."
> 
> George Bush was said to have alienated the world, *as if our friends in Eastern Europe, Britain, Australia, and a billion in India did not matter.* Yet the same was said in 1941 when Latin America, Asia, and Africa were in thrall to the Axis. Neutrals like Spain, Argentina, and Turkey wanted little to do with a disarmed United States that had unwisely found itself in a two-front war with the world's most formidable military powers.
> 
> By the 1950s we seemed to have defeated Germany and Japan only to have subsequently "lost" China and Eastern Europe once more. Much of Asia and Latin America deified the mass-murdering Stalin and Mao while deriding elected American presidents. The Richard Clarks and Joe Wilsons of that age lectured about a paranoid Eisenhower administration, clumsy CIA work, and the general hopelessness of ever defeating global Communism, whose spores sprouted almost everywhere in the form of Nasserism, Pan-Arabism, Baathism, Castroism, and various "national liberationist" movements. (_interjection by me: many of these movements are fascist in nature. This is no accident or surprise; NAZI is the contraction of National *Socialism*. Remember that next time someone says NAZIs are "right wing_.)
> 
> 5. Why?
> 
> Why do Americans do all this to themselves? In part, the nature of an open society is constant self-critique, especially at times of national elections. Our successes at creating an affluent and free citizenry also only raise the bar ever higher as we sense we are closer to heaven on earth â â€ and with a little more perfection could walk more like gods than crawl as mere men.
> 
> *There are also still others among us who are impatient with the give and take of a consensual society. They harbor a secret admiration for the single-mindedness of the zealot in pursuit of a utopian cause â â€ hence the occasional crazy applause given by some Americans to the beheading "Minutemen" of the Sunni Triangle or the "brave" "combat teams" who killed 3,000 on September 11. *
> 
> *Finally, the intellectual class that we often read and hear from is increasingly divorced from much of what makes America work, especially the sort of folk who join the military. * They have little appreciation that the U.S. Marine Corps is far more deadly than Baathist diehards or Taliban remnants â â€ or that a fleet of American bombers with GPS bombs can do more damage in a few seconds than most of the suicide bombers of the Middle East could do in a year.
> 
> It is wise to cite and publicize our errors â â€ and there have been many in this war. Humility and circumspection are military assets as well. And we should not deprecate the danger of our enemies, who are cruel and ingenious. Moreover, we should never confuse the sharp dissent of the well-meaning critic with disloyalty to the cause.
> 
> But nor should we fall into pessimism, when in less than four years we have destroyed the two worst regimes in the Middle East, scattered al Qaeda, avoided another promised 9/11 at home, and sent shock waves of democracy throughout the Arab world â â€ so far at an aggregate cost of less than what was incurred on the first day of this unprovoked war. Car bombs are bad news, but in the shadows is the real story: The terrorists are losing, and radical reform, the likes of which millions have never seen, is right on the horizon. So this American gloominess is not new. Yet, if the past is any guide, our present lack of optimism in this struggle presages its ultimate success.
> 
> *A final prediction: By the end of this year, formerly critical liberal pundits, backsliding conservative columnists, once-fiery politicians, Arab "moderates," ex-statesmen and generals emeriti, smug stand-up comedians, recently strident Euros â â€ perhaps even Hillary herself â â€ will quietly come to a consensus that what we are witnessing from Afghanistan and the West Bank to Iraq and beyond, with its growing tremors in Lebanon, Libya, Egypt, and the Gulf, is a moral awakening, a radical break with an ugly past that threatens a corrupt, entrenched, and autocratic elite and is just the sort of thing that they were sort of for, sort of all along â â€ sort of...*
> 
> â â€ Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson200502250748.asp


----------



## a_majoor

Language as a weapon of war

Since this is primaraly a war of ideas and opposing idiologies, we need to be much more careful in how we speak of this:



> *Terror and the English Language*
> Making use of a chief weapon.
> 
> The long, twilight struggle against Islamo-fascism requires Civilization to deploy numerous weapons against this implacable foe. As usual, these will include intelligence, covert operations, and high-tech armaments. But another vital tool is language. How Americans and our allies speak and write about this conflict will influence when and how victory will come.
> 
> We now face the most anti-Semitic enemy since Adolf Hitler and Josef Goebbels blew their brains out in Berlin in 1945.
> 
> Militant Islam is the most bloodthirsty ideology since the Khmer Rouge exterminated one-third of Cambodia's people. The big difference, of course, is that Pol Pot had the good manners to keep his killing fields within his own borders, as awful as that was.
> 
> Islamo-fascism, in contrast, is a worldwide phenomenon that already has touched this country and many of our allies. And yet Muslim extremists rarely have armies we can see, fighter jets we can knock from the sky, nor an easily identifiable headquarters, such as the Reich's Chancellery of the 1940s or the Kremlin of the Cold War.
> 
> While basketball players and their fans battle each other on TV, actresses suffer wardrobe malfunctions, and rap singers scream sweet nothings in our ears, it's very easy to forget that Islamic extremists plot daily to end all of that and more by killing as many of us as possible.
> 
> Language can lull Americans to sleep in this new war, or it can keep us on the offense and our enemies off balance.
> 
> Here are a few ways language can keep Americans alert to the danger Islamic terrorism poses to this country:
> 
> *September 11 was an attack, not just a string of coincidental strokes and heart failures that eliminated thousands of victims at once.*
> 
> Recall some of the words that soon followed the September 11 atrocity. Kinko's stores, for instance, installed placed with the Stars and Stripes emblazoned across the lower 48 states. That graphic included this regrettable caption:
> 
> "The Kinko's family extends our condolences and sympathies to all Americans who have been affected by the circumstances in New York City, Washington, D.C. and Pennsylvania."
> 
> Circumstances? That word describes an electrical blackout, not terrorist bloodshed.
> 
> Similarly, September 11 was tragic, but far more, too. "The September 11 tragedy" misses the point: Tornadoes cause tragedies, but they are not malicious, as America's enemies were that day, and still are.
> 
> Victims of terrorism do not "die," nor are they "lost." They are killed, murdered, and slaughtered.
> 
> Likewise, many say that people "died" in the Twin Towers and at the Pentagon. No, people "die" in hospitals, often surrounded by their loved ones while doctors and nurses offer them aid and comfort.
> 
> *The innocent people at the World Trade Center, the Defense Department, and that field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, were killed in a carefully choreographed act of mass murder.*
> 
> *Specify the number of human beings who terrorists destroy.*
> 
> â â€ "3,000" killed on 9-11 sounds like an amorphous blob. The actual number â â€ 2,977 â â€ forces people to regard these individuals as men and women with faces, stories, and loved ones who miss them very much.
> 
> â â€ The precise figures are 2,749 killed at the World Trade Center, 184 at the Pentagon, and 44 in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
> 
> â â€ Likewise, the Bali disco bombings killed 202 people, mainly Australians.
> 
> â â€ The Madrid train bombings killed 191 men, women, and children.
> 
> Somehow, a total of 191 people killed by al Qaeda's Spanish franchisees seems more ominous and concrete than a smoothly rounded "200."
> 
> Terrorists do not simply "threaten" us, nor does homeland security merely shield Americans from "future attacks." These things are true, but it is more persuasive to acknowledge what these people have done and hope to do once more: Wipe us out.
> 
> House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner (R ., Wis.), said this on the November 28 NBC Nightly News:
> 
> *"We need to tighten up our drivers license provisions and our immigration laws so that terrorists cannot take advantage of the present system to kill thousands of Americans again."
> 
> That is a perfect sound bite. There is no amorphous talk about "the terrorist threat" or "stopping further attacks." Sensenbrenner concisely explained exactly what is at risk, and what needs to be thwarted:*
> 
> No more killing of Americans, by the thousands, again.
> 
> Quote Islamo-fascist leaders to remind people of their true intentions.
> President Bush, Heritage Foundation chief Ed Feulner, or I could explain how deadly militant Islam is and how seriously we should consider this toxic philosophy. Far more impressive, however, is to let these extremists do the talking. And yet their words are nowhere as commonly known as they should be:
> 
> *â â€ As Osama bin Laden and Ayman al Zawahiri said in their 1998 declaration of war on the United States:
> 
> "The ruling to kill all Americans and their allies â â€ civilian and military â â€ is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it."
> *
> *â â€ As the late Iranian dictator, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, stated in 1980:
> 
> "Our struggle is not about land or water...It is about bringing, by force if necessary, the whole of mankind onto the right path."*
> 
> â â€ Khomeini, ever the comedian, said this in 1986: "Allah did not create man so that he could have fun. The aim of creation was for mankind to be put to the test through hardship and prayer. An Islamic regime must be serious in every field. There are no jokes in Islam. There is no humor in Islam. There is no fun in Islam. There can be no fun and joy in whatever is serious."
> 
> â â€ Asked what he would say to the loved ones of the 202 people killed in the October 2002 Bali nightclub explosions, Abu Bakar Bashir, the al-Qaeda-tied leader of Indonesia's radical Jemaah Islamiyah, replied, "My message to the families is, please convert to Islam as soon as possible."
> 
> The phrase "Weapons of Mass Destruction" has been pounded into meaninglessness. It has been repeated ad infinitum. Fairly or unfairly, the absence of warehouses full of anthrax and nerve gas in Iraq has made the whole idea of "WMD" sound synonymous with "LIE."
> 
> America's enemies do not plot the "mass destruction" of empty office buildings or abandoned parking structures. Conversely, *they want to see packed office buildings ablaze as their inhabitants scream for mercy. That's why I use the terms "Weapons of Mass Death" and "Weapons of Mass Murder."*
> 
> When discussing those who are killed by terrorists, be specific, name them, and tell us about them. Humanize these individuals. They are more than just statistics or stick figures.
> 
> *I have written 18 articles and produced a website, HUSSEINandTERROR.com, to demonstrate that Saddam Hussein did have ties to terrorism.*
> 
> (By the way, I call him "Saddam Hussein" or "Hussein." I never call him "Saddam" any more than I call Joseph Stalin "Joseph" or Adolf Hitler "Adolf." "Saddam" also has a cute, one-name ring to it, like Cher, Gallagher, Liberace, or Sting. Saddam Hussein does not deserve such a term of endearment.)
> 
> To demonstrate that Saddam Hussein's support of terrorism cost American lives, I remind people about the aid and comfort he provided to terror master Abu Nidal.
> 
> Among Abu Nidal's victims in the 1985 bombing of Rome's airport was John Buonocore, a 20-year-old exchange student from Delaware. Palestinian terrorists fatally shot Buonocore in the back as he checked in for his flight. He was heading home after Christmas to celebrate his father's 50th birthday.
> 
> In another example, those killed by Palestinian homicide bombers subsidized by Saddam Hussein were not all Israeli, which would have been unacceptable enough. Among the 12 or more Americans killed by those Baathist-funded murderers was Abigail Litle, the 14-year-old daughter of a Baptist minister. She was blown away aboard a bus in Haifa on March 5, 2003.
> 
> Her killer's family got a check for $25,000 courtesy of Saddam Hussein as a bonus for their son's "martyrdom."
> 
> Is all of this designed to press emotional buttons? You bet it is!
> 
> Americans must remain committed â â€ intellectually and emotionally â â€ to this struggle. There are many ways to engage the American people.
> 
> No one should hesitate to remind Americans that terrorism kills our countrymen â â€ at home and abroad â â€ and that those who militant Islam demolishes include promising young people with bright futures, big smiles, and, now, six feet of soil between them and their dreams.
> 
> *Who are we fighting? Militants? Martyrs? Insurgents?
> 
> Melinda Bowman of Brief Hill, Pennsylvania, wrote this in a November 24 letter to the editor of the Wall Street Journal:
> 
> *"And, by the way, what is all this 'insurgent' nonsense? These people kidnap, behead, dismember and disembowel. They are terrorists." *Nicely and accurately put, Ms. Bowman.
> 
> Is this a war on terror, per se? A war on terrorism? Or is really a war on Islamo-fascism? It's really the latter, and Americans should say so.
> 
> Daniel Pipes of the Philadelphia-based Middle East Forum believes terror is a tactic, not an enemy.
> 
> Calling today's conflict "a 'War on Terror' is like America in 1941, after Pearl Harbor, declaring a 'War on Surprise Attacks.' We really are engaged in a war on radical Islam."
> 
> Jim Guirard runs the TrueSpeak Institute in Washington, D.C. He has thought long and hard about terror and the English language.
> 
> He recently informed me, to my horror, that more than three years into the war on Islamo-fascism, the State Department and the CIA have not produced a glossary of the Arabic-language words that Middle Eastern Islamo-fascists use, as well as the antonyms for those words. Such a "Thesaurus of Terrorism" would help Civilization turn this war's words upside down.
> 
> *Why, for instance, do we inadvertently praise our enemies by agreeing that they fight a jihad or "holy war?" Instead, we correctly should describe them as soldiers in a hirabah or "unholy war."*
> 
> Guirard has many astute and valuable recommendations in this area. U.S. diplomats and national security officials promptly should implement his common-sense proposals.
> 
> America and the rest of civilization can and must win this showdown against these sadistic cavemen. We can and will crush them â â€ through espionage, high-tech force, statecraft, and public diplomacy. And, here at home, we can and will vanquish them through eternal vigilance.
> 
> One of our chief weapons should be something readily available to everyone who reads these words: The English language.
> 
> â â€ Deroy Murdock is a columnist with the Scripps Howard News Service and a senior fellow with the Atlas Economic Research Foundation in Fairfax, Virginia. This article is adapted from a speech delivered at the Heritage Foundation.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/murdock/murdock200503021001.asp


----------



## FastEddy

a_majoor said:
			
		

> Language as a weapon of war
> 
> Since this is primaraly a war of ideas and opposing idiologies, we need to be much more careful in how we speak of this:



There is no reason to argue what you have expressed, but I also get a sinking feeling of hopelessness after reading it. The scope is of such magnitude and dims only in the Destruction of the Ottoman Empire.

My only thought is, can it be achieved employing our Rules of Engagement, all the Rules of the Geneva
Convention, All the Groups of Humane Treatment and a Out Cry from  Neutral Moslam Fractions, I could go on and on.

A Terrorist is nothing more than a Rabid Fanatically Insane Animal, charging at you with the sole purpose of
killing you. So I would like know how we would eliminate this plague on Humanity within the confines of the above, who would object that the Detainees didn't have a colored T.v..

And for anyone who thinks that stooping to their level, would be far below us, I will listen to your arguments when a Family member of yours appears on T.V. being Beheaded.


----------



## Slim

Personally I think that the best way to deal with this particular threat is to have their own countries marginallize them.

In the broad spectrum this could be acheived by turning the countries in question from third to first (or even second) world. Raise the standards of living without making them give up their beliefes in any way (we all know the the Muslim religion is no more violent than any in the west)

How this is accomplished is beyond me but I think that the U.S. (in Iraq) and we in Afghan have probably already taken the first faltering steps...

Slim


----------



## Kirkhill

My mind keeps drifting back to the Mafia and the Carabinieri.  That model is the modern model for what we are dealing with I think.  Robust policing.  Or in the Canadian context, the NWMP, precursors of the RCMP.

It is a long struggle, decades to be honest, demands the rule of law and civility on the part of the "good" guys - if we don't act in a civilized manner then we lose the battle for the people.  At best we would then end up with a population saying "a pox on both their houses" as still being hostile and uncooperative.

This struggle has been the work of centuries in many parts of the world and still continues even in our most "civilized" countries.  Spain-ETA, UK-IRA, France-Corsicans, Italy-Mafia, US-Militias, Netherlands-South Moluccans...... Canada-FLQ, Oka, Gustafsson Lake? Varous in scale but not dissimilar in that violent means are adopted to oppose the will of the democratic government.

I was just looking at a map of European languages in the 15th Edition of Goode's World Atlas.  It shows, amongst other things, that in the heart of southern Italy that back up in the interior valleys of the mountains, both on the mainland and on Sicily, there are clusters of people whose language is not Italian.  It is a derivative of Albanian.  How long has it been since Latinesque languages came to dominate the Italian peninsula?  Rome, by tradition and with some modern confirmatory evidence, was founded some 2800 years ago.  These people have maintained their connection to the pre-existing culture for about that long.  Also the root language in the Reggio di Calabria area, at the very toe of the Italian boot on the Straits of Messina, is Greek, probably dating back to the era when the Greeks founded trading ports like Marseille in France, 2400 years ago.

Peoples don't forget easily, nor can they be easily coerced, nor even easily persuaded.  All change will take time.  Supplying security, physical and economic, and freedom, will contribute to their happiness and that will act as a powerful magnet to others and draw them away from the violently inclined.


----------



## a_majoor

From another thread about the utility of torture and generally becoming as "bad assed" as the Jihadis"


> Answer: we don't, *not now and not ever*
> 
> Ordinary Iraqis are the prime target for the barbaric treatment the Jihadis dish out, just as ordinary Afghanis were subject to the Taliban or ordinary Iranians have to deal with the religious "police". People can be held in check by fear for only so long, what the coalition forces offer by their civilized conduct is hope. While the Jihadis and their fellow travellers are "turned on" by the idea of using a gun to empower themselves at the expense of others (*the infamous "Root Cause" of terrorism and crime*), more and more we see the ordinary people cooperating with the authorities to root them out of their neighbourhoods.
> 
> On a larger scale, this is the same sort of action that led to the Orange revolution in the Ukraine and the current mass demonstrations in Lebanon to push out the Syrians.
> 
> *If we were to sink to the levels of barbarism the Jihadis exhibit, the Iraqis would withdraw from the coalition in fear and disgust, and perhaps the fear of local terrorists would win out over the fear of the foreign armies.* This is not a profitable way to do business.


----------



## Block 1

WW IV This is a concept all Countries of the world should be involved in, You know posters, rally the troops, motivate the population, search out and destroy all terrorism on this plant!!!!!!!. UUUURRRRRAAAAAA !!!!!!  

Not just a coalition of the willing! but global WW IV on Terrorism. Each country to do their part large or small!!. Their I go again getting all worked up â Å“ I need another tourâ ?                               

 :soldier:


----------



## QORvanweert

I may have been sleeping, but have I missed WW III??    :


----------



## vangemeren

Many classify the cold war as WW3.


----------



## QORvanweert

vangemeren said:
			
		

> Many classify the cold war as WW3.


So now I have missed three of them, all before I was born. Talk about rotten luck!... well, I think that the cold war was just that. A cold war. To be classified as a world war I think it would have to at least have the two main combatants actually engaged in combat... either or..


----------



## FastEddy

QORvanweert said:
			
		

> So now I have missed three of them, all before I was born. Talk about rotten luck!... well, I think that the cold war was just that. A cold war. To be classified as a world war I think it would have to at least have the two main combatants actually engaged in combat... either or..




No my flippant friend, I'd say your damn lucky, just ask any Veteran.


----------



## dirky

The only terrorists I see are on TV....  

I hope we can all keep our minds here and remember that people arnt born terrorists, rather theyre a product of their society.  Cant we think of rather destroying people, perhaps improving them.  People dont rationalize this but It can be done...  I think Terror, although it has allways ALLWAYS been around, is somewhat of a gimmick today.  Terrorist is a pretty lame lable too, people should know who their enemies are.  I cant stomach terrorism, hearing it on TV, like its fresh and new...  Was Hitler considered a terrorist?  Anyone?  Im autchally cusious because I personally have never heard such an account.


----------



## FastEddy

dirky said:
			
		

> The only terrorists I see are on TV....
> 
> I hope we can all keep our minds here and remember that people arnt born terrorists, rather theyre a product of their society.   Cant we think of rather destroying people, perhaps improving them.   People dont rationalize this but It can be done...   I think Terror, although it has allways ALLWAYS been around, is somewhat of a gimmick today.   Terrorist is a pretty lame lable too, people should know who their enemies are.   I cant stomach terrorism, hearing it on TV, like its fresh and new...   Was Hitler considered a terrorist?   Anyone?   Im autchally cusious because I personally have never heard such an account.






where do you want to see it. You should get down and kiss the Good Old Canadian ground you're standing on,
and that you have only seen it on T.V..

As for gimmicks, boy! 9/11, that was sure some gimmick.


----------



## dutchie

dirky said:
			
		

> The only terrorists I see are on TV....
> 
> I hope we can all keep our minds here and remember that people arnt born terrorists, rather theyre a product of their society.   Cant we think of rather destroying people, perhaps improving them.   People dont rationalize this but It can be done...   I think Terror, although it has allways ALLWAYS been around, is somewhat of a gimmick today.   Terrorist is a pretty lame lable too, people should know who their enemies are.   I cant stomach terrorism, hearing it on TV, like its fresh and new...   Was Hitler considered a terrorist?   Anyone?   Im autchally cusious because I personally have never heard such an account.



Could you please focus your argument? Your all over the place here. I'm not sure what your point is, but I'm sure the responses to it will be 'interesting' once we figure out what in God's name your trying to say.


----------



## a_majoor

To stay on track, here is a summary of WW IV:

1.	Various groups seeking to impose their program by force (referred to as Jihadis to terrorists) have banded together, along with various sponsoring regimes. The general outline of the program is to unite the Middle East under a theocratic regime; gain control of the oil and oil revenues; use these revenues to destabilize the global economy, gain nuclear weapons to project force; and destroy Israel.

2.	These groups have been operating against the west since 1979, and committing bolder and bolder attacks against Western interests, culminating in the mass murder attacks of September 11, 2001. 

3.	The American led Coalition of the willing has counterattacked and toppled two sponsoring regimes (the Taliban and Iraqi Ba'athist party), as well as damaging the Al Qadea network. Some of the remaining sponsoring regimes have stopped giving overt support to the Jihadis.

4.	Some sponsoring regimes have not given up. Syria supports the Jihadis with safe harbours and perhaps equipment. Jihadis killed and captured in Fallujia often had GPS receivers with waypoints in Western Syria. Iran also supports the Jihadis, as well as investing in nuclear weapons and long-range rocket technology.

5.	Various subsidiary theatres also exist. The Jihadis are known to operate and hide among Islamic populations in Indonesia, Europe, Africa, Canada and the United States. Various strategies will have to be developed to deal with these threats.

6.	Wild cards include North Korea and China, which are aggressive and predatory states with different interests than the Jihadis. This is historically analogous to WWII, where the Allies were fighting the Fascists in Europe (part of the war against Socialism which blighted the 20th century), while at the same time fighting Imperial Japan in the East in what was essentially a colonial empire war (Given the trigger was the weakening of the European Empires in the East, this could be viewed as an extension of WWI, the â Å“Fall of the Eaglesâ ?).

7.	Given the religious/ideological issues involved, WWIV could resemble the 30 years war; with episodes of major conflict interspersed in a â Å“hot peaceâ ?.


----------



## couchcommander

That's a pretty good synopsis there a_majoor. 

I'd just like to add a few things if I can.

The ideological aspect of the conflict should not be underestimated. Both sides (the neocons and the jihadists) view this as a struggle of "Good" against "Evil"; of course both believe that they are on the side of good and have God behind them. Furthermore, both sides depend on a morale realist viewpoint in order to provide philosophical backing to their respective crusades (we are Good, they are Evil, and what is good and evil is the same everywhere and applies to everything), unfortunately this is a very shaky foundation as modern philosophy has largely following a morale relativst viewpoint (what is good and what is bad depends on the society, the time, the place, etc.). I can go into detail on the failings of the morale realist viewpoint in further if desired.

It should also be noted that no one side really started this war. Neocons and jihadists emerged at around the same time at opposite ends of globe, even cooperated for a time. There were neocons pushing their agenda of the good and evil struggle back in regan's time, as well the jihadists were operating in egypt even farther back. Yes, as is sure to be pointed out, the jihadists did strike on september 11th, however one has to be objective and realize we have done a lot to piss them off in the past (and have killed a lot of them as well), and they have in fact struck at us numerous times before sept 11. IMO, trying to find out who threw the first stone is about as impossible as it is useless. The conflict exists, no one party is free from blame. 

Finally, some of what dirky has said does have some merit. The beliefs of the neocons require them to keep the population feeling like they are sourrounded by enemies that may or may not really exist. The fact is they don't care whether they do or not, only that they frighten the population enough to allow them to further their agenda. And lets be real here for a minute (and please don't attack for this statement, it is just a statement of fact), several times (3-4 times) as many people die as a result of gun violence in the US each year than was killed on september 11th. Don't get me wrong, that was a horrible event that should not go unpunsihed, but I find it very very hard to deny that the threat posed by terrorists has been inflated by the US in order to further their goals (and once again, the jihadists are doing the exact same thing on their side... America the devil and all of that when it is their strange take on the Koran that is probably killing more than the Americans ever will).


----------



## a_majoor

Moral relativism leads to the current situation where Jihadis who publicly behead innocent hostages are given a pass by the press. Where are the lurid headlines and outraged commentary? You will notice the amount of coverage of things like colateral damage seem disproportionalte to the damage the Jihadis do, how many pictures of public beheadings, Jihadi snipers firing from Mosques and Hospitals or using ambulances as transports for personel and ammunition do you see in the press? I will stick to moral realism, since murder, violence and the use of force in the persuit of power or personal gain *is* wrong in all times and places.

We have a moral right and duty to defend ourselves, which is the ultimate purpose of the Armed Forces anyway.

Your comment on gun violence really makes no sense in this context; large numbers of people die in car crashes and industreal accidents as well, what is the connection? If the Jihadis came and gunned down these people (which is, in fact, one of their desires), then it would be a valid argument.


----------



## couchcommander

Regarding the gun violence, my point is that there are plenty of other causes of very preventable and tragic deaths that deserve attention in society.

Re: Moral Realism. I think you'd agree, being a moral realist, that killing a baby is wrong. What about if killing that one baby saved ten others? All of a sudden it's not quite so wrong.

My point is that something that may indeed be wrong in most if not all contexts, such as killing a person, is not in fact wrong or morally reprehensible in other contexts, say if that person is trying in fact to kill you. There is a lot more to this argument, and if you are interested in reading about it I would suggest reading Hume , "An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals", it's a fairly short read that makes a far better case than i ever could. 

I completely agree with you that using ambulances, mosques, and hospitals for offensive purposes is a very reprehensible thing to do given the current situation, and IMO that is not something that can be excused on the basis of moral relativism in the current situation. Furthermore, killing journalists and even killing the Americans in iraq I would describe as bad, they are actually trying to help you. In no way has moral relativism lead to this, it is in fact moral realism that is at fault. The jihadists, like the neo cons, believe in a great "Good" and "Evil", it is just largely opposite. They use this realist viewpoint to justify all of these killings because these people, regardless who they are, or what they doing, are not true muslims (true being the key), and thus deserve to die. If they were realtivists, they would see that the journalists, the iraqi police, and even the americans are trying to help them, and would find killing them a horrible thing to do (as I do).

Regarding your comments about the moral right and duty to defend ourselves; I am not quite sure if I can agree with that. I mean, let us say that you and your wife and daughter are being held hostage, and one of gunman goes to you, holds a gun to your head, and says he is going to kill you, but if you resist, then the others will not only kill you but your wife and daughter. I am sure that you, as I, would take it for their sake. 

My point regarding all of this, and it is not meant as an affront to you, is just that there is no great list of "Good" and "bad" things, it all depends on the circumstances surrounding it. That does not mean you can excuse anything, indeed not, there ARE still good and bad things, their exact nature just changes with the situation (one final example, killing civilians is usually considered wrong, killing a civilian who is carrying explosives is something that I would personally consider to be fine). Both the Jihadists and the neocons use a realist moral structure to justify what they are doing, not a relativist.


----------



## Wizard of OZ

Regarding your comments about the moral right and duty to defend ourselves; I am not quite sure if I can agree with that. I mean, let us say that you and your wife and daughter are being held hostage, and one of gunman goes to you, holds a gun to your head, and says he is going to kill you, but if you resist, then the others will not only kill you but your wife and daughter. I am sure that you, as I, would take it for their sake.  

How is that defending yourself?  That really has nothing to do with the argument as it is a different kind of situation all together.  If you eliminate the wife and kids do you not try and defend yourself or do you just let him shoot you.

I can appreciate thinking outside the box but lets stay in the same ball park.


----------



## couchcommander

Resisting the gunman who is trying to shoot you I would consider defending oneself. Yes, you are right, if you remove the wife and kids from the situation, I would indeed resist... but that is exactly my point Wizard. There are situations where an action that would normally seem good would in fact be a very bad thing to do, morally speaking, and vice versa, which relates directly to what I was talking about regarding relatvism of morality. 

In regards to this specific discussion I was simply pointing out a flaw with the philosophical reasoning behind both the neo conservative movement and the jihadists; that one cannot simply make a blanket statement that something, someone, or some action is "evil" or "bad" because, as was demonstrated, some things that would normally appear fine, or oppositely appear bad, may in fact not be so given a particular situation or frame of events. 

This presents problems for BOTH movements as they both believe they are in a great struggle of "Good" vs "Evil", however in reality there is no big list of "good" or "evil", just anamorphous groups of people and actions who's moral status in fact changes day by day, situation by situation, and in fact depending on who is doing the judgement. It's hard to struggle against "evil" if you really have no idea who or what they are, and in the end you usually hurt yourself and many innocent people instead (and this is true of both the neocons AND the jihadists).


----------



## FastEddy

couchcommander said:
			
		

> Resisting the gunman who is trying to shoot you I would consider defending oneself. Yes, you are right, if you remove the wife and kids from the situation, I would indeed resist... but that is exactly my point Wizard. There are situations where an action that would normally seem good would in fact be a very bad thing to do, morally speaking, and vice versa, which relates directly to what I was talking about regarding relatvism of morality.
> 
> In regards to this specific discussion I was simply pointing out a flaw with the philosophical reasoning behind both the neo conservative movement and the jihadists; that one cannot simply make a blanket statement that something, someone, or some action is "evil" or "bad" because, as was demonstrated, some things that would normally appear fine, or oppositely appear bad, may in fact not be so given a particular situation or frame of events.
> 
> This presents problems for BOTH movements as they both believe they are in a great struggle of "Good" vs "Evil", however in reality there is no big list of "good" or "evil", just anamorphous groups of people and actions who's moral status in fact changes day by day, situation by situation, and in fact depending on who is doing the judgement. It's hard to struggle against "evil" if you really have no idea who or what they are, and in the end you usually hurt yourself and many innocent people instead (and this is true of both the neocons AND the jihadists).




Good - Bad Evil - Bad Good - Maybe Evil - Bad - Evil - I would - I wouldn't - Maybe Good - Crap - No Crap.

The problem in the last 50 years, is that we have over analyzed to death every aspect of morality, behavior, social conscience, Humanitarianism which you probably believe has served us well, well just look around you, all the fancy philosophical words and reasoning maybe have brought us to this state.

Maybe I'm wrong, but all your Coffee House rhetoric, is conceiling or suggests a personal agenda.


----------



## couchcommander

FastEddy said:
			
		

> Maybe I'm wrong, but all your Coffee House rhetoric, is conceiling or suggests a personal agenda.



lol Who shat in your corn flakes this morning?  

More seriously, I am curious as to exactly what you mean by "personal agenda"...? From my perspective, my only agenda was to put forth my opinion, which is midly informed on this topic, and discuss it's merits. In this case, what I was pointing out was the philosophical backing of the two movements, that they are similar, and that they are flawed. If you have any further problems with my "Coffee House rhetoric" I suggest you find a way to deal with other than restorting to personal attacks.


----------



## FastEddy

couchcommander said:
			
		

> lol Who shat in your corn flakes this morning?
> 
> More seriously, I am curious as to exactly what you mean by "personal agenda"...? From my perspective, my only agenda was to put forth my opinion, which is midly informed on this topic, and discuss it's merits. In this case, what I was pointing out was the philosophical backing of the two movements, that they are similar, and that they are flawed. If you have any further problems with my "Coffee House rhetoric" I suggest you find a way to deal with other than restorting to personal attacks.




With regard to a personal attack, you couldn't be more wrong, in that I was only expressing my opinion about your opinions which obviously I found so much Blah Blah Blah.

As to "personal agenda", your quite right, I definitely used the wrong expression and stand corrected.
I meant to indicate that I think you are coming from somewhere else other than a philosophical point of view.

If you think any of the foregone constitutes a personal attack, I think you might be confussing " ATTACK " with
" DISAGREEMENT ".


----------



## a_majoor

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/Printer&cid=1110338402882&p=1006953079897


> *The London and Paris 'street' is still roiling*
> AMIR TAHERI, THE JERUSALEM POST 	Mar. 9, 2005
> 
> Throughout the debate that preceded the liberation of Iraq in 2003, supporters of Saddam Hussein claimed that any attempt at removing him from power by force would trigger an explosion in "the Arab street."
> 
> As it turned out, the explosion they had predicted did take place, but only in Western streets, where anti-Americans of all denominations, their numbers inflated by the usual "useful idiots," marched to keep the Ba'athist butcher in power.
> 
> More than two years later, however, the Arab street seems to be heading for an explosion. From North Africa to the Persian Gulf and passing by the Levant, people have been coming together in various "Arab streets" to make their feelings and opinions known.
> 
> These demonstrations, some big some small, have several features in common. Unlike the rent-a-mob marches concocted by the _mukhaberat_ secret services, this latest spate of demonstrations was largely spontaneous. Nor are the demonstrations controlled by the traditional elites, including established opposition groups and personalities.
> 
> In almost every case we are witnessing a new kind of citizens' movement, an Arab version of people power in action. *But the most important feature of these demonstrations is that they are concerned not with imagined external enemies, be it Israel or the United States, but with the real deficiencies of contemporary Arab societies. In almost every case the key demand is for a greater say for the people in deciding the affairs of the nation.*
> 
> It is, of course, far too early to speak of an "Arab spring."
> 
> It is not at all certain that the ruling elites will have the intelligence to manage the difficult transition from autocracy to pluralism. Nor is it certain that the budding democratic movement would produce a leadership capable of mixing resolve with moderation. The deep-rooted Arab tradition of political extremism may prove harder to dissipate than one imagines.
> 
> What is interesting is that there are, as yet, no signs, that the "Western street" may, at some point, come out in support of the new "Arab street."
> 
> Over the past two weeks several Western capitals, including London and Paris, have witnessed feverish activity by more than two dozen groups organizing meetings and marches to mark the second anniversary of the liberation of Iraq. The aim is not to celebrate the event and express solidarity with the emerging Iraqi democracy, but to vilify George W. Bush and Tony Blair, thus lamenting the demise of Saddam Hussein.
> 
> *I spent part of last week ringing up the organizers of the anti-war events with a couple of questions. The first: Would they allow anyone from the newly-elected Iraqi parliament to address the gatherings? The second: Would the marches include expressions of support for the democracy movement in Arab and other Muslim countries, notably Iraq, Lebanon and Syria?
> 
> In both cases the answer was a categorical no, accompanied by a torrent of abuse about "all those who try to justify American aggression against Iraq."*
> 
> But was it not possible to condemn "American aggression" and then express support for the democratic movement in Iraq and the rest of the Arab world? In most cases we were not even allowed to ask the question. In one or two cases we received mini-lectures on how democracy cannot be imposed by force.
> 
> *The answer to that, of course is that, in Iraq no one tried to impose democracy by force. In Iraq force was used to remove the enemies of democracy from power so as to allow its friends to come to the fore.*
> 
> That remnants of the totalitarian Left and various brands of fascism should march to condemn the liberation of Iraq is no surprise. What is surprising is that some mainstream groups, such as the British Liberal-Democrat Party and some former members of Tony Blair's Labor government, should join these marches of shame.
> 
> The Lib-Dems at their spring conference last week found enough time to reiterate their shameful opposition to the liberation of Iraq at some length. But they had no time to take note of what looks like an historic turning point in favor of democracy in the Middle East. As for those Labor ministers who resigned from Blair's cabinet in protest against the toppling of Saddam Hussein, there is as yet no sign that they might express any support for freedom marches in various Arab capitals.
> 
> The situation is no better in continental Europe.
> Joschka Fischer, the German foreign minister, has yet to show the same degree of activism in support of the Arab democratic movement as he did in 2003, when he fought desperately to prevent the removal of Saddam Hussein from power.
> 
> For his part, France's President Jacques Chirac, who in February 2003 proposed an emergency summit to save Saddam Hussein, and appeared almost daily on television opposing the liberation of Iraq, is yet to give the slightest hint that he might favor the demise of any more tyrannies in the region.
> 
> *Why are so many Westerners, living in mature democracies, ready to march against the toppling of a despot in Iraq but unwilling to take to the streets in support of the democratic movement in the Middle East?*
> 
> Is it because many of those who will be marching in support of Saddam Hussein this month are the remnants of totalitarian groups in the West plus a variety of misinformed idealists and others blinded by anti-Americanism?
> 
> Or is it because they secretly believe that the Arabs do not deserve anything better than Saddam Hussein?
> 
> Those interested in the health of Western democracies would do well to ponder those questions.


----------



## I_am_John_Galt

a_majoor said:
			
		

> Why are so many Westerners, living in mature democracies, ready to march against the toppling of a despot in Iraq but unwilling to take to the streets in support of the democratic movement in the Middle East?



Well said, and I think that the same could be asked vis-a-vis a few other regions/threads-on-this-board as well!


----------



## a_majoor

Iraqis are taking matters into their own hands:

http://iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/2005/03/shorja-announces-sanctions-on-syria.html



> IRAQ THE MODEL
> Saturday, March 12, 2005
> 
> Shorja announces sanctions on Syria!
> 
> Just to introduce Shorja to you, Shorja is Baghdad's (actually Iraq's) main trading center.
> It's a very old neighborhood that lies in the heart of Baghdad. The streets of this area hosts markets that deal with all kinds of goods and you can find literally everything you want there, I mean EVERYTHING starting from nails and screws to PS2 and satellite receivers, foreign currencies, cigarettes, food stuff and the list doesn't end with snakes and goldfish!
> 
> My cousin who's a shop keeper has a weekly tour in Shorja to reequip his shop with the items that he had sold throughout the past week.
> 
> Yesterday I was there in his shop when he returned from his tour without some of the items he had on his purchase list, as he reported to his brother who runs the shop with him.
> 
> From my experience as an ex-shop keeper I expected that one or more of the roads from Jordan, Syria or Turkey has been closed but it wasn't the case this time.
> My cousin explained saying:
> 
> _I had a number of Syrian products which I couldn't find this time. The wholesaler that I usually deal with said that there has been some kind of an agreement among many of the main Iraqi importers to boycott the Syrian products._
> 
> When I asked him for the reason behind this decision he repeated the wholesaler's words to me:
> 
> _After what we've seen on TV, we thought that it's totally unpatriotic to trade with that country; the Syrian government is benefiting from trade with Iraq and using the money they get to fund the criminals who slaughter our people. Not only that; the ordinary people themselves started to prefer products from other origins over Syrian products so we thought that it's better to search for alternatives for the boycotted items._
> 
> Frankly speaking the story amazed me because for the 1st time I see merchants putting economic benefit in the second place and the decision was made spontaneously, unlike Saddam's orders of boycotting western products back in the early 90's which forced wholesalers as well as small shop keepers who depended on those products for a great portion of their incomes to adopt a high level of secrecy in their exchanges.
> 
> This time it's a result of the growing sense among the public that the Syrian Ba'athist regime must be held accountable for a great deal of terrorism in Iraq. *Maybe this isn't going to change much of the situation but it indicates that the people have begun to realize their duties towards their country.
> They began to understand that fighting terror is not only the responsibility of the coalition or the government and that they can always contribute to securing their country even with a small part like this initiative.*
> - posted by Omar @ 20:35


----------



## couchcommander

As to "personal agenda", your quite right, I definitely used the wrong expression and stand corrected.
I meant to indicate that I think you are coming from somewhere else other than a philosophical point of view.

Bah yes and no. The arguments, and not just my own, against the moral structure of the jihadist and neocon movements are pretty formitable. I was just trying to point this out. My own perspective on the situation does not change that. 

My opinion on the topic, on the other hand, which is probably pretty clear, is that I don't suscribe to either viewpoint (jihadist or neocon). IMO Iraq should have been invaded and Saddam overthrown in the 80's (while the US was busy supplying him with biological weapons (there is a senate report about this if you are interested, as I am sure there is going to be disbelief about this)). 

What pisses me off is that the US first of all supported him with intelligence, money, weapons, etc., then 20 years later is going around saying he is a great evil for having all of these things we gave him, and then saying we should invade. HOWEVER.... even this at this point it would have been fine. I COULD have gone along with invading iraq because they had WMD, EVEN IF the americans gave it to them (people make mistakes). I can forget about being pissed at the US for not doing what it should have done decades earlier, and even for causing the problem they were now trying to fix if there was a geuine threat to my way of life.

But the REAL pisser, and what gets me so pissed off every time I think of it, was that the primary reason they gave for invading was a BLATANT LIE (and don't even try that they were just confused. Hans Blix sure as hell knew what was going on, but they just ignored him). This was just a slap in my face. Iraq had no WMD left, they knew this, but instead they still went ahead for that reason. This is what really pisses me off.

And this is where I become very skepitcal of the neocons. Their entire philosophy allows for this; in fact it encourages this. They don't care whether or not the evils they attack really exist or not, only that the public thinks that it does. I have no problem with attacking horrible dictators; I have an issue with being lied too. But that is just IMO. Hopefully that explains some of my "personal agenda".


----------



## Andyboy

Where do these people keep coming from?


----------



## I_am_John_Galt

couchcommander said:
			
		

> What pisses me off is that the US first of all supported him with intelligence, money, weapons, etc., then 20 years later is going around ...


 .... yada, yada, yada: how about a wee bit o' perspective?


*Imports of conventional arms by Iraq 1973-1990, by source*

Values are shown in millions of US dollars at constant (1990) estimated values. "Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact" includes Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Romania. The majority of these transfers came from the Soviet Union, followed by Czechoslovakia.
Year 	Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact   France 	China (PRC)   United States 	Egypt 	Others
1973 	             1,321 	                          5 	         0 	             0   	               0 	       0
1974 	             1,471 	                         5 	          0 	             0 	                 0 	       0
1975 	             1,087 	                       35              0                 0 	                 0 	       0
1976 	             1,161 	                     119 	          0 	             0 	                 0 	       0
1977 	             1,062 	                     106 	          0 	             0 	                 0 	       0
1978 	             1,827 	                       26 	          0 	             0 	                 0   	   20
1979 	             1,108 	                       78 	          0 	             0 	                 0 	     17
1980 	             1,665 	                     241 	          0 	             0 	               12        114
1981 	             1,780 	                     731 	          0 	             0 	               46        182
1982 	             2,023 	                     673 	      217 	             0 	                71        227
1983 	             1,898 	                     779 	      745 	            21 	               58 	    773
1984 	             2,857 	                     883 	   1,065 	              6 	                 0       116
1985 	             2,601 	                     700 	   1,036 	              9 	               32 	    116
1986 	             2,663 	                     251 	      918 	              9 	               70          86
1987 	             2,719 	                     214 	      887 	            30 	             114 	     157
1988 	             1,202   	                   355 	      301 	          125 	             118 	     196
1989 	             1,319 	                     113 	       23 	              0 	                47         67
1990 	                537 	                      281 	        0 	              0 	                 0 	     33

Source: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI)





> But the REAL pisser, and what gets me so pissed off every time I think of it, was that the primary reason they gave for invading was a BLATANT LIE ...


 ... yada, yada, yada: do you not think that it might have occurred to someone in the neo-con-cabal/vast-right-wing-conspiracy that if they were going to knowingly lie that they might fake some evidence to avoid the grief that comes from inevitable knee-jerk reactions like this?  Or is it actually more believable that they lied, full well knowing that they would be found out and discredited?  Maybe you should check out William of Ockham some time ...


----------



## a_majoor

> But the REAL pisser, and what gets me so pissed off every time I think of it, was that the primary reason they gave for invading was a BLATANT LIE ...



Thats right, powerful neo-cons like Bill Clinton were warning of Iraq's WMD program in the 1990's, and such neo con luminaries as Senator John Kerry,Senator John Edwards and Senator Hillary Clinton warned us in the aftermath of 9/11 that Saddam Hussein's WMD program was a clear and present danger to the middle east and the United States.

Other reasons like preserving peace, enforcing UN resolutions, speading democracy and stopping human rights violations, as well as constant acts of war by Iraq (targeting allied aircraft partrolling the "no fly zone" and attempting to assasinate President George H W Bush) were also touted by neo conservative President Bill Clinton and his cabinet (as well as real conservative Presidents George H W Bush and George W Bush) for over 12 years prior to OIF.

Maybe if you did some real thinking using open source factual evidence, you would be a bit less "pissed off".


----------



## couchcommander

Not everyone who was for going into Iraq was a neo conservative (or is). They were just misinformed.

The point was clinton didn't invade Iraq, he just enforced the UN resolutions...(once again no problem with that, and don't even try that Bush was just backing up UN resolutions...)

...yadda, yadda, yadda.... obviously it didn't or else we wouldn't be having this discussion would we?


----------



## Andyboy

It's getting to be like Groundhog Day around here, isn't it A_Majoor?


----------



## a_majoor

Let me cut and paste post # 1.  

I only hope not too many Iraqis stumble across this thread. Although it is 100% more likely that they can and will now (the Ba'athist regime violently restricted access to FAX machines and the Internet, and bloggers like Iraq the Model would have been in mortal danger had they tried to post or otherwise publish prior to OIF), I can only imagine what *they* must feel reading some of these posts.


----------



## a_majoor

The northern front of WWIV



> Danger Up North
> Canada's welcome mat for terrorists.
> 
> By Deroy Murdock
> 
> Let's hope Honduras is awash in American agents. Al Qaeda's Abu Musab al-Zarqawi reportedly has dispatched Islamo-fascist murderers to penetrate the U.S. via Tegucigalpa, where bribe-hungry authorities allegedly sell passports to smooth passage through Mexico to the human highway known as the U.S.-Mexican border.
> 
> But American officials better eye the northern frontier, too. Canadians seem rather relaxed about some who inhabit the land nestled between Alaska and the Lower 48. While most Canadians are as friendly as Labrador retrievers, that attitude is not universal.
> 
> "I'm not afraid of dying, and killing doesn't frighten me," Algerian-born Canadian Fateh Kamel said on an Italian counterterrorism intercept. "If I have to press the remote control, vive the jihad!"
> 
> Kamel, who jet-setted among Afghanistan, Bosnia, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey, was arrested in Jordan on December 15, 1999, and extradited to France. He was convicted of distributing bogus passports and conspiring to blow up Paris Metro stations. He was sentenced April 6, 2001, to eight years in prison.
> 
> But after fewer than four years, France sprang Kamel for "good behavior." (What is it about iron bars and German shepherds that mellows people so?) Kamel flew home to Canada January 29.
> 
> *"When Kamel arrived in Montreal, the RCMP [Royal Canadian Mounted Police] was not even at the airport to greet him," Canada's National Post reported last month. "As far as they're concerned, he is an ex-convict who has done his time and has committed no crimes in Canada."*
> 
> Kamel now freely strolls Canada's streets. That's just fine, so long as he limits his violence to moose hunting and such. But what if he has humans â â€ Americans, even â â€ in his crosshairs?
> 
> "We should be looking at him and possibly sending him back to Algeria," Conservative-party deputy leader Peter MacKay said in the February 27 Toronto Star. "There is a strong circumstantial case right now to suggest this guy isn't deserving of Canadian citizenship." MacKay sees Kamel as emblematic of Ottawa's peaceful, easy feeling toward terrorist killers. "What crossed my mind was that the French authorities wanted him out of the country, and we were all too willing to take him in."
> 
> Kamel is not alone. Canada crawls with terrorists, suspected violent extremists, and folks worthy of 24-hour surveillance.
> 
> "There have been a number of instances where Canadians or individuals based here have been implicated in terrorist attacks or plans in other countries, at least a half dozen or more in the last several years," Canadian Security and Intelligence Director Jim Judd told a Canadian Senate panel in Ottawa March 7. "There are several graduates of terrorist training camps, many of whom are battle-hardened veterans of campaigns in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Chechnya and elsewhere who reside here...Often these individuals remain in contact with one another while in Canada or with colleagues outside of the country, and continue to show signs of ongoing clandestine activities, including the use of counter-surveillance techniques, secretive meetings, and encrypted communications." Among other things, Canadian-based terrorists have aspired to whack a visiting Israeli official, bomb a Jewish district in Montreal, and sabotage an El Al jet over Canada.
> 
> On March 16, British Columbian Supreme Court Justice Ian Bruce Josephson found Sikh separatists Ripudaman Singh Malik and Ajaib Singh Bagri not guilty of planting a bomb that destroyed Air India Flight 182 off the Irish coast on June 23, 1985, killing 329 people. Two baggage handlers also were killed in a subsequent explosion at Tokyo's Narita Airport.
> 
> An acquittal is an acquittal. Just ask Robert Blake. Still, the testimony against Malik remains fascinating. One witness quoted him as saying: "We had Air India crash. Nobody, nobody can do anything. It is all for Sikhism."
> 
> For his part, Bagri reportedly told the founding conference of the World Sikh Organization: "Yes, there must be our handshake with the Hindus. We will shake hands. Where? On the battlefield."
> 
> "This verdict sends a message to terrorists around the world that you can get away with these kinds of acts in Canada," Liberal-party legislator Dave Hayer told the Vancouver Sun. His publisher father was assassinated after agreeing to testify in the trial.
> 
> Egyptian refugee Mohammad Majoub remains in a Toronto jail â â€ for now. Federal court justice Elinor Dawson has blocked efforts to deport him to Egypt for fear he may be tortured there. Majoub admits to working on Osama bin Laden's Sudanese farm in the 1990s and meeting with members of Canada's terror-tied Khadr family. Judge Dawson's thoughts on the "security certificate," which has permitted his detention without bail or charge since June 2000, highlight the logic that eventually could free someone like Majoub. "When reviewing the reasonableness of a security certificate," Dawson ruled, "at issue is whether there are 'reasonable grounds to believe' certain facts. The issue is not whether those facts are true."
> 
> Meanwhile, Adil Charkaoui was released February 18 on bail of $50,000 Canadian (about $41,500 in U.S. dollars). Charkaoui claims no terrorist ties, but al-Qaeda honcho Abu Zubaida and convicted terrorist Ahmed Ressam say they met him in 1998 at an Afghan terror training camp.
> 
> Algerian-born Ressam, a failed Montreal refugee applicant and suspected Fateh Kamel protégé, was caught by U.S. Border Patrol on December 14, 1999, at Port Angeles, Washington after crossing the Canadian frontier in an explosive-laden car. He dreamed of ringing in the millennium by blowing up Los Angeles International Airport.
> 
> "CSIS was aware of him since 1995 and was surveilling him, but they never put him out of business," the National Post's Stewart Bell, author of last year's Cold Terror: How Canada Nurtures and Exports Terrorism to the World, told journalist Bill Gladstone. "On the other hand, the second he entered the United States, he was stopped, arrested, and turned into a very good government informant." In his book, Bell writes: "Canada has tried to smother terrorism with kindness...Its most valuable contribution to the war on terrorism may well be its terrorists."
> 
> Canadian Zaynab Khadr flew from Islamabad, Pakistan to Toronto February 17 with her daughter, age 4 1/2, and teenage sister. She joined her mother and brother, Karim, who returned to Canada last April. Karim was wounded when Pakistani forces raided a suspected al-Qaeda hideaway. Her Egyptian-born father, who was killed in that attack, previously had been arrested in Islamabad after a 1995 Egyptian embassy truck bombing. Another brother, Abdurahman, returned to Canada in December 2003. He told Canadian Broadcasting that he grew up in an "al-Qaeda family." (To be fair, he briefly worked for the CIA.)
> 
> "No one likes killing people," the burka-clad Ms. Khadr to the Toronto Star, referring to September 11. "But sometimes killing people can solve a problem, a bigger problem." She added: "A man doesn't just get on the plane and put himself in a building unless he really believes in something."
> 
> The Washington Times reported last September 24 that Adnan G. El Shukrijumah, an al-Qaeda cell leader with a $5 million U.S. bounty on his head, visited Canada in 2003 seeking nuclear materials for a dirty bomb.
> 
> *Paul Martin, Canada's Liberal premier, attended a May 2000 dinner while finance minister. Its hosts: The Federation of Association of Canadian Tamils, a front for the Tamil Tigers, a Sri Lankan terrorist group. It has killed at least 60 people, including two Americans, and injured more than 1,400 others, the State Department reports. Martin, and international cooperation minister Maria Minna, ignored security officials who urged them to stay away. Wooing Canada's sizable Tamil minority apparently was irresistible.*
> 
> Canadian immigration agents admitted Mahmoud Mohammed Issa Mohammad in 1987, despite his role in attacking an El Al aircraft in Athens in 1968. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine alumnus has foiled deportation through relentless legal tricks.
> 
> *"There are known al-Qaeda cells in Montreal and Toronto," *one congressional expert tells me. She nonetheless detects progress among Canadian counterterrorists. "They are very sensitive about being called a conduit for terrorism. Since September 11, Canada has been on the offense. The RCMP has some joint intelligence centers where both Americans and Canadians operate." Still, this aide sees areas of danger, from porous borders to vulnerable infrastructure. Detonating the Canadian side of the Ambassador Bridge between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario, for example, could cripple the most economically valuable trade route linking our two countries.
> 
> The Capitol Hill staffer, who spoke anonymously, added: "Canada has stepped up their visa application procedures, but there are huge populations of people they have let in under refugee and asylum status and as immigrants who may be of concern. They are changing their laws to allow them to deport those people. But increasing that effort and deporting those people is something the United States would encourage."
> 
> Harvey Kushner, author of the hair-raising counterterrorism best-seller Holy War on the Home Front, is less sanguine. "It's quite disturbing that Canada's immigration policies have let this situation fester and grow," he says. "We do not have an electrified fence. *When you have a neighbor who is not on the same page, it's indeed troublesome."*
> 
> What can America do about all this? Pressing the Canadians to tighten up may require constant engagement. Amplifying the calls of Canada's Tories for stricter immigration and easier deportation would help. For starters, President Bush should broach border security when he meets his North American counterparts in Mexico on March 23.
> 
> The warm U.S.-Canadian relationship, illustrated by our 3,145-mile unprotected boundary, cooled somewhat when Ottawa recently refused to help Washington develop defenses against incoming nuclear-tipped missiles. But that modest dispute will pale beside the northward-flowing rancor that will erupt if a terrorist attack kills innocent Americans, and U.S. officials discover that the butchers slipped past complacent Canadians.
> 
> â â€ Deroy Murdock is a New York-based columnist with the Scripps Howard News Service and a senior fellow with the Atlas Economic Research Foundation in Fairfax, Va.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/murdock200503210830.asp


----------



## a_majoor

Al Qadea may still attempt to carry the war back into the homeland. Information from the previoous post (i.e. Al Qadea has active cells in Toronto and Montreal) could create real problems for Canada in our relations with the United States:



> The Union of the Snake
> Al Qaeda planning and possibilities.
> 
> Recently several events have conspired to raise the question of whether the U.S. is due for another major domestic terror attack. A communiqué between Osama bin Laden and his chief lieutenant Abu Mousab al-Zarqawi was intercepted in which bin Laden suggested that Zarqawi turn his attentions away from Iraq and towards hitting the United States. Meanwhile the Department of Homeland Security's "National Planning Scenarios" report was accidentally posted to the web, causing a minor stir. The report posits a variety of forbidding possibilities (such as spreading pneumonic plague in airport bathrooms) in order to aid in budgeting, planning preemptive measures, and responding to terrorist attack. The scenarios are graphic and frightening, but also hypothetical, not those necessarily thought most likely to happen, or even suggested by actual terrorists. Around the same time, a confidential FBI report cast doubt that AQ could undertake any large-scale attacks inside the US, given their lack of infrastructure and the heightened security climate. Yet information purportedly from a top Zarqawi aid indicated that he would not be looking to repeat something like 9/11 but would aim at softer targets, such as "movie theaters, restaurants and schools."
> 
> So will it happen? Apparently, they have been thinking about it for some time, and with a good degree of frustration. This same top aide said that Zarqawi fumed about the "lack of willing martyrs," of people willing to die in the process of hitting the U.S. homeland. This is a significant admission, since the popular belief is that the terrorists can draw from a bottomless well of volunteers to conduct their missions. You would think that if there were volunteers ready to do anything they would be most keen to take on the Great Satan. Hitting U.S. targets is their version of the major leagues. Any terrorist worth the label would consider striking at us the very definition of success in his profession. And it is a quick ticket to immortality. Everyone remembers Mohammed Atta; operations in Iraq just do not get the same kind of coverage. Even al Qaeda press releases are unsatisfying for the fame-seeking vest bomber. Note for example this one from a February suicide attack in Baquba:
> 
> On Monday, a martyr was wed to Paradise, and what a good martyr he was! ...One of the monotheism lions from the Martyrdom-seekers Brigade of Al-Qa'ida of Jihad Organization in the Land of the Two Rivers carried out a martyrdom attack against the infidels and the apostates in Ba'qubah, may God grant it and the rest of the country freedom from its bondage. Congratulations to you, brother in monotheism!
> 
> O.K., but what was his name? Can't his friends and family get bragging rights for all those innocent people he blew up? Zarqawi needs to rethink his incentivization program. The jihad is not all about him.
> 
> Zarqawi may gripe privately about the sorry condition of terrorist voluntarism, but he has no problem heaping blame on the Iraqi people for not supporting him as he seeks to liberate them from the "humiliation" of freedom and democracy. In the first edition of his new online magazine, Dhurwat al-Sanam [literally the highest point on the camel's hump â â€ in this context, the highest obligation] he published an editorial explaining why al Qaeda has lately been targeting policemen, Iraqi army troops and "everyone whose soul is debased and who assists infidels in their war against Muslims in the territory of Iraq." He has been forced to do it for their own good. The Iraqis have not mobilized their human resources to supply him with the foot soldiers he needs. They have not "united under one banner of clear vision" (i.e., al Qaeda's) to bring the fight to the infidels. They have not prevented vice where they see it. Moreover, they have the nerve to condemn the actions of the "fraternal [foreign] Mujahedin" that have come to Iraq to do the job the Iraqis should be doing for themselves. The editorial is thick with frustration. You get the idea he does not think they are winning.
> 
> *Measured by al Qaeda's own strategic goals they surely are not. Recall that according to a letter captured over a year ago, al Qaeda was seeking actively to promote what many feared was going to be the natural course of events in post-Saddam Iraq, a civil war between the Shias, Kurds, and Sunnis. Al Qaeda's purpose was to promote this brand of chaos and then exploit it. However, despite their best efforts, the expected civil war did not materialize. Indeed, the Iraqis have been much more willing to live and let live than anyone would have given them credit for. Yes, there is violence, but not the full-scale ethnic conflict that many even in this country had predicted. Rationality won out over the supposed hatreds that these groups were said to harbor against each other. Al Qaeda has not given up on the strategy â â€ witness the March 10 bombing at a Shia mosque in Kurdish Mosul, while across town representatives of the Shia List and the Kurdish Alliance were busy negotiating the details of the new government. But the bombing failed to derail the negotiations; the two sides know who the real enemy is.*
> 
> Bin Laden's sense of entitlement has angered many Iraqis â â€ *a wealthy Saudi hiding in Afghanistan appoints a Jordanian malcontent the Prince of Iraq, and they proceed to declare any Muslims who participate in free elections heretics worthy of death?* How many ways can al Qaeda find to offend people? This is probably why bin Laden wants to shift gears and get back to trying to attack the US directly. Bin Laden and Zarqawi are reportedly mulling over new strategies, trying to reach some kind of consensus. The Washington Post reported that some analysts have concluded from this that Zarqawi is an independent operator â â€ despite the pledge of abject fealty to Osama he issued last October, and the fact that he renamed his group "Al Qaeda of the Two Rivers." Saddam is out of the picture yet the monomania to de-link Iraq and al Qaeda continues. It just goes to show that the government is still rife with analysts who seek to draw complexity out of simplicity whenever possible. No wonder we have not caught bin Laden yet.
> 
> Al Qaeda wants to hit us again. They have been threatening it for years. The fact that they have not managed to do so yet is a measure both of our effectiveness in combating terrorism and their relative weakness and disorganization. This does not mean they cannot attack â â€ the soft-target scenario is especially troubling â â€ but even if they did, it would hardly change the course of a war that they are without doubt losing badly.
> 
> â â€ James S. Robbins is senior fellow in national-security affairs at the American Foreign Policy Council and an NRO contributor.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/robbins/robbins200503220749.asp


----------



## a_majoor

Take that, Jihadis!



> *Ordinary Iraqis Wage a Successful Battle Against Insurgents*
> By ROBERT F. WORTH
> 
> BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 22 - Ordinary Iraqis rarely strike back at the insurgents who terrorize their country. But just before noon today, a carpenter named Dhia saw a troop of masked gunmen with grenades coming towards his shop and decided he had had enough.
> 
> As the gunmen emerged from their cars, Dhia and his young relatives shouldered their own AK-47's and opened fire, police and witnesses said. In the fierce gun battle that followed, three of the insurgents were killed, and the rest fled just after the police arrived. Two of Dhia's young nephews and a bystander were injured, the police said.
> 
> "We attacked them before they attacked us," Dhia, 35, his face still contorted with rage and excitement, said in a brief exchange at his shop a few hours after the battle. He did not give his last name. "We killed three of those who call themselves the mujahedeen. I am waiting for the rest of them to come and we will show them."
> 
> It was the first time that private citizens are known to have retaliated successfully against insurgents. There have been anecdotal reports of residents shooting at attackers after a bombing or assassination. But the gun battle today erupted in full view of half a dozen witnesses, including a Justice Ministry official who lives nearby.
> 
> The battle was the latest sign that Iraqis may be willing to start standing up against the attacks that leave dozens of people dead here nearly every week. After a suicide bombing in Hilla last month that killed 136 people, including a number of women and children, hundreds of residents demonstrated in front of the city hall every day for almost a week, chanting slogans against terrorism. Last week, a smaller but similar rally took place in Baghdad. Another demonstration is scheduled for Wednesday in the capital.
> 
> Like many of the attacks here, today's gun battle had sectarian overtones. Dhia and his family are Shiites, and they cook for religious festivals at the Shiite Husseiniya mosque, across from Dhia's shop. The insurgents are largely Sunnis, and they have aimed dozens of attacks at Shiite figures, celebrations, even funerals. The conflict has grown sharper in the past year, with Shiites now dominating Iraq's new police force and army and holding a narrow majority of seats in the newly elected national assembly.
> 
> The attack unfolded in Doura, a working-class neighborhood in southern Baghdad where much of the capital's violence is concentrated. A number of assassinations and bombings have taken place here in recent weeks, and the police openly acknowledge they have little control.
> 
> Just hours before the gun battle this morning, an Interior Ministry official was gunned down in Doura as he drove to work, officials said.
> 
> Elsewhere in Iraq, insurgents continued their campaign of violence. In the northern city of Mosul, four civilians were killed this morning and 14 wounded when a roadside bomb detonated near an American military convoy, health officials said. The bomb did not appear to have harmed the convoy, witnesses said, but destroyed four or five civilian cars that were passing near it on the Sunharib bridge, in the city center.
> 
> In Anbar province, the troubled area west of Baghdad, gunmen kidnapped six Iraqi soldiers today as they walked to a bus station, The Associated Press reported.
> 
> Just before the gun battle in Doura began, witnesses saw the gunmen circling near the Husseiniya mosque in three cars, said Amjad Hamid, 25, who works in Iraq's Ministry of Justice. They stopped near Dhia's shop, across from the mosque.
> 
> The men carried pistols and guns, and one had a belt full of hand grenades, Mr. Hamid said. They drove an Oldsmobile, a gray Honda, and a red Volkswagen Passat.
> 
> When the shooting began, Mr. Hamid said, his mother ran outside shouting his name, and was struck by bullets in the leg and the ear.
> 
> After a group of insurgents fled, leaving the Honda and three of their dead behind them, one was left behind, said the Doura police chief. The gunman broke into a nearby house and hid there, holding the residents at gunpoint, until his friends arrived and drove him away, the police chief said.
> 
> The owner of the house, who spoke on condition that he not be named, said the gunman entered through the garage and made his way to the living room.
> 
> "I heard the screaming of the women, so I went to see what was the matter and I saw a guy holding an AK-47," the man said.
> 
> The homeowner said the gunman then shouted: "Keep me here for a short time until I can leave the area or I will kill you all. I don't want anyone to leave this room."
> 
> They obeyed. The gunman telephoned some friends, and stayed for about an hour until they arrived to pick him up. Before he left, the owner of the house said, he issued a final warning: "If you scream or call the police, my friends will come and kill you. They know where you are."
> 
> Two of Dhia's nephews who were with him during the attack, one aged 13, one 24, were wounded, family members said. After the police arrived, they recovered the bodies of the three dead insurgents, who were identified through documents in their clothing as Abdul Razzaq Hamid, Abdul Hamid Abed, and Zaid Safaa, officials said.
> 
> Hours later, Dhia was still furiously cursing the mujahedeen when he spoke to a reporter in his carpentry shop. A Shiite cleric quickly told him to stop talking, and he complied.
> 
> Meanwhile, a group of armed neighborhood men stood watch on the roof of the house, guarding the streets leading to the Husseiniya mosque and Dhia's shop.
> 
> "I am sure they will be back," one of the guards said. "We killed three of them."
> 
> Layla Isitfan contributed reporting for this article.
> 
> Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company | Home | Privacy Policy | Search | Corrections | RSS | Help | Back to Top


----------



## a_majoor

Regime change can bring on attitude change, it is just going to take a lot of time:



> *Don't Stop Now*
> Opening Pandora's democratic box.
> 
> With the encouraging news of change in the air in Lebanon, Egypt, and the Gulf, coupled with a solidification of democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan, there has arisen a new generation of doubters. Not all are simply gnashing their teeth that their prognostications of doom were wrong, but rather often reflect genuine worries about the viability of emerging democracy in the Middle East.
> 
> Concerns about illiberal democracy run the gamut. Some fear that Islamists will hijack democracy and install Islamist or other such theocracies. Others worry that the veneer of voting gives legitimacy to otherwise autocratic societies and leaders that will hide their crimes behind the sanction of the "people. "
> 
> *There is also a vast body of research, both historical and sociological, that suggests democracy is the aftermath of a long slow evolution toward egalitarianism and economic liberalization. Ancient Greek democracy, for example, was an expansion on earlier consensual government. It did not in itself spring forth at Athens in 507 B.C. from the head of Zeus. The revolution that started in 1776, we sometimes forget, was possible because of nearly two prior centuries of English relatively liberal colonial rule, under which small landowners and shopkeepers enjoyed property rights and participated in local councils despite a distant king.*
> 
> So what makes Americans think we can plop down a democracy on the ashes of Saddam's Gulag, or see free elections in a Beirut that was once the Murder, Inc. of the 1970s and 1980s? How can we even imagine that Dr. Zawahiri's dream of theocracy won't follow from the end of the Mubarak dictatorship?
> 
> As the ripples from Iraq and Afghanistan spread, we are warned that success, not failure, is our new concern: The problem is not that the Middle East cannot vote, but that it can â â€ and that the results will be worse than the mess that preceded it.
> 
> Aside from the fact that we could never have even dreamed of such a "problem" less than four years ago when an ash cloud hovered over the crater in Manhattan, we need to reflect on a few often-forgotten realities.
> 
> First, America had few alternatives. This war was never between good and bad choices, but always a call between something bad and something far worse. The challenge was not about a post-Nazi Germany, which for a decade and a half ruined the old protocols of Prussian parliamentarianism. Iraq was not quite like prompting post-Franco Spain to allow elections when surrounded by European democracies.
> 
> No, the dilemma was an exclusively autocratic Arab Middle East. It was a mess where every bankrupt and murderous notion â â€ Soviet-style Communism, crack-pot Baathism, radical pan-Arabism, lunatic Khadafism, "moderate" monarchy, old-style dictatorship, and eighth-century theocracy â â€ had been tried and had failed, with terrible consequences well before September 11.
> 
> Only democracy was new. And only democracy â â€ and its twin of open-market capitalism â â€ offered any hope to end the plague of tribalism, gender apartheid, human-rights abuses, religious fanaticism, and patriarchy that so flourished within such closed societies.
> 
> *It was not just idealism but rather abject desperation that fueled the so-called neoconservative quest to try something new.
> *
> Second, while the nature of man remains unchanged, how he communicates has been reinvented. What is bringing the Middle East to the crisis stage is the spread into traditional societies of Western-style popular culture, liberality, and materialism â â€ with all its destabilizing and unforeseen consequences. DVDs, the Internet, rap music, wide-open television and movies â â€ all this and more have titillated once-closed cultures. Globalization also reminded the masses just how far behind the rest of the world Arab society has lapsed under its many faces of autocracy.
> 
> But the effects of modernism were not just to reinforce a sense of failure and despair. Just as Western globalization reminds the Arab Street of what it is missing out on, so too it can offer instantaneous encouragement and support for political reform in a way impossible just years earlier. Demonstrations are flashed onto millions of television screens. Dissidents can fly back and forth to the Middle East in hours; and reports from Baghdad to the university lounge stream back and forth across oceans in a matter of seconds.
> 
> So a democrat in the Middle East has access to global education, support, and financial backing as never before. While it is accurate to say that there is almost no history of free voting in the Middle East, one can also hope that millions of Arabs see and learn from democracy everyday as they watch European, American, Turkish, and now Iraqi and Afghan democratic societies in action. That the Palestinian territories were right next to Israel, for all the tragedy of that juxtaposition, helps to explain why they are voting in a way impossible in Jordan or Egypt.
> 
> Democracy is now the rule, not the exception, and the Arab world is not so much in fear of going out on a limb as of being left behind.
> 
> Finally, there were historical accidents that helped to isolate the Arab world in ways that precluded the democratic evolution now going on in unlikely places like Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America.
> 
> Most important was the curse of oil. Petroleum made the Middle East the battleground of the Cold War, where the West excused right-wing autocracy if it promised to keep Communists out and keep the oil flowing. Petrodollars, in turn, warped the economy, *allowing corrupt elites to avoid structural reforms and to stave off internal revolt by bribing the masses with entitlements, which only created greater appetites and resentment all at once.* Nigeria, Venezuela, and Mexico are proof enough how petroleum either ensures a corrupt status quo or makes it even worse.
> 
> It was not so much the creation of Israel but the startling success of the Jewish state in a sea of Arab failure that so distorted Middle East political discourse â â€ and out of envy and pride diverted all indigenous failure onto the Jews. Their liberal and successful nation, in an otherwise inhospitable terrain, was a daily reminder of what could be possible in such an impoverished region. The Israelis, after all, had plenty of enemies, no oil, few people â â€ and yet thrived in the desert in a manner unthinkable in Egypt, Jordan, or Syria.
> 
> There is still oil and there is still Israel. Yet slowly there has grown a new realism about both. While elite Westerners may drive to their 'no blood for oil' rallies in upscale cars, in the Middle East most acknowledge that oil in not stolen, but hawked at sky-high prices.
> 
> *The villain is no longer the old idea of Aramco or 'big oil,' but the absence of transparency that allows an Arab elite to rake in billions without popular scrutiny. For all the hatred of Israel, millions in the Middle East are beginning to see that Arafat was more a kleptocrat than a leader, and that Israel, not Syria, got out of Lebanon.*
> 
> In Iraq, we do not see mass rallies castigating Americans for the presence of oil tankers in the Gulf or protests daily damning the Jews. Iraqi democrats control their own oil and have enough problems with car bombs and Islamists without wasting time blaming them on Israel.
> 
> None of us know whether we are witnessing the foundations of radical and positive changes in the Middle East, or false starts and brief detours from the usual pathologies. Many of us have written of the perils in thinking that mere voting is ipso facto the answer. But for better or worse, here we are and we can only press on in ways that transcend even threatening tyrants and encouraging reformers.
> 
> *For our own part, the United States desperately needs an energy policy, one that combines alternate energy sources, radical conservation, nuclear power, and increased fossil-fuel production â â€ and transcends shrill partisan debate. It is critical to curb our petroleum appetite not just to help our economy, curb foreign debt, and address trade imbalances, but more importantly to lower the world price of oil, and thus to keep obscene profits out of the hands of petrocracies that so easily appease terrorists and deform their economies. The only thing worse than a dictator is a rich oil-fed dictator whose failures are masked by largess.*
> 
> Finally, the United States must somehow forge a policy of consistency. True, a Gen. Musharraf is a neutral of sorts, and on occasion a convenient ally in hunting down terrorists. But for all his charm and the need to work with Pakistan, he is still a dictator, and a bullet away from a nuclear theocracy. Selling him high-priced F-16s is perhaps good policy in the short-term, but inconsistent with spending American blood and treasure for elections in Iraq and Afghanistan. It ultimately will send a terrible message to both Pakistani democratic reformers and to the world's largest democracy in India, which not long ago itself was on the verge of war on its border.
> 
> Sooner rather than later, Americans must also face the embarrassing fact that giving billions to the Egyptian dictator Mubarak, providing good-behavior money to the king of Jordan, and now giving jets to a Pakistani autocrat are all in the long-term as damaging to the United States' efforts to reform the Middle East as they are in the present smoothing the ruffled feathers of hurt strongmen.
> 
> The next problem we face is not that we have pushed democracy too abruptly in once-hostile lands, but that we have not pushed it enough into so-called friendly territory. It is, of course, dangerous to promote democracy in the Middle East, but more dangerous still to pause in our efforts, and, finally, most dangerous of all to quit before seeing this bold gambit through to its logical end â â€ an end that alone will end the pathologies that led to September 11.
> 
> â â€ Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson200504010803.asp


----------



## a_majoor

> Tigerhawk on Doran
> 
> Tigerhawk extensively covers a lecture by Michael Doran, Asst. Professor of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton, on the subject of the evolution of Al-Qaeda and its goals. (Hat tip: DL)
> 
> * Professor Doran was rather famously passed over for tenure last spring, quite possibly because he does not hold to the prevailing academic dogma about the Iraq war and American policy in the Middle East. At the time, the Daily Princetonian quoted an anonymous professor in the History Department as having said "we don't want him" with the pregnant implication that the reason had little to do with the quality of his scholarship*
> 
> What Princeton's history department lacked in enthusiasm was provided by his audience and the overflow crowd had to be moved to a larger venue -- where it overflowed again. Doran told the packed room that Al Qaeda's grand strategy consisted of the belief that an Islamic torrent of victory could only be constituted from a multitude of rivulets.
> 
> *Al Qaeda's thinkers have reinterpreted Islam all the way back to the time of the Crusades (or even the time of the Prophet). They argue, for example, that Muslim victories in the Crusades were not attributable to Saladin, but to small bands of Muslim insurgents that laid the foundation for Saladin's victories. Their argument is that, in effect, al Qaeda-like organizations were at the source of Muslim triumphs a thousand years ago. These victories did not derive from the state, but from little bands of determined men.*
> 
> From this premise, Al Qaeda embarked on a vast scheme of coalition warfare against their primary enemy, the United States. The idea's many concrete ramifications included these policies:
> 
> * the jihadis concluded that they could not overthrow the state and usher in Islamist rule by themselves and that therefore winning public opinion mattered. With the right public face, the radicals believed that they could divide their enemy;
> * it was important to "vex and exhaust" America by making them spend a lot of money and spread themselves thinly;
> * it was important to force Americans to carry the war into the heartland of the Middle East to drain America and polarize the Islamic world; and
> * it was important to "vex and exhaust" the local rulers.
> 
> Doran concluded that Al Qaeda would fail and while he enumerated the instances of their failure, he never spelled out the underlying flaw in their approach. The nearest Doran came to it was writing in the Opinion Journal (to which Tigerhawk provides a link) where he distinguishes between anti-American talk and actual support for Al Qaeda.
> 
> Take Iraq's Shiites. Few today will openly express their support for Washington. What drives their deepest choices, however, is the Sunni-Shiite split in their country, not their opposition to America. ... No Shiite, therefore, lifted a finger for the Sunni insurgency in Fallujah. ...
> 
> Here was fatal downside of coalition warfare. Using local grievances to construct a united front against America carried the risk of embroiling Al Qaeda in local disputes as well. Doran cited an incident in Saudi Arabia to illustrate his point. An Islamic preacher, Salman al-Awdah, declared his hatred for America and then cooperated with the Saudi security forces to prevent his sons from being used as 'martyrs' in Iraq. Anti-Americanism was but one card in the deck, which in the complexity of things was liable to be trumped by another.
> 
> Doran warns that we will need more than democracy to win this fight. ... That having been said, he is optimistic that al Qaeda will lose this struggle within Islam, even if it takes a generation for the victory of al Qaeda's enemies to become clear. ... Doran did not say why ... but his other work suggests that it is because of the success of the elections and improved counterinsurgency.
> 
> I will venture to speculate on the flaw within Al Qaeda's strategy. It is plagued by the curse of empire-builders from time immemorial: the problem of how to harness diverse local interests to the yoke of a single overarching goal. It hoped to tap the wellsprings of democracy without being bound by it; for howsoever wide they wished to cast their net over the world, the unspoken presumption was that in the end it would be guided by the Elect. Control over the Ummah from London to Jakarta was at the last going to emanate from a prophet's cave.
> 
> *One reason why the democratization strategy has proved so potent against the Al Qaeda is that it is actually Al Qaeda's own strategy, purged of its fatal flaw, turned against it. It was a recognition that winning public opinion mattered; that it was important to "vex and exhaust" the enemy by forcing them to take up local political causes; that it was desirable to force Al Qaeda to fight in their own Middle Eastern heartland to divide their very base; and that it was important to allow the local populations to "vex and exhaust" their own dictators.* _America's solution to the problem of empire-builders was simply to dispense with building an empire at all: it would thrive within dynamic conditions rather than seek to fix them. Success would be imperium in itself._
> 
> The ancient gladiatorial arena had a type of fighter called the Retiarius, armed with a trident and a net who would often be asymmetrically matched against a fighter with a large shield and short sword, the Scutarii (Mirmilliones or Secutores). In those combats, the Retarius would strive to utilize his mobility, the reach of his trident and the interposition of his net, often laid on the arena floor, to keep the Scutarii from closing to within fatal range. Gladiatorial promoters never paired the Retiarii against the Hoplomachi, whose long spear destroyed the net-and-trident's asymmetrical advantage. Al Qaeda made the error of assuming their enemies would fight according to their scenario, a mistake America has also committed on occasions. Al Qaeda metaphorically armed itself with a net and girded itself to meet the Scutarii and found to its dismay, that its foe had brought a spear.


----------



## a_majoor

Destroying the support base for the terrorist movements is perhaps the centre of gravity for GWOT operations during WW IV



> Cutting their Support
> Fighting terrorism effectively.
> 
> EDITOR'S NOTE:This is testimony delivered before the United States Senate Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security on the afternoon of Wednesday, April 20, 2005. It is printed here as prepared.
> 
> Chairman Kyl, Senator Feinstein, and members of the Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security, thank you for inviting me here this afternoon. It is an honor to testify before you, particularly on a matter of such importance to our national security.
> 
> I am currently an attorney in private practice in the New York area and a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a nonpartisan, nonprofit policy institute here in Washington that is dedicated to defeating terrorism and promoting freedom. For close to 18 years up until October of 2003, I served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York.
> 
> While I held several executive staff positions in our Office and had the opportunity to participate in a number of significant cases, the most important work that I participated in, along with teams of dedicated Assistant United States Attorneys working arm-in-arm with our colleagues in the FBI and other federal and state law enforcement agencies, was in the area of counterterrorism.
> 
> From a time shortly after the World Trade Center was bombed on February 26, 1993, through early 1996, I was privileged to lead the prosecution against Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and eleven others for conducting against the United States a war of urban terrorism that included, among other things: the WTC bombing, the 1990 murder of Meir Kahane (the founder of the Jewish Defense League), plots to murder prominent political and judicial officials, and a conspiracy to carry out what was called a â Å“Day of Terrorâ ? â â€ simultaneous bombings of New York City landmarks, including the United Nations complex, the Lincoln and Holland Tunnels (through which thousands of commuters traverse daily between lower Manhattan and New Jersey), and the Jacob K. Javits Federal Building that houses the headquarters of the FBI's New York Field Office (a plot that was thwarted).
> 
> After defending those convictions on appeal, I also participated to a lesser extent in some of our Office's other prominent counterterrorism efforts â â€ including pretrial litigation in the prosecution against the bombers of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, and the appellate defense of convictions in the case involving the conspiracy to bomb Los Angeles International Airport during the Millennium observance. Finally, following the 9/11 attacks, I supervised the U.S. Attorney's command post in lower Manhattan, near ground zero, working closely with all our colleagues in the law enforcement and intelligence communities to try to do what we have been trying to do ever since that awful day: prevent another attack against our homeland.
> 
> It is for that reason that I am happy to come here today to respectfully and enthusiastically urge the committee to vote in favor of the proposed â Å“Material Support to Terrorism Prohibition Improvements Act of 2005.â ?
> 
> *The proposed bill focuses on what are two of the most critical aspects of our national struggle to defeat the network of Islamic militants that is waging a terrorist war against us: (a) the need to beef up the statutory arsenal that enables law enforcement to stop attacks at an early stage, before they endanger Americans; and (b) the need to recognize the threat posed by paramilitary training.*
> 
> Both of these concerns emerged as serious problems from the very *start of our confrontation with militant Islam in the early 1990s.* When the WTC was attacked in 1993, it was not only the American public and political system that were taken by surprise. Although terrorism was not unknown in the United States, its incidents â â€ at least since the Civil War â â€ had been neither frequent nor threatening on the scale with which we have become all too familiar in recent years. As a result, the then-existing legal system was not sufficiently prepared to deal with the onslaught.
> 
> The inadequacy of the legal tools for combating terrorism came into sharpest relief in the months immediately following the WTC bombing. By then, it had become clear that an international jihad army, under the leadership of Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman â â€ the blind cleric who led the murderous Egyptian Gamaat al Islamia (or Islamic Group) which had played a key role in the 1981 assassination of President Anwar al-Sadat â â€ had been had been forming since the late 1980s. *This militia had actually been surveilled by the FBI during 1988 and 1989, the time during which it first started conducting paramilitary exercises in marksmanship, assassination tactics, and explosives training in remote outposts like Calverton, Long Island, and western Connecticut.*
> 
> While it is difficult in our post-9/11 world to look at history without the prism of all we have been through for the past twelve years, it is important to underscore that this was what might be called the pre-terror era. We now know that paramilitary training â â€ not only in the U.S. but overseas â â€ is perhaps the surest sign that people are committed to doing our nation harm. But at the time, the U.S. government was not investigating the nascent group in the New York area as a terrorist organization. Rather, understanding that the training might, at least in part, be geared toward supporting the Afghan mujahedeen, the FBI's concern was that the group could be violating federal â Å“neutralityâ ? laws, which generally prohibit American persons (citizens and legal aliens) from helping make war on a country with which the United States is at peace.
> 
> The true significance of this training emerged only after the WTC bombing. It was then that the old surveillance photos of the training were reviewed and found to depict key members of the bombing conspiracy. These included Mohammed Salameh, Nidal Ayyad, and Mahmud Abouhalima, all later convicted of the WTC bombing; Clement Hampton-El, later convicted of terrorism charges relating to the bombing; and El Sayyid Nosair, later convicted not only of the same terrorism charges but also the 1990 Kahane homicide. I should note here that Abouhalima and Hampton-El, even then, even before any of the atrocities that followed, were already prominent figures in what was a growing jihadist movement. Why? Precisely because they had gone to Afghanistan, they had participated in the rigorous training there, they had fought with the mujahedeen, and they had come back to the United States to share what they had learned with the new recruits.
> 
> The crucial role of paramilitary training â â€ especially the kind imported from overseas â â€ was also evident from the activities of two other men who were central to the WTC bombing conspiracy. Ahmed Ajaj had settled in Houston, Texas, upon first arriving in the United States on September 9, 1991, and petitioning for political asylum. He was permitted to remain at liberty â â€ despite failing to show up for his immigration hearing. He used that liberty to make some necessary militant contacts. These helped him arrange to attend a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan.
> 
> Ajaj left the United States to do precisely that in April 1992. When he returned from the training on September 1 of that year, he was not alone. His traveling companion, aboard a flight to New York City from Pakistan, was Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, a trained explosives expert who would later become the chief architect of the WTC bombing. Nor was Ajaj empty-handed. He had in tow items that his training had taught him would be most valuable: bomb making manuals and instructions on the creation of false identity documents.
> 
> Tragically, while Ajaj was arrested on immigration charges upon attempting to enter our country, Yousef was permitted to enter and remain at liberty upon claiming asylum. He immediately took up residence with Salameh in New Jersey and spent the next six months experimenting with various compounds and finally constructing the powerful urea nitrate explosive that was detonated at the WTC, killing six people including a pregnant woman, injuring countless others, causing hundreds of millions of dollars in damages, and, effectively, declaring war on the United States.
> 
> Yousef, of course, eluded capture for nearly two years, fleeing the U.S., returning to militant strongholds overseas, and planning what became known alternatively as the â Å“Bojenkaâ ? conspiracy or the â Å“Manilla Airâ ? conspiracy â â€ a plot to bomb U.S. airliners while they were in flight over the Pacific, which claimed the life of one man, and nearly took down a crowded flight, as a result of one of Yousef's test runs during which a bomb was detonated using a timing device.
> 
> The realization in early 1993, after the WTC bombing, of an emergent, international jihad army with members stationed inside the United States had immediate consequences. An acceptance of responsibility letter penned by Yousef warned that the terrorist militia had many trained members and was fully prepared to strike again. This proved instantly to be the case. An FBI informant soon learned that a plot for even greater devastation was underway: the aforementioned â Å“Day of Terrorâ ? conspiracy. Once again, paramilitary training proved critical to this plot, which was to be carried out by members of different cells under Sheik Abdel Rahman's influence.
> 
> *Of course, by the spring of 1993, in the wake of the WTC bombing, we already knew that while the Afghan mujahedeen was quite real, it had also been ostensibly valuable as a cover in the United States for the true purpose of the training. This was plainly to have trained individuals, infiltrated into our community and at the ready to perform violent jihadist activities, on short notice, whenever and wherever the opportunities presented themselves. Still, in the investigation of the Day of Terror plot by the FBI and the New York Joint Terrorism Task Force, the obvious was made explicit.*
> 
> An informant became accepted into one of the aforementioned cells, a primarily Sudanese group under the leadership of a man named Siddig Ibrahim Siddig Ali. Siddig Ali repeatedly stressed to the informant the importance of training, and detailed how members of his cell had conducted training exercises in a public park in Jersey City, New Jersey as well as in days-long ventures to rural Pennsylvania. As was the case with the purported Afghanistan training in the late 1980's and early 1990's, participants in the training had a cover story: they were readying themselves to take up arms in the former Yugoslavia on behalf of the Bosnian Muslims. But Siddig Ali explained to the informant that the essential point was to have people â Å“ready for actionâ ? whether in the U.S. or overseas. As the leader of the cell, Siddig Ali elaborated that this arrangement meant he could plot terror operations, get the necessary approval from Sheik Abdel Rahman, and then follow the practice of not â Å“speak[ing] to these people about what we are going to do until the last momentâ ? since these people had already been instructed to stand â Å“readyâ ? for further instructions.
> 
> Indeed, in the early spring of 1993, Siddig Ali had planned to use the cell to carry out the assassination of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak during the latter's scheduled visit to New York City. The plot was aborted when Siddig Ali learned that that law enforcement had become suspicious and taking some investigative steps. But Amir Abdelgani, a member of Siddig Ali's cell, later confirmed for the FBI's informant the â Å“sleeperâ ? nature of the cell by telling the informant that even though Siddig Ali had not told Abdelgani about targeting Mubarak, Abdelgani had been trained and would have been willing and able to carry out an attack.
> 
> The paramilitary training we are talking about was no amateur hour. Its leaders had military experience, including combat, and trained would-be terrorist operatives in commando tactics, the use of small and large firearms, the construction of explosives, techniques for neutralizing sentries, and various other maneuvers. It should come as no surprise then that, before law enforcement interdicted the Day of Terror plot, the would-be bombers had engaged in a host of activities that were consistent with their training â â€ including repeated and detailed surveillance of the targets.
> 
> Of course, unearthing this plot before it could be executed was an enormous public service. In matters of terrorism, the object for law enforcement (and for the rest of government) must always be to prevent attacks from happening rather than to bring terrorists to justice only after mass murder has already occurred. But one important effect of thwarting the Day of Terror plot was the revelation that there were gaping weaknesses in American anti-terrorism law â â€ weaknesses that counterintuitively penalized investigators for foiling plots.
> 
> For example, under American criminal law, circa 1993, a successful bombing could be punished with a term of life imprisonment and, once capital punishment was revived under federal law in the mid-1990s, by execution if the bombing had caused any deaths. The criminal code, however, contained no specific provision for bombing conspiracy. Thus, if a group plotted a bombing but was interrupted by effective law enforcement, the plotters had to be charged under the catch-all federal conspiracy statute (18 U.S.C. ( 371), which punishes an agreement to violate any criminal statute with a maximum five-year penalty (and no requirement that the judge impose any minimum term of incarceration at all). Such a term was grossly insufficient for a conspiracy to kill of tens of thousands.
> 
> Federal law also made it a crime to attempt to carry out a bombing (18 U.S.C. ( 844), which at least provided another charge against unsuccessful plotters. But the penalty was paltry: a maximum of ten years' imprisonment (and, again, no requirement that the judge impose any minimum term of incarceration at all). *Attempt law, in addition, created a counterproductive tension between public safety and prosecution. Proving attempt requires the government not only to show that the plotters agreed to commit the crime at issue (here, bombing) and took some preparatory measures, but also that those measures amounted to a â Å“substantial stepâ ? toward the accomplishment of the crime.* But the difference between â Å“mere preparationâ ? (which is insufficient) and a â Å“substantial stepâ ? (which is required to establish guilt) can be murky â â€ made more ambiguous back in 1993 because the leading court case on attempt, which was not a model of clarity, came in the context of an attempted bombing.1
> 
> The tension here was palpable. Because prosecutors and investigators must fear that purposeful actions to carry out a bombing could be construed as â Å“mere preparationâ ? rather than a â Å“substantial step,â ? their incentive is to let the conspirators go forward with their plans until the last possible second in order to bolster the chances of conviction. Public safety, however, strongly counsels against this approach, for if the investigators lose control of events â â€ which can easily happen when dealing with organizations whose operations are by nature secretive â â€ massive loss of life can result. Fortunately, this did not occur in the Day of Terror plot, but the possibility of its happening was too great in the WTC bombing era.
> 
> The Clinton administration's Justice Department and the members of this Congress are to be greatly commended for energetically dealing with these grave problems in the best tradition of bipartisanship in the arena of national security. In 1996, antiterrorism legislation was enacted which both ratcheted up the penalties for terrorism-related crimes and, perhaps more significantly, gave prosecutors urgently needed tools, designed to root out terrorist plots at an early stage, shut down funding channels, and place a premium on preventing terrorist acts rather than simply prosecuting them afterwards.
> 
> Among these much-needed improvements were the material-support statutes this subcommittee is again considering today, Sections 2339A and 2339B of Title 18, United States Code. Of course the greatest threats we face come from the frontline operatives who are actually willing to carry out attacks. But, as we have learned the hard way, *those terrorists simply cannot succeed without support networks: people and entities willing to fund them, to train them, to provide them with fraudulent documents that facilitate their travel, and to provide them with the other assets they need to carry out their savage deeds.*
> 
> The material-support statutes target just this type of behavior. Thus, it should come as no surprise that the material-support statutes have become the backbone of antiterrorism enforcement since they were enacted in 1996. And, I respectfully submit, it is no accident that we have not had another domestic terror attack since 9/11, during a period of time when the Justice Department under President Bush has been appropriately aggressive in using the material-support statutes to isolate and disrupt activity that facilitates terror networks.
> 
> I strongly support the theory behind both statutes. Section 2339A is the most straightforward. If the government can prove that someone has contributed assets or any kind of assistance with the intention or awareness that these resources will be used to carry out the types of violent crimes we commonly associate with terrorism, the law must treat such contributions harshly â â€ both to neutralize the contributors who have been identified and to convey an unambiguous message to other would-be contributors that this behavior will not be tolerated.
> 
> Section 2339B is at least equally important, although it has been subjected to more criticism. It stipulates that once an entity that has been designated a â Å“foreign terrorist organizationâ ? (FTO) by the Secretary of State Under, it is illegal to provide material support to that organization. Because many terrorist organizations compartmentalize themselves into purportedly separate military wings, political wings and social-services wings, it is sometimes contended that Americans should not be restrained from contributing assets, advice, or expertise to the non-military activities.
> 
> I respectfully submit that this is ill-conceived. Our goal here, for the sake of national security, has to be to marginalize and eradicate terrorist activity. Organizations that practice terrorism must be made aware that, no matter what good they may seek to do, by participating in conduct that targets civilians and aims to extort concessions by force, they forfeit any claim on our good will. Once an organization has been designated an FTO, it must be considered radioactive â â€ an entity that merits only our contempt, not our contributions.
> 
> It also bears noting here that Congress did not give the Secretary of State a blank check. Federal law provides for a rigorous administrative procedure, the State Department must support its conclusions with findings of fact, and key congressional members must be given an opportunity to object prior to the designation's publication in the Federal Register. Moreover, even though it may be an avowed enemy of the United States, an FTO is permitted to appeal the designation to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia â â€ a system that provides due process but also centralizes all adjudication in a single tribunal that can develop the requisite competence and apply a uniform set of analytical standards.
> 
> These well-considered safeguards should give us confidence that only the organizations which deserve the designation are being targeted, and that an entity which is either wrongly accused of practicing terrorism or that convincingly renounces terrorism has an open avenue to challenge the designation. Given that, the law does not and should not allow individuals, however well intentioned they may be, to provide material support. Such individuals may sincerely believe they are performing in a socially beneficial manner by contributing resources to nonviolent activities. Many resources that terrorists need, however, are fungible. *A dollar contributed for charity may be used for weapons. Expertise or other assets that help an FTO carry out seemingly innocent activity may allow it to shift a greater percentage of its resources to violence or to function more efficiently and more attractively â â€ which inevitably helps its recruiting and its capacity to use force. If we are to win the war in which we are engaged, these organizations must be starved and ostracized, not fed and emboldened.*
> 
> I strongly support the measures in the proposed bill to improve the effectiveness of the material-support statutes, as well as the much needed crackdown on the menace of paramilitary training. I commend Senator Kyl for proposing them.
> 
> Last year's Intelligence Reform Act provided much needed clarification on statutory terms such as â Å“personnel," â Å“training,â ? and â Å“expert advice or assistance,â ? to address constitutional vagueness objections; expanded the jurisdictional bases for material-support offenses; and clarified the mens rea element to require that the government need only show a defendant knew that the organization to which he gave material support either engaged in terrorism or was designated as a terror group. These changes both helped the government target appropriate offenders and promoted fairness and due process by ensuring clarity in the law.
> 
> Allowing such improvements to sunset would take us a step back to the uncertainty of judicial decisions that created doubt about the statutory requirements and thus reduced the effectiveness of material support laws as the vital law enforcement tool Congress intended them to be. I respectfully urge the committee that the sunsets be removed and the improvements enacted by the Intelligence Reform Act be made permanent.
> 
> I also support the increased penalties for material support offenses. Terrorism is the most profound national-security challenge our country faces, and it must result in penalties that reflect that reality. The Supreme Court's recent ruling that the federal Sentencing Guidelines are advisory at best will obviously challenge this Congress in many ways to ensure that the worst offenders are subjected to commensurate terms of incarceration. Mandatory minimums are often unpopular, and in many instances they may be overkill. But here, we are not dealing with a blight we are merely seeking to prosecute. We are actually at war with a vicious terror network and our highest priority must be to eradicate terror networks. If there is any context in which mandatory minimums are proper and prudent, it is surely this one.
> 
> Finally, it is time to recognize in an assertive way the threat posed to our country by militant Islam's emphasis on paramilitary training. Recent expert estimates suggest that as many as 70,000 people may have gone through paramilitary training at al Qaeda camps over the years. Obviously, not every one of those trainees becomes or has any intention of becoming an active terrorist operative. But we would be foolish not to recognize that some percentage will, that this percentage may well be higher than we'd like to think, and that even if it were only one percent that would be far too many. Nor can we close our eyes to the fact that paramilitary training by at least some defendants has been a staple of virtually all the major terrorist prosecutions in our country over the past dozen years. As we have seen, it is what makes effective sleeper cells possible.
> 
> I thank the subcommittee for its time and attention.
> 
> â â€ Andrew C. McCarthy, who led the 1995 terrorism prosecution against Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and eleven others, is a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/mccarthy/mccarthy200504210800.asp


----------



## a_majoor

> Winning the War
> But don't forget the rules of this strange conflict!
> 
> 
> 
> If we look back at the war that started on September 11, there have emerged some general rules that should guide us in the next treacherous round of the struggle against Islamic fascism, the autocracies that aid and abet it, and the method of terror that characterizes it.
> 
> 1. Political promises must be kept. Had the United States postponed the scheduled January elections in Iraq â â€ once the hue and cry of Washington insiders â â€ the insurrection would have waxed rather than waned. Only the combination of U.S. arms, the training of indigenous forces, and real Iraqi sovereignty can eliminate the vestiges of hard-core jihadists and Saddamites.
> 
> Given our previous record â â€ allowing Saddam to survive in1991, restoring the Kuwaiti royals after the Gulf War, subsidies for the Mubbarak autocracy, and a moral pass given the Saudi royals â â€* we must bank carefully any good will that we accrue if support for democracy is going to be a credible alternative to the old realpolitik. * Reformers with no power in Egypt or the Gulf, who oppose such â Å“moderateâ ? autocracies, must, despite all the danger that such a policy entails, be seen in the same positive light as those dissidents in far more peril in Lebanon, Syria, and Iran. Consistency and principle are the keys, and they will be worth more than a division or an air wing in bringing this war to a close.
> 
> 2. *Any warnings to use force * â â€ much less unfortunate unguarded braggadocio â â€ *should be credible and followed through*. The efforts of the terrorists are aimed at the psychological humiliation and loss of face of American power, not its actual military defeat. Appearance is as often important as reality, especially for those who live in the eighth rather than the 21st century.
> 
> After the horrific butchery of Americans in Fallujah in late March 2004, we promised to hunt down the perpetrators, only to pull back in April and May, and allow the city a subsequent half-year of Islamic terror, before retaking it in November. The initial hesitation almost derailed the slated elections; the subsequent siege ensured their success. Nothing has been more deleterious in this war than the promise of hard force to come, followed by temporization. Either silence about our intent or bold military action is required, though a combination of both is preferable.
> 
> 3. Diplomatic solutions follow, not precede, military reality. Had we failed in Afghanistan, Musharraf would be an Islamic nationalist today, for the sake of his own survival. Withdrawing from Iraq in defeat would have meant no progress in Lebanon. Some hope followed in the Middle East only because the Intifada was crushed and Arafat is in paradise. The Muslims scholars of Iraq talk differently now than a year ago because thousands of their sympathetic terrorists have been killed in the Sunni Triangle. The would-be Great Mahdi Moqtada Sadr is more buffoon than Khomeini reborn since his militia was crushed last year.
> 
> A quarter century, from the Iranian hostage-taking to 9/11, should have taught us the wages of thinking that an Arafat, bin Laden, assorted hostage-takers, an Iranian mullah, Saddam, or Mullah Omar might listen to a reasoned diplomat in striped pants. Our mistake was not so much that appeasement and empty threats made no impression on such cutthroats. The real tragedy instead was that onlookers who wished to ally with us shuddered that the United States either would talk to, or keep its hands off, almost any monster or mass murderer in the Middle East â â€ if such accommodation meant sort of a continuation of the not so bothersome status quo. In contrast, that bin Laden and Mullah Omar are in hiding, Saddam in chains, Dr. Khan exposed, the young Assad panicking, and Colonel Khadafi on better behavior will slowly teach others the wages of their killing and terrorism and that the United States is as unpredictable in using force as it is constant in supporting democratic reformers.
> 
> 4. The worst attitude toward the Europeans and the U.N. is publicly to deprecate their impotent machinations while enlisting their aid in extremis. After being slurred by both, we then asked for their military help, peace-keepers, and political intervention â â€ winning no aid of consequence except contempt in addition to inaction.
> 
> Praise the U.N. and Europe to the skies. Yet under no circumstances pressure them to do what they really don't want to, which only leads to their gratuitous embarrassment and the logical need to get even in the most petty and superficial ways. The U.N. efforts to retard the American removal of Saddam interrupted the timetable of invasion. Its immediate flight after having its headquarters bombed emboldened the terrorists. And a viable U.S. coalition was caricatured by its failed obsequious efforts to lure in France and Germany. We should look to the U.N. and Old Europe only in times of post-bellum calm when it is in the national interest of the United States to give credit for the favorable results of our own daring to opportunistic others â â€ occasions that are not as rare as we might think.
> 
> 5. Do not look for logic and consistency in the Middle East where they are not to be found. It makes no sense to be frustrated that Arab intellectuals and reformers damn us for removing Saddam and simultaneously praise democratic rumblings that followed his fall. We should accept that the only palatable scenario for the Arab Street was one equally fanciful: Brave demonstrators took to the barricades, forced Saddam's departure, created a constitution, held elections, and then invited other Arab reformers into Baghdad to spread such indigenous reform â â€ all resulting in a society as sophisticated, wealthy, free, and modern as the West, but felt to be morally superior because of its allegiance to Islam. That is the dream that is preferable to the reality that the Americans alone took out the monster of the Middle East and that any peaceful protest against Saddam would have ended in another genocide.
> 
> Ever since the departure of the colonials, the United States, due to its power and principled support for democratic Israel, has served a Middle Eastern psychological need to account for its own self-created impotence and misery, a pathology abetted by our own past realpolitik and nurtured by the very autocrats that we sought to accommodate.
> 
> After all these years, do not expect praise or gratitude for billions poured into Iraq, Egypt, Jordan, or Palestine or thanks for the liberation of Kuwait, protection of Saudi Arabia in 1990, or the removal of Saddam â â€ much less for American concern for Muslims in Bosnia, Kosovo, Chechnya, Somalia, the Sudan, or Afghanistan. Our past sins always must be magnified as much as our more recent benefactions are slighted.
> 
> In response, *American policy should be predicated not on friendship or the desire for appreciation, but on what is in our national interest and what is right â â€ whose symbiosis is possible only through the current policy of consistently promoting democracy. Constitutional government is not utopia â â€ * only the proper antidote for the sickness in the Middle East, and the one medicine that hateful jihadists, dictators, kings, terrorists, and theocrats all agree that they alike hate.
> 
> The events that followed September 11 are the most complex in our history since the end of World War II, and require far more skill and intuition than even what American diplomats needed in the Cold War, when they contained a nuclear but far more predictable enemy. Since 9/11 we have endured a baffling array of shifting and expedient pronouncements and political alliances, both at home and abroad. So we now expect that most who profess support for democratization abroad do so only to the degree that â â€ and as long as â â€ the latest hourly news from Iraq is not too bad.
> 
> One of the most disheartening things about this war is the realization that on any given day, a number of once-stalwart supporters will suddenly hedge, demand someone's resignation, or bail, citing all sorts of legitimate grievances without explaining that none of their complaints compares to past disappointments in prior successful wars â â€ and without worry that the only war in which America was defeated was lost more at home than abroad.
> 
> Yet if we get through all this with the extinction of Islamic-fascist terrorism and an end to the Middle East autocracy that spawned and nurtured it â â€ and I think we are making very good progress in doing just that and in less than four years â â€ it will only be because of the superb quality of the American military and the skilful diplomacy of those who have so temperately unleashed it.
> 
> â â€ Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.
> 
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson200504220743.asp


----------



## a_majoor

The home front needs more security as well, since terrorists are well aware of how intelligence and law enforcement works and will use sanctuaries granted or created unintentionally or not to carry out their deeds:



> *Check This Out*
> Libraries should be a key target of the Patriot Act.
> 
> As Congress considers reauthorizing the Patriot Act, it explicitly should add libraries to the locations where federal investigators may hunt terrorists. Here are five reasons why: Marwan al Shehhi; Mohand, Wail, and Waleed Alshehri; and Mohamed Atta - September 11 hijackers, all.
> 
> Reference librarian Kathleen Hensmen remembers Wail and Waleed Alshehri's summer 2001 visit to the Delray Beach Public Library. Well-dressed, they resembled "the GQ of the Middle East" that evening, she tells me. Hensmen found them "very courteous, very friendly," although "they just sat at one computer, and they were staring at me, and I didn't understand why."
> 
> Hensmen had ethnic Arab neighbors in her native southeastern Michigan, though she rarely saw such folks at her library in southeastern Florida. "They [the Alshehri brothers] stood out in my mind because not many Middle Eastern people pass through here."
> 
> Marwan al-Shehhi arrived later, Hensmen says. That night, "he just sat at a table. He didn't ask for a computer." She says al-Shehhi asked her one question: "Can you recommend a good restaurant?"
> 
> Hensmen, new to Delray Beach, had few suggestions. "At that point," she adds, "a group of 'we nice Americans' who were sitting around said, 'Oh, I can recommend restaurants to you.' So, they were helping him, as I was busy signing people up for the computer, and doing my reference work, ordering books."
> 
> "When their pictures were published in the Miami Herald, that's when I broke down and cried," Hensmen says. "I lost it, knowing what they had done, and how we were so friendly towards them."
> 
> Additional evidence of the 9/11 hijackers' fondness for libraries has not fazed Patriot Act foes.
> 
> The 9/11 Commission Report discusses the man who smashed United Flight 175 into 2 World Trade Center: "[Marwan al-] Shehhi and other members of the group used to frequent a library in Hamburg [Germany] to use the Internet."
> 
> "[Angela] Duile said Atta, al-Shehhi and other Arabs regularly came to the Hamburg library where she worked," the Associated Press reported last November 10. The Hamburg Technical University librarian testified in 9/11 associate Mounir el Motassadeq's German retrial. She echoed her initial-trial testimony about an early 1999 anti-American outburst in which she said al-Shehhi bragged, "Something will happen, and there will be thousands of dead." Duile added: "He mentioned the World Trade Center." Sure enough, that's where al-Shehhi helped murder 2,749 innocents.
> 
> A page A-1, September 30, 2001, Washington Post story explained that hijacker Mohand Alshehri came from a poor Saudi family but "was facile enough with computers that he could use the Internet at a Delray Beach public library."
> 
> While learning to fly, the Los Angeles Times reported on its front page on September 27, 2001, "Atta used computers at the public library and worked out at a Delray Beach health club."
> 
> These September 11 hijackers were not the only terrorists who used libraries as tactical assets.
> 
> "_n January and February '04, I went myself, personally, to South Waziristan and handed over money to, and supplies to a high ranking al-Qaeda official," Mohammad Junaid Babar confessed last June 3 in Manhattan federal court while pleading guilty to giving terrorists material support. "I provided some of the materials, like I mentioned, aluminum nitrate, ammonium nitrate, and aluminum powder" Babar elucidated, for bombings that al-Qaeda allegedly envisioned for pubs, restaurants, and train stations in London.
> 
> The Pakistani-born, Queens-reared Babar frequented the New York Public Library (NYPL). As Deputy Attorney General James Comey told the Senate Judiciary Committee September 22: *"We found out after we locked this guy up that he was going there because that library's hard drives were scrubbed after each user was done, and he was using that library to e-mail other al-Qaeda associates around the world. He knew that that was a sanctuary."*
> 
> Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski's September 1995 manifesto, published in U.S. newspapers in exchange for his stopping his attacks, referred to L. Sprague De Camp's The Ancient Engineer. G-men already had sought records from Rocky-Mountain-area libraries Kaczynski may have consulted. As FBI director Robert Mueller wrote in the January 1, 2004 American Libraries: "A librarian in Montana near Kaczynski's home told FBI agents that Kaczynski had ordered 'tons of stuff' on L. Sprague De Camp." Kaczynski soon was arrested. Since May 1998, he has been serving four life terms, plus 30 years, for 16 bombings that killed three people and wounded 23 others.
> 
> When NYPD detectives suspected Scottish occult poet Aleister Crowley may have inspired "Zodiac Killer" Heriberto Seda, a Queens grand jury granted them a subpoena on July 3, 1990, to see who requested Crowley's books from NYPL's Bryant Park headquarters. These records helped officials arrest Seda and, in June 1998, convict him for three murders and one attempted homicide. He is behind bars for 83 years.
> 
> Congress should add "library" to the Patriot Act, one place that word does not appear. Its absence has not deterred detractors from labeling the Act's Section 215 as "the Library Provision." This phrase is as invented as the light bulb. Section 215 allows the FBI to ask federal judges for "access to certain business records for foreign intelligence and international terrorism investigations." Unfortunately, domestic terrorism inquiries are verboten. Fortunately, so are those "conducted solely upon the basis of activities protected by the first amendment to the Constitution."
> 
> The Justice Department seems needlessly skittish about potentially equipping agents with search warrants and dispatching them to libraries to foil the mass murder of Americans. Justice "has not sought a Section 215 order to obtain library or bookstore records," an April DOJ fact sheet declares - twice.
> 
> The American Library Association is underwhelmed.
> 
> "Keep Big Brother Out of Your Library!" screams a headline on its website. ALA considers Section 215 "a present danger to the constitutional rights and privacy rights of library users."
> 
> "*I am dismayed by librarians' uninformed opposition to the Patriot Act," says Maria Vagianos, a librarian at the anti-Islamist Investigate Project and a former public librarian in Peabody, Massachusetts. "Librarians commit a disservice to society and to their profession when they succumb to the ignorance that they are charged to dispel."
> *
> Vagianos's voice is rare in her profession. Indeed, *alarmist librarians heartily eliminate records that counterterrorists might need.*
> 
> Consider the ALA's August 2003 "Guidelines for Developing a Library Privacy Policy." Due, in part, to "increased law enforcement surveillance," this document says "librarians need to ensure that they...*[a]void retaining records that are not needed for efficient operation of the library, including data-related logs, digital records, vendor-collected data, and system backups." It adds: "Information that should be regularly purged or shredded includes PII [personally identifiable information] on library resource use, material circulation history, security/surveillance tapes and use logs, both paper and electronic."*
> 
> Like a handkerchief that can wipe the fingerprints off a smoking gun, many libraries now use computer software that automatically deletes each book's check-out history as soon as it's returned. Berkeley, California's library now shreds Internet log-in records daily rather than weekly, as done before 9/11.
> 
> "We're quiet rebels," Cindy Czesak, director of New Jersey's Paterson Free Public Library, told Fox News. Her institution collects every completed computer sign-up sheet. "After that, it's removed and destroyed." She added: "We bought a nice new shredder." Paterson happens to be the Garden State town where Nawaf and Salem al Hazmi, Khalid al Mihdar, Hani Hanjour, and Majed Moqed rented an apartment in spring 2001. All five slammed American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon. Death toll: 184.
> 
> These dangerously naÃƒÂ¯ve or clandestinely seditious librarians are beyond foolish. They potentially jeopardize the lives of American citizens.
> 
> No square inch of this country should be a safe harbor where terrorists calmly can schedule the slaughter of defenseless civilians. Whether fueled by sincere civil libertarianism or malignant Bushophobia, those who thwart probes of Islamo-fascist library patrons have the same impact: They make it easier - not harder - for terrorists to kill you.
> 
> - Deroy Murdock is a New York-based columnist with the Scripps Howard News Service.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/murdock/murdock200504250750.asp
> _


----------



## Infanteer

You realize that this page is now the A Majoor article repository now....


----------



## a_majoor

Just so long as you know where to go for the background briefings!


----------



## I_am_John_Galt

But please, keep it up: makes for good reading ...


----------



## a_majoor

Another one for the repository. The question here seems to be what will arouse American action against Iran and Syria, although the unspoken hope in the administration _may_ be that something like the Ceadar Revolution will displace the dictatorsdhips in syria and Iran as well.



> *The Hand of the Mullahs*
> What we know, and what we don't do.
> 
> The State Department has once again awarded the blue ribbon to the mullahs of Tehran:
> 
> Iran remained the most active state sponsor of terrorism in 2004. Its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Ministry of Intelligence and Security were involved in the planning and support of terrorist acts and continued to exhort a variety of groups to use terrorism in pursuit of their goals.
> 
> This is no small accomplishment, even for the leaders of the Islamic republic. As recent events in Iraq make all too clear, there are still lots of terrorists with an insatiable appetite for the blood of their friends and neighbors, even if it has gotten much harder for them to slaughter crusaders and infidels. As Coalition fighters repeatedly report, Iran's claw marks â â€ often side by side with the Syrians' and the Saudis' â â€ are all over innumerable terrorist strikes, from Fallujah and Hilla to Baghdad and Mosul in Iraq, and, with the melting snows, across Afghanistan as well. It is not hard to get this story; I have abundant first-hand testimony to these facts from military and civilian sources in both countries. Any serious news organization could get it, but none seems to want it.
> 
> The State Department knows it, and says so in its own peculiar convoluted way:
> 
> Iran pursued a variety of policies in Iraq during 2004, some of which appeared to be inconsistent with Iran's stated objectives regarding stability in Iraq... Senior (Iraqi) officials have publicly expressed concern over Iranian interference in Iraq, and there were reports that Iran provided funding, safe transit, and arms to insurgent elements...
> 
> In normal English, that would read, "Iran says it wants stability in Iraq, but it isn't so; the mullahcracy supports the terrorists." Had the State Department been interested in expanding its context ever so slightly, it could have added, "and its support for the terrorists is coordinated with the Syrians." A few months ago, American forces in Iraq captured photographs and documents about a meeting in Syria between Iraqi terrorists and Syrian and Iranian intelligence officials. Similar information was found in Fallujah.
> 
> If we cast our gaze elsewhere, we find the Iranians fighting democracy in Lebanon. Their Syrian buddies have withdrawn their armed forces â â€ while sending their intelligence officers back into the country in new wardrobes â â€ which leaves the Lebanese to the tender mercies of Hezbollah, the Iranian-created and mullah-operated organization that is the most dangerous band of killers on earth. And they have other allies, too, ranging from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (Ahmad Gibril's assassins, who have taken over a goodly number of rocket launchers and T55 tanks that the Syrians thoughtfully left behind in Damour and in the Bekaa Valley) to the militias of the Syrian Socialist National Party, the Baath Party, and the Tawhid in Tripoli.
> 
> All this raises some very embarrassing questions for President Bush and his top strategists. We know this is going on, yet we are fighting a purely defensive war in Iraq alone. The Iranians, Syrians, and Saudis have all heard the president say he wants an end to tyranny in the Middle East, because he understands the passionate embrace between the tyrants and the terrorists. The Iranian, Syrian and Saudi terror masters know that those words are aimed at their rule, and they are rightly afraid, afraid that Bush's vision will inspire their own people to become the gravediggers of the old regimes.
> 
> The terror masters hoped and expected that they would be able to turn Iraq into a replay of Lebanon in the 1980s, when they drove American and French armed forces out of the country. But they have failed. Contrary to their hopes and expectations, we â â€ and the Iraqi people â â€ have not been spooked by the wave of terror, and the Iraqis have demonstrated grit, bravery, and patience far beyond most expectations. Indeed, as the slaughter of innocent Iraqis grows, the people are manifestly becoming more resolute; dead national guardsmen and soldiers are quickly replaced with new volunteers, and the murder of government officials has not deterred Iraqi citizens from participating in government. The Iraqis are fighting back.
> 
> Worst of all, from the standpoint of the terror masters, the ultimate threat â â€ freedom â â€ is growing stronger, just as the president wishes, and freedom is spreading even though, despite his constant promises to support democratic revolution, he is doing virtually nothing to help it. He, along with Secretaries Rice and Rumsfeld, has not rallied to the side of the Iranian people, even though the Iranians have abundantly demonstrated their desire to be rid of the mullahs. Two weeks ago there were massive demonstrations and work stoppages in the oil-rich regions, centering around the city of Ahwaz. The demonstrators called for an end to the regime, scores of people were killed, and hundreds were beaten and arrested. On May Day, workers again demonstrated against the regime, this time in all the major cities. In Tehran, strongman and likely president-in-waiting Hashemi Rafsanjani was hooted down by the crowd, and pictures of him and Supreme Leader Khamenei were torn down and trampled. Yet no one in the American Government spoke a word of support for the demonstrators, and no one has yet endorsed the one thing that unites the overwhelming majority of Iranians, whatever their political proclivities: a national referendum on the legitimacy of the regime itself. If there were a national ballot on the single question â â€ Do you want an Islamic republic? â â€ the regime would pass into history overnight. But there is silence in official Washington.
> 
> The anti-Rafsanjani demonstrations are very important, because Rafsanjani will soon formally declare his candidacy for the presidency. Elections are scheduled for June, and the regime is desperate to "prove" its standing with the people. To that end, they will use force and trickery to produce a huge voter turnout. They will compel all government employees and all military personnel to go to the polls, and they will spread rumors (if you don't vote, you'll never get an exit visa; if you don't vote, your family members will be punished, etc.) to bring the unwilling to vote. The mullahs know that many millions of Iranians plan to boycott the elections, in a kind of silent demonstration of contempt.
> 
> The trickery has to do with Rafsanjani's grand return to national politics (he is an ex-president). He intends to campaign as the anti-establishment candidate par excellence, and has reportedly connived with Khamenei to prepare a super-reformist image. Rafsanjani intends to run against the Supreme Leader, criticizing the regime's performance on everything from foreign policy (hoping to seduce the West into thinking that he â â€ who has been a key figure in the mullahcracy for decades â â€ will produce the long awaited "opening" to the United States) to the management of the economy. It is unlikely that many Iranians will fall for this; they remember Rafsanjani as one of the most brutal leaders of the vicious crackdown on the student demonstration of the late eighties (a story recounted in shocking detail in the memoirs of the Grand Ayatollah Montazeri), and they are aware of the billions that he and his family have reportedly stashed away in foreign banks and real estate.
> 
> All of this is public information, yet we do not hear it from our leaders, and the silence in Washington must be terribly discouraging to the Iranian people. It will get even worse if the Rafsanjani ploy or others that will follow are taken seriously by our diplomats, as they surely will by those Europeans eager to continue to do business in Iran and restrain the United States from pursuing regime change there.
> 
> *It is long past time for the president to show that he is serious about winning the war against terror; it can't be done by speeches alone, and it doesn't require armed invasion. But it does require action: political action to support and aid the forces of democratic revolution in Iran, Lebanon, Syria, and Saudi Arabia.
> *
> If you listen to the hateful speeches of Rafsanjani, Khamenei, and the other tyrants in Tehran, you will hear them warning us that our day of judgment will soon arrive. They publicly enlist thousands of would-be martyrs, eager to wage jihad against us wherever they find us, here and overseas. And they are already here. In early March, Mr. Mahmoud Youssef Kourani, a resident of Dearborn, Michigan, pled guilty to providing material support to Hezbollah. The Detroit News carried the story, of which the last three paragraphs deserve our most careful attention:
> 
> Kourani received training in weaponry, spy craft and counterintelligence in Lebanon and Iran...Kourani was "a member, fighter, recruiter and fund-raiser for Hezbollah."
> 
> His brother is Hezbollah's chief of military security in southern Lebanon and oversaw Kourani's activities.
> 
> Kourani...has been in custody since May 2003, when federal agents...charged him with harboring an illegal immigrant. Kourani pleaded guilty, served six months in a federal prison and was awaiting deportation...when he was indicted in 2004 on the terror charge.
> 
> We're talking about the brother of the chief of Hezbollah's military security in Lebanon, a man trained as an agent by the Iranians.
> 
> We dawdle at our peril, and yet we dawdle.
> 
> To continue to say "faster, please" is like spitting into the wind. We're back at September 10, waiting for our enemies to rouse us from our contented torpor.
> 
> â â€ Michael Ledeen, an NRO contributing editor, is most recently the author of The War Against the Terror Masters. He is resident scholar in the Freedom Chair at the American Enterprise Institute.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/ledeen/ledeen200505040834.asp


----------



## a_majoor

The resonse of our so called "elites" has a lot to do with why the war seems to be so tentative, and also explains how horrible missteps like the Newsweek fabrication keep happening, without consequence.

As a side bar, Canada is sliding along the lines VDH suggests is common in the middle east; we wish to cherry pick the fruits of market capitalism and liberal democracy (in the true meaning of the word, not the "Liberal Party's" meaning) without being very accomodating to the cultur that allows it to thrive. Punative taxation, regulatory overkill and effective one party rule do have a lot to do with the wide gap between our GDP per capita and our declining productivity and relevance in global markets and politics. Thank goodness the various pathologies which induce violence are absent in Canada, for now.

http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson200505200756.asp



> *Our Two-Front Struggle*
> Pre-modern plus postmodern equals riots in Afghanistan.
> 
> One recent Newsweek story alleged - or fabricated - that a single Koran was desecrated by an American soldier in Guantanamo Bay.
> 
> The unsubstantiated rumor led to rioting and death in Afghanistan and general turmoil and rage across the Islamic world. Mullahs issued fatwas and the more lunatic even declared a "holy war." What explains the unsubstantiated story and why the hysterical reaction?
> 
> The superficial answer is that we now live in a globalized village - united by the marriage of satellite communications with cheap consumer goods. Someone sneezes in Texas and a few minutes later a villager in upper Russia can say "bless you." What an "in-the-know" Beltway insider conjures up as buzz in the "Periscope" section of the magazine for his American readers can cause death and mayhem hours later 7,000 a miles away in the Hindu Kush.
> 
> Yet there is something far more to these bizarre events than mere "interconnectedness," or even media-savvy fundamentalists who have got the hang of Western telecommunications and know how to use them to stir up the mob.
> 
> There is not a necessary connection in the Middle East - or anywhere else - between the occasional appearance of technological sophistication and what we might call humanism, or the commitment to explain phenomena through reason and empiricism. We forget that far too often as we kow-tow to extremists and seek to apologize or fathom the holy protocols surrounding a religious text.
> 
> In the West, the wonder of a cell phone in some sense is the ultimate expression of a long struggle for the primacy of scientific reason, tolerance, critical consciousness, and free expression. That intellectual journey goes back to Galileo, Newton, and Socrates.
> 
> Everything from CDs to Starbucks that we take for granted is a representation of millions of past Western lives. These forgotten scientists, inventors, and entrepreneurs, along with other reformers in politics, journalism, economics, and religion, created our present liberal environment. Only its institutions led to our prosperous modernity.
> 
> _Without them, thinkers cannot discuss ideas freely. They will not find legal protection for their accomplishments, status for their contributions, and profit for their benefactions - and thus would end up hopeless and adrift in a society such as present-day Syria, Iran, or Egypt._
> 
> That long odyssey is not so in the world of bin Laden or an Iranian theocrat - or the ignorant who stream out of the madrassas and Friday fundamentalist harangues along the Afghan-Pakistani border. These fist-shaking, flag-burning Islamic fascists all came late to the Western tradition and now cherry-pick its technology. As classic parasites, a Zawahiri or al-Zarqawi wants Western sophisticated weapons and playthings - without the bothersome foundations that made them all possible.
> 
> An Afghan who riots because he learns of a rumor in a Western magazine, and those like him who explode and behead in Iraq, are emblematic of this hypocrisy. Nothing they have accomplished in their lives, either materially or philosophically, would result in a free opinion magazine, much less the technology to send out the story instantaneously - or, in the case of al-Zarqawi, to have his murdering transmitted globally on the Internet.
> 
> Instead, our Afghan rioters, and the Islamist organizations that have endorsed them, live in the eighth century of rumor, sexual and religious intolerance, tribal chauvinism, and gratuitous violence - but now electrified by the veneer of the 21st-century civilization that is not their own, but sometimes fools the naÃƒÂ¯ve who it is.
> 
> Yet all the illumination in the modern world - neon, fluorescent, or incandescent - cannot light up the illiberal Dark Age mind if it is not willing (or forced) to begin the long ordeal of democracy, tolerance, legality, and individual rights.
> 
> Despite cheap, accessible, and easy-to-operate consumer goods imported from the Westernized world, the thinking of a bin Laden or Muslim Brotherhood still leads back to swords, horses, and jihad, not ahead to iPods and Microsoft.
> 
> They want such things to use to destroy, but not along with them the institutions like democracy and freedom that would allow such progress in their own countries - and shortly make al Qaeda and the fundamentalists not merely irrelevant, but ridiculous as well. Thus, we can understand the increasing hatred of the United States and its policy of democratic idealism abroad that threatens to put them out of business.
> 
> As we learned on September 11, they try to kill us now with our own appurtenances before they are buried themselves under modernism, liberality, and freedom. That really is what this war is about: a last-ditch effort by primordial fascists to prevent the liberalization of the Muslim world and the union of Islamic society with the protocols found in the rest of the globe and which many in the Middle East prefer if given a chance.
> 
> Only democracy and freedom, not Western money or cheap guilt, will remedy the deep sickness of radical Islam that now so tires and sickens the rest of the world that daily has to watch and endure it.
> 
> For a suicide bomber like Mohammed Atta, the more he bumped into the West and used its bounties, the more he despised us for his own hypocrisy of enjoying what his culture could not make or allow. There was no law forcing Mr. Atta to go study in Germany or visit the United States or to wear Western clothes and use our technology; he did so on his own free volition - and later despised himself for doing so.
> 
> The Saudi insurgents who now volunteer to blow themselves up in northern Iraq, like their spiritual kindred suicide bombers on the West Bank, are not poor villagers content to plow ancestral fields and follow the tribal and religious rhythms of a timeless Middle East.
> 
> No, they are usually upscale and spoiled, or at least middle class, educated, and with some disposable income - the prerequisites to allow them contact with the West and almost immediately to incite their sense of envy, self-loathing, exaggerated entitlement, and ultimately nihilism at trying to destroy what they hate and lust for and cannot destroy.
> 
> Second, there is a certain mental disease here at home - long chronicled in Western literature - that encourages the Afghan rioter's love/hate relationship with things Western. After all, we have developed a culture in which a Newsweek writer grasps that if he scoops a story that the United States military is insensitive to the "other" and, better yet, religiously intolerant, he finds a certain resonance within our own elite. If that slur turns out to be wrong, well, his intentions were at least "noble" and there are likely to follow little consequences in his own circle that is far away from those soldiers who pay for his lapse on the ground in Afghanistan.
> 
> Note also after the riots how few Americans announced their immediate scorn for silly rumors about our own POW center in a time of war - especially when it is housing Afghan terrorists who helped kill 3,000 of our own innocents. Can one imagine fundamentalists in the Bible Belt rioting and shooting should they hear an unfounded rumor that an American prisoner in Riyadh, charged with complicity in killing thousands of Arabs, found his Old Testament trashed by a Saudi guard - or a Saudi official promising to apologize to the Western world should a miscreant guard be culpable?
> 
> Was the Church of the Nativity carefully treated by its Islamic intruders - or did the desecration cause rioting and holy-war warnings across Christendom? It is just this imbalance that our elites do not talk openly about, but that outrages the populace who tires of it.
> 
> So we do not dare remind the world that we have nothing to apologize for, given that we have expended lives and treasure in Afghanistan to improve a country that once helped to butcher us. Most of those rioting and killing idolize bin Laden. The problem is not that they are confused, but that they express exactly what they feel - and that is a deep hatred for Western liberalism, manifested on their now sacred day of September 11. We don't say such rude things, not only because it would be stupid politics, but because we don't quite believe them ourselves anymore.
> 
> In that sense, we can be as warped as the Afghan rioter. Westerners have their own delusions. We seem to think that our neat gadgets also equate with an ability to refashion human nature or that a fascist abroad needs to know how much we care about his hurt.
> 
> There is a sort of arrogance in the liberal West - the handmaiden to our own guilt and self-loathing - that strangely believes we are both to blame for the ills abroad and alone can solve them through handing out money. Almost all of the pathetic rhetoric of al Qaeda - "colonial exploitation," "American hegemony," or "blood for oil" - was as imported from the West as were the terrorists' bombs and communications.
> 
> Some Western intellectuals, I think, need a bin Laden to illustrate and confirm their nihilistic ideas about their own postmodern society, just as he needs them to explain why his culture's failure is not its own fault. So just as al Qaeda will always find an enabling Westerner to say, "You lashed out at us in frustration for your unfair treatment," so too a guilty Westerner will always find a compliant terrorist to boast, "Yes, we kill you for your sins." America was once a country that demolished Hitler and Tojo combined in less than four years and broke the nuclear Soviet Union - and now frets and whines that a few thousand deranged fascists want an apology.
> 
> Abroad, we battle Islamic fascists who hate us for our success and want to kill us with the tools of the modern world they despise. But at home, we are also at odds with our own privileged guilt-ridden aristocracy, whose very munificence has made them misunderstand why they are hated.
> 
> The Islamists insist, "We kill you for being soft." Westerners in response feel, "We are killed because we are not being soft enough."
> 
> And so they riot and kill in Afghanistan over a stupid rumor, and we seek to apologize that it somehow spread.
> 
> How truly sad.
> 
> - Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson200505200756.asp


----------



## Edward Campbell

I usually find something with which to agree in most of Hanson's work, but this time my agreement is absolute, 100%, all the way, etc.


----------



## a_majoor

Edward Campbell said:
			
		

> I usually find something with which to agree in most of Hanson's work, but this time my agreement is absolute, 100%, all the way, etc.



Some more agreeable writing then,



> *Our Strange War*
> Looking ahead, our options.
> 
> The three-year-plus war that began on September 11 is the strangest conflict in our history. It is not just that the first day saw the worst attack on American soil since our creation, or that we are publicly pledged to fighting a method â â€ â Å“terrorâ ? â â€ rather than the concrete enemy of Islamic fascism that employs it.
> 
> Our dilemma is that we have not sought to defeat and humiliate the enemy as much as wean a people from the thrall of Islamic autocracy. That is our challenge, and explains our exasperating strategy of half-measures and apologies â â€ and the inability to articulate exactly whom we are fighting and why.
> 
> Imagine that a weak Hitler in the mid-1930s never planned conventional war with the democracies. Instead, he stealthily would fund and train thousands of SS fanatics on neutral ground to permeate European society, convinced of its decadence and the need to return to a mythical time when a purer Aryan Volk reigned supreme. Such terrorists would bomb, assassinate, promulgate fascistic hatred in the media, and whine about Versailles, hoping insidiously to gain concessions from wearied liberal societies that would make ever more excuses as they looked inward and blamed themselves for the presence of such inexplicable evil. All the while, Nazi Germany would deny any connections to these â Å“indigenous movementsâ ? and â Å“deploreâ ? such â Å“terrorism,â ? even as the German people got a certain buzz from seeing the victors of World War I squirm in their discomfort. A triangulating Mussolini or Franco would use their good graces to â Å“bridge the gap,â ? and seek a â Å“peaceful resolution,â ? while we sought to â Å“liberateâ ? rather than defeat the German nation.
> 
> So to recap: The real enemy is an Islamic fascist ideology that is promulgated by a few thousand. They wear no uniforms and are deeply embedded within and protected by Muslim society.
> 
> Beyond the terrorists, a larger percentage of Middle Easterners, if it cost them little, gain psychological satisfaction when fellow defiant Muslims (terrorists or not) â Å“stand upâ ? to Westerners, who enjoy power, status, and wealth undreamed of in the Middle East.
> 
> Even if they would hate living under Taliban-like theocrats, millions at least see the jihadists as about the only way of â Å“getting backâ ? at the Western world that has left them so far behind. This passive-aggressive sense of inferiority explains why millions of Muslims flock to Europe to enjoy its freedom and prosperity, even as they recreate there an Islamist identity to reconcile their longing and desire for what they profess to hate.
> 
> Still, most in the Middle East wish simply to embrace the human desire for prosperity, freedom, and security within the umbrella of traditional Muslim society â â€ and will support American efforts if (a) these initiatives seem to be successful, and (b) are not seen as American.
> 
> Consequently, the United States has not been able to bring its full arsenal of military assets to the fray. It is nearly impossible to extract the killers from the midst of civilian society. Too much force causes collateral damage and incites religious and nationalist anti-American fervor. Too little power emboldens the fascists and suggests America (e.g., Nixon's â Å“pitiful, helpless giantâ ?) cannot or will not win the war.
> 
> Like a parent with a naughty child, a maddening forbearance is the order of the day: They burn American flags, behead, murder, and promise death and ruin to Americans; we ignore it and instead find new ways of displaying our sensitivity to Islam.
> 
> Although the enemy is weak militarily and its nihilist ideology appeals to few, it still has powerful ways to meet our own overwhelming military power and economic strength.
> 
> First is the doctrine of the deniability of culpability. In the legalistic world of the United Nations and international courts, Islamists depend on their patrons' not being held responsible beyond a reasonable doubt for the shelter and cash they provide to those who kill Westerners. Elites in Syria or Iran deny that they offer aid to terrorists. Or if caught, they retreat to a fallback position of something like, â Å“Do you really want to go to war over our help for a few ragtag insurrectionists?â ?
> 
> A second advantage is oil. A third to half the world's reserves is under Saudi Arabia, the other Gulf States, Iraq, and Iran. None until recently were democratic; most at one time or another have given bribe money to terrorists, sponsored anti-Americanism, or survived by blaming us for their own failures.
> 
> These otherwise backward societies â â€ that neither developed nor can maintain their natural wealth â â€ rake in billions, as oil that costs $2-5 to pump is sold for $50. Some of that money in nefarious ways arms terrorists. *Should an exasperated United States finally strike back at their patrons, we risk ruining the world economy â â€ or at least so it will be perceived by paranoid and petroleum-dependent Japan, Europe, and China. Without an energy policy of independence, this war will be hard to win*, since Saudi Arabia will never feel any pressure to purge its royal family of terrorist sympathizers or to cease its subsidies for Wahhabist hatred.
> 
> A third edge for the terrorists lies in the West itself. After 40 years of multiculturalism and moral equivalence â â€ the wages of wealth and freedom unmatched in the history of civilization â â€ many in the United States believe that they have evolved beyond the use of force. Education, money, dialogue, conflict resolution theory â â€ all this and more can achieve far more than crude Abrams tanks and F-16s.
> 
> A bin Laden or Saddam is rare in the West. In our arrogance, we think such folk are more or less like ourselves and live in a similar world of reason and tolerance. The long antennae of the canny terrorists pick up on that self-doubt. Most of the rhetoric in bin Laden's infomercials came right out of the Western media.
> 
> As September 11 fades in the memory, too many Americans feel that it is time to let bygones be bygones. Some now consider Islamic fascism and its method of terror a â Å“nuisanceâ ? that will go away if we just come home. We are a society where many of our elite believe the killer bin Laden is less of a threat than the elected George Bush. Al Qaeda keeps promising to kill us all; meanwhile Ralph Nader wants the wartime president impeached for misuse of failed intelligence.
> 
> Fourth, in an asymmetrical war the cult of the underdog is a valuable tool. *Europeans march with posters showing scenes from Abu Ghraib, not of the beheading of Daniel Pearl or the murder of Margaret Hassan. *They do not wish, much less expect, al Qaeda to win, but they still find psychic satisfaction in seeing the world's sole superpower tied down, as if it were the glory days of the Vietnam protests all over again. How else can we explain why Amnesty International claims that Guantanamo â â€ specialized ethnic foods, available Korans, and international observers â â€ is comparable to a Soviet Gulag where millions once perished? So there is a deep, deep sickness in the West.
> 
> In response, we have embarked on the only strategy that offers a lasting victory: Kill the Islamic fascists; remove the worst autocracies that sponsored terrorists; and jump-start democratic governments in the Middle East.
> 
> Our two chief worries â â€ terrorists and weapons of mass destruction â â€ wane when constitutional societies replace autocracies. Currently few democratic states harbor and employ terrorists or threaten their neighbors with biological, chemical, or nuclear weapons, even if they have ample stockpiles of each.
> 
> Where will it all end? Our choices are threefold.
> 
> We can wind down â â€ essentially the position of the mainstream Left â â€ and return to a pre-September 11 situation, treating Islamism as a criminal justice matter or deserving of an occasional cruise missile. This, in my view, would be a disaster and guarantee another mass attack.
> 
> Or we can continue to pacify Iraq. *We then wait and see whether the ripples from the January elections â â€ without further overt American military action into other countries â â€ bring democracy to Lebanon, Egypt, the Gulf States, and eventually the entire Middle East. This is the apparent present policy of the administration: talking up democracy, not provoking any who might disagree. It may well work, though such patience requires constant articulation to the American people that we are really in a deadly war when it doesn't seem to everyone that we are.*
> 
> Or we can press on. We apprise Syria to cease all sanctuary for al Qaedists and Iran to give up its nuclear program â â€ or face surgical and punitive American air strikes. Such escalation is embraced by few, although many acknowledge that we may soon have few choices other than just that. But for now we can sum up the American plans as hoping that democracy spreads faster than Islamism, and thus responsible government will appear to ensure terrorists and WMD disappear.
> 
> *The above, of course, is what we plan, but gives no consideration to the intent of the enemy*. As we speak, he desperately searches for new strategies to ward off defeat as jihad seems more likely to lead to ruin than the return of the caliphate.
> 
> For now Islamic fascist strategy is to make such horrific news in Iraq that America throws up its hands and sighs, â Å“These crazy people simply aren't worth it,â ? goes home, snoozes â â€ and thus becomes ripe for another September 11.
> 
> â â€ Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson200506030807.asp



A lot of this ties into Infanteers observations about "4GW", where absolute military power is not the engine which wins wars, but only one of the tools available.


----------



## a_majoor

As if the situation on the ground isn't complex enough, US forces in Iraq are now dealing with "Red on Red" incidents....

http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/007038.php



> *Red-on-Red*
> by Bill Roggio at June 21, 2005 05:37 PM
> 
> The brutal acts of violence directed at civilians and Iraqi police is losing favor among some of the members of the Iraqi insurgency. During Operation Matador, we saw examples of the local tribes, some of whom are sympathetic or even participating in the insurgency, rise up to fight the foreign jihadis after their attempts to impose a Taliban-like rule of law in Western Anbar. Today's New York Times reports further cases of 'red-on-red', AKA the enemy fighting amongst themselves. The Marines gladly watched as insurgents duked it out along the Syrian border.
> 
> Late Sunday night, American marines watching the skyline from their second-story perch in an abandoned house here saw a curious thing: in the distance, mortar and gunfire popped, but the volleys did not seem to be aimed at them. In the dark, one spoke in hushed code words on a radio, and after a minute found the answer. "Red on red," he said, using a military term for enemy-on-enemy fire.
> 
> Marines patrolling this desert region near the Syrian border have for months been seeing a strange new trend in the already complex Iraqi insurgency. Insurgents, they say, have been fighting each other in towns along the Euphrates from Husayba, on the border, to Qaim, farther west. The observations offer a new clue in the hidden world of the insurgency and suggest that there may have been, as American commanders suggest, a split between Islamic militants and local rebels.
> 
> A United Nations official who served in Iraq last year and who consulted widely with militant groups said in a telephone interview that there has been a split for some time.
> "There is a rift," said the official, who requested anonymity, citing the sensitivity of the talks he had held. "I'm certain that the nationalist Iraqi part of the insurgency is very much fed up with the Jihadists grabbing the headlines and carrying out the sort of violence that they don't want against innocent civilians."
> 
> Mohammed at Iraq the Model reports there is turmoil among the Mosul insurgency over the methodology used by al Qaeda to intimidate the less radical groups. The recent arrest of Abu Talha may have been precipitated by these divisions.
> 
> This conflict originated from the different attitudes of the different groups regarding the issue of targeting civilian "collaborators" (which refers to anyone who works for the government) and it's more likely that this conflict has lead to the appearance of opportunities for a dialogue between some of these groups and the government and this will possibly put an end to a great deal of the violence going on in that area. It's becoming clearer that most of those groups have begun to doubt the benefits of violence and their reluctance has been taking the shape of an internal conflict with the hard-line groups and I think what supports this theory is the message that came from Al-Qaeda to the Sunnis warning them from the consequences of being involved in the political process and I think that Al-Qaeda wouldn't have threatened its allies in Iraq if Al-Qaeda didn't feel that the carpet was being pulled from under its feet.
> 
> As Mohammed states, *the split in the insurgency gives the Coalition room to maneuver, and co-opt the insurgents and tribal groups disgusted by the tactics and ideology of al Qaeda in Iraq.* In a critical assessment by the New York Times of US force deployments in Tal Afar, the dislike of the foreign elements of the insurgency becomes clear. Al Qaeda is not winning allies by their ruthless tactics and vicious treatment of the Iraqi tribes. The terrorists must stoop to threatening children to project fear within the city.
> 
> On arrival here, commanders found a town that was, for all practical purposes, dead, strangled by the violent insurgents who held it in their thrall. "Anyone not helping the terrorists can't leave their homes because they will be kidnapped and the terrorists will demand money or weapons or make them join them to kill people," said Hikmat Ameen al-Lawand, the leader of one of Tal Afar's 82 tribes, who said most of the city is controlled by insurgents. "If they refuse they will chop their heads off."
> 
> Khasro Goran, the deputy provincial governor in Ninewa, which includes Tal Afar, concurred. "There is no life in Tal Afar," he said in an interview a week ago. "It is like Mosul a few months ago - a ghost town." There are more than 500 insurgents in Tal Afar, he said, and they project a level of fear and intimidation across the city far in excess of their numbers. Thoroughfares lined with stores have been deserted, the storefronts covered with blue metal roll-down gates.
> 
> In northeast Tal Afar, a young mother now home-schools her six children, after a flier posted at their school warned: "If you love your children, you won't send them to school here because we will kill them." A neighbor, Muhammad Ameen, will not let his kids play outside. "Standing out in the open is not a good idea," he said.
> 
> Tribes sympathetic to the new Iraqi government have suffered constant assaults at the hands of insurgents and rival tribes. More than 500 mortars have struck lands belonging to the Al-Sada al-Mousawiyah tribe since September, said the tribe's leader, Sheik Sayed Abdullah Sayed Wahab. "All of my tribe are prisoners in their own homes," he says. "We can't even take our people to the hospital...
> Real leadership in Tal Afar lies with the 82 tribal leaders. Angered by the attacks and emboldened by the enlarged American military presence here, some sheiks [tribal leaders] have become outspoken critics of the insurgency. On June 4, at great risk to their own lives, more than 60 attended a security conference at Al Kasik Iraqi Army base near here. *To the surprise of Iraqi and American commanders who organized the gathering, many sheiks demanded a Falluja-style military assault to rid Tal Afar of insurgents and complained that American forces do not treat terror suspects roughly enough.*
> 
> It has become clear that as the terrorists move into remote locations and attempts to establish their vile brand of civil law, the local populations begin to despise and reject them. As the Sunnis who are typically sympathetic or supportive of the insurgency come into close proximity to the extreme jihadis, they witness their true nature.
> 
> *This is a measure of success that cannot be quantified, such as the numbers of insurgent fighters killed or captured, the number of suicide attacks across the country, Coalition casualties, the number of operational Iraqi battalions or their fighting effectiveness, money spent of reconstruction or the number of completed projects. As Grim eloquently reminds us, â Å“The fact that escalation exists does not prove anything about the success or failure of the mission in Iraqâ ?, and in fact we should expect escalation as the enemy commits more resources to fight the progress of the Coalition.
> *
> The Christian Science Monitor looks at the US Strategy in Iraq and asks if it is working. In the assessment, Professor Juan Cole is quoted as saying the insurgency is gaining ground in the Sunni Triangle and Anbar, and not losing it:
> 
> "It's indisputable that the insurgents are enormously more popular among the Sunni Arab community today than they were two years ago,'' says Juan Cole, a professor of Middle Eastern History at the University of Michigan. "Every time you hear a suicide bomb has gone off ... I guarantee you that means there are 3,000 Iraqis who saw the preparations and decided that this would be a good thing."
> 
> *How would Professor Cole explain red-on-red fighting in Western Iraq, or the pleas for cooperation from local tribes? These are facts Professor Cole conveniently ignores as they do not fit into his preconceived notion that the US has lost the war and it is time for the UN to ride to the rescue.*
> 
> Two indicators that Professor Cole is wrong are the attitudes of the Syrians and the Kofi Annan. Syria continues to tout its efforts to bolster security along its borders. Kofi Annan publishes a column in the Washington Post touting the political progress in Iraq and the strides made to reach consensus on the Iraqi Constitution, which Iraq the Model reports as being 80% completed.
> 
> Neither Syria (the headwaters of the ratline) or Kofi Annan (Mr. Illegal) have been sympathetic to American efforts in Iraq, and their attempts to curry favor with the US speak volumes on their assessment of the situation. And this comes before Coalition forces and the Iraqi Army commits the resources to fully engage and occupy the towns and cities of Anbar.


----------



## a_majoor

Indications the war might indeed widen:



> Come Back, Cowboy
> Why public support for the Iraq war is fading.
> 
> By Barbara Lerner
> 
> Four June polls show the president in increasing trouble over the war in Iraq. The poll numbers are bad. But the usual interpretations of them are even worse â â€ and, I think, dangerously mistaken.
> 
> First, the numbers: In the AP/Ipsos poll, only 41 percent of Americans support Bush's handling of the Iraq war; in the CBS/New York Times poll it's only 37 percent. In the Gallup poll, 56 percent say the war isn't worth fighting. In the Post/ABC poll, almost 60 percent say the same, with two thirds seeing the U.S as "bogged down" in Iraq and 52 percent not believing the fighting there contributes to our long-term security. The biggest majority â â€ nearly three-quarters â â€ say our level of casualties is "unacceptable."
> 
> Why is the public mood so defeatist? Some say it's because Americans don't have the patience for the long war we face and have grown too soft to accept the casualties we must accept to win. Jim Hoagland blames it on the Bush administration's "lack of serious accountability for lies, mistakes and worse in the military and civilian chain of command."
> 
> I don't buy the "soft America" argument. I agree that the administration is at fault, but for an entirely different reason: because Cowboy George morphed into Cautious George. Cowboy George was a bold leader, unafraid to take the tough offensive actions we must take to win this war. He led us in the first two years after 9/11, and Americans rallied behind him in numbers so overwhelming they made "soft America" all but invisible. But after our conquest of the Iraqi military in 2003, Cautious George replaced Cowboy George. Cautious George is forcing us to fight with one hand tied behind our back by pretending we are fighting against one country only. In fact, we are fighting a regional war in Iraq, and have been since day one. It's past time for America to acknowledge that fact and act on it. Time to make all the Middle Eastern despots who are pouring money, men, and arms into the battle in Iraq stop.
> 
> Because the president has not done this, most Americans think we are fighting only against Iraqis â â€ local people, dependent on local resources. In that light, our inability to stem the daily toll of bombs and blood looks like evidence that most Iraqis support terror. Americans don't see that Iraq as worth fighting for, or that kind of war as winnable. Other polls suggest Americans worry, increasingly, that Iran, Syria, and Saudi Arabia also threaten our security. They fear that by expending so much blood and treasure on Iraq alone, we may make ourselves more vulnerable to attacks from others.
> 
> Iraq is a difficult place, but this all-dark picture is false as well as dispiriting. Inadvertently, the Bush administration has made it look believable by downplaying the big role that foreign governments and their terrorist proxies play in Iraq. *Administration spokesmen rarely pointed to the support â â€ diplomatic as well as military â â€ Iraq's Sunni Baathist terrorists get from Sunni tyrants abroad, and they kept insisting that foreign jihadists are only a minority of the fighters we face. But foreign support is a fact, and harping on the relatively small number of foreign jihadists in Iraq at any one time misses the point. Foreign jihadists are responsible for almost all suicide bombings, and suicide bombings cause a disproportionate share of American and Iraqi casualties. Worse, because foreign jihadists come from all the Arab states as well as Iran, there is an endless supply of them*. If we confine ourselves to hunting them down, one by one, only after they infiltrate Iraq, we will be there forever. Far better to act forcefully to stop the infiltration, and do it in a way that sends a message to all terror-succoring states: The free ride is over. The price for continuing to aid and abet the war against us and against a free Iraq has gone up.
> 
> We can do that with relative ease, because although foreign jihadists come from all over the Middle East, *most of them enter Iraq from only one country: Syria. Syria is a police state, a small, economic basket-case of a country that hosts a multitude of terrorist groups and terror training camps, and which is working to defeat democracy in Lebanon as well as Iraq.* Syria could stop the foreign terrorist influx into Iraq if it wanted to, and we could make Syria want to. The Turks did it in 1998, when Syria hosted the PKK terror group and sent them across the border to murder Turkish soldiers and civilians. Then as now, Syria claimed it was doing no such thing, but instead of spluttering impotently, Turkey massed her army on the border and made it clear that if Syria didn't end PKK infiltration, Turkey would invade. Surprise, surprise, PKK infiltration from Syria suddenly stopped.
> 
> We can make Syria stop too, and do it without putting additional strain on our hard-working ground troops. Democracy is a fine long-term goal, but for now, we don't need to remake Syria; we just need to make her stop. We can use our air power to bomb the rat lines that feed terrorists into Iraq, and blow up all the terror training camps and weapons sites in Syria and Lebanon, hitting enemy targets from the Bekaa Valley to the Iraqi border in a new shock-and-awe campaign. That would end the easy re-supply of suicide bombers in Iraq, and reduce our casualties significantly. It would, equally, send a clear message to terror-harborers everywhere: Stop.
> 
> *Defense Secretary Rumsfeld has been asking President Bush for a go-ahead to strike back at Syria from the start of the Syrian campaign against us, but has yet to get one. The president's toughening rhetoric toward Syria in recent weeks suggests he may, now, be considering it; and the excellent new tone set by our new ambassador, Zalmay Khalilzad, reinforces that possibility. *If President Bush does order military strikes on enemy bases in Syria and Lebanon, it would mark the return of the war leader so many of us cheered in 2001 and 2002 â â€ the stand-up Texan who made us believe we can win this war. Come back, Cowboy George. America needs you.
> 
> â â€ Barbara Lerner is a frequent NRO contributor.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/lerner200506230745.asp


----------



## I_am_John_Galt

Another interesting opinion (forgive me, but I'm too lazy to link all the references within the article):



> Posted 17:03 UT by Michael McNeil
> *BBC World confirms the Flypaper Strategy*
> 
> It was Canadian essayist David Warren who in 2003 originated the concept of the so-called â Å“Flypaperâ ? strategy with regard to the war in Iraq.  As Warren wrote in his first essay on the subject:
> 
> _While engaged in the very difficult business of building a democracy in Iraq â â€ the first democracy should it succeed in the entire history of the Arabs â â€ President Bush has also quite consciously to my information created a new playground for the enemy away from Israel and even farther away from the United States itself.  By the very act of proving this lower ground he drains terrorist resources from other swamps.
> 
> This is the meaning of Mr. Bush's â Å“bring 'em onâ ? taunt from the Roosevelt Room on Wednesday when he was quizzed about the â Å“growing threat to U.S. forcesâ ? on the ground in Iraq.  It should have been obvious that no U.S. President actually relishes having his soldiers take casualties.  What the media and U.S. Democrats affect not to grasp is that the soldiers are now replacing targets that otherwise would be provided by defenceless civilians both in Iraq and at large.  The sore thumb of the U.S. occupation â â€ and it is a sore thumb equally to Baathists and Islamists compelling their response â â€ is not a mistake.  It is carefully hung flypaper._
> 
> Nothing that has occurred since in Iraq and elsewhere has invalidated the fundamental correctness of this doctrine.  Warren himself has written considerably further on this topic, most recently during this last month here, where he says:
> 
> _*I do feel sure, that while the continuing terrorist carnage in Iraq, especially, but also in Afghanistan, must disturb us as conscientious human beings, we have less reason than ever to be alarmed by it.  We are witnessing what amounts to the purposeful bleeding of a septic wound, as the most fanatic Islamist incendiaries from within Iraq and abroad take their best, hopeless shot at bringing down the new Iraqi constitutional order.  It is a matter of life or death for their cause, and we could hardly expect them to abandon it easily.
> 
> As the author of the much-mocked â Å“flypaper theoryâ ? â â€ the phrase I used to describe the implicit strategy behind the U.S. invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan â â€ I am more and more persuaded it has worked.  All ground indications are that large numbers of Islamist terrorists who would otherwise remain dangerously under cover, not only across the region but in Europe and elsewhere, are irresistibly drawn towards these theatres of action, where they sooner or later get themselves killed.
> *
> As terrorists, they were, almost invariably, in a position to be more effective where they were.  They are lured away for emotional reasons, or â Å“spiritualâ ? if that word can be applied to something that is essentially not Godly but demonic.  It is the Islamist analogy to the way young socialists, anarchists, and adventurers from across Europe were drawn to Spain during its Civil War in the 1930s.
> 
> In addition to being annihilated, themselves, they deflate their cause by showing it to be losing.  And what began as a recruiting inducement, soon becomes the opposite.  For the near-certainty of getting killed oneself, in the cause of murdering (mostly) defenceless civilians, is not as attractive a motivator as the incendiaries make out.
> _
> Many other analysts have commented on this strategy, most recently James Taranto of the Wall Street Journal's editorial OpinionJournal page, where he runs a daily feature the â Å“Best of the Web Today.â ?  Yesterday, in a piece called â Å“Red on Red,â ? Taranto notes a report from that day's New York Times revealing that insurgents in Iraq are now fighting each other as some local Iraqis, otherwise opponents of the Coalition's presence in the country, seek to forestall the imported foreign jihadists' proclivities towards blowing up Iraqis right and left in their campaign to prevent the newly installed elected Iraqi government from consolidating its hold on power and completing work on the new democratic Iraqi constitution.
> 
> As Taranto says, â Å“it would seem to vindicate both Vice President Cheney's much-maligned view that the indigenous insurgency is in its 'final throes' and the 'flypaper' theory that liberating Iraq is drawing in terrorists and forcing them to face the U.S. military.â ?
> 
> In this regard, a report from the BBC just a week ago thoroughly reinforces this point of view.  While the BBC has been almost unremittingly negative with respect to the war on terror, including its Iraqi theater, even a stopped clock gets it right occasionally, and the BBC now and then does partially make up for its â Å“sins.â ?
> 
> On June 15, 2005, BBC World broadcast a remarkable story (carried in the U.S. by PBS outlets) illustrating how fighting the terrorists in Iraq is making both America and Europe safer.  They reported, â Å“Police in Spain say they've arrested sixteen suspected Islamic militants in raids across the country.  Eleven of them are said to be linked to Abu Musab al-Zarkawi, the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq.â ?
> 
> As BBC Security Correspondent Frank Gardner (who was crippled a year ago incidentally by gunmen in Saudi Arabia) narrates:
> 
> _Under cover of darkness, Spanish police move into position.  In five different locations around the country, more than 500 officers broke into the suspected hideouts of Islamist militants.  Sixteen men of North African origin were arrested, in what's said to be one of Europe's biggest ever counter-terrorist operations.  Spain's Interior Minister spoke today of jihad and would-be suicide bombers, but their targets, he said, were not in Europe, they're in Iraq.  Investigators believe they have uncovered an international network of extremists, financed and supported by robbery, drug dealing, and false documents.  They say most of those arrested in Spain are linked to a cell of Islamist recruiters in Syria dedicated to sending volunteers into Iraq to fight the US-led Coalition.  Five of those arrested are accused of links to last year's Madrid bombings.  The remainder are accused of connections to Abu Musab al-Zarkawi, the Al Qaeda operative who's been driving the insurgency in Iraq.
> _
> A BBC interviewee, Jeremy Binnie of Jane's Terrorism and Insurgency Centre, put it thusly:
> 
> _ *The war in Iraq has minimized the threat to Europe because everyone who's Jihad-inclined wants to go fight over there.  So even though some of these... the guys suspected of involvement in the train bombings have reportedly gone over to lodge themselves in Iraq.  So there are these radicals sort of coming out of Europe and actually going to a different theater altogether.*_
> 
> Gardner concludes his report, noting:  â Å“Spain has seen terror-related arrests like these before, but despite early claims by the authorities, insufficient evidence has often seen them result in embarrassing acquittals.â ?
> 
> As one might expect from the BBC, the written reportat their web site concerning this incident has been sanitized of all such stuff as â Å“The war in Iraq has minimized the threat to Europe.â ?  However, the report does include some other very interesting tidbits, to wit:
> 
> _Twenty-four men charged with terror offences recently appeared in court, three of them accused of involvement in planning the 11 September 2001 attacks on the US [!].  The BBC's Katya Adler says interior ministry sources say one Madrid train bombing suspect who escaped police is believed to have carried out a suicide attack in Iraq last month.
> _
> Thus, the importance of the war in Iraq for keeping terrorists at bay from the centers of civilization.  The BBC broadcast piece shows how the â Å“flypaper strategyâ ? for attracting terrorists to Iraq is working.  Instead of subverting European countries or attacking America, potentially at the cost of thousands of civilian casualties as we've seen before, jihadists are flocking to Iraq, where our military can kill them in detail.
> 
> *It's also worth observing how the suicide bombers we hear about every day in the news from Iraq are actually arriving from abroad.  From the reports I've seen, essentially none of the fanatics willing to blow themselves up taking many Iraqis along with them are Iraqis themselves.  So much for the idea that it's primarily the Iraqis who hate Americans and the Coalition and want us out; rather it's radical Islamofascist foreigners from around the world who are desperate to prevent Iraqis from taking destiny in their own hands to establish a modern, decent democratic society in the heart of the Muslim world.*


 http://impearls.blogspot.com/2005_06_19_impearls_archive.html#111945985253374887


----------



## a_majoor

What is old is new again (as always). This book tell the tale of how America fought a "War on Terror" some 205 years ago with a combination of diplomacy, militrary action, "covert" action and general wheeling and dealing.



> *Gangway! for Real History*
> Richard Zacks gets it right.
> 
> When you get finished reading the Radoshes' Red Star Over Hollywood, grab a copy of Richard Zacks's rollicking account of the event that put "the shores of Tripoli" in the Marine Hymn. The two have a lot in common, somewhat surprisingly. Both meet my standard for historical writing, which comes from Sidney Greenstreet in The Maltese Falcon. After telling Humphrey Bogart the story of the bird, Greenstreet folds his hands over his belly and says â â€ this is from the fading memory of an aging scholar, remember â â€ "and that, Mr. Spade, is the stuff history is made of. Real history. Not that junk H. G. Wells writes about."
> 
> But here I'm interested in the Zacks book.
> 
> The Pirate Coast is the truly cinematic story of the American response to the trafficking of American and European slaves by the Bey, or Pasha, or Bashaw (the Arabs don't pronounce the letter "P" so "Pasha" became "Bashaw") of Tripoli in the early 19th century. Even those who fancy themselves well educated in such matters will, I fear, be astonished at how much has been Hollywoodized and even falsified in the popular press and the children's texts. The real tale is at once more entertaining, more believable, and far more instructive than the mythology most of us have been fed. Just for starters, you will no doubt be surprised to learn that the first Marines â â€ a mere eight of them â â€ to see foreign combat did not actually make it to "the shores of Tripoli," but fought their way across the Libyan desert to a less celebrated location, and then were forced to leave the matter in the hands of our diplomats.
> 
> Yes, they performed admirably. Yes, they left their mark on history. But no, it was not a particularly glorious adventure. You wouldn't cast John Wayne in this movie. Sidney Greenstreet, on the other hand, has a target-rich environment.
> 
> Which is to say that Zacks gets it right.
> 
> For one thing, Zacks has a refreshing way of putting events into their proper context. So, at the very beginning, he talks about slavery, since the whole thing started in 1798 when Arab pirates raided an Italian island and carted off 950 people â â€ all but 248 were women and children, who fetched higher prices than the older men â â€ to Tripoli. And Zacks gives us the big picture:
> 
> On the northern coast of Africa circa 1800, blacks AND whites could still be sold into slavery. Men were usually peddled near naked, or in dangly shirts, in an outdoor auction; women could be inspected privately in stalls nearby. Unlike slave auctions in the southern United States, male buyers here openly acknowledged lustful desires for their human purchases; matrons inspected the women, and virgins were sold at a steep premium...
> 
> And Zacks, perhaps unaware of the current stigma on pointing out unfortunate elements of Islam, reminds us that "Sura 47 of the Koran allowed these Muslim attackers to enslave and ransom any of these captives."
> 
> Having set the stage, Zacks presents us with the ensuing saga in enthusiastic detail, from a series of bumbling and cowardly American sea captains stumbling into captivity in Tripoli, to the emergence of the story's leading man, William Eaton, a crazy Massachusetts military man who sought to recover his honor (he'd been court-martialed) and his fortune (he'd ruined himself by ransoming some of those slaves from Italy) by embarking on a covert operation to produce regime change in north Africa.
> 
> To be cinematically attractive, this kind of story needs several great minor characters, and The Pirate Coast has lots of them. To begin with, there's President Jefferson, who comes off as a cynical politico who grudgingly lets Eaton sail off with a mealy-mouthed letter of commission that would provide Jefferson with plausible deniability if the thing went bad, and who cheerfully pursued other options along parallel tracks. Chief among these was the negotiating track, conducted by another of the tale's terrific minor characters, our Consul in Malta. I love this:
> 
> While Jefferson's secret agent, Eaton, starved in the desert, Jefferson's diplomat Tobias Lear lounged in the perfumed gardens of Malta and decided that the time was ripe to reopen peace negotiations with Tripoli. Lear â â€ eager to settle the peace himself â â€ chose to ignore Eaton's covert mission...
> 
> *It is so today, isn't it? The warriors are out there risking all on behalf of our national honor, while the realists are busily selling out in order to make a deal (and Lear, unlike some of his more modern heirs, didn't wait until retirement to start making private business deals with north African rulers). The president, as so often happens, supports them all. It's a great lesson in real geopolitics: Most everything you can imagine is gong on all the time, and neat simplifications rarely account for the richness of human activity.*
> 
> Zacks does not spare Jefferson, quoting from a memorandum of Senator Plumer: "The President was in an undress â â€ Blue coat, red vest, cloth coloured small cloths â â€ white hose, ragged slippers with his toes out â â€ clean linen (!) â â€ but hair disheveled." To which Zacks adds, a bit over the top, "Jefferson's rebellion from British formality was reaching new extremes." It does seem to have established an American tradition which, for example, Lyndon Baines Johnson vigorously continued.
> 
> In the end, Eaton succeeded in his mission by making it possible for Lear to cut his deal, and then we abandoned our Arab allies, thereby establishing yet another tradition, most recently incarnated in our Kurd "policy" of betraying them to their murderous neighbors at least once a decade. And Eaton achieved brief celebrity in another singularly contemporary way â â€ his operation was blown out of all proportion by a politically motivated press â â€ only to have the air let out of his balloon by Jefferson once the media feeding frenzy died down.
> 
> It all ended with suitable disgrace for most of the characters, major and minor. Eaton was disgraced and his name vanished from most history books. Lear returned to America a wealthy man â â€ thanks to his Arab business deals â â€ got a reward of sorts from Jefferson (chief accountant of the War Department), and eventually committed suicide for no apparent reason. Eaton's Arab allies ended badly, and his main enemy, the Bashaw, ruled successfully for nearly three more decades, during which he shook down European and American leaders for a vast cornucopia of presents. Finally, having bankrupted the kingdom, he was overthrown by an ambitious son and driven into a dark corner of his palace "half-naked in rags."
> 
> America's honor was not rescued until the end of the War of 1812, when Steven Decatur Jr. captured an Algerian flagship, forced the local regime to promise an end to taking American slaves, and then went to Tripoli where he collected a tribute from the Bashaw and liberated ten Christian slaves. As Zacks tells us in his admirable book's penultimate paragraph, "*ultimately, a few years after Jefferson's death, it was military coercion and not diplomatic finesse that ended the three-century-long reign of terror of the Barbary pirates."
> *
> Somebody might mention that to Jack Straw the next time he implores us to be patient as he appeases the ayatollahs in Tehran.
> 
> Or we can wait for the movie.
> 
> â â€ Michael Ledeen, an NRO contributing editor, is most recently the author of The War Against the Terror Masters. He is resident scholar in the Freedom Chair at the American Enterprise Institute.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/ledeen/ledeen200506270746.asp


----------



## a_majoor

In this issue of Parameters http://carlisle-www.army.mil/usawc/Parameters/05summer/contents.htm, there is a look at the evolution of "containment" policy against the former USSR; and the comparison with the current GWOT.



> _Our Cold War containment policy wasn't easily arrived at, and went through several permutations - some good, some bad - through 40-plus years. We're still in the early stages of this new war - and we'll need time for a good policy to cohere. (NOTE: When I say "early stages," *I mean that this Terror War is likely to last as long, if not longer, than the Cold War*. If the Cold War began in 1948 and the Terror War began in 2001, then today we're only up to the equivalent of 1951. By that measure, we're doing much better at this early stage than we were doing back then.)_


----------



## McG

> *War on terror strategists should leaf through U.S. Cold War doctrine*
> Battlefield victories won't defeat al-Qaeda unless its ideology is contained
> IAN BREMMER
> International Herald Tribune
> (Printed: Edmonton Journal, 26 Mar 05)
> NEW YORK
> 
> George Kennan, a giant of U.S. foreign policy who died on March 17, will be remembered as the architect of the Cold War doctrine of containment. But Kennan was more than an insightful analyst of the logic behind Soviet expansionism.  He was a big-picture strategist who understood that the Cold War could only be won with a variety of tools, weapons and ideas.
> 
> Like the Cold War, the war on terror can't be won by military means alone. President George W. Bush got it wrong when, in a speech at West Point in June 2004, he rejected â Å“Cold War doctrines of deterrence and containmentâ ? for the war on terror and argued instead that, to defeat terrorism, all that was needed was to â Å“take the battle to the enemy.â ?
> 
> In 1947, Kennan exhorted the United States and its allies to engage in â Å“a long- term, patient, but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies.â ? The goal of the Cold War was not to defeat the Soviet Army, but to contain Communist expansionism. Its means, while partly military, were primarily political, economic and cultural.
> 
> U.S. policymakers saw the wisdom in Kennan's counsel and patiently built states capable of resisting and rejecting Communism. Kennan's strategy was not simply to eliminate the Soviet â Å“supplyâ ? of Communism, but to undermine â Å“demandâ ? for it all over the world.  The application of that formula to the war on terror is vitally important.
> 
> The war on terror requires that non-military efforts take the upper hand in U.S. foreign policy, particularly with regard to the Middle East, and that the United States maintain a long-standing coalition of allies committed to a common goal. America survived the Cold War because it did not try to go it alone. The Cold War was won because the United States helped spark a European economic recovery and remained committed to promoting effective governance in Europe, if not, alas, elsewhere. The war on terror will require a similar commitment to open governance, particularly in the Middle East.
> 
> Finally, the Cold War was won because the United States and its allies were able to offer the peoples of the Soviet bloc an attractive ideological, political and cultural alternative to Communism.  Here, too, winning the war on terror re quires that Washington work to reduce the appeal of militant Islam by demonstrating that the West can provide better solutions to pressing issues â â€ from economic development to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. To win the war on terror, the United States must promote the transformation of failed societies into stable, functioning states.
> 
> The Bush administration has not completely ignored demand-side issues. It has increased foreign-aid budgets and established the Millennium Challenge Account, which ties economic aid to political and economic reform.  These measures are welcome, but when the means to achieve them are compared with the resources devoted to defeating the Taliban, al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein, it is clear the administration is still pursuing the war on terror as if it can be won on a battlefield.
> 
> It's too early to say that America is losing the war on terror, but signs are not encouraging. The Iraqi elections were a welcome demonstration that Arabs want to choose their own leaders. But nothing has yet occurred in Iraq to suggest that a civil war can be avoided once U.S. troops pull back.  Afghanistan remains precariously balanced between order and chaos.
> 
> Devoting U.S. resources and imagination to the construction of states that serve the needs of their citizens must be the long-term complement to the short-term pursuit of military goals.  A U.S. strategic framework that charts a course toward transforming the Middle East of the future into the Eastern Europe of today will be worthy of George Kennan's considerable legacy.
> 
> _Ian Bremmer is president of the Eurasia Group and a senior fellow at the World Policy Institute_


----------



## paracowboy

> Devoting...resources and imagination to the construction of states that serve the needs of their citizens must be the long-term complement to the short-term pursuit of military goals.


 that's what I been sayin'!


----------



## McG

That is what a lot of people have been saying.


----------



## paracowboy

MCG said:
			
		

> That is what a lot of people have been saying.


true, but this guy owes me money, 'cause I said it before him. Anybody sees him, tell him I want my money! Or an ice cream sandwich. I'm good either way.


----------



## Infanteer

Something to think about - here is what I said yesterday:



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Al Qaeda has stuck to six points on where it feels it is justified calling a defensive Jihad against the West:
> 
> 1) Support for Israel
> 
> 2) The Presence of Western troops in _dar al-Islam_
> 
> 3) The invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan
> 
> 4) Acquiescence to the persecution of Muslims by states like China (Xinjiang), India (Kashmir), and Russia (Chechnya)
> 
> 5) Western hand in taking the petroleum resources in the Middle East
> 
> 6) Support for apostate regimes in the Middle East that do not govern according to the Word of God (Egypt, Saudi Arabia, etc, etc).



...and, here is what the attackers stated:



> â Å“Rejoice, Islamic nation. Rejoice, Arab world. The time has come for vengeance against the Zionist crusader government of Britain in response to the massacres Britain committed in Iraq and Afghanistan,â ? said the statement, translated by The Associated Press in Cairo.
> 
> The authenticity of the message could not be immediately confirmed. The Associated Press was unable to access the Web site where it was posted, which was closed quickly after the reports.
> 
> â Å“The heroic mujahedeen carried out a blessed attack in London, and now Britain is burning with fear and terror, from north to south, east to west,â ? the statement said.
> 
> â Å“We warned the British government repeated. We have carried out our promise and carried out a military attack in Britain after great efforts by the heroic mujahedeen over a long period to ensure its success.â ?
> 
> â Å“We continue to warn the governments of Denmark and Italy and all crusader governments that they will receive the same punishment if they do not withdraw their troops from Iraq and Afghanistan,â ? the statement went on.



There you have it.  Notice that there is no mention of democracy, freedom of speech, or separation of church and state.

Regardless, this is an attack on us.  Those reasons cited above prove that this easily could have been Vancouver, Toronto or Montreal.

This is a war people - don't look at it as some sort of underground isolated terrorist attacks, this is an offensive attack in our rear area by the enemy aimed at the moral level of warfare.  These are not terrorists, these are insurgents, and the battlefield ranges from Bali, to Kashmir, to Baghdad, to our own streets.

Obviously, after over 3 years of fighting, Al Qaeda has not lost its ability to reach out and strike us.  This is a war, we must do one of two things or these attacks will only continue.  We must seek an understanding - _dar al-Ahd_ - with the specific demands of the Insurgency.  Or the gloves must come off and we must root out and destroy support for the Islamic Insurgency at the physical, mental, and moral planes; no more pussy-footing with "democracy" and whatnot, for we must go as Sherman and Grant did, to destroy any and all ability to fight us.

"War is the remedy that our enemies have chosen, and I say let us give them all they want." William Tecumseh Sherman

Infanteer


----------



## Edward Campbell

Infanteer said:
			
		

> ...
> 
> Regardless, this is an attack on us.   Those reasons cited above prove that this easily could have been Vancouver, Toronto or Montreal.
> 
> This is a war people - don't look at it as some sort of underground isolated terrorist attacks, this is an offensive attack in our rear area by the enemy aimed at the moral level of warfare.   These are not terrorists, these are insurgents, and the battlefield ranges from Bali, to Kashmir, to Baghdad, to our own streets.
> 
> Obviously, after over 3 years of fighting, Al Qaeda has not lost its ability to reach out and strike us.   This is a war, we must do one of two things or these attacks will only continue.   We must seek an understanding - _dar al-Ahd_ - with the specific demands of the Insurgency.   Or the gloves must come off and we must root out and destroy support for the Islamic Insurgency at the physical, mental, and moral planes; no more pussy-footing with "democracy" and whatnot, for we must go as Sherman and Grant did, to destroy any and all ability to fight us.
> 
> "War is the remedy that our enemies have chosen, and I say let us give them all they want." William Tecumseh Sherman
> 
> Infanteer



Spot on, Infanteer.  Messers Martin, Pettigrew, Graham and Hiller: please take note and repeat after Infanteer, "... this is an attack on us ... This is a war ... these are insurgents ... the battlefield ranges  to our own streets ... we must root out and destroy support for the Islamic Insurgency at the physical, mental, and moral planes."


----------



## Dare

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Something to think about - here is what I said yesterday:
> 
> ...and, here is what the attackers stated:
> 
> There you have it.  Notice that there is no mention of democracy, freedom of speech, or separation of church and state.
> 
> Regardless, this is an attack on us.  Those reasons cited above prove that this easily could have been Vancouver, Toronto or Montreal.
> 
> This is a war people - don't look at it as some sort of underground isolated terrorist attacks, this is an offensive attack in our rear area by the enemy aimed at the moral level of warfare.  These are not terrorists, these are insurgents, and the battlefield ranges from Bali, to Kashmir, to Baghdad, to our own streets.
> 
> Obviously, after over 3 years of fighting, Al Qaeda has not lost its ability to reach out and strike us.  This is a war, we must do one of two things or these attacks will only continue.  We must seek an understanding - _dar al-Ahd_ - with the specific demands of the Insurgency.  Or the gloves must come off and we must root out and destroy support for the Islamic Insurgency at the physical, mental, and moral planes; no more *****-footing with "democracy" and whatnot, for we must go as Sherman and Grant did, to destroy any and all ability to fight us.
> 
> "War is the remedy that our enemies have chosen, and I say let us give them all they want." William Tecumseh Sherman
> 
> Infanteer


Calling these people "insurgents" militarizes these people. They are not part of a military, nor attacking a military asset. They are *terrorists* plain and simple. They are several orders of magnitude below the legitimacy of an insurgent. Absolutely this is a war, but these people are NOT warriors. They are COWARDS, and SLIME. They are *terrorists*.  An "insurgent" fights against the authority of an establish government, it is not a mass murderer of innocent men, women and children. Maybe even a better term would be "cultist mass murderers".


----------



## paracowboy

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Regardless, this is an attack on us.   Those reasons cited above prove that this easily could have been Vancouver, Toronto or Montreal...This is a war people...Obviously, after over 3 years of fighting, Al Qaeda has not lost its ability to reach out and strike us...the gloves must come off and we must root out and destroy support for the Islamic Insurgency at the physical, mental, and moral planes; no more *****-footing with "democracy" and whatnot, for we must go as Sherman and Grant did, to destroy any and all ability to fight us...


I agree, but this is not an 'Insurgency'. These are terrorists. Criminals. Period.


----------



## paracowboy

Dare said:
			
		

> Calling these people "insurgents" militarizes these people. They are not part of a military, nor attacking a military asset. They are *terrorists* plain and simple. They are several orders of magnitude below the legitimacy of an insurgent. Absolutely this is a war, but these people are NOT warriors. They are COWARDS, and SLIME. They are *terrorists*.   An "insurgent" fights against the authority of an establish government, it is not a mass murderer of innocent men, women and children. Maybe even a better term would be "cultist mass murderers".


spot on. Good grouping. You're zeroed.


----------



## Edward Campbell

paracowboy said:
			
		

> spot on. Good grouping. You're zeroed.



Sorry, Dare  and paracowboy, I disagree.  I think Infanteer was right, *insurgent* is the right word.

Leave aside the exact, Oxford Canadian Dictionary, definition â â€œ which doesn't indicate that insurgents are, somehow, military; we need to sensitize Canadians to the fact that these people are not just _terrorists_ in some far off land who can, possibly, be dealt with by police using an anti-terrorism law.  That's not what we face.  We are facing insurgents who are rebelling against our government here in Canada.  They want to force our government to accede to their demands â â€œ whatever they are.  It's not criminals attacking someone else, somewhere else; it is a real enemy attacking us, in our home-towns â â€œ that makes them insurgents in my book.


----------



## Marty

" it is a real enemy attacking us, in our home-towns"
IMHO this is semantics........I think "Enemy" is the correct term for these O2 burners , and its high time they are teated as such


----------



## dutchie

I don't think it matters much what you call 'them', as long as you call them the enemy. Of that, there can be no variance. Now that they are properly identified, they must be dealt with. They need to be pursued as 'Insurgents' by our militaries, as 'Terrorists' by our police and intelligence services, and as 'Illegal Aliens' by our Customs/Immigration services. This war cannot be won using only one avenue.

Further, the quicker we separate Islam and these animals, the quicker we will see the enemy. These 'people' are no more 'Muslim' than David Koresh was a 'Christian'. They are religiously perverted. Having said that, I fully expect that future attacks to come from the Arab world by people claiming to be Muslim, and claiming to be acting on 'God's Word'. 

I sincerely hope we can turn the tide in this war soon, before it gets much worse. My deepest condolences to those killed and injured, and all Londoners and Britons. God Bless.


----------



## McG

Infanteer said:
			
		

> . . . this is an attack on us.  Those reasons cited above prove that this easily could have been Vancouver, Toronto or Montreal.
> 
> This is a war people - don't look at it as some sort of underground isolated terrorist attacks, this is an offensive attack in our rear area by the enemy aimed at the moral level of warfare.  These are not terrorists, these are insurgents, and the battlefield ranges from Bali, to Kashmir, to Baghdad, to our own streets.
> 
> Obviously, after over 3 years of fighting, Al Qaeda has not lost its ability to reach out and strike us.  This is a war, we must do one of two things or these attacks will only continue.  We must seek an understanding - _dar al-Ahd_ - with the specific demands of the Insurgency.  Or the gloves must come off and we must root out and destroy support for the Islamic Insurgency at the physical, mental, and moral planes; no more pussy-footing with "democracy" and whatnot, for we must go as Sherman and Grant did, to destroy any and all ability to fight us.
> 
> "War is the remedy that our enemies have chosen, and I say let us give them all they want." William Tecumseh Sherman



Infanteer,
I'm at least 90% in agreement here.  A few small variations in view though.  LIke others, I don't feel "insurgent" is the correct word.  There are insurgents in Iraq & Afghanistan fighting forgeign forces and thier own governments trying to rebuild.



			
				Edward Campbell said:
			
		

> Sorry, Dare  and paracowboy, I disagree.  I think Infanteer was right, *insurgent* is the right word.
> 
> Leave aside the exact, Oxford Canadian Dictionary, definition which doesn't indicate that insurgents are, somehow, military; we need to sensitize Canadians to the fact that these people are not just _terrorists_ in some far off land who can, possibly, be dealt with by police using an anti-terrorism law.  That's not what we face.  We are facing insurgents who are rebelling against our government here in Canada.  They want to force our government to accede to their demands whatever they are.  It's not criminals attacking someone else, somewhere else; it is a real enemy attacking us, in our home-towns that makes them insurgents in my book.


Edward,
It is for this exact description that the word "terrorist" must be used.  It is an unscroupulous human being content to use murder, fear, and panic against us in our homes.  They are like the executioners of genocide, but with out the means.  They would just as happily kill us all today and not have to worry about resolving the dispute.

Infanteer,
I had one other concern with your post, and that was a preception that you sounded ready to turn your back on reconstruction.  The military solution is required, but it cannot work alone.  I hope that I've read too much into your post and that this was not your intended message.


----------



## Dare

Edward Campbell said:
			
		

> Sorry, Dare  and paracowboy, I disagree.  I think Infanteer was right, *insurgent* is the right word.
> 
> Leave aside the exact, Oxford Canadian Dictionary, definition â â€œ which doesn't indicate that insurgents are, somehow, military; we need to sensitize Canadians to the fact that these people are not just _terrorists_ in some far off land who can, possibly, be dealt with by police using an anti-terrorism law.  That's not what we face.  We are facing insurgents who are rebelling against our government here in Canada.  They want to force our government to accede to their demands â â€œ whatever they are.  It's not criminals attacking someone else, somewhere else; it is a real enemy attacking us, in our home-towns â â€œ that makes them insurgents in my book.


They are not rebelling against our government. They're murdering innocent civilians. Now, for you, the word insurgent, might bring "them" closer to home. But the word "insurgent" is not one that is worthy of vilification. Nor is it accurate. What we have to do, is sensitize Canadians to the fact that "terrorists" are *here*. Not change the termonology. *They* are *here*. Most people think that is ridiculous. The idea of an insurgency in Canada is even further away from the grasp of the average Canadian. We're not at War against Insurgency. If you read what these radicals are saying *amongst themselves* (rather than reading their PR), you will find, they want all nations to yield to the Will of Allah (or in reality, their will). This includes the government, yes, but it is not strictly the government. It is ALL people. I don't want to change this thread into a debate on the nature of the War on Terrorism, but I will end this up saying: 1) Acts of Terrorism must be abhored and selected apart from insurgencies. 2) My mother was in the Kings Cross station taking trains all over only a few days ago, and a friend of mine just missed getting hit by 10 minutes. They're getting closer to home for me, and for a lot of other people in Canada, as well. Perhaps, this will be a wakeup call for Canada. Hopefully, the public will gather enough to take stock of who these people are, and how they are getting here. BEFORE we get hit. Now, it is possible there are insurgents in amongst these terrorists, but I have yet to see it. We don't call serial killers insurgents, even if they have a political view (like the Unibomber).


----------



## Infanteer

Dare said:
			
		

> Calling these people "insurgents" militarizes these people.



I could list off pages and pages of successful attacks.

Look at the camps that were set up in the Sudan, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc, etc.   Sure, special cells were instructed on how to infiltrate and conduct terrorist attacks but these guys were being instructed in how to *fight*.   The motivations that these attackers used in London are of the same militant ones that drive Chechens to fight off Russians, Afghanis to fight against us, Iraqis to take to the streets of Fallujah and an Najaf, operatives to attack sites throughout Africa, Asia, and Europe, and men to, by the will of their conviction, drive planes into the World Trade Center.

Criminal acts are often performed for financial gain - gangs and organized crime aim for status and for material profit.   Crime itself can be seen as one half of a "business" scale which falls below moral acceptability; since it is on the "immoral" side of the bar, there is no recourse to law and thus violence is often the preferred method of dispute resolution.

I don't see criminal motivations here, I only see blatantly obvious offensive attacks by soldiers.   Because they don't fall into the neatly ordered, Geneva Convention ascribed paradigm of "soldier" does not make them less so.   If you think that the years of continuous attacks are anything near that of organizations like Hizballah, Abu Nidal, or the Red Brigade, then perhaps you need to take a closer look at what these people are saying.



> They are not part of a military, nor attacking a military asset.



Neither were the people of Hamburg, Dresden, or Hiroshima.   Jihad is total war, and Total War is a bitch.   Until we figure out that we are in a total war with these folks, we can go on pretending we are chasing Thelma and Louise through the Hindu-Kush mountains.



> They are *terrorists* plain and simple. They are several orders of magnitude below the legitimacy of an insurgent. Absolutely this is a war, but these people are NOT warriors. They are COWARDS, and SLIME. They are *terrorists*.   An "insurgent" fights against the authority of an establish government, it is not a mass murderer of innocent men, women and children. Maybe even a better term would be "cultist mass murderers".



Emotive sure - but does this get you anywhere?   These men have attacked us.   They have attacked us in means that they see as acceptable within the confines of Jihad (re: Total War).   You can lob all the insults you want at them, and I'm sure they'll respond with "Infidel" and "Apostate", but in the end, does it add anything to the debate around *WHY* and *HOW* these attacks took place?

By the way, Al Qaeda has explicitly stated that, as the banner for Islamic Insurgency, they fight the apostate regimes (the "established governments") of the Middle East who rule in a manner opposed to their interpretation of God's Word.   They view the West as supporters of these regimes and thus as legitimate targets.   Debate it all you want, but they are attacking us for a reason.



			
				paracowboy said:
			
		

> I agree, but this is not an 'Insurgency'. These are terrorists. Criminals. Period.





			
				Caesar said:
			
		

> I don't think it matters much what you call 'them', as long as you call them the enemy. Of that, there can be no variance. Now that they are properly identified, they must be dealt with. They need to be pursued as 'Insurgents' by our militaries, as 'Terrorists' by our police and intelligence services, and as 'Illegal Aliens' by our Customs/Immigration services. This war cannot be won using only one avenue.





			
				MCG said:
			
		

> I'm at least 90% in agreement here.   A few small variations in view though.   LIke others, I don't feel "insurgent" is the correct word.   There are insurgents in Iraq & Afghanistan fighting forgeign forces and thier own governments trying to rebuild.
> Edward,
> It is for this exact description that the word "terrorist" must be used.   It is an unscroupulous human being content to use murder, fear, and panic against us in our homes.   They are like the executioners of genocide, but with out the means.   They would just as happily kill us all today and not have to worry about resolving the dispute.



Terrorism is a tactic, and one that they've used to great effect, but IMHO it doesn't effectively describe their motivations and their goals.   Terrorism first became a buzz word with anarchists.   Later, it would be the domain of socialist groups during the Cold War.   Picking up on Ayatollah Khomeini inspired efforts to paint the West as decadent and immoral, many Islamic groups sprouted up as well.   However, these groups were usually on a tight-leash, and their tactics were an extention of the state that funded and supported them in an effort to play the "Great Game" of the Cold War.   The rabid 10% (which is now part of the Insurgency) would gladly take part in the Cold War.

These attacks, along with the long list of others that Al Qaeda have taken the banner for, are something completely different.   They are not some sneaky attacks by state-sponsored terrorists, they are attacks that are fairly easy to predict (Britney saw it coming) because the enemy has announced that *we are at war*, *why we are at war*, and *what they are going to do to us because we are at war*.   Call their acts unscrupulous but it does nothing, because we are probably considered equally unscrupulous in their eyes for shooting up half of Iraq, dropping bombs on weddings in Afghanistan, and having newpapers show Lindi Englund disrepsecting Arab men for kicks.   Perception is key, and our perception is useless if it doesn't consider what the enemy is really up to.

Here is a quote that I think shows why the "Law Enforcement" approach does us no good:



> Instead of "painting the map red" as did Britain's Imperial elite, America's elites use U.S. law - to paraphrase the inane Woodrow Wilson - to "teach the world to make good laws."   A noted Harvard professor spoke for those eager to wage gavel-powered war, arguing that "[t]he most powerful weapon against terrorists is our commitment to the rule of law.   We must use courts to make clear that terrorism is a criminal act, not jihad, not heroism, not holy war.   And then we must no make martyrs of murderers."   The professor does not say who the courts would convince that jihad is a crime - Americans maybe, Muslims never - and also does not say how courts will stop attacks.   Helpfully, however, a colleague of hers has said, "If alleged terrorists are planning future attacks, these attacks can be uncovered and thwarted while law enforcement officials gather evidence."   You see, there is nothing to it.
> 
> The legalistic lens America uses to deal with the world causes confusion about what we are doing, and what we need to do, against bin Laden: Are we waging a war, or hot on the trail of Thelma and Louise?   As I said, we are predisposed by two-plus centuries of history to look for law-enforcement solutions to problems.   In bin Laden's case, this predisposition is encouraged by our leaders' insistence that bin Laden means to destroy our freedom, liberties, and democracy.   If that is what bin Laden intends, it is only natural we seek protection from the FBI and the Justice Department.   Here is more evidence of the danger that lies in our elites' inability or refusal to recognize bin Laden's goals and to respond effectively, rather than in ways they - and we - find intellectually comfortable.   "Five years of investigation and trials and appeals, as after the first World Trade Center [attack in 1993], deter nobody," William Safire wrote on 12 September 2001, and yet the chase-and-arrest technique still holds sway, only now the world's most powerful military is packing the handcuffs.
> 
> Michael Sheuer, Imperial Hubris pp: 185-186



This is why I believe terrorism is the wrong word - it encapsulates what is happening into legalistic terms, which the record of the last ten years shows clearly isn't the case.

We did not destroy fascism by threatening legal action and arresting people - sure, we did that after the war with Nurnburg with spectacular show trials that could have just as easily have been handled by handing Goering and Co. over to the Soviets - but we could only do this after we had won the war by destroying every inch of ability and will to resist on the part of the German and Japanese people.   This is the course I believe may be necessary in winning this war.  We can worry about the pieces, like we did with Germany and Japan, after we have won.


----------



## Infanteer

Caesar said:
			
		

> Further, the quicker we separate Islam and these animals, the quicker we will see the enemy. These 'people' are no more 'Muslim' than David Koresh was a 'Christian'. They are religiously perverted. Having said that, I fully expect that future attacks to come from the Arab world by people claiming to be Muslim, and claiming to be acting on 'God's Word'.



_"The war is fundamentally religious, under no circumstances should we forget this enmity betwen us and the infidels."_

These are the words of Osama bin Laden.

We do ourselves no favours by disrespecting our enemy and denigrating his convictions in his Faith.   These people are as Muslim as any other Muslim - they are just as serious about their Faith as were the Crusaders who words, similar to the ones above, from Pope Urban II when he launched the Crusades to the Holy Land.

Obviously, due to the fact that Muslims in Mindanao, Muslims in Afghanistan, Muslims in Iran, Iraq, Palestine, Egypt, Algeria, London and Sydney are saying the same thing as the comments above means that we should take this as a serious action by Muslims who believe that their call to Jihad is right.   This is not a cult - it is a movement, and judging from the fact that their is violence against the West in some way, shape or form *every single day*, it is one that seems to be picking up followers as time progresses.

Just because they are violent does not mean that they are religiously bankrupt - religion, and the battle for the soul in general, have been a huge motivator in conflict since we figured out that war was a good way to solve things.   This doesn't make them any less of a Muslim, just as lacing up your boots doesn't make you any less of a Christian [or whatever one decribes themselves as].

Perception.


----------



## KevinB

BLAH BLAH BLAH


 FIND, FIX, AND KILL   Durkha Durkha Motherfuckers 


Condolences to the Brits


----------



## Infanteer

KevinB said:
			
		

> BLAH BLAH BLAH
> 
> 
> FIND, FIX, AND KILL   Durkha Durkha Motherfuckers
> 
> 
> Condolences to the Brits



Hey, that is what I am getting at with the reference to Sherman.  I just like to wrap it up in a nice box.... :threat:


----------



## McG

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Hey, that is what I am getting at with the reference to Sherman.   I just like to wrap it up in a nice box.... :threat:


So, you have given-up on reconstruction?


----------



## KevinB

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Hey, that is what I am getting at with the reference to Sherman.   I just like to wrap it up in a nice box.... :threat:



Your so much more eloquent than me -- Shoot them in the M*^*er F$%king FACE is more my style.

We have to do both PRT function and Hunter Killer work --- Let Dwyer take a page from the Grey Fox playbook.

Get off our ass - send the Pats into Iraq (you know how angry and vile we'd be on a 1 year dry tour  :threat and summ it the F-up.  Bush is right - anyone not with us is against us (so ante up Canada) make the other nations saddle up - or kick them in the junk.


----------



## paracowboy

fine, I'll call them insurgents. I'll be happy to carve "Insurgent" in big, red letters into their foreheads.


----------



## dutchie

Infanteer - My point was misunderstood:

We have to make sure we don't paint all Muslims with the Terrorist brush. Differentiating 'Muslim Terrorist/Insurgent' and 'Muslim Canadian/American/Briton/Etc' is easy, just remove the word 'Muslim', and you're left with "Terrorist/Insurgent' or 'Canadian/American/Briton/Aussie'.

Once you identify the target, refer to KevinB's post, FFE.


----------



## I_am_John_Galt

I don't care what name we call them or euphemism we use to describe them:



> *MY ADVICE TO TONY BLAIR
> 
> Find.
> 
> Kill.
> 
> Repeat.*


     :threat: :skull: :threat: :skull:
http://www.secondbreakfast.net/archives/001989.html


----------



## Infanteer

MCG said:
			
		

> Infanteer,
> I had one other concern with your post, and that was a preception that you sounded ready to turn your back on reconstruction.   The military solution is required, but it cannot work alone.   I hope that I've read too much into your post and that this was not your intended message.



Are you talking about Afghanistan?   I take it you've read into my new sigline?

Well, perhaps we shouldn't be wasting our time with reconstruction - what good do soldiers do when they are building schools and wells in Afghanistan while we are getting attacked in our own streets?

Is it worth trying to rebuild Afghanistan when 2000 years of tribal politics, religious strife, ethnic conflict, and geo-strategic imperative will ensure that the "cockpit of the world" (to quote one British Viceroy) will continue to be the Slagheap of the Earth (to quote one Afghan elder).

"Democracy on the end of a bayonet" is a joke - it took us in the ABCA world (Britain, Australia, Canada, the United States) 8 Centuries of political evolution, complete with debates among great men, conflict between groups, religious wars, uprisings, and outright revolution, to achieve what we have now.   We should be proud of it and cherish it, but we should also not be foolish enough to think that we can pass it around like a nice hat.

The most stable period in recent history for Afghanistan?   When the "Iron Amir", Amir Abdul Rehman, basically clamped down with a bloody fist on opposition with backing from the British.

Here is why I remain suspicious of reconstruction:

1.   Do you think Pakistan, with Musharaf walking the tightrope and India constantly percolating, will really allow a government dominated by the Northern Alliance, who were allied with India and Russia, to sit on its other flank?

2.   Do you think the Soviets, who poured over 100,000 men into Afghanistan and stayed for 13 years, figured out that the Afghans are xenophobic and tough - we are all outsiders to them, are we not?

3.   Do you think that the Pashtuns, who are a majority of the population and have supplied the rulers of Afghanistan for the last two centuries are going to sit back and watch the heirs of Ahmed Shah Masood take over?

4.   Do you think that Hamid Karzai and Co., who never fought the Soviets, never fought the Communists, can blow into Kabul and set up a viable democracy.   Robert Kaplan was right, the Afghans are strong, stubborn and hardy people - I'm not sure they will suffer fools gladly, and I don't think for a minute that they will see the expat Karzai (despite is Pashtun background), with his nice suits and Italian shoes and American commando bodyguards, as anything different than Najibullah and Babrak Karmal.

It is reasons like these that I am skeptical.   I have no doubt that our intentions are good and that we score tactical successes, but the forces of History seem ready to overwhelm them.   I prefer the "Adams" approach to that of "Wilson" - we'll be friendly with them if they trade with us, we'll bring the Wrath of God upon them if they throw rocks at us, and other than that, they can sort their own lives out.   If they want our help, they'll come to us.

Maybe I'm getting a tad cynical, but the events of today seem to lead me to believe that to quote Bismarck, rebuilding the unbuildable and winning the unwinnable are not "worth the bones of single Pomeranian Grenadier".   For now, we should do what the British did after getting their asses handed to them a few times by the Afghanis - stay at arms length, go in for a raid and _"shoot them in the M*^*er F$%king FACE"_ when we have to, and let them and Allah sort the rest out.

Little fuel for the fire,
Infanteer


----------



## Dare

Infanteer said:
			
		

> I could list off pages and pages of successful attacks.


This thread is about the attacks in London.


> Look at the camps that were set up in the Sudan, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc, etc.  Sure, special cells were instructed on how to infiltrate and conduct terrorist attacks but these guys were being instructed in how to *fight*.  The motivations that these attackers used in London are of the same militant ones that drive Chechens to fight off Russians, Afghanis to fight against us, Iraqis to take to the streets of Fallujah and an Najaf, operatives to attack sites throughout Africa, Asia, and Europe, and men to, by the will of their conviction, drive planes into the World Trade Center.
> 
> Criminal acts are often performed for financial gain - gangs and organized crime aim for status and for material profit.  Crime itself can be seen as one half of a "business" scale which falls below moral acceptability; since it is on the "immoral" side of the bar, there is no recourse to law and thus violence is often the preferred method of dispute resolution.
> 
> I don't see criminal motivations here, I only see blatantly obvious offensive attacks by soldiers.  Because they don't fall into the neatly ordered, Geneva Convention ascribed paradigm of "soldier" does not make them less so.  If you think that the years of continuous attacks are anything near that of organizations like Hizballah, Abu Nidal, or the Red Brigade, then perhaps you need to take a closer look at what these people are saying.


These terrorists don't fall into any description of "soldier" as far as I'm concerned. 


> Neither were the people of Hamburg, Dresden, or Hiroshima.  Jihad is total war, and Total War is a *****.  Until we figure out that we are in a total war with these folks, we can go on pretending we are chasing Thelma and Louise through the Hindu-Kush mountains.


And what? Respond with total war? No. We are *not* in a total war. Some of those loonies are in a total war (in their heads), and we are taking the moral high ground, which ultimately will prevail because innocent people have voices and power, and innocent people don't like to get blown up. Lot's of innocent people around the world are now gaining more and more say in their governments and will fight terrorism. Thus is our strategy of creating democraticly accountable governments that respond to the will of the people (the innocent people Al Qaeda (and offshoots/splinter cells/ideological relatives/etc) want to kill, including ourselves). Now do I think we should up it a few notches? Yeah, maybe 50 notches..


> Emotive sure - but does this get you anywhere?  These men have attacked us.  They have attacked us in means that they see as acceptable within the confines of Jihad (re: Total War).  You can lob all the insults you want at them, and I'm sure they'll respond with "Infidel" and "Apostate", but in the end, does it add anything to the debate around *WHY* and *HOW* these attacks took place?


I wasn't talking about the why, nor the how. Why or how the attacks took place have nothing to do with the distinction in terms.  It's the effects and the intent that matters in that.  My description of them seems insulting (and it SHOULD) not just because of the meaning but because of the accuracy. They *are* cowards. Period. They *are* scum. Period. It's not what I brought up to insult them, but to describe them. As they, in their existance, are an insult to all of us.


> By the way, Al Qaeda has explicitly stated that, as the banner for Islamic Insurgency, they fight the apostate regimes (the "established governments") of the Middle East who rule in a manner opposed to their interpretation of God's Word.  They view the West as supporters of these regimes and thus as legitimate targets.  Debate it all you want, but they are attacking us for a reason.


PR. I suggest you make a few trips to radical Islamic websites. There's more than enough.


> Terrorism is a tactic, and one that they've used to great effect, but IMHO it doesn't effectively describe their motivations and their goals.  Terrorism first became a buzz word with anarchists.  Later, it would be the domain of socialist groups during the Cold War.  Picking up on Ayatollah Khomeini inspired efforts to paint the West as decadent and immoral, many Islamic groups sprouted up as well.  However, these groups were usually on a tight-leash, and their tactics were an extention of the state that funded and supported them in an effort to play the "Great Game" of the Cold War.  The rabid 10% (which is now part of the Insurgency) would gladly take part in the Cold War.


Terrorism is what we are at war against. It is defined. It is not a buzz word. Yes, it is a tactic. If you want to cooly describe it as that. Genocide is a tactic too. 


> These attacks, along with the long list of others that Al Qaeda have taken the banner for, are something completely different.  They are not some sneaky attacks by state-sponsored terrorists, they are attacks that are fairly easy to predict (Britney saw it coming) because the enemy has announced that *we are at war*, *why we are at war*, and *what they are going to do to us because we are at war*.  Call their acts unscrupulous but it does nothing, because we are probably considered equally unscrupulous in their eyes for shooting up half of Iraq, dropping bombs on weddings in Afghanistan, and having newpapers show Lindi Englund disrepsecting Arab men for kicks.  Perception is key, and our perception is useless if it doesn't consider what the enemy is really up to.


Back to the moral relativity, I see. Intent is key in all things moral. "We" did not pick up one day and choose to blow up a wedding. "They" did pick up one day and chose to blow up innocent people. There's the difference. It's clear and definied. I'm afraid naked-man pyramids or standing on a box or a "non-believer" touching a Qu'ran will never in my lifetime equivicate to a beheading. To lend credence to that does not to justice to good cause.


> Here is a quote that I think shows why the "Law Enforcement" approach does us no good:
> 
> This is why I believe terrorism is the wrong word - it encapsulates what is happening into legalistic terms, which the record of the last ten years shows clearly isn't the case.
> 
> We did not destroy fascism by threatening legal action and arresting people - sure, we did that after the war with Nurnburg with spectacular show trials that could have just as easily have been handled by handing Goering and Co. over to the Soviets - but we could only do this after we had won the war by destroying every inch of ability and will to resist on the part of the German and Japanese people.  This is the course I believe may be necessary in winning this war.


Why would you think I am taking a Law Enforcement approach on the War on Terrorism, because I describe it as an Act of Terrorism? We are *at war* against Terror. These people *are* Terrorists. It might be time to put that book down, Infanteer. While Sheuer might quote Safire, I doubt the reverse would happen. I'm all for taking the battle to them. You bet. I just disagree with the term "insurgent". It's unsuitable.


----------



## S McKee

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Something to think about - here is what I said yesterday:
> 
> ...and, here is what the attackers stated:
> 
> There you have it.   Notice that there is no mention of democracy, freedom of speech, or separation of church and state.
> 
> Regardless, this is an attack on us.   Those reasons cited above prove that this easily could have been Vancouver, Toronto or Montreal.
> 
> This is a war people - don't look at it as some sort of underground isolated terrorist attacks, this is an offensive attack in our rear area by the enemy aimed at the moral level of warfare.   These are not terrorists, these are insurgents, and the battlefield ranges from Bali, to Kashmir, to Baghdad, to our own streets.
> 
> Obviously, after over 3 years of fighting, Al Qaeda has not lost its ability to reach out and strike us.   This is a war, we must do one of two things or these attacks will only continue.   We must seek an understanding - _dar al-Ahd_ - with the specific demands of the Insurgency.   Or the gloves must come off and we must root out and destroy support for the Islamic Insurgency at the physical, mental, and moral planes; no more *****-footing with "democracy" and whatnot, for we must go as Sherman and Grant did, to destroy any and all ability to fight us.
> 
> "War is the remedy that our enemies have chosen, and I say let us give them all they want." William Tecumseh Sherman
> 
> Infanteer



Outstanding post! Lets give them all they want and more.


----------



## Infanteer

Dare said:
			
		

> This thread is about the attacks in London.



...of which it is simply the latest in an unending list of attacks by people who really do not like us for some reason.   Are you implying that the attacks in London are unrelated to anything else?   Obviously not, so the rest of the discussion is relevent.



> These terrorists don't fall into any description of "soldier" as far as I'm concerned.



Well, have your cake then.

They arm themselves, they train, they announce their goals, they fight our soldiers and attack our civilians, and they do so to for a common interest.   If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck then it just may be a duck.

Maybe I should send them a copy of the Geneva Conventions and ask them to conform so that we can end this debate?



> And what? Respond with total war? No. We are *not* in a total war. Some of those loonies are in a total war (in their heads), and we are taking the moral high ground, which ultimately will prevail because innocent people have voices and power, and innocent people don't like to get blown up.



With the streets of the Middle East ablaze, people dying in conflict and combat everyday, fear of death paramount in the minds of many around the world, and outright competition at the level of Samuel Huntington's Clash of Civilizations, you claim that we are not in a Total War?



> Lot's of innocent people around the world are now gaining more and more say in their governments and will fight terrorism. Thus is our strategy of creating democraticly accountable governments that respond to the will of the people (the innocent people Al Qaeda (and offshoots/splinter cells/ideological relatives/etc) want to kill, including ourselves). Now do I think we should up it a few notches? Yeah, maybe 50 notches..



...and that, to date, has got us where?   Judging by the events of today in London, we are just as vulnerable (if not more so) to attacks from the enemy as we were on September 10, 2001.   The Director of Central Intelligence stated this to the Senate as well, so maybe I'm not alone in my thinking.

As for "democracy on the end of a bayonet", my comments above should state my views on this venture.



> I wasn't talking about the why, nor the how. Why or how the attacks took place have nothing to do with the distinction in terms.   It's the effects and the intent that matters in that.



Causality - we can rail at affects and intent all we want, but if we don't determine causality, then all we do is get to be on the receiving end of more effects and intent.   The why and the how (which I have stated is a religiously inspired, pan-Islamic Insurgency) is how we solve the problem. 



> My description of them seems insulting (and it SHOULD) not just because of the meaning but because of the accuracy. They *are* cowards. Period. They *are* scum. Period. It's not what I brought up to insult them, but to describe them. As they, in their existance, are an insult to all of us.



 :boring:

Well, now that their feelings are hurt, we can move on.   Labelling them cowards does not do anything to deter them from killing you and me.



> PR. I suggest you make a few trips to radical Islamic websites   There's more than enough.



OK - PR then.   I have no doubt that the Insurgency has its 10% who do want to gun for the West because we are liberal, democratic secular states.   These are the inheritors of Khomeini and the only real solution is a Hellfire.   However, as far as I'm concerned, Osama bin Laden isn't in that category and Al Qaeda says what they mean and do what they say.   I'm taking them seriously not putting them in the same page as internet rants.



> Terrorism is what we are at war against. It is defined. It is not a buzz word. Yes, it is a tactic. If you want to cooly describe it as that. Genocide is a tactic too.



Okay, we are fighting Terrorism.   What's next after that, fighting Section Attacks and Strategic Bombardment?   Terrorism is a loose term (people can say that the USSR was a terrorist organization) at best.   If we want to base our actions upon a loosely defined term then we will get a open-ended strategy that will mean defeat in the end.

Apparently, others agree with me:

http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/30081.0.html



> Back to the moral relativity, I see. Intent is key in all things moral.



Sorry, you're right.

Dumb Muslims - what do they know.   They should be sitting at their computers like us, learning that the Truth lies in minimum wage, Chevy Suburbans, and steak and eggs.

Whew, I feel glad I'm _up here_ and they're _down there._

As far as I am concerned, if they are willing to fight and die for it, then we must treat it as a serious cause that is justified to some people somehow.   I refuse to paint the world as "Good" and "Evil" - that can stay in Dungeons and Dragons....



> "We" did not pick up one day and choose to blow up a wedding. "They" did pick up one day and chose to blow up innocent people. There's the difference. It's clear and definied.



Well, if I was Abdul the Pashtun, and my son just got blown up with the rest of the wedding party, I'd probably say "Why are the American's here dropping bombs on me?"

Regardless of the reason we are there (which you are right, is a good one), people tend to get mad and strike back when they are being kicked. 



> I'm afraid naked-man pyramids or standing on a box or a "non-believer" touching a Qu'ran will never in my lifetime equivicate to a beheading. To lend credence to that does not to justice to good cause.



That's good for you, but that does nothing to stop them from doing it.   In the end, it is just your word against the guy with the rusty knife - where is that going to go?



> Why would you think I am taking a Law Enforcement approach on the War on Terrorism, because I describe it as an Act of Terrorism?



If you looked at the quotes before my response, you would notice that they were directed towards McG, Paracowboy, and Caesar.



> We are *at war* against Terror. These people *are* Terrorists. It might be time to put that book down, Infanteer. While Sheuer might quote Safire, I doubt the reverse would happen.



Well that's cute.   Time to put the book down.   Are you going to respond to the claim, or are you just going to tell me to "put the book down".

I will, like Britney Spears, admit that I don't no much about anything in this incredibly complicated world.   I like to chat, and pick up on various different outlooks of the world, and to present them here for others to have a look at and to debate.   The view of Sheuer, as much as you deride it, seems to make sense to me.   I've only been to the very edge of _dar al-Islam_, but it makes sense that there is something beyond either criminality or slinking terrorist groups working with KGB-backed spies in what we are dealing with - it is the impression I remember from playing a little cat-and-mouse in two Muslim communities that really didn't seem to like us one bit; the hair on my neck would stand up when we cruised through them.

Others have Been There and Done That to an extent far beyond what I have done, and I'd be glad to hear from them.   But if I choose to read into matters to understand what I have experienced and you tell me to "put down the book", then I'll politely tell you to stick it up your ass.


----------



## a_majoor

Democracy at the point of a bayonet may not be the "best" response to the problem, but since the problem is so deeply rooted in the dysfunctional nature of the societies in the Middle east (and to a lesser extent ion the various Asian nations with Al Quada splinter cells), it is hard to think of another means of getting to the objective. IF we were really in a hurry, I suppose it could be arranged for the land mass from the Persian Gulf to the Hindu Kush be turned into glowing glass, regime change is longer and messier but has been proven to work (i.e. reconstructionism in the South, occupying National Socialist Germany and Imperial Japan) so long as we have: a. totally defeated the enemy society to such an extent that the ruling ideologies are totally discredited, and; b. are willing to stay and do the work of reconstruction for at least a generation.

American forces in Iraq are close enough at hand to do a "March to the Sea" through Syria, Iran or Saudi Arabia if required, I think (and it is only speculation on my part) that the Administration does not feel ready to do so, and is pinning their hopes on internal uprisings like the Cedar Revolution in Lebanon to do most of the work for them. In other threads I have speculated that it IS possible for the US to perform military actions throughout the Middle East, and that their preference for strategic and logistical reasons might take the form of violent "head shots" against opponent regimes to decapitate them and unhinge their ability to offer coordination or support to the Jihadis.

While "head shots" are militarily feasible, they do not conform to the requirements to discredit the enemy society and the ruling ideologies, nor does it set up conditions for a successful reconstruction. I believe the Americans are coming to these realizations, and we will see a change in the way WW IV is being prosecuted, with a lot more emphasis on the 4GW precepts of destroying the opponent's society through cultural, propaganda and economic means.


----------



## Infanteer

a_majoor said:
			
		

> Democracy at the point of a bayonet may not be the "best" response to the problem, but since the problem is so deeply rooted in the dysfunctional nature of the societies in the Middle east (and to a lesser extent ion the various Asian nations with Al Quada splinter cells), it is hard to think of another means of getting to the objective. IF we were really in a hurry, I suppose it could be arranged for the land mass from the Persian Gulf to the Hindu Kush be turned into glowing glass, regime change is longer and messier but has been proven to work (i.e. reconstructionism in the South, occupying National Socialist Germany and Imperial Japan) so long as we have: a. totally defeated the enemy society to such an extent that the ruling ideologies are totally discredited, and; b. are willing to stay and do the work of reconstruction for at least a generation.



Ok, but I still think that Iraq and Afghanistan are the two completely worst places to start "nation building".

Germany worked, but that was because it was a Western, liberal democratic state that was hijacked during a time of intense social crisis.   Luckily we were able to save the land of Goethe, Schiller, and Beethoven from going over the edge.

Japan worked, but that was because it had a tradition of westernization stemming back for almost a century.   This tradition was usurped from within by the military, but we pounded the crap out of them and put them back on track.

South Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore also seem to be success stories.   However, they weren't overnight and I think these places were blessed by the fact that they are almost ethnically homogeneous.   Commentators on Athenian democracy have pointed out that it worked because of this homogeneity - tolerance that we find in the ABCA take the hundreds of years of evolution to form.

Both Afghanistan and Iraq are riven with tribal differences, ethnic differences, religious differences, and geo-political meddling by both regional and global players.   I think these forces will overwhelm a transplanted democracy.

Perhaps we should have kept Saddam on board and had him go after Al Qaeda and like-minded individuals within an on the borders of Iraq; he sure did have the propensity for it when we sent him after Iran.   A Machiavellian ploy right out of the 17th century..sure - but as I said above, it helped the British solve the problem with Afghanistan 100 years ago.   ???



> American forces in Iraq are close enough at hand to do a "March to the Sea" through Syria, Iran or Saudi Arabia if required, I think (and it is only speculation on my part) that the Administration does not feel ready to do so, and is pinning their hopes on internal uprisings like the Cedar Revolution in Lebanon to do most of the work for them. In other threads I have speculated that it IS possible for the US to perform military actions throughout the Middle East, and that their preference for strategic and logistical reasons might take the form of violent "head shots" against opponent regimes to decapitate them and unhinge their ability to offer coordination or support to the Jihadis.
> 
> While "head shots" are militarily feasible, they do not conform to the requirements to discredit the enemy society and the ruling ideologies, nor does it set up conditions for a successful reconstruction. I believe the Americans are coming to these realizations, and we will see a change in the way WW IV is being prosecuted, with a lot more emphasis on the 4GW precepts of destroying the opponent's society through cultural, propaganda and economic means.



Very true - I await General Sherman, who will make Georgia dar al-Islam howl.


----------



## Dare

Infanteer said:
			
		

> ...of which it is simply the latest in an unending list of attacks by people who really do not like us for some reason.  Are you implying that the attacks in London are unrelated to anything else?  Obviously not, so the rest of the discussion is relevent.


My dispute with the terminology was about the London attacks. Thanks.


> Well, have your cake then.
> 
> They arm themselves, they train, they announce their goals, they fight our soldiers and attack our civilians, and they do so to for a common interest.  If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck then it just may be a duck.


Interestingly enough, these attackers did not fight soldiers, did not (knowingly, as of yet) announce their goals. We do not know what their interests are, we assume they are Islamic in nature. We don't know what branch or offshoot. I don't know of any soldiers that have blown up civilian trains for the sake of blowing up civilians.


> Maybe I should send them a copy of the Geneva Conventions and ask them to conform so that we can end this debate?
> 
> With the streets of the Middle East ablaze, people dying in conflict and combat everyday, fear of death paramount in the minds of many around the world, and outright competition at the level of Samuel Huntington's Clash of Civilizations, you claim that we are not in a Total War?


Streets of the middle east ablaze.. OK. That's a bit dramatic, don't you think? No. We are *NOT* in a total war. Not even close. If we were our economy would be converted to war production and we would be conscripting or recruiting in MUCH higher numbers.


> ...and that, to date, has got us where?  Judging by the events of today in London, we are just as vulnerable (if not more so) to attacks from the enemy as we were on September 10, 2001.  The Director of Central Intelligence stated this to the Senate as well, so maybe I'm not alone in my thinking.


Many attacks have been stopped in London. Cells disrupted and arrested. That is called progress. If you think leaving Iraq or visaversa blowing it up even more is going to make these nuts leave the country, no chance.


> As for "democracy on the end of a bayonet", my comments above should state my views on this venture.


Yeah. Japan. Jihad has nothing on Bushido. Yeah. It takes time.


> Causality - we can rail at affects and intent all we want, but if we don't determine causality, then all we do is get to be on the receiving end of more effects and intent.  The why and the how (which I have stated is a religiously inspired, pan-Islamic Insurgency) is how we solve the problem.


As I said, I understand the why and how. 


> :boring:
> 
> Well, now that their feelings are hurt, we can move on.  Labelling them cowards does not do anything to deter them from killing you and me.


Interestingly enough, the "label" or correct definition, (if you like), was made because it's true, not as some sort of deterrence(why would you think that?).


> OK - PR then.  I have no doubt that the Insurgency has its 10% who do want to gun for the West because we are liberal, democratic secular states.  These are the inheritors of Khomeini and the only real solution is a Hellfire.  However, as far as I'm concerned, Osama bin Laden isn't in that category and Al Qaeda says what they mean and do what they say.  I'm taking them seriously not putting them in the same page as internet rants.


No, the 10% are the ones that are at war with the west purely because of Iraq. Or because of military bases. 


> Okay, we are fighting Terrorism.  What's next after that, fighting Section Attacks and Strategic Bombardment?  Terrorism is a loose term (people can say that the USSR was a terrorist organization) at best.  If we want to base our actions upon a loosely defined term then we will get a open-ended strategy that will mean defeat in the end.


People can say that walking my dog is terrorism. That doesn't make it true. People can say that my cat is a dog. That doesn't make it true. Terrorism is defined. It's real. We *are* basing our actions on defeating terrorism. It IS winnable and needed. It is not open ended. We don't declare war on strategic bombardment because the people who have declared war on US have not this capability and because we don't enjoy killing innocent people or having innocent people killed. They do have the ability to bring in bombs and hurt the unprotected. We have to stop that.


> Apparently, others agree with me:
> 
> http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/30081.0.html


Couldn't care less how many people agree with you. Because others agree with me as well. Fortunately, they include our leadership.


> Sorry, you're right.
> 
> Dumb Muslims - what do they know.  They should be sitting at their computers like us, learning that the Truth lies in minimum wage, Chevy Suburbans, and steak and eggs.
> 
> Whew, I feel glad I'm _up here_ and there _down there._
> 
> As far as I am concerned, if they are willing to fight and die for it, then we must treat it as a serious cause that is justified to some people somehow.  I refuse to paint the world as "Good" and "Evil" - that can stay in Dungeons and Dragons....


That's fine. You do that then. You can view them as justified all you want. As far as I'm concerned, not only are they not justified in what they have done, they need to feel the hurt. It's also likely these particular Muslims (if they were), are well educated in the west. It takes a lot of guile to pull off what they did.


> Well, if I was Abdul the Pashtun, and my son just got blown up with the rest of the wedding party, I'd probably say "Why are the American's here dropping bombs on me?"


If I was ME, and the Americans missed a cruise missile that hit my house. I'm sure they would apologize (as they do) and I would be mad at the individuals who made the error, but I'm not about to go on Jihad because of it.


> Regardless of the reason we are there (which you are right, is a good one), people tend to get mad and strike back when they are being kicked.


Kick the terrorists until they don't get up. How's that sound? I can't say I'm sure what you're advocating? Isolationism/retreat or full out conquest/occupation? It doesn't seem to be the same thing as What We Are Doing.


> That's good for you, but that does nothing to stop them from doing it.  In the end, it is just your word against the guy with the rusty knife - where is that going to go?


The word is what drives them. Words carry weight.


> If you looked at the quotes before my response, you would notice that they were directed towards McG, Paracowboy, and Caesar.
> 
> Well that's cute.  Time to put the book down.  Are you going to respond to the claim, or are you just going to tell me to "put the book down".
> 
> I will, like Britney Spears, admit that I don't no much about anything in this incredibly complicated world.  I like to chat, and pick up on various different outlooks of the world, and to present them here for others to have a look at and to debate.  The view of Sheuer, as much as you deride it, seems to make sense to me.  I've only been to the very edge of _dar al-Islam_, but it makes sense that there is something beyond either criminality or slinking terrorist groups working with KGB-backed spies in what we are dealing with - it is the impression I remember from playing a little cat-and-mouse in two Muslim communities that really didn't seem to like us one bit; the hair on my neck would stand up when we cruised through them.


I have a few more arabic words for you, since you like that one. Look up dhimmi, jizyah and taquiyya. Maybe you'll catch a gleen of why others in the middle east aren't too pleased at the theocracy and why we all fall for the lies over here.


> Others have Been There and Done That to an extent far beyond what I have done, and I'd be glad to hear from them.  But if I choose to read into matters to understand what I have experienced and you tell me to "put down the book", then I'll politely tell you to stick it up your ***.


 As long as you say it politely. I still love you Infanteer.


----------



## Gunnar

OT:   I think we should preserve Infanteer and Dare's discussion as an example of how to hold a civilized discussion with someone who's obviously wrong.      I'm not going to say who that is right now tho. >


----------



## TCBF

"A Machiavellian ploy right out of the 17th century..sure - but as I said above, it helped the British solve the problem with Afghanistan 100 years ago. "

- They also helped the Wahabbis seize power in Arabia.  Sometimes, you guess right.  Sometimes, you guess wrong.

Tom


----------



## Infanteer

Dare said:
			
		

> My dispute with the terminology was about the London attacks. Thanks.



Doesn't answer my question - are you saying this is unrelated to anything happening in the rest of the world right now, because my terminology was aimed at that implying the opposite.



> Interestingly enough, these attackers did not fight soldiers, did not (knowingly, as of yet) announce their goals. We do not know what their interests are, we assume they are Islamic in nature. We don't know what branch or offshoot.



Well, judging by the events of the last 3-5 years, I think it should be pretty obvious on who, what, and why these guys are all about - unless the PIRA pulled a fast one on all of us.



> I don't know of any soldiers that have blown up civilian trains for the sake of blowing up civilians.



Here is two of them:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0759659400/qid=1120775748/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/103-5278873-7828656

Worked for us, didn't it?



> Streets of the middle east ablaze.. OK. That's a bit dramatic, don't you think?



Ok, a bit dramatic - but I wouldn't say it is _Green Acres_ either.



> No. We are *NOT* in a total war. Not even close. If we were our economy would be converted to war production and we would be conscripting or recruiting in MUCH higher numbers.



The war is total because it is global in nature and we are all legitimate targets.   Just as we will reach into Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen or Chechnya to hit the enemy, they will also reach into Madrid, London, and New York to hit us.

One thing is for certain, this isn't a "Cabinet War".



> Many attacks have been stopped in London. Cells disrupted and arrested. That is called progress.



It appears to me that attacks around the world have been escalating since the early 1990's.   If there is progress (aside from a few tactical successes every now and then), please point it out.



> Yeah. Japan. Jihad has nothing on Bushido. Yeah. It takes time.



As I said above, the fact that the Japanese broke it down on their own with Meiji for 70 odd years combined with the fact that you have ethnic homogenity makes it far more workable there than it does in places we are today.



> No, the 10% are the ones that are at war with the west purely because of Iraq. Or because of military bases.



And your positive about this - so most people screaming "Down With America" are really protesting short skirts and Playstations?



> People can say that walking my dog is terrorism. That doesn't make it true. People can say that my cat is a dog. That doesn't make it true. Terrorism is defined. It's real. We *are* basing our actions on defeating terrorism. It IS winnable and needed. It is not open ended. We don't declare war on strategic bombardment because the people who have declared war on US have not this capability and because we don't enjoy killing innocent people or having innocent people killed. They do have the ability to bring in bombs and hurt the unprotected. We have to stop that.



I remember writing a paper on terrorism, and the first problem I had was the defintion.

Taken from dictionary.com

_ter ·ror ·ism 
n. 
The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons._

Pretty loose if I say so myself.   Heck, half the people around these forums apply this to the US invasion of Iraq.   Certainly, Canada's invasion of Kosovo could be written up as terrorism, since we bombed Belgrade into submission first.   As I said earlier, the State organs of the USSR would be terrorists (should we throw all the old KGB apparachiks in Gitmo as well?).   How about guerilla's? Terrorists or freedom fighters?   Israel's own creation is surrounded by the actions of violent zionist groups.   As well, I'm sure the Natives of North America would easily point out that the British, American, and Canadian governments have committed acts of terrorism against their societies in the past.

That's about as open-ended as it gets.

I'm sticking to my guns with the term "Islamic Insurgency".   It defines who the enemy is, what he wants, and where we can aim to defeat him.   Much of what I understand leads me to draw real links between dusty tribesmen fighting in the Suleman range of Afghanistan, the Iraqi in the streets of Fallujah, the stubborn hillman in Chechnya, and the attackers of 9/11, Bali, Madrid and now London.   These aren't isolated incidents, they aren't the work of madmen or criminals, and they aren't purely based upon random acts of violence.

The Insurgency is a loose network, not a monolith.   But the message of hatred against us is strong enough that these many groups of people from across Southern Asia and Africa seem willing to take a bit of time from killing themselves to direct their actions onto us.   They believe many things, and support many different goals, but as long as men like Osama bin Laden trumpet that we are the cause for their spiritual doom, they will take the chance to stick us in the eye and drive us away if they can.



> If I was ME, and the Americans missed a cruise missile that hit my house. I'm sure they would apologize (as they do) and I would be mad at the individuals who made the error, but I'm not about to go on Jihad because of it.



The wedding remark is to show how fighting in people's backyards can bring them into the conflict, whether we wanted them there or not.   Next time your wedding gets leveled, come back and tell me how you feel.



> I have a few more arabic words for you, since you like that one. Look up dhimmi, jizyah and taquiyya. Maybe you'll catch a gleen of why others in the middle east aren't too pleased at the theocracy and why we all fall for the lies over here.



Hmm, two for rules for non-believers living in Islamic countries and one for hiding ones motives.   And this has what to do with the question at hand?



			
				Dare said:
			
		

> As long as you say it politely. I still love you Infanteer.



Ok, well at least we got that sorted out.... :blotto:



			
				TCBF said:
			
		

> They also helped the Wahabbis seize power in Arabia.   Sometimes, you guess right.   Sometimes, you guess wrong.



Ain't that the truth - ah well, what the hell can you do, eh?


----------



## Infanteer

Since this thread seems to have turned into a discussion on the general conflict, I'll return to what I said in my original post:



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Al Qaeda has stuck to six points on where it feels it is justified calling a defensive Jihad against the West:
> 
> 1) Support for Israel
> 
> 2) The Presence of Western troops in _dar al-Islam_
> 
> 3) The invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan
> 
> 4) Acquiescence to the persecution of Muslims by states like China (Xinjiang), India (Kashmir), and Russia (Chechnya)
> 
> 5) Western hand in taking the petroleum resources in the Middle East
> 
> 6) Support for apostate regimes in the Middle East that do not govern according to the Word of God (Egypt, Saudi Arabia, etc, etc).



Notice the underlined emphasis.   Now, look what else happened today in the world:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4660909.stm

Al Qaeda in Iraq (the Jordanian Zarqawi's gang) execute the Egyptian envoy in Iraq - reason given; for being an apostate.   This jives with issue number 6.

This is the link I'm trying to point out when I go on about Insurgency.   In the same day, Al Qaeda in Europe kills British civilians in London while Al Qaeda in Iraq kills an Egyptian diplomat in Iraq.   Why would an organization, if it was one of terrorists dedicated to destroying the West and all it stands for, be wasting their time with a diplomat from another Arab country?  Hard to answer, probably because "terrorists dedicated to destroying the West" doesn't completely fit the bill.

I would venture that these events occured because of the link between them, the link of the Insurgency which pursues fighting the West based upon the six reasons listed above.   I'm willing to bet that these two organizations had no communication or knowledge of eachothers actions, but the fact that they are being driven by what they perceive to be a legitimate _casus belli_ (which Al Qaeda is trumpeting to the Islamic world) should indicate again that the conflict we are seeing is more then a simple gamut of terrorist attacks on the West driven by madmen.


----------



## Brad Sallows

insurgency: the quality or state of being insurgent; specifically : a condition of revolt against a government that is less than an organized revolution and that is not recognized as belligerency

I dunno; they seem sort of belligerent, organized, and desirous of (Islamic) revolution.   If you wish to cast it as conflict, then with respect to operations in the nations of the middle east, I call it Islamic Revolt.   With respect to operations in Europe and North America, I call it Islamic Invasion.


----------



## Slim

Winston Churchill said:
"The best argument agains democracey is a five-minute conversation with the average voter!"

The days of fat, dumb and happy are over...

Time to act.  :mg:......................................................... :skull:



> There is no specific threat to Canadians, but we have to be prepared."
> 
> -Anne McLellan, minister of public safety



Pull your head out of your A$$!


----------



## a_majoor

> *Is It a War, or Isn't It?*
> The London bombings and different approaches to terror.
> 
> Unfortunately, points like these are best made when terror strikes and the collective public mind is focused. So it is worth pausing today to consider that British law and government have many features that critics both here and in the "international community" contend the United States should adopt. It's times like these when such claims appear most starkly dubious.
> 
> England has a domestic intelligence service, MI-5, which some keep insisting makes for superior homeland security compared with our system because it can single-mindedly focus on intelligence collection and analysis. In contrast, our FBI does both counterintelligence and traditional law enforcement. But for all the talk about the supposed efficiencies of specialization and study, good intelligence, at bottom, is a matter of squeezing bad people for information. That is a fact â â€ like it or not. The FBI, of course, is far from perfect, but our system â â€ when it is working properly â â€ more easily allows the threat or reality of prosecution for crimes to induce suspects to cooperate and provide vital intelligence.
> 
> The Brits, moreover, adhere to the 1977 "Protocol I" to the Geneva Conventions which provides additional protections for terrorists at the expense of civilian populations. As David Rivkin and Lee Casey wrote in an important 2004 article ("Leashing the Dogs of War") in The National Interest, Protocol I:
> 
> " eliminates the requirement of government sanction for lawful combatant status, and the rules requiring uniforms and the open carriage of arms are relaxed. In this regard, under Protocol I, irregular forces need to produce their arms and identifying badges only immediately before launching an attack, and can only be targeted themselves while preparing for an attack or attacking. At all other times, Protocol I requires irregulars to be treated as civilians, who can be arrested, but not targeted. Obviously, these changes bestow a dramatic advantage on the hit-and-run tactics favored by guerrillas, and seriously handicap regular armed forces."
> 
> The U.S. rejected Protocol I during the Reagan administration, precisely because it would abet terrorists. Nevertheless, as Rivkin and Casey elaborated, the fact that the U.S. regards al Qaeda terrorists as unlawful enemy combatants, rather than criminal defendants with constitutional rights or POWs with Geneva protections,
> 
> " has opened a rift with America's European allies, many of which act as if Protocol I applies to the United States, even without its consent. Some in Europe have actually questioned their governments' right to transfer individual Al-Qaeda and Taliban members to the United States, and British units operating in Afghanistan in 2001-02 evidently feared capturing Osama bin Laden, since they might not have been able to turn him over to American forces. Indeed, this problem persists in Iraq, and is magnified by another quandary â â€ the British, because of the combination of domestic legislation, Protocol I strictures and EU obligations, are apparently unable to utilize any form of military tribunals to prosecute and punish either unlawful Iraqi combatants or those lawful Iraqi combatants that have committed war crimes. This situation has greatly complicated the Coalition's ability to deter attacks on its forces in Iraq."
> 
> Not only do the Brits display a curious legal and military deference to terrorists' choice of barbaric tactics. They are also in the vanguard pushing toward legitimizing those tactics politically â â€ even now toying with the idea of recognizing and negotiating with Ham as and Hezbollah. As our government nervously watches developments in the Middle East â â€ where the Palestinian Authority is poised to invite Hamas into its governing coalition â â€ atrocities like the ones in London today should remind us that *the moral clarity of the Bush Doctrine (you are either with us, or with the terrorists) is dependent on a steadfast rejection of all who practice or promote the slaughter of innocent civilians to achieve political ends.*
> 
> Further, the British revile our Guantanamo Bay detentions of captured enemy combatants, to the point of insisting, with success, that British prisoners (some of whom were among the worst terrorists held in Gitmo) be returned to England, where most were promptly released into the population.
> 
> And, when parliament enacted a tough antiterrorism law, the House of Lords threw out the provisions permitting national-security detentions. Why? The Law Lords one-sidedly ruled that detaining terrorists without trial violated European human-rights standards.
> 
> *Of course, detaining enemy operatives until hostilities are over is not simply acceptable under the time-honored laws of war; it is common sense not to release militants so they can kill more of your soldiers and civilians.* Too often, in Britain and throughout Europe, the humans whose rights are the subject of obsessive concern are the ones doing the killing rather than the ones doing the dying.
> 
> Amid the carnage today, Home Secretary Charles Clarke is talking about the people who carried out "these terrible criminal acts." That's an understandable reaction â â€ and we shouldn't quibble too much over a choice of words by people who have been stellar allies, who are in the middle of a rescue effort, and who are unsure the bombing has actually stopped. But it is worth repeating that what happened today is not mere crime.
> 
> _*This is war. It can't sensibly be separated from Bali or Mombassa or Istanbul or Madrid or Baghdad or Virginia or lower Manhattan â â€ or any of the other places where the enemy has attacked.*_
> 
> *The only security â â€ and an imperfect security it is â â€ is to acknowledge that this is a war and fight it like a one. Prime Minister Blair has been a staunch ally after 9/11, but many in his country, and throughout Europe, have not grasped what we are up against.*
> 
> â â€ Andrew C. McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor, is a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/mccarthy/mccarthy200507071247.asp


----------



## Zartan

Insurgent: citizen or occupant of a conquered country fighting the foreign nation(s) that conquered it.
Terrorist: citizen or occupant of one nation who goes to a foreign country and harms its people while lacking a mutual declaration of war.
Rebel: a person fighting against their own government, people, or the authority above them.
- my definitions of the preceding things.

A truly terrible day. My radio begins to spout the news as the alarm strikes the 9:00, and the first thing I hear is "Terrorists have attacked London". However, one has to give the Brits credit; they sure can take stress well. I hope they can take down these guys just aswell. On a third note: USA 2001, Spain 2003, UK 2005 - two years apart, and each country is or was involved in Iraq (one has to give exemption to the US on this, though). Perhaps Iraq is more important than most people would like to believe. If this has any relevance to the terrorist's plans, perhaps Italy is next...

P.S. Jack Layton should get a clue. Anne McClellan should get a lesser clue (really, is it that hard to notice?).


----------



## CH1

Well for my 2 cents,   These thugs are nothing but a bunch of COWARDS, no matter what their bible says.   Any low life that deliberately targets civvies, women, & children deserve no better than what they give.   If these useless bags of skin, want respect than fight the military face to face!

As far as I'm concerned, it is the time to take the war & dump it not on their door steps, but right in their laps, up front & personal!   They say eye for eye, then fine, let's start the same type of tactics.   Maybe then after a good taste of their own bitter medicine, will they slither back to the bottom of the cess pool they crawled out of!

And if ppl think I'm PO'd, they are right.   I for 1 am ready to go after these slugs in their ball park but on my terms.   No surrender & no prisoners, & NO MEDIA.   Just eradicate these poor excuses for humans.   

Cheers


----------



## Roy Harding

CH1 said:
			
		

> Well for my 2 cents,  These thugs are nothing but a bunch of COWARDS, no matter what their bible says.  Any low life that deliberately targets civvies, women, & children deserve no better than what they give.  If these useless bags of skin, want respect than fight the military face to face!
> 
> As far as I'm concerned, it is the time to take the war & dump it not on their door steps, but right in their laps, up front & personal!  They say eye for eye, then fine, let's start the same type of tactics.  Maybe then after a good taste of their own bitter medicine, will they slither back to the bottom of the cess pool they crawled out of!
> 
> And if ppl think I'm PO'd, they are right.  I for 1 am ready to go after these slugs in their ball park but on my terms.  No surrender & no prisoners, & NO MEDIA.  Just eradicate these poor excuses for humans.
> 
> Cheers



I agree with the sentiment, BUT:

Where are "their door steps"?  Let alone "their laps"??  For that matter, where's "their ball park"??

How do you take the fight to them when you don't know where they are?

Kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out?

That might work, but who are the "all" that we're going to kill?

I understand your frustration - I've lived it, and I understand that your posting was an expression of that frustration, but "mount up" and "charge" don't work if you don't know who/what/where you're charging at/to.

I don't know what the answer is - I wish I did - but with all due respect I think your suggestion is an example of what the answer isn't.

We (the West) need to stop REacting, think this thing through, find out WHO these people are, WHERE they are located, and THEN begin acting.  So far, we haven't done a very good job of this - we've made a lot of noise, blown up a lot of stuff and people, and spread these idiots (and their philosophy) to the four winds.

Just my .02.


----------



## CH1

Well Retired CC, I agree.   The preface to any action is intel.   So what's the hold up?   Every body has their heads stuck up their wazoos.   It's time to L&L.   Enough of the niceties, & other crap.   If we are to win the day, it's time to quit pussy footin & get into the game.   The only way to put out this fire is to use fire.   And nobody get me wrong, all muslims are not what these wackos are.   Most are like the rest of us, being drug into the quagmire kicking & screaming!

The issue at hand is how much more "collateral damage" (I hate those words), are we going to tolerate on either side. 

But the fact is if we want to avoid this escalating into all out full fledged war, we have to step up the black side of things. Get the intel networks going in high gear & hit Osama with a few good blows below the belt, & I'll bet he & his bottom feeding slime   will wither up & Die.

As a side note, Retired CC, I think we know each other, & come from basically the same plane of thought.   Think we may have even discussed this, once or twice back in Calgary & Edmtn.

Cheers & beers.


----------



## McG

Infanteer,
I'll give some parting thoughts on terminology, not to change any opinions, but so that we all understand eachother while reading through these posts.   I don't think your linking of the word â Å“terrorismâ ? with a â Å“law enforcing approachâ ? develops a clear picture.   I also do not think that it is appropriate to refer to this as an insurgency.   We are at war.   There are insurgency battles in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Philippines, etc.   However, the battles with terrorism are omnipresent.   Our enemy is a mix of soldiers, terrorists, guerrillas, and their leaders.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Well, perhaps we shouldn't be wasting our time with reconstruction - what good do soldiers do when they are building schools and wells in Afghanistan while we are getting attacked in our own streets?


Soldiers should not be rebuilding schools.   Civilian government agencies and NGOs should be doing that.   Soldiers should be ensuring the security and stability for this to happen.   Further, â Å“reconstructionâ ? must go beyond physical infrastructure.   It must include rebuilding the government institutions to run the country.   It must include training police, military, medical, government, and other essential pers.   It must include DDR.   It must include re-activating the country's economy.   None of this is a military task (and so it should not be given to the military).   However, without reconstruction the country will slip back into the state it was at prior to military action and our soldiers will have to re-fight the battle.  Worse, without reconstruction the country can degenerate while we are still there and prolong the need to keep our troops on the ground.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Ok, but I still think that Iraq and Afghanistan are the two completely worst places to start "nation building".


If we do not make the effort toward reconstruction, the terrorist ideologist will find it much easier to recruit disillusioned citizens to support the insurgency battles or join in terrorist attacks abroad.


----------



## Shec

I think we all agree that like him or not you have to respect the rank if not the man.  And today our Prime Minister told it like it is: 



> Our collective freedom has come under assault today by those who would use violence and murder to force extremism upon the world. We must and we will stand against these terrorists. And we will do so together. And we will prevail.


  

The way I figure it, by attacking when our leaders were together at the G8 summit Al Queda may have made the same mistake that the Arabs made when they attacked while many Israeli reservists were in their Synagogues on Yom Kippur 1973 --  being altogether in one spot facilitated the  mobilization of a concerted and united response to a common threat.


----------



## KevinB

I'm not holding my breath and packing my kit...

 I've heard a lot of rhetoric from the PM before too.

I'm all for reconstruction - after I had crawled all over their hills and killed every last one of them...

 Personally I think we just found a great role for reservists - PRT security forces - while the regs play hunter killer.


----------



## Infanteer

Yargh, you moved my soapbox, McG.... 



			
				MCG said:
			
		

> Infanteer,
> I'll give some parting thoughts on terminology, not to change any opinions, but so that we all understand eachother while reading through these posts.



Ok, and I'll try and clarify my terminology a little better so it doesn't look like I'm pulling this stuff out of my hat.... 



> I don't think your linking of the word â Å“terrorismâ ? with a â Å“law enforcing approachâ ? develops a clear picture.



The problem I have with title of "terrorism", "terrorists" and "War on Terror" is that it automatically brings up the very loose definition of terrorism that I talked about above.   As well, terrorism has, due to its historical connotations that associate it with anarchists, 5th columinst communists, and state-sponsered groups like Abu Nidal, a legal implication.   We put wanted posters up of these men, convict them in absentia of crimes in our State, and say that the Rule of Law will deal with them.   This carries the connotation that it is a criminal act of murder or assault, rather than one of war (where combatants are legitimately inflicting casulties upon the enemy).   Terrorism implies individuals who act against civilians - what we are seeing (IMHO) is a movement; one of those who view themselves as soldiers and view the victims as legitimate targets of Jihad.   Putting them into a paradigm of terrorist criminals may handicap our efforts to defeat them by giving us an incomplete understanding of who the enemy is.   Sure, this may run contrary to our existing defintion of "war" and "soldiers", but we all know that the Geneva Convention, the Hague Conventions and the Laws of Land Warfare don't extend far beyond the borders of the signatories.   Let's not pound their square peg into our round hole.

All I've looked at regarding the current situation leads me to believe that there is nothing criminal about it; they've declared war, announced Jihad, and issued Fatwas.   We can denigrate them, label them fascists, and attempt to poke holes in their authority to do so, but, as subsequent events have shown, it should be as real as Germany crossing into Poland or Japan attacking Pearl Harbour.   Here it is, plain as light to see, from Osama bin Laden himself:



> _"So the case is easy, America will not be able to leave this ordeal unless it leaves the Arabian Peninsula, and stops its involvement in Palestine, and in all the Islamic World.   If we give this equation to any child in an American school, he will easily solve it within a second.   But, according to Bush's actions the equation won't be solved until the swords fall on their heads, with the permission of Allah....
> 
> We renew our pledge to Allah, our promise to the Ummah, and our threat to the Americans and Jews that they shall remain restless, shall not feel at ease, and shall not dream of security until they take their hands off our Ummah and stop their aggression against us and their support for our enemies.   And soon will the unjust assailants know what vicissitudes their affairs will take."_



This was said as the war in Afghanistan began - similar statements were stated before (see his Fatwa of 1996) and similar things have been said since then.

So, they have declared war upon us, and we have attempted to follow suit - thus, to me, we have left the confines of Civilian Law which is applied to terrorist acts against civilians.



> I also do not think that it is appropriate to refer to this as an insurgency.   We are at war.   There are insurgency battles in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Philippines, etc.   However, the battles with terrorism are omnipresent.   Our enemy is a mix of soldiers, terrorists, guerrillas, and their leaders.



Okay - I use the term "Insurgency" to desribe what we are at war with because it seems to work a hell of alot better than "Terrorism".   As I (hopefully) made clear before, I don't believe that all these groups, factions, and organizations that oppose us are monolithic.   They have their own beliefs, their own goals, and their own history.   Mixed into the conflict thoughout _dar al-Islam_ (I use this term as it effectively describes an area that transcends regional and continental tags) are tribal interests, Shia/Sunni battles, rabid fundamentalism, Chechens, Bosnians and Kashmiris with a bone to pick, Palestinians (with their own gig), and a whack of pissed off people who have Westerners marching through their backyard.   Some hate us for who we are (westerners), and some hate us for what we do (support regimes, etc) - but they all seem to hate us, and that is good enough.

They aren't united - infact, alot of them like to waste each other when they're not fighting us - and they aren't coordinated.   What ties them togeather is the seemingly common dislike for the West.   This is where Al Qaeda has come to the fore - for the first time since the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire, Islam has had a "Banner" to follow.   Not all follow it, nor agree with it - but many do; we can't wish away this phenomenon to the fringe of Islam.   This Al Qaeda banner has espoused the message that the West is undertaken a new crusade to subjugate or destory Islam.   There is credibility to this claim, given the current envionement:



> "There is a perception in the Muslim world - which bin Laden has fed - that the Christian West is always ready to use economic coercion and military force if proselytizing does not work, or does not work quickly.   The latter is an intense irritant in the Islamic world and is, as Professor Samuel Huntington noted, grounded in fact: from 1980 to 1995 "the United States engaged in seventeen military operations in the Middle East, all of them directed at Muslims.   No comparable pattern of U.S. military operations occurred against the people of any other civilization."   Tough economic sanctions have been simultaneously enforced by the West against several Muslim states.   As noted, bin Laden has been outspoken in condemning the Crusaders' eagerness to put sanctions on Sudan, Iraq, and Libya; to tolerate prolonged military aggression against Muslim Bosnians, Somalis, Kashmiris, and Kosovars; and to conspire to divide Muslim states such as Afghanistan, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia.   In voicing these views, bin Laden is more virulent than most Muslims, *but he is not the lone voice.*"
> 
> Anonymous, Through Our Enemies' Eyes; pg 244.



Thus, this is where the banner is planted.   It is an Insurgency of those who have heeded the call to the Banner to undertake Jihad.   Whatever their motivation and whatever tribal/ethnic/political/relgious group they come from, they find common cause to fight us.   It is an Insurgency within the Ummah, which they believe is the undivided House of Submission.   Again, not all have a common view of how things should be run within this house, but they sure do agree with the fact that the West shouldn't be in it - at all.   Because we are in it (see the Huntington reference above; Israel, Oil, Iraq, Afghanistan), the Insurgency has now spilled into our streets.   They are rising up to fight what they view are wrongs - Crusaders, Infidels, Zionists, and Apostates - and they will fight in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Bali, London, and New York to do so.   Again, denigrate or pick apart this assertion by the enemy, but it will do nothing to deter them from carrying out their actions.

Sure there are, as you mention, "terrorists" in the mix - after all, I'd venture that this Insurgency inherited groups like Hizballah - but terrorism is but one tactic, and is only a subset of what these people truely are, insurgents who want to drive the West and the Apostate regimes out of the Ummah.

Now, this is what I've derived from looking at a few sources; it is their view and it is what drives them.   It may not be based on a completely accurate interpretation of events, but the perception is important because it is what drives them to war.   We may agree or disagree that the general claims of the Insurgency are valid, but we must recognize that they are there.



> Soldiers should not be rebuilding schools.   Civilian government agencies and NGOs should be doing that.   Soldiers should be ensuring the security and stability for this to happen.



Okay - we don't build the schools, but we use our manpower in defending the guys who stack the bricks, so we are essentially part of the school-building team.   Shoudl we be part of this team?   I'm not sure, but I bring up the Peters' quote in my sigline _""Do not waste an inordinate amount of effort to win unwinnable hearts and minds.   Convince hostile populations through victory."_   Should we be worrying about winning the unwinnable (which, from the historical record, Afghanistan seems to be) or killing the enemy?

We weren't tieing down our soldiers with reconstruction tasks in the Moro River Valley or along the Rhine while Germany was still putting up the ability to resist us.   We waited until after we shattered them and then got on with the game (with most of the soldiers being sent back to their homes).   As Kevin points out, _"I'm all for reconstruction - after I had crawled all over their hills and killed every last one of them..."_



> Further, â Å“reconstructionâ ? must go beyond physical infrastructure.   It must include rebuilding the government institutions to run the country.   It must include training police, military, medical, government, and other essential pers.   It must include DDR.   It must include re-activating the country's economy.   None of this is a military task (and so it should not be given to the military).   However, without reconstruction the country will slip back into the state it was at prior to military action and our soldiers will have to re-fight the battle.   Worse, without reconstruction the country can degenerate while we are still there and prolong the need to keep our troops on the ground.



Ok - I understand that.   But is this neccesarily productive?   Is "rebuilding the government institutions" really effective when it means putting Hamid Karzai in charge despite the fact that he never fought and is guarded by American bodyguards?   The Afghans fought the Soviets for 13 years, labelling them "atheists" and "invaders" and sending them back to Moscow with their tails between their legs.   Now, a different Western army has invaded Afghanistan and we have replaced Karmal with Karzai.   Irregardless of our motives, we most likely appear to be the same to them; foreigners, and infidel ones at that.   If it was Canada, I wouldn't care if the troops in my backyard were French or Chinese; I'd be pissed.

History seems to point to the fact that you can't keep the Pashtuns down and out, you can't institute a strong government in Kabul (unless it is ruthless like the Iron Amir), you can't play them for fools (they see Karzai just as they saw the Soviets man), that they will distrust strangers who march into their land, and that they will keep on fighting, whether it be Alexander, Persia, India, Britain, the Soviets, us, our themselves.

Anyways, I could be wrong - but history has a tendency to bite us in the ass when we think we make progress.



> If we do not make the effort toward reconstruction, the terrorist ideologist will find it much easier to recruit disillusioned citizens to support the insurgency battles or join in terrorist attacks abroad.



Here is where I do have a problem - you point to a "terrorist ideology"; but if what I advocated above (Islamic Insurgency based upon Jihad against trasgression of _dar al-Islam_ by infidels and apostates) has any foundation, then the "terrorist ideology" doesn't exist.   I'm not sure we are being attacked because they are poor.   The Afghans lived in a slagheap before, and they were our Allies because they were killing atheist Soviets.

Now I'm trying to figure out what has really changed there to all the sudden turn them from "hardy Mujihadeen" into "terrorist Islamofascists who are bred on hate."   Is there a point in the last 10 years that Afghanistan, due to being war-ravaged, suddenly became susceptable to "terrorist ideology" (which I would like someone to define, since I think you could find people who could lump Nazism, Envioronmentalism, and the Manifest Destiny as such).   Perhaps they haven't fallen to this ill - perhaps they are fighting us because the Soviets left and then we came in.

As for Iraq, Britney Spears made it quite clear on another thread that "reconstructing" Iraq has meant that American and Coalition soldiers are lying in a cockpit that is increasingly radicalizing - Iraq was articface and was due for a civil war; I don't know how reconstrution is going to help anything there, except for driving many to the Insurgency because they abhor the fact that Western soldiers stalk the streets of Najaf, Fallujah, and Baghdad (Iraq is probably the second holiest place in Islam, so perhaps that is a given).

Oh well, just playing some thoughts out.   They may be incorrect, off the mark, or just plain wrong, but I think the questions that raise these points are very valid and worth looking at.   Falling back on the simple rhetoric that seems to fly around (not blaming anyone here) leaves us open to underestimation of the enemy and bad strategy.

Cheers,
Infanteer


----------



## a_majoor

I am coming to the conclusion that there is a fairly sophisticated American Strategy for the prosecution of GWOT, and it is based around the precepts of "4th Generation Warfare". This sort of activity works at a different speed from warfare as we know it, so we haven't made the connections yet, nor seen the results.

I know Infanteer isn't a big fan of what is known as Regime change, and doing regime change at the point of a bayonet isn't a practical proposition in the long run, but what is driving our opponents can be summed up as "dysfunctional societies". The rulers of these societies are attempting to deflect the population's anger against poverty and lack of opportunity and hope against the "Jews" and the "Crusaders"; which isn't too difficult given the great and obvious disparity between their standards of living and our own. Since most people lack a basic understanding of economics, it is also easy to suggest the real reason for poverty and dispair is that the "Jews" and "Crusaders" are stealing from the Middle East. It wasn't too long ago that the same paradigm was used to suggest the reason for the decline in the standards of living in Africa, and indeed there are enough voters in Canada who believe in zero sum economics to elect 19 NDP members of parliament.

Changing these societies so they no longer threaten us can be done by a "March to the Sea", humiliating and discrediting the current rulers and ideologies, but this requires a vast application of military power and political will. It also leaves room for doubt that the new regimes are really "legitimate". What I see happening is the use of Iraq as a lever to encourage and support events like the "Cedar Revolution" all across the Middle East. With tyranny overthrown through a sort of self help project, the Americans can go in and stabilize the popular and legitimate new regimes through trade and economic development, rather than by establishing a military Proconsul.

This story shows cracks appearing in the Ba'athist regime of Syria proper, which was already humiliated by being forced out of Lebanon.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/02/international/middleeast/02kurds.html?ei=5090&en=36d147f2d8c96d10&ex=1277956800&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=print
Similar demonstrations happen all the time in Iran, and it is hard to imagine that pressure is not building within Saudi Arabia as well. Should these movements overthrow the current regimes, Jihadis will be cut off from state funding and popular support will wane as people unleash their energies towards improving their own lives.

American military power is close at hand in Iraq to encourage the freedom movements, deter the existing regimes and provide a direct means of intervening should all else fail. The failure of alternatives like the EU's diplomacy efforts in Iran can be contrasted to American success, further weakening competition against American diplomacy and economic efforts in the region. This is a brilliant economy of force operation at the grand strategic level if it works as planned.


----------



## TCBF

Infanteer, your above post made more sense than all of the tripe in the papers these day.  

Fourth Generation Warfare - Can you lose a war without never having known - or admitted - that you were actually AT war?

Yup.

And it's not like the other side hasn't been telling us, either.  The lies are ours, and we've been telling them to ourselves.  

Tom


----------



## McG

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Neither were the people of Hamburg, Dresden, or Hiroshima.  Jihad is total war, and Total War is a bitch.  Until we figure out that we are in a total war with these folks, we can go on pretending we are chasing Thelma and Louise through the Hindu-Kush mountains.





			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> we had won the war by destroying every inch of ability and will to resist on the part of the German and Japanese people.  This is the course I believe may be necessary in winning this war.  We can worry about the pieces, like we did with Germany and Japan, after we have won.





			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> The war is total because it is global in nature and we are all legitimate targets.  Just as we will reach into Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen or Chechnya to hit the enemy, they will also reach into Madrid, London, and New York to hit us.


I agree that the enemy has taken a total war approach to this conflict.  However, are you arguing we should employ the tactics of total war and the "do the whole village" mentality that comes with it?

Russia has been fighting the same war in Chenchnya, but using a posture much closer to total war than ours.  They have not been blessed with any greater success.  



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> We weren't tieing down our soldiers with reconstruction tasks in the Moro River Valley or along the Rhine while Germany was still putting up the ability to resist us.


After the Nazi war machine was destroyed, the allies began reconstruction concurrent with fighting insurgency battles against the groups that were not prepared to give up.  We are at that point in Iraq and Afghanistan where the enemy's conventional military ability has been crushed and the population wants to get back to living.  Now is the time to begin reconstructing their ability to run their own country.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Is "rebuilding the government institutions" really effective when it means putting Hamid Karzai in charge despite the fact that he never fought and is guarded by American bodyguards?  The Afghans fought the Soviets for 13 years, labelling them "atheists" and "invaders" and sending them back to Moscow with their tails between their legs.  Now, a different Western army has invaded Afghanistan and we have replaced Karmal with Karzai.


This is why we are including elections in the reconstruction process.  The citizens of Afghanistan (and of Iraq) will be able to look at their leaders and know that they selected them.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> we most likely appear to be the same to them; foreigners


We must be seen as different from previous occupiers by making our intentions to leave clearly known.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Now I'm trying to figure out what has really changed there to all the sudden turn them from "hardy Mujihadeen" into "terrorist Islamofascists who are bred on hate."


In Afghanistan, I tend to think that most are insurgents fighting that battle.  However, those that are terrorists likely were terrorists even when fighting our enemy (Soviet Russia).

More to follow . . .


----------



## Dare

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Doesn't answer my question - are you saying this is unrelated to anything happening in the rest of the world right now, because my terminology was aimed at that implying the opposite.


Alright. I'll explain this to you again. The people who commited the London attacks are terrorists. They are not insurgents. There are insurgents in Afghanistan and Iraq. You want to meld all definitions into one. Which doesnt surprise me given what I saw Scheuer say on CBC today. His owl-eyed theories just do not hold water. His suggestion is that we completely disengage from the middle east and let Israel hang out to dry. Then we should stop buying middle east oil and let the innocent civilians suffer even more (given their entire economies run on oil money and it's certain the leaders wouldn't feel hurt by it any). Then we can work out a *cease-fire* with the Ummah. Won't that be great! Then we'll have peace. 

What utter nonsense. Yes, let's let the tyrants take over their own areas, mop up Israel, let millions of people continue to live under oppressive governments, then they will be all squared up with us. Only fitting he was questioned after George Galloway. Retreat and fortify is a losers strategy in this age. 


> Ok, a bit dramatic - but I wouldn't say it is _Green Acres_ either.
> 
> The war is total because it is global in nature and we are all legitimate targets.  Just as we will reach into Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen or Chechnya to hit the enemy, they will also reach into Madrid, London, and New York to hit us.


That's not the definition of Total War. There were wars all over the world in the Cold War as well, but it wasn't Total War either. Why do you insist on changing definitions?


> One thing is for certain, this isn't a "Cabinet War".
> 
> It appears to me that attacks around the world have been escalating since the early 1990's.  If there is progress (aside from a few tactical successes every now and then), please point it out.


If you measure progress by numbers of attacks, then you've really got to readjust your metrics. Progress should be measured in the amount of freedom loving people who are gaining power in the former bastians of intolerance and tyranny. Measure the exposure of people who are truely against us. Measure the growing awareness to the danger these people pose for everyone. Just because Terrorists finally hit off a plan (not surprising given how many radicals are in and around London) does not mean "Oh Gosh! We failed! Let's pack it up, boys!"  It means we're succeeding. Out of the millions of Muslims in the UK and after several decades, they can still only manage to recruit enough people for one attack such as this. Obviously disproving the idea that if you're Muslim you have to be anti-American or you have to not support the War against Terrorism. There are many Muslims who are fighting these nuts, and now we're in their backyard teaching them how to do it effectively.


> As I said above, the fact that the Japanese broke it down on their own with Meiji for 70 odd years combined with the fact that you have ethnic homogenity makes it far more workable there than it does in places we are today.


The idea that the Japanese converted themselves to democracy on their own is nonsense, I'm afraid. I'm sorry. It's just nonsense. Without the threat of American force, Japan would never surrendered, and without continued pressure and occupation, Japan would not be the democracy it is today. All you have to do is watch (even current day) Japanese politics. 


> And your positive about this - so most people screaming "Down With America" are really protesting short skirts and Playstations?


I did not distort your arguement. Please do not distort mine. 90% of these people screaming Down With America are doing so because they know that the US is the major driver behind the removal of tyranny. They know that their theocratic tyranny can not survive in a democratic environment. They are not as simple minded as you and Scheuer seem to think. They understand the broader implications of democracy. It will bring tolerance to minorities and give them say, which ultimately will undo much of what these radicals can dish out. Yes, they want their theocratic tyranny to conquer the globe, but one thing at a time. First they have to feign as the innocent victim and weaken their attackers so they can build an even larger power base.


> I remember writing a paper on terrorism, and the first problem I had was the defintion.
> 
> Taken from dictionary.com
> 
> _ter ·ror ·ism
> n.
> The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons._
> 
> Pretty loose if I say so myself.  Heck, half the people around these forums apply this to the US invasion of Iraq.  Certainly, Canada's invasion of Kosovo could be written up as terrorism, since we bombed Belgrade into submission first.  As I said earlier, the State organs of the USSR would be terrorists (should we throw all the old KGB apparachiks in Gitmo as well?).  How about guerilla's? Terrorists or freedom fighters?  Israel's own creation is surrounded by the actions of violent zionist groups.  As well, I'm sure the Natives of North America would easily point out that the British, American, and Canadian governments have committed acts of terrorism against their societies in the past.


There was never (with the exception of the USSR (which we took rather seriously, as I'm sure you know)) any threat of a single terrorist blowing up an entire city in previous times.
And thus, the War on Terrorism is created. Which is that, we must defeat groups that expouse this idea before they do it, for obvious reasons. So you might not like the idea that we are going to war against terrorism or that we have chosen that term, but we have, are and will continue to do so in the future.


> That's about as open-ended as it gets.
> 
> I'm sticking to my guns with the term "Islamic Insurgency".  It defines who the enemy is, what he wants, and where we can aim to defeat him.  Much of what I understand leads me to draw real links between dusty tribesmen fighting in the Suleman range of Afghanistan, the Iraqi in the streets of Fallujah, the stubborn hillman in Chechnya, and the attackers of 9/11, Bali, Madrid and now London.  These aren't isolated incidents, they aren't the work of madmen or criminals, and they aren't purely based upon random acts of violence.


Obviously they are not isolated. That does not mean you can paint them all with the same inaccurate label. It may be more simple to do so, but your (Scheuer's) label is not accurate.


> The wedding remark is to show how fighting in people's backyards can bring them into the conflict, whether we wanted them there or not.  Next time your wedding gets leveled, come back and tell me how you feel.


Will do. A Jewish friend of mine had her taoist friend leveled yesterday. Interestingly enough, she does not want to kill random Arabs/Muslims/People. Imagine that.


> Hmm, two for rules for non-believers living in Islamic countries and one for hiding ones motives.  And this has what to do with the question at hand?


Ah, so when you bring in the broader view it's required for understanding, but apparently my broadening does not matter? I assure you, *it matters*. Expecially as we are bringing Shar'ia into Canada. It matters a *whole lot*. It matters that there is no religious compulsion to Tell the Truth about their purpose. Hamas representatives can boldly deride Israel for any perceived notch in the Road map to Peace while at the same time they have no intention of Peace at all. Only cease-fires (at best). Which is another reason why Scheuer is completely wrong. The war is on, and has been on for some time. Not because we want it to be, but because there are only cease-fires.


----------



## Dare

From a man who better understands the enemy.


> DOBBS: Ariel Sharon, the prime minister, has asked all of the cabinet to say very little. He may have said it even somewhat more strongly for fear of offending Londoners, the British.
> 
> But the fact is, you have been straightforward, in the days you and I talked after 9/11. You have been straightforward now in talking about the common bond as victims of terrorism. What do you think should be the response now?
> 
> NETANYAHU: Well, I don't think we have to give any advice to the British government, because prime minister Blair and his government, my colleague Gordon Brown, they know what to do and are handling the situation well.
> 
> I think the larger issue is the challenge we all face. I don't mean just Britain; the United States; Spain before this in the Madrid bombings; Israel, obviously; Russia. We have all been in the gun- sights of Islamic terrorism.
> 
> And, if fact, we have to understand that this is not a partial attack on America's allies in Iraq. After all, America was attacked before Iraq. In fact, America went to Iraq after it was attacked on September 11th. The problem we face is a worldwide radical movement, a splinter movement that distorts many of the messages of Islam and seeks to roll back the clock of history 1,000 years. It's mad. It's a fantasy ideology. But nonetheless it has a method.
> 
> The method is the application of terror to inspire fear among its victims, who are the West. The West they want to destroy, hobble, eventually get rid of our way of life, our free, liberal way of life. And the most important thing is to refuse...
> 
> (CROSSTALK)
> 
> DOBBS: You know, in the aftermath of 9/11 and the aftermath of what the British and we all now will call 7/7, a lot of talk about bringing people to justice, a lot of talk about carrying out life as if it were normal. It also causes one -- in the pain we all suffer when innocents are attacks in this cowardly, barbaric way -- to say: Let's go kill these people who would do us such harm and destroy our way of life.
> 
> The fact of the matter is the world is not having immense success in dealing with this radical, Islamist terror. And there has to be a prescription, an approach that bright, intelligent leaders around the world can come up with to deal with this issue, this movement, splinter or otherwise.
> 
> *NETANYAHU: Well, I agree. And I think there are three things you have to do.
> 
> The first is to refuse to surrender to fear and to muster the courage and the resolve to fight back. That's absolutely necessary.
> 
> The second thing is to understand that it's not what we do, but what we are that causes offense to these mad radicals: the fact that we breathe in our free society; the fact that women have rights; the fact that children can flip on a TV channel. That is something anathema to people who want to roll us back 1,000 years.
> 
> Understand: We are not guilty; they are guilty.
> 
> The third is to reverse the odds. It is not we who should cower in fear; it is they who should run for their lives. They means the organizations, the terror organizations, and also the regimes that give them sustenance. There are regimes left who are doing it, both actively supporting them and also ideologically and financially supporting them -- sometimes directly; sometimes passively. I think you have to circumscribe the locus of action.
> 
> Here is the reason why you have to do these three things -- if you don't do it, then what I have been saying to you and so many years before to you and to others, I have been saying now for over two decades for close to a quarter of a century -- the danger of international terrorism is you will have terrorists acquiring the weapons of mass destruction.
> 
> And when they do, these particular terrorists, especially radical Islamic terrorists, will use them. Bin Laden would have used them. And the studio that you are talking in, the city you are talking from would not exist. We have to stop them before they destroy us. The war is still on.*
> 
> DOBBS: Obviously and hopefully, that war will turn decisively soon.
> 
> Thank you very much, Benjamin Netanyahu.


http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0507/08/ldt.01.html


----------



## Infanteer

Dare said:
			
		

> Alright. I'll explain this to you again. The people who commited the London attacks are terrorists. They are not insurgents. There are insurgents in Afghanistan and Iraq. You want to meld all definitions into one. Which doesnt surprise me given what I saw Scheuer say on CBC today. His owl-eyed theories just do not hold water. His suggestion is that we completely disengage from the middle east and let Israel hang out to dry. Then we should stop buying middle east oil and let the innocent civilians suffer even more (given their entire economies run on oil money and it's certain the leaders wouldn't feel hurt by it any). Then we can work out a *cease-fire* with the Ummah. Won't that be great! Then we'll have peace.
> 
> What utter nonsense. Yes, let's let the tyrants take over their own areas, mop up Israel, let millions of people continue to live under oppressive governments, then they will be all squared up with us. Only fitting he was questioned after George Galloway. Retreat and fortify is a losers strategy in this age.



I never said I advocated his strategies.   Mr Scheuer's explanation of the cause seems quite compelling to me, as well as his description of the conflict, but his solution does not strike me as the best COA.   He swings fully into the "What We Do" camp, where Western policies are the only _causus belli_.   This is something I don't believe to be true - they certainly are a key to contributing to the reason for conflict, but they aren't the only reason.   Sure many hate us for what we do, many hate us for being Westerners, and many don't know much at all about the West except for the fact that we are on their turf.

As I said in a previous debate, Who we are is what we do.   We support Israel because it is a democratic state surrounded by people that hate them.   We pay attention to the oil because we have a capitalist economy that is fueled by petroleum.   We can't back out on these, so we must pound acceptance into the enemy.



> That's not the definition of Total War. There were wars all over the world in the Cold War as well, but it wasn't Total War either. Why do you insist on changing definitions?



I think it is pretty damn close to one - lets see; we have attacks around the globe aimed at our military, economic, and political infrastructure (of which 9/11 was but a single incident), we have the militaries of Western nations constantly deployed forward (to the point where the United States is straining), Reserves are being called up, we have the scope of our civil landscape being changed by legislation triggered by the War (things like the Patriot Act in the US), we have Jordanians, Egyptians, Libyans, Somalis, Chechens, Afghans, and Indonesians fighting us at various parts of the globe, and the Airlines won't let me have nailclippers or a plastic butter knife on board the aircraft.   It is one that seems to fit into Huntington's *Clash* paradigm, where the triggers are civilizational in nature.

Considering that the lives of every person in the West is somehow affected in many different ways by this war, I don't see this as anything but Total in nature.



> If you measure progress by numbers of attacks, then you've really got to readjust your metrics. Progress should be measured in the amount of freedom loving people who are gaining power in the former bastians of intolerance and tyranny. Measure the exposure of people who are truely against us. Measure the growing awareness to the danger these people pose for everyone.



Readjust the metrics?   WTF is that?

Give me some sort of tangible sign of "freedom loving people" who are removing the "bastions of intolerance and tyranny" - hundreds of Iraqi offing each other every day doesn't seem to play that out.   Show me metric that there is a sign of dwindling opposition against us - because casualty lists don't seem to be bearing that notion out.   These fluffy notions do no good in telling us if we are succeeding, because we see just as much violence and conflict (if not more) as we did in the last decade.

Wilsonian rhetoric isn't making your argument very palatable when you consider the fact that we are still being attacked in the hearts of our cities.



> The idea that the Japanese converted themselves to democracy on their own is nonsense, I'm afraid. I'm sorry. It's just nonsense. Without the threat of American force, Japan would never surrendered, and without continued pressure and occupation, Japan would not be the democracy it is today. All you have to do is watch (even current day) Japanese politics.



I didn't see PRT teams and occupation forces arrive with Perry's ships.   Sure, the fingers were in the pie (a la Tom Cruise and The Last Samurai    8)), but this was done with a willing Japanese regime that was backed by the Emperor.   The military hijacked the state in the time leading up to WWII, but that tradition of Japanese democracy was there, and it was something that we could exploit after we pounded them to dust (which MacArthur did).  This isn't something I see in either Afghanistan or Iraq - willing players (especially elites) who are happy to take Western help to build a democratic order.

As well, Japan was ethnically homogeneous, which made things easier by order of magnitude.  It is hard to get people to work towards the notion of a national government when their loyalty is to their faith/tribe/family/faction and when they are busy fighting you in the streets everyday.  




> I did not distort your arguement. Please do not distort mine. 90% of these people screaming Down With America are doing so because they know that the US is the major driver behind the removal of tyranny. They know that their theocratic tyranny can not survive in a democratic environment. They are not as simple minded as you and Scheuer seem to think. They understand the broader implications of democracy. It will bring tolerance to minorities and give them say, which ultimately will undo much of what these radicals can dish out. Yes, they want their theocratic tyranny to conquer the globe, but one thing at a time. First they have to feign as the innocent victim and weaken their attackers so they can build an even larger power base.



90% protest America, cheer in the streets of the Middle East after the 9/11 attacks, wear Osama bin Laden shirts, listen to his tapes, and burn US Flags because they are opposed to anything that will drive away tyranny?

You accuse me of deeming them simple-minded, and then you paint a good portion of the Middle East as promoters of tyranny that are only need us in the West to show them how to be "freedom loving people who are gaining power in the former bastians of intolerance and tyranny".

I'm not even going to bother commenting on that one.




> There was never (with the exception of the USSR (which we took rather seriously, as I'm sure you know)) any threat of a single terrorist blowing up an entire city in previous times.
> And thus, the War on Terrorism is created. Which is that, we must defeat groups that expouse this idea before they do it, for obvious reasons. So you might not like the idea that we are going to war against terrorism or that we have chosen that term, but we have, are and will continue to do so in the future.



Ok, I'm going to play "Step out of my Western Armchair" for a minute and put myself into the moccasins of some Cherokee in the 19th century.   I've just been deliberately given blankets from a smallpox ward as aid from the US Government - my village gets sick and most die off.   That would be pretty close to the same impact you described above, as the actions of a few destroy my entire society.   Maybe the "War on Terrorism" was being fought by the Sioux at Little Bighorn?

Terrorism is a tactic.   You are right, the lethality of modern weapons means that individuals can condense the magnitude of destructiveness into a smaller piece of time and space, but the ideas behind the attacks are nothing new.   It does not define the enemy we fight or his reasons for fighting, just as it didn't on the American West, in Tzarist Russia in the 1880's, or in Germany in 1945 (I'm sure the Jews can view _Kristallnacht_ as a terrorist act).

If (or when) a WMD goes off in one of our cities, it will be no different than Tamerlane building pyramids of skulls at the outskirts of Baghdad.   It is not some "new war" that sprung out of the lethality of modern weapons.



> Obviously they are not isolated. That does not mean you can paint them all with the same inaccurate label. It may be more simple to do so, but your (Scheuer's) label is not accurate.



Ok, so you do agree that they are not isolated.   Then how does the "War on Terror" serve as the accurate label.   How does the "War on Terror" link the London Bombers, Chechens bombing Moscow and attacking Russian soldiers in Ossetia, insurgents fighting Americans in Fallujah, Libyans (who swore themselves to Osama bin Laden) marauding against the regime in Libya, Saudis attacking oil workers, Pashtun tribesman launching rockets into Kabul, and Indonesians blowing up a nightclub in Bali?   I latched onto "Islamic Insurgency" as it seems to encompass all these disparate interests which are directed outward at those the "Banner" has pointed to as the enemy.

Of course, you could just call them all terrorists and pop in Team America: World Police - but does that do any justice to why they fight us?



> Will do. A Jewish friend of mine had her taoist friend leveled yesterday. Interestingly enough, she does not want to kill random Arabs/Muslims/People. Imagine that.



Ok, now repeat for 20 years, and we'll see how that works out.   You don't even need to do that - look at the reaction of many in the West on chat rooms following attacks on our city: "Get some", "Fallujah delenda est", "Make them Pay".

We are all human, and all prone to the same reactions - the power of human emotions, hiding deep in the lower brain, are much stronger than the rational part - the tendency to lash out when the perception of threat is a strong one, and I feel that is what many Muslims are doing when they attack us.

Is it that, or are they all terrorists who are fighting against the spread of liberty and peace?



> Ah, so when you bring in the broader view it's required for understanding, but apparently my broadening does not matter? I assure you, *it matters*. Expecially as we are bringing Shar'ia into Canada. It matters a *whole lot*. It matters that there is no religious compulsion to Tell the Truth about their purpose. Hamas representatives can boldly deride Israel for any perceived notch in the Road map to Peace while at the same time they have no intention of Peace at all. Only cease-fires (at best). Which is another reason why Scheuer is completely wrong. The war is on, and has been on for some time. Not because we want it to be, but because there are only cease-fires.



Ok - because they don't live like us and they are attacking us, this makes them liars?   Everything they say is a clever ruse?

You're going to have to prove to me that all the enemies are big liars and not one of them says what they mean.   I put that quote up from Osama bin-Laden earlier, which seems to be quite coherent and straight forward, but I guess I should throw that in the garbage because it is the work of a cabal who rely on a convention of their Faith to be pathological liars.


----------



## Infanteer

MCG said:
			
		

> I agree that the enemy has taken a total war approach to this conflict.   However, are you arguing we should employ the tactics of total war and the "do the whole village" mentality that comes with it?
> 
> Russia has been fighting the same war in Chenchnya, but using a posture much closer to total war than ours.   They have not been blessed with any greater success.



Not neccesarily - if a good portion of these people are fighting us because they do believe us to be marauding Crusaders bent on destroying Islam (or simply invaders period), then the effort should be aimed at convincing them we're not.   I'm sure that there is an equal amount of carrot and stick involved, but I'm not sure planting our flag, propping up interim governments, and saying "here is democracy!" is the best carrot (or stick?).

Russia takes the wrong approach with the "wipe them off the face of the Earth" approach.   It only breeds more resistence.   However, history has shown that Carthaginian Peace works at time, if applied properly.   Look at all the Great Captains in history, they are their because they were victorious by ruthlessly destroying the enemies will to resist.   We must figure out how to send Sherman in to finish off the enemy.   The solution is a tough one, one that demands a clear and resolute approach - hopefully we will find the answer, properly defining the conflict is the first step (IMHO).



> After the Nazi war machine was destroyed, the allies began reconstruction concurrent with fighting insurgency battles against the groups that were not prepared to give up.   We are at that point in Iraq and Afghanistan where the enemy's conventional military ability has been crushed and the population wants to get back to living.   Now is the time to begin reconstructing their ability to run their own country.



We fought insurgents in Germany?   I thought we were busy squaring off with the Soviets by then.

Is destroying conventional military ability the end of the war and the beginning of reconstruction?   The Insurgency (I'm still going to call it that) isn't based upon a conventional Western foe.

Look at Afghanistan - the Soviets dispersed the Afghans in days, driving there tanks in and saying "Zdravstvuite, Comrades!"   13 years later, the Afghans were still fighting and any hope for a Soviet backed Communist government fell.   Does our current situation not seem to be a replay of this?

Look at Iraq - we say "the War is Over!", smash the Republican Guard, and put Saddam in jail.   But Saddam was a bit player in the Insurgency anyways.   Since then, we've had more battles, more casulties (civilian and military) and more conflict then we did in the conventional war.

If this is "reconstruction" phase, then I'd hate to see "Insurection" or "Unrest".



> This is why we are including elections in the reconstruction process.   The citizens of Afghanistan (and of Iraq) will be able to look at their leaders and know that they selected them.



As I said earlier, we have elections because 8 centuries of political evolution made them acceptable to us.   The people of Iraq were a complex civlization while our ancestors were still living in thatch and worshipping trees - in 6,000 years, we see their first liberal democratic election now and expect that they will take it at face value?   We see elected leaders, and then we see them getting offed in the streets of Iraq on a daily basis.

The fact that we pulled off elections is feat enough, but I am doubting the long-run impact that they will have.   As I said earlier, history has the tendency to bite us in the ass when we thing we are making progress.



> We must be seen as different from previous occupiers by making our intentions to leave clearly known.



Well, I'm sure our intentions are clearly known, and I believe that they are well-meaning, but it doesn't change the fact that they are foreign.   I've never been invaded and occupied, so I don't know the feeling, but I'm sure I'd be pissed.  I think it is hard to discern between a helping hand and a jackboot when it comes from a soldier who is there to fight.  I'm pretty sure that, to many, they aren't differentiating between "good occupiers" and "bad occupiers".



> In Afghanistan, I tend to think that most are insurgents fighting that battle.   However, those that are terrorists likely were terrorists even when fighting our enemy (Soviet Russia).



I'm not sure I follow this one.   What distinguishes and Afghan insurgent fighting the Soviets and and Afghan terrorist fighting the Soviets?



> More to follow . . .



Standing by.     :warstory:


----------



## paracowboy

> We fought insurgents in Germany?  I thought we were busy squaring off with the Soviets by then.


yup. Insurgency continued in Germany for 5 years, 10 in Japan.


----------



## Infanteer

paracowboy said:
			
		

> yup. Insurgency continued in Germany for 5 years, 10 in Japan.



Really, can I get a source?   I ask because I have never ran into this myself.   Are we talking about bands of Werewolves trying to drive the Allies out of occupied Germany, or just rounding up some SS guys hiding out somewhere.

I've never heard of a military effort to destroy an insurgency in Japan or Germany in the 5-10 years following WWII - I've heard of supporting Greece, the Marshall Plan, the Berlin Blockade, the Korean War and the onset of the Cold War in general, but never anything of fighting against throwbacks from WWII who were pissed at occupation.

PS: I googled "German Insurgency and found this (although it is just some blogspot:



> On the German "insurgency," there really wasn't much of one--or at least one comparable to the insurgency in Iraq. A 2003 study by the Rand Corporation reports: "U.S. officials anticipated and planned to deal with significant residual German resistance following the surrender of its armed forces. Yet no resistance of consequence emerged then or at any time thereafter." There have been more than 1,300 Americans killed in Iraq after 5/1/03. How many Americans did the German resitance kill after 5/45? I'm not aware of any, but I'm not an expert on the matter. Perhaps some enterprising or expert reader can come up with an answer.



I couldn't find anything at all on a Postwar Japanese insurgency.


----------



## paracowboy

> Really, can I get a source?


 oh, man! Most of my books are buried in the basement and packed. It's gonna be a while for me to dig them out, and it's gonna tick off Niner. I'll get back to you. 

Now, don't go thinking either insurgency compares to what the Coalition Forces are dealing with in Iraq, right now. It was fairly low key. Mostly fanatics here and there, Werewolves & die-hard SS in Germany, over-the-top Kamikaze types in the land of the rising sun. Anyway, I'll go poke around and get some references.


----------



## paracowboy

ok, I quit! I'm going cross-eyed, there are books everywhere, and Niner is seriously annoyed. I can't find the references I wanted. Ignore my post, as I can't find anything more concrete than you could dig up on a few quick google searches. As compensation, I will buy the first round if you get out to Edmonton, and I hereby officially announce my Dumbass status.


----------



## CH1

For all the good intentions & posts, the fact still remains, that we are engaged in war.   The symantics are simply in the names & methodology.   Osama & his cronies have figured out that they can hit when & where they want.   They are bringing the war from their front yard to ours, piece by piece.   The problem we have, is simply we are playing by a rule book that is different than theirs.   We (the West), are not ready or willing to pour the resources into finding a small group(s) & fighting the same way they do.

We are still locked into the idea of skirmish lines.   The Americans were tossed out of Vietnam because of this "old doctrine" vs Guerilla warfare.   The Russians had their Vietnam in Afghanistan.

I use "old doctrine & skirmish lines" in a very loose sense.

This is Guerilla warfare. It is the chosen doctrine of the enemy, on how they prosecute this war.   We have set the "skirmish lines" in Iraq & A'stan. We have to put more resources into finding   the loose threads that lead to the snake's head.   Not an easy task at best.

I feel for all the innocents that have been caught up in this mess, on both sides.   They are the ones that pay the greatest price & have the most to lose.

We went into Iraq & have destroyed the infrastructure,   what we rebuild, the enemy destroys. The Russians did it in A'stan. On & on ad nauseum through history.

We are slow to rebuild, in part to economics, and to a major extent due to our lack of control of the region.   Plain & simple, we have to fight a Guerilla war with the same or better force.   We have to fight this war by the same rules sans "collateral damage"

Cheers


----------



## Dare

Infanteer said:
			
		

> I never said I advocated his strategies.  Mr Scheuer's explanation of the cause seems quite compelling to me, as well as his description of the conflict, but his solution does not strike me as the best COA.  He swings fully into the "What We Do" camp, where Western policies are the only _causus belli_.  This is something I don't believe to be true - they certainly are a key to contributing to the reason for conflict, but they aren't the only reason.  Sure many hate us for what we do, many hate us for being Westerners, and many don't know much at all about the West except for the fact that we are on their turf.
> 
> As I said in a previous debate, Who we are is what we do.  We support Israel because it is a democratic state surrounded by people that hate them.  We pay attention to the oil because we have a capitalist economy that is fueled by petroleum.  We can't back out on these, so we must pound acceptance into the enemy.


I think the definition of "who we are" and "what we do" are improper. As it is often referrenced it would be better defined as our domestic policies (who we are) and foreign policies (what we do to "them"). That is how most use the term. The difference being (what we do): We should feed them more, or educate them more, or not go into Islamic countries, etc. Or (who we are), countries with relatively immoral behavior, with tolerance and human rights. Really it's a debate wether they are attacking us because of what we have done in the middle east or for our liberal social environment. We know where Scheuer stands, we know where I stand. Do you think it is both, then?


> I think it is pretty darn close to one - lets see; we have attacks around the globe aimed at our military, economic, and political infrastructure (of which 9/11 was but a single incident), we have the militaries of Western nations constantly deployed forward (to the point where the United States is straining), Reserves are being called up, we have the scope of our civil landscape being changed by legislation triggered by the War (things like the Patriot Act in the US), we have Jordanians, Egyptians, Libyans, Somalis, Chechens, Afghans, and Indonesians fighting us at various parts of the globe, and the Airlines won't let me have nailclippers or a plastic butter knife on board the aircraft.  It is one that seems to fit into Huntington's *Clash* paradigm, where the triggers are civilizational in nature.


The Clash of Civilizations is a Total War. The War on Terrorism is not yet even close to a Total War. It is low to mid level armed conflict and occupation. If we were fighting a Total War with the military power we have now, we would be losing.


> Considering that the lives of every person in the West is somehow affected in many different ways by this war, I don't see this as anything but Total in nature.


Total War refers to the level of combat is being used. It is not Total War.


> Readjust the metrics?  WTF is that?
> 
> Give me some sort of tangible sign of "freedom loving people" who are removing the "bastions of intolerance and tyranny" - hundreds of Iraqi offing each other every day doesn't seem to play that out.  Show me metric that there is a sign of dwindling opposition against us - because casualty lists don't seem to be bearing that notion out.  These fluffy notions do no good in telling us if we are succeeding, because we see just as much violence and conflict (if not more) as we did in the last decade.


Is the democratic voting in Iraq and Afghanistan a fluffy notion? Or how about in Lebanon? Democratic reforms all over the middle east? 


> Wilsonian rhetoric isn't making your argument very palatable when you consider the fact that we are still being attacked in the hearts of our cities.


I'm not trying to sweet talk you, Infanteer. I know we're being attacked, I've expected to be attacked. We have been warned we would be attacked. That does not mean we're losing.


> I didn't see PRT teams and occupation forces arrive with Perry's ships.  Sure, the fingers were in the pie (a la Tom Cruise and The Last Samurai   8)), but this was done with a willing Japanese regime that was backed by the Emperor.  The military hijacked the state in the time leading up to WWII, but that tradition of Japanese democracy was there, and it was something that we could exploit after we pounded them to dust (which MacArthur did).  This isn't something I see in either Afghanistan or Iraq - willing players (especially elites) who are happy to take Western help to build a democratic order.


The Shinto tradition of the leader being an unquestioned God was there, right up til even after formal surrender. The willing players in Afghanistan and Iraq are the voters and the lines of recruits.


> As well, Japan was ethnically homogeneous, which made things easier by order of magnitude.  It is hard to get people to work towards the notion of a national government when their loyalty is to their faith/tribe/family/faction and when they are busy fighting you in the streets everyday.


If your enemy is divided against itself, then it's a lot easier than if it is united against you.


> 90% protest America, cheer in the streets of the Middle East after the 9/11 attacks, wear Osama bin Laden shirts, listen to his tapes, and burn US Flags because they are opposed to anything that will drive away tyranny?


That's right. They want their theocratic tyranny to take hold.


> You accuse me of deeming them simple-minded, and then you paint a good portion of the Middle East as promoters of tyranny that are only need us in the West to show them how to be "freedom loving people who are gaining power in the former bastians of intolerance and tyranny".


A good portion of the Middle East wears bin Laden tshirts? If they are wearing Bin Laden tshirts, listening to his tapes, burning US flags and cheered in the streets after 9/11, I think it's fair to say that 90% of them are interested in the Salifasts (theocratic authoritarian tyranny) winning.


> Ok, I'm going to play "Step out of my Western Armchair" for a minute and put myself into the moccasins of some Cherokee in the 19th century.  I've just been deliberately given blankets from a smallpox ward as aid from the US Government - my village gets sick and most die off.  That would be pretty close to the same impact you described above, as the actions of a few destroy my entire society.  Maybe the "War on Terrorism" was being fought by the Sioux at Little Bighorn?


Perhaps the *British* Government was indeed responsible for doing just that (as that is when the smallpox epidemic occured for the Cherokee.) 


> Terrorism is a tactic.  You are right, the lethality of modern weapons means that individuals can condense the magnitude of destructiveness into a smaller piece of time and space, but the ideas behind the attacks are nothing new.  It does not define the enemy we fight or his reasons for fighting, just as it didn't on the American West, in Tzarist Russia in the 1880's, or in Germany in 1945 (I'm sure the Jews can view _Kristallnacht_ as a terrorist act).


I know the ideas behind the attacks are nothing new. The reason we do not define the enemy in that manner is because *anyone* can be a terrorist. There are domestic terrorists of every stripe. Primarily we are focused on Islamic fundamentalist terrorism, but that is not the only ideology bent on our destruction.


> If (or when) a WMD goes off in one of our cities, it will be no different than Tamerlane building pyramids of skulls at the outskirts of Baghdad.  It is not some "new war" that sprung out of the lethality of modern weapons.


Sure it is a new war. We can not wait for them to hit us, now. We can not guarentee they value their own life enough to try them civilly. What was generally a civil problem before (murder of domestic civilians) is now a military matter. That is new. Disrespecting a states right to protect terrorists is new. 


> Ok, so you do agree that they are not isolated.  Then how does the "War on Terror" serve as the accurate label.  How does the "War on Terror" link the London Bombers, Chechens bombing Moscow and attacking Russian soldiers in Ossetia, insurgents fighting Americans in Fallujah, Libyans (who swore themselves to Osama bin Laden) marauding against the regime in Libya, Saudis attacking oil workers, Pashtun tribesman launching rockets into Kabul, and Indonesians blowing up a nightclub in Bali?  I latched onto "Islamic Insurgency" as it seems to encompass all these disparate interests which are directed outward at those the "Banner" has pointed to as the enemy.


All of the above have committed Acts of Terrorism, in their own generalized description. That does not mean there are not "legitimate" insurgents in these places.


> Of course, you could just call them all terrorists and pop in Team America: World Police - but does that do any justice to why they fight us?


How many radicals have you talked to Infanteer? Oh yes, Iraq pisses them off, but most of them were pissed off before Iraq. They have a long list of things that they are pissed off about. None of them are reconcilable. It doesn't matter how many times or how many ways we apologize or try to compensate. They are committed to their cause. We might be able to convert some or perhaps (so far unlikely) a sizable group of them, but most of them we will have to imprison or kill.


> Ok, now repeat for 20 years, and we'll see how that works out.  You don't even need to do that - look at the reaction of many in the West on chat rooms following attacks on our city: "Get some", "Fallujah delenda est", "Make them Pay".


Yeah, go into the Islamic chat rooms. Or even better, go to the Jewish chat rooms and listen to the Islamic radicals spout off nonstop with death threats. I know I have. It's always an interesting conversation. Of course there is to be a natural reaction to an attack, but how many of those in those "West" chatrooms formed private mass murder terrorist cells in the middle east? Don't even try to tell me a PMC is the same thing.


> We are all human, and all prone to the same reactions - the power of human emotions, hiding deep in the lower brain, are much stronger than the rational part - the tendency to lash out when the perception of threat is a strong one, and I feel that is what many Muslims are doing when they attack us.


Really, have you seen what the radical Muslims are doing when they attack us? They are exuberantly shouting ALLAH IS GREATER, over and over. Sure they perceive us to be a threat, and to the theocratic tyrannies, we are.


> Is it that, or are they all terrorists who are fighting against the spread of liberty and peace?


They have a different idea of "peace". If living under a tyranny is peace (and to many it is), and liberty means being freed of the laws of man (supposedly), then no, they are not fighting the spread of liberty and peace. Fortunately, I do not find it enjoyable to entertain their distorted views of the world and disagree wholeheartedly.


> Ok - because they don't live like us and they are attacking us, this makes them liars?  Everything they say is a clever ruse?
> 
> You're going to have to prove to me that all the enemies are big liars and not one of them says what they mean.  I put that quote up from Osama bin-Laden earlier, which seems to be quite coherent and straight forward, but I guess I should throw that in the garbage because it is the work of a cabal who rely on a convention of their Faith to be pathological liars.


Your sarcasm is correct. Certainly, if we do everything Bin Laden says, there still will not be peace. Which I'm sure you can agree with. Therefore, it IS designed entirely to trick people into believing they are reasonable in their expectations and combat operations. Which they are not. That is a major reason the ignorant portion of the far left support these people, they TRUELY believe that if we just left them alone, no harm would come to us. They want us to retreat into an inferior position and allow them to take a more solid root where they are. Democratization puts a large bend in their plans. Whatever assists it's spread assaults their base. We can't afford to leave them alone. I'm pleased you do not agree 100% with Scheuer, but his causation is still flawed.


----------



## Infanteer

Dare said:
			
		

> I think the definition of "who we are" and "what we do" are improper. As it is often referrenced it would be better defined as our domestic policies (who we are) and foreign policies (what we do to "them"). That is how most use the term. The difference being (what we do): We should feed them more, or educate them more, or not go into Islamic countries, etc. Or (who we are), countries with relatively immoral behavior, with tolerance and human rights. Really it's a debate wether they are attacking us because of what we have done in the middle east or for our liberal social environment. We know where Scheuer stands, we know where I stand. Do you think it is both, then?



It's chicken and egg really - some will be the chicken and some will be the egg.   I'm sure some people fight us because of our domestic policies, some will fight us because they hate Pepsi and walkmans, some will fight us because of our foreign policies and some will fight us because we are in their back yard and we just knocked down their market.   Some will start with "I hate America and thus their policies are bad" and some will say "I really hate these actions so America is bad".   We should avoid painting with a broad brush and saying that within the minds of the billion or so people within Islamic countries that the attitudes and degree of enmity (or sympathy) are all the same.



> The Clash of Civilizations is a Total War. The War on Terrorism is not yet even close to a Total War. It is low to mid level armed conflict and occupation. If we were fighting a Total War with the military power we have now, we would be losing.
> 
> Total War refers to the level of combat is being used. It is not Total War.



I guess it is a matter of semantics and we'll have to agree to disagree - as I said, I consider the war total in nature because it pervades every aspect of the societies involved and the solution for us is going to demand efforts across the board (from economics to policies to military action to legislation to attitudes etc, etc).



> Is the democratic voting in Iraq and Afghanistan a fluffy notion? Or how about in Lebanon? Democratic reforms all over the middle east?



We'll see how well the voting does, because voting is underpinned by such things as civil society and established democratic principles; something absent in there areas.   If voting is supposed to be a sign of progress, then I guess we'll give Mugabe a slap on the back for bringing Zimbabwe into the 21st century.   Sure, we made sure they were free and fair in the places we occupied, but I'm not interested in how we handle elections, I'm interested in how they do.

Lebanon is promising, but I remember reading how Chomsky held it up as the model polyglot society in the 1970s in his attacks on Israel - Lebanon in the 1980's sure deflated that notion.   I really enjoyed watching the "Cedar Revolution" (especially to see all the gorgeous Lebanese protesters   :blotto, but we must remember the huge pro-Syria rally (estimated at 200,000) that also took to the streets.

Finally, what are these "democratic reforms all over the middle east" that you refer to?



> The Shinto tradition of the leader being an unquestioned God was there, right up til even after formal surrender.



Yes, and it helped that the Chrysanthemum throne backed the Meiji Restoration and the Westernization that came along with that - I don't see Allah being as generous for us.



> The willing players in Afghanistan and Iraq are the voters and the lines of recruits.



The willing players are the voters and the lines of recruits, but there is also the people who attack Western Forces everyday, kill politicians, and drive bombs into recruiting line-ups.   I worry that the will to struggle for such a foreign and alien concept as democracy will wilt under the threat of sectarian violence.   The 13 Colonies would not wilt because they had convention dating back to Runnymede - no such thing exists in Afghanistan or Iraq.



> If your enemy is divided against itself, then it's a lot easier than if it is united against you.



 ???

So reconstruction is easier if the population of the country is divided against itself, promoting sectarian violence?   Judging from the fact that Al Qaeda's strength among the Kurds grew after the invasion and that both Shia and Sunni will fight the Coalition in the streets of Iraq (Najaf, Fallujah), I would say that there is some degree of agreement and unity in the goals of Insurgent forces in Iraq.

I have no doubt the same will happen in Afghanistan if tribal politics turns it head and bites us in the ass.



> That's right. They want their theocratic tyranny to take hold.
> 
> A good portion of the Middle East wears bin Laden tshirts? If they are wearing Bin Laden tshirts, listening to his tapes, burning US flags and cheered in the streets after 9/11, I think it's fair to say that 90% of them are interested in the Salafists (theocratic authoritarian tyranny) winning.



I'm not to sure that all those Palestinians are dedicated Salafists.   How about Shia's in Iran and Iraq (there is enough anti-Western sentiment from them) - you're not trying to tell me that they are actually Sunni's in disguise?   Painting with the big brush again.



> Perhaps the *British* Government was indeed responsible for doing just that (as that is when the smallpox epidemic occured for the Cherokee.)



Whatever, change the name to some Plains Indian tribe - the point remains the same.



> I know the ideas behind the attacks are nothing new. The reason we do not define the enemy in that manner is because *anyone* can be a terrorist. There are domestic terrorists of every stripe. Primarily we are focused on Islamic fundamentalist terrorism, but that is not the only ideology bent on our destruction.



Okay, so we West invaded Iraq to target Islamic Fundamentalist Islam?   Support for the AQ aside, the Taliban was fundamentalist, but I don't recall them taking claim for many attacks on us.   Again, the connotations of "War on Terror" are too narrow, is insufficient at providing a proper viewpoint of the full spectrum of the conflict, and (again) paints with a broad brush.



> Sure it is a new war. We can not wait for them to hit us, now. We can not guarentee they value their own life enough to try them civilly. What was generally a civil problem before (murder of domestic civilians) is now a military matter. That is new. Disrespecting a states right to protect terrorists is new.



New to whom, new to what?



> All of the above have committed Acts of Terrorism, in their own generalized description. That does not mean there are not "legitimate" insurgents in these places.



Most (if not all) of the above have also made conventional attacks on military targets, conducted propaganda campaigns, and undertaken economic ventures to shore up their infrastructure - terrorism is simply one tactic that these people will use to see their ends met; it is neither the chief tactic nor the defining one.



> How many radicals have you talked to Infanteer? Oh yes, Iraq pisses them off, but most of them were pissed off before Iraq. They have a long list of things that they are pissed off about. None of them are reconcilable. It doesn't matter how many times or how many ways we apologize or try to compensate. They are committed to their cause. We might be able to convert some or perhaps (so far unlikely) a sizable group of them, but most of them we will have to imprison or kill.



Did we have to imprison or kill most German's or Japanese to achieve victory over them?   No.

The enemy is not a lunatic fringe, and seems to be, from the firm and unswerving level of attacks and opposition against us in the last 15 years, a substantial portion of the Muslim world - at least, this is what the Pew Research Center finds:

_*In the predominantly Muslim countries surveyed, anger toward the United States remains pervasive, although the level of hatred has eased somewhat and support for the war on terrorism has inched up. Osama bin Laden, however, is viewed favorably by large percentages in Pakistan (65%), Jordan (55%) and Morocco (45%). Even in Turkey, where bin Laden is highly unpopular, as many as 31% say that suicide attacks against Americans and other Westerners in Iraq are justifiable. Majorities in all four Muslim nations surveyed doubt the sincerity of the war on terrorism. Instead, most say it is an effort to control Mideast oil and to dominate the world.*_

http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=206

They must of interviewed all the Salafists, eh?

So, what you seem to suggest is that there is no way to undercut the enemies will to fight (of which addressing specific grievances is one way) and that the entire Islamic world is one big Masada?



> Yeah, go into the Islamic chat rooms. Or even better, go to the Jewish chat rooms and listen to the Islamic radicals spout off nonstop with death threats. I know I have. It's always an interesting conversation. Of course there is to be a natural reaction to an attack, but how many of those in those "West" chatrooms formed private mass murder terrorist cells in the middle east? Don't even try to tell me a PMC is the same thing.



As much as applaud you for your trips to the front lines of cyberspace, I'm not sure how we can take the words of a few internet blusterers like you and I to represent the motives and motivations of the enemy.

Why you mention PMC's is beyond me.



> Really, have you seen what the radical Muslims are doing when they attack us? They are exuberantly shouting ALLAH IS GREATER, over and over. Sure they perceive us to be a threat, and to the theocratic tyrannies, we are.



_Allahu Akbar_ is a very common term amongst Muslims - I heard Bosnian Muslims use it for many things.   As well, it is used for many different occasions - a Tajik tribal leader could use it to express gratitude for the great dinner:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allah_Akbar

I'm sensing that you've got your cultural blinders on good and tight - you seem to take a long-standing practice in the Muslim world as a sign of terrorist extremism.



> They have a different idea of "peace". If living under a tyranny is peace (and to many it is), and liberty means being freed of the laws of man (supposedly), then no, they are not fighting the spread of liberty and peace. Fortunately, I do not find it enjoyable to entertain their distorted views of the world and disagree wholeheartedly.



Distorted views of the world...hmm, I see - the Black and White thing again.   Looks like this one is going to come to a close pretty quick; no point in me trying to undercut your pillar of moral superiority.

Tell me, if there was only two people in the world - you and one of the enemy - who would be right?



> Your sarcasm is correct. Certainly, if we do everything Bin Laden says, there still will not be peace. Which I'm sure you can agree with. Therefore, it IS designed entirely to trick people into believing they are reasonable in their expectations and combat operations. Which they are not. That is a major reason the ignorant portion of the far left support these people, they TRUELY believe that if we just left them alone, no harm would come to us. They want us to retreat into an inferior position and allow them to take a more solid root where they are. Democratization puts a large bend in their plans. Whatever assists it's spread assaults their base. We can't afford to leave them alone. I'm pleased you do not agree 100% with Scheuer, but his causation is still flawed.



You never answered my question - are all of our enemies relying on a convention of their Faith to be pathological liars?   None of them ever say what they mean?


----------



## McG

One benefit of reconstruction - we can gradually turn over more of the responsibility for fighting insurgency to the nation itself (Iraq, Aghanistan, or other).


> 300 Italian soldiers to be pulled out of Iraq
> The Associated Press
> (Printed in the Edmonton Journal)
> Saturday, July 09, 2005
> 
> GLENEAGLES, Scotland -- Italy plans to begin withdrawing 300 troops from Iraq in September as Iraqi security forces become increasingly capable of securing the territory, Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi said friday.
> 
> Iraq "must come to a point where it must guarantee its own security," the Italian leader said at the end of the G-8 summit in Scotland.  ...
> 
> However, Berlusconi added any withdrawal plans would depend on security conditions on the ground and could change. He said the partial pullout would not compromise security for the remaining Italian troops or the zone of southern Iraq under their control.   ...
> 
> Berlusconi sent 3,000 troops to Iraq after the ouster of Saddam Hussein. The contingent is based in the southern Iraqi city Nasiriyah.
> 
> ...


----------



## Edward Campbell

The weekend papers are chock-a-block with analyses of the London bombings and I expect that _all the usual suspects_ from the _commentariat_ will be on the Sunday TV political round-ups.

A few observations, if I may, from the _cheap seats_:

"¢	Rick Hiller and his minions are looking pretty prescient - Canada Command, with its stated focus on domestic operations and security, is looking like a smart move.  This matters because there is a constant power struggles in Ottawa for the attention and _respect_ of the security secretariat in the Privy Council Office - DND, Foreign Affairs, RCMP and the new, somewhat cumbersome Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Canada are all competitors.  (By the way, I applaud this - as I have said before I do not favour the _collectivization_ of intelligence as is being planned/implemented in the USA.)

"¢	Racial profiling is back on the front burner - there are reports that the security services reckon the miscreants were not home grown, locally 'run' British Muslims; some, especially the leaders, it is postulated, entered Britain over the past six months - probably on fake passports.  More focus - read: ethnically based - screening might have stopped or slowed them.

"¢	The Brits lowered their state of alert in part, at least, because there was no _chatter_ - the radical Muslims in Britain (and on the European continent where GCHQ also intercepts civilian telecom traffic without the knowledge or approval of other governments) have stopped using their cell phones and e-mail.  (I seem to recall that we used to regard the imposition of _radio silence_ as a sure sign of a coming move, of come sort.  The dog not barking as Sherlock Holmes might have observed,)   Some will question whether frightening the enemy away from public switched telecom was a good idea; other will counter than everything that makes live more complicated for the enemy is a smart move.

"¢	The CCTV cameras in London are likely to provide the Brits with real, solid leads re: whodunit.  There was no practical way for CCTV to have _prevented_ the attacks but they may 'solve' them and provide good links to the enemy's structure - if the Brits stay smart and do not bother with the justice system.  The trick is to identify the bad guys and then seize them and use them as sources of information - they can be flushed into the North Sea when their utility reaches zero.  Watch for more and better electronic surveillance in Britain - explosive 'sniffers' all over the place, tens of thousands more CCTV cameras, periodic, pseudo-random X-ray checks of briefcases and shopping bags in some areas, and so on.

"¢	This may be just another day in an 'endless war' - some prognosticators believe that more and more Muslims (still a tiny minority) are buying into the idea that there can be Muslim global domination because neither East nor West is willing to endure a permanent state of terror in which all infidels are targets all the time.  For the folks who believe this, any and all counter-measures, other than abject surrender, are welcome because they will support the position that Muslims are the victims and their (violent) _resistance_ is both just and noble.

"¢	There are 20+ million Muslims of North African, Middle Eastern and South-West Asian descent in Europe.  Only people of Black African descent have higher levels of unemployment in Europe.  No other group, including blacks, is less _integrated_ into European society.  Youngish Muslim men in Europe are, in hugely disproportionate numbers, found in low paying, part time, low status jobs - that status is, I think (no data), just about the same here in Canada.  European (and Canadian) immigration regulations give special dispensations to religious leaders who are recruited from abroad because there are few (no?) Muslim (equivalent) divinity schools in Europe - these religious leaders (imans, sheiks, etc) are frequently radicals and they have little understanding of and less interest in the cultures of the European nations within which they will preach and teach.

"¢	The Canadian government's response to the US call for the 'willing' to join them in Iraq might have bought us some time.  Our new mission in Afghanistan will take Canadians into direct contact with the enemy - Canada will reappear on the target lists.  Thousands of Muslims in Canada will wonder out loud why 'we' are attacking and killing 'them' - except the CF will become 'they' and these (thousands of) mostly young Muslim men will identify as 'we' with Arabs, West Asians and North Africans - many of whom are, in fact, their cousins.


----------



## bossi

I'm going to pull up a chaise lounge today, some iced tea (the non-Long Island variant) and really enjoy reading this thread "cover to cover" ...

Agreeing with Monseigneur LeJoint's comments re: CanadaCom and regime change (as well as Monseigneur Majoor's reference to "4th Generation Warfare") ... I hark back to a mantra of "fight smarter, not harder" ...
In this context, when we can't fire bullets ... we can fire information ... while also denying ammo to the enemy (something the bombers did when they invoked EMCON in Britain ...).  It's nothing new, but ... sooner or later, everything old is new again ...

And so, for cross-reference purposes (since this thread will carry on separately from the 7/7 London transit bombing thread ...) I'd like to chime in, as fol:



			
				FastEddy said:
			
		

> Very well. then please inform us how we should discribe them in the future.
> HAND.



Personally, I view the bombers as criminals who have murdered indiscriminately - there can be no honour in killing innocent civilians, and thus they are a disgrace to whatever cause they purport to serve.  I'd be tempted to agree with PM Blair's use of the term "barbarians", except that it would be an insult to the original Barbarians (footnote at bottom). 

Moving on ... it's gratifying to see how Britain is swinging into retaliation mode - amongst other things, an aggressive *Info Ops campaign * ...  backed up by REAL TIME ops ... (Churchill said "We have nothing to fear but fear itself" - thus, to defeat a terrorist it's necessary to not be terrified ... and, the best defence is a good offence ... especially when every man, woman and child gets onboard ...)

1.  "We're coming to get you."
2.  "The World is united against you."  
3.  "Did we mention that every pair of eyes in Britain, and our allies, are now looking for you ... ?"
4.  "Oh, by the way ... we're coming to get you."

1.  





> No.10 [Downing Street] Operation FIGHBACK - A  £2 BILLION counter-terror operation swung into action within minutes of the first explosion. ...


http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2005310418,00.html

2.  





> GLENEAGLES: The world's most powerful leaders united on Thursday to condemn the wave of bombings in London, saying they would not bow to terrorists ... British Prime Minister Tony Blair, summit host, insisted talks would continue despite what he described as `barbaric attacks'. ...


http://www.hindu.com/2005/07/08/stories/2005070806071600.htm

3.  





> Britons urged to help find attackers
> LONDONâ â€Police have called on Britons to be their "eyes and ears" in a hunt for bombers who killed more than 50 people, some of whom remain buried in the wreckage of an unstable and vermin-infested subway tunnel. ...


http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&call_pageid=971358637177&c=Article&cid=1120859414904&DPL=IvsNDS%2f7ChAX&tacodalogin=yes

4.  





> Extra troops for Afghan border
> (photo caption:  Pakistan already has 70,000 soldiers along the Afghan border)
> Pakistan says it is deploying an additional 4,000 soldiers on its border with Afghanistan to prevent militants from moving across the frontier. ...


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4660441.stm


Barbarian footnote (I'm half Barbarian by ancestry, thus ... sort of a "Cliff Claven" commentary ...)



> ... Those who they came in contact with considered them uncivilized, and yet were fascinated by their strength, stamina, force of will, charisma, and versatility.  They were respected by those they befriended, and feared by those who opposed them.  Even within their own society, they fought amongst themselves, seeking supremacy of power and controllership of the lands they acquired.
> 
> In Northern Europe they became known as the Teutons, Norse, Goths, and Celts, and within those tribes arose many sub-tribes.  Settling deep in the regions of Northern Europe, they were forgotten by the various civilizations to the South and East such as Greece, Assyria, Persia, and Egypt.  It was not until the end of the Bronze age and the onset of the Iron Age that the cultures would re-emerge, clashing with those civilizations fronting the Mediterranean Sea; Greece, and Rome.
> 
> Reviled by the Greeks, and both respected and feared by the Romans, these people would time and again engage in battles against those civilizations.  Those of Teutony proved to be indomitable, and even the ones conquered by Rome did not remain under Roman rule for long.  Their fierce, warlike nature and coarse behaviors earned them the name "barbarians", meaning both "illiterates" and "wanderers".  ...



And, the latest headline (reminding us not to underestimate our enemy ...):

*... The deadliest of Thursday's blasts, which took place far below King's Cross station on the Picadilly Line, has so far claimed 21 known dead, but that number is certain to climb because many bodies remain trapped in the wreckage there. ...*

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1120947011737&call_pageid=968332188492&col=968793972154&t=TS_Home



> *Blasts occurred within seconds, police now say*
> Oakland Ross, staff reporter
> 
> LONDONâ â€Police and transit authorities have dramatically revised the chronology of the three blasts that hit trains on the London Underground on Thursday.
> 
> Initially, those explosions were thought to have occurred over a 26-minute span, from 8:51 until 9:17 in the morning.
> 
> Based on a closer examination of emergency reports and other data, officials now say the underground bombs went off within seconds of each other, at about 8:50 a.m.
> 
> "It was bang, bang, bang, very close together," Tim O'Toole, managing director of the London Underground, said yesterday.
> 
> The first explosion hit a train near Aldgate station, followed almost immediately by two more bombs, one at Edgware Rd. and a third at King's Cross.
> 
> A fourth explosion, which ripped the roof off a double-decker bus at Tavistock Square, killing 13, came nearly an hour later.
> 
> The death toll in the four bombings stands at 49, but is certain to rise.
> 
> The revised chronology of the blasts is important because it tends to bolster the likelihood that the bombs were detonated by electronic timing devices rather than being the work of suicide bombers.
> 
> "It might seem to move the probability toward a timing device," said Brian Paddick, Scotland Yard deputy assistant commissioner. "But we cannot rule out the possibility that people set these bombs off manually.
> 
> Last night, police evacuated large areas of downtown Birmingham, in what they described as "a precautionary measure" in response to an undisclosed security threat.
> 
> An estimated 20,000 people were ordered to leave the Broad St. entertainment district of Britain's second largest city, and motorists were prevented from entering the area.
> 
> The city's Chinatown area was also evacuated, involving about 10,000 people.
> 
> The alert, however, was not likely connected to the subway and bus bombings in London two days earlier, said Stuart Hyde, assistant chief constable of West Midlands Police.
> 
> "I want to make that pretty clear," he told a news conference.
> 
> The evacuation followed intelligence warning of a "substantial threat," Hyde said.
> 
> A controlled explosion â â€ designed to disarm any explosive device â â€ was carried out on a bus following a call from a member of the public, but officers concluded there was no explosive device.
> 
> London police also revealed yesterday that "high explosives" were used in the four blasts on Thursday, rather than "home-made" bombs, but they would not provide more specific information.
> 
> In all, about 700 people were wounded in the blasts, 65 of whom remain in hospital, 12 in critical condition. Approximately 25 other people are thought to be missing.
> 
> "You can have all the surveillance in the world, and you couldn't stop that happening," British Prime Minister Tony Blair said in a radio interview yesterday. He praised the "inner resilience" of Londoners for their calm response to last week's attacks.
> 
> The deadliest of Thursday's blasts, which took place far below King's Cross station on the Picadilly Line, has so far claimed 21 known dead, but that number is certain to climb because many bodies remain trapped in the wreckage there.
> 
> Ian Blair, commissioner of the London police, said yesterday he does not believe the final death toll in the four blasts will rise above 100.
> 
> Civic authorities in London announced yesterday that two minutes of silence will be observed at noon local time this Thursday, in honour of the victims of last week's bombings.
> 
> Yesterday, a second Islamic group sought to take responsibility for the deadly attacks on central London, but it was not clear whether the claim could be taken seriously.
> 
> Calling itself the Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigade, the organization claimed on its website that it caused the London bombings, but the group is known to have made bogus claims in the past. It previously sought to take credit for the power blackouts that hit parts of the United States and Canada two years ago.
> 
> On its website, the group threatens further terrorist actions against "infidel London."
> 
> Earlier, a group calling itself the Secret Organization of Al Qaeda Jihad in Europe claimed responsibility for the blasts.
> 
> Police investigators also revealed yesterday that they have so far been unable to identify any of the 49 bodies so far recovered from the wreckage left by the four explosions.
> 
> "It is a very harrowing task," Detective Superintendent Jim Dickie said, referring to the recovery of the corpses. "Most of the victims have suffered intensive trauma, and by that I mean there are body parts as well as torsos."
> 
> Police and rescue workers continued to work in appalling conditions roughly 30 metres below King's Cross station, trying to remove more bodies from the wreckage.
> 
> "This is going to be a very long process," said Trotter of the British Transit Police. "The conditions are extremely difficult."
> 
> He said there was no natural ventilation in the cramped and rat-infested tunnel, one of the deepest in the London Underground system. "It's a slow, methodical, meticulous process," said Trotter.
> 
> While recovery teams laboured underground yesterday, crowds of Londoners gathered under partly cloudy skies at the King's Cross station, where they filed past a makeshift shrine set up outside the station. Hundreds of floral offerings and handwritten tributes have been placed outside the station in honour of the bomb victims.
> 
> "In loving memory of you all," said one. "They will not beat us."
> 
> With files from Associated Press


----------



## Dare

Infanteer said:
			
		

> It's chicken and egg really - some will be the chicken and some will be the egg.  I'm sure some people fight us because of our domestic policies, some will fight us because they hate Pepsi and walkmans, some will fight us because of our foreign policies and some will fight us because we are in their back yard and we just knocked down their market.  Some will start with "I hate America and thus their policies are bad" and some will say "I really hate these actions so America is bad".  We should avoid painting with a broad brush and saying that within the minds of the billion or so people within Islamic countries that the attitudes and degree of enmity (or sympathy) are all the same.


I'll agree that it is somewhat paradoxical.


> I guess it is a matter of semantics and we'll have to agree to disagree - as I said, I consider the war total in nature because it pervades every aspect of the societies involved and the solution for us is going to demand efforts across the board (from economics to policies to military action to legislation to attitudes etc, etc).


I understand why you consider it total war. It is not Total War. It has a wide spectrum, yes, but it is not all encompassing, as of yet.


> We'll see how well the voting does, because voting is underpinned by such things as civil society and established democratic principles; something absent in there areas.  If voting is supposed to be a sign of progress, then I guess we'll give Mugabe a slap on the back for bringing Zimbabwe into the 21st century.  Sure, we made sure they were free and fair in the places we occupied, but I'm not interested in how we handle elections, I'm interested in how they do.


Well, that's if you want to consider what Mugabe held to be a real election rather than theatre.


> Lebanon is promising, but I remember reading how Chomsky held it up as the model polyglot society in the 1970s in his attacks on Israel - Lebanon in the 1980's sure deflated that notion.  I really enjoyed watching the "Cedar Revolution" (especially to see all the gorgeous Lebanese protesters  :blotto, but we must remember the huge pro-Syria rally (estimated at 200,000) that also took to the streets.


I also enjoyed that revolution. And the Syrian counter rally. Then another and another until the anti-Syrian protesters outmanned them. Western reporters walking freely in amongst the anti-Syrian protesters also said something to me. Don't discount our supporters in the middle east. 60-70% might hate us, but there always the 40-30% that do not.


> Finally, what are these "democratic reforms all over the middle east" that you refer to?


There have been steps made towards real democracy in Morocco, Bahrain, Qatar, Jordan, Yemen, Kuwait, Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Increasing opposition movements in Iran. Obviously, Lebanon. The steps may seem insignificant to us, but they are monumental steps there. 


> Yes, and it helped that the Chrysanthemum throne backed the Meiji Restoration and the Westernization that came along with that - I don't see Allah being as generous for us.
> The willing players are the voters and the lines of recruits, but there is also the people who attack Western Forces everyday, kill politicians, and drive bombs into recruiting line-ups.  I worry that the will to struggle for such a foreign and alien concept as democracy will wilt under the threat of sectarian violence.  The 13 Colonies would not wilt because they had convention dating back to Runnymede - no such thing exists in Afghanistan or Iraq.


No one ever said it would be easy.


> ???
> So reconstruction is easier if the population of the country is divided against itself, promoting sectarian violence?  Judging from the fact that Al Qaeda's strength among the Kurds grew after the invasion and that both Shia and Sunni will fight the Coalition in the streets of Iraq (Najaf, Fallujah), I would say that there is some degree of agreement and unity in the goals of Insurgent forces in Iraq.


There is, of course, a nationalist insurgency in Iraq. It makes it more challenging to pacify when they are fighting eachother as well, but if those fighting eachother were all focused on fighting the Coalition, it would be quite a bit more challenging.


> I have no doubt the same will happen in Afghanistan if tribal politics turns it head and bites us in the ***.
> 
> I'm not to sure that all those Palestinians are dedicated Salafists.  How about Shia's in Iran and Iraq (there is enough anti-Western sentiment from them) - you're not trying to tell me that they are actually Sunni's in disguise?  Painting with the big brush again.


If they're wearing a bin Laden t-shirt (which is what I was talking about). I'd say chances are good they aren't Shi'a. The Taliban and Al Qaeda killed off many Shi'a in Afghanistan. Bin Laden believes that the Shi'a are heretics. Who's broad brush, again? 


> Whatever, change the name to some Plains Indian tribe - the point remains the same.
> 
> Okay, so we West invaded Iraq to target Islamic Fundamentalist Islam?  Support for the AQ aside, the Taliban was fundamentalist, but I don't recall them taking claim for many attacks on us.  Again, the connotations of "War on Terror" are too narrow, is insufficient at providing a proper viewpoint of the full spectrum of the conflict, and (again) paints with a broad brush.


War on Insurgency certainly wouldn't be accurate. Neither would War on Islamic Insurgency. We have to call it something, you know? We can't say we're at war with one group, there's hundreds of them. We went to Afghanistan to get Al Qaeda, because the Taliban refused to let the US have bin Laden. So now we are also fighting a domestic insurgency. What would you title it? What is a proper title for Canada to use, and seperately (or similarly) the west?


> New to whom, new to what?
> 
> Most (if not all) of the above have also made conventional attacks on military targets, conducted propaganda campaigns, and undertaken economic ventures to shore up their infrastructure - terrorism is simply one tactic that these people will use to see their ends met; it is neither the chief tactic nor the defining one.


Yes, and it is one tactic that seperates our modern sense of civility to their methods. It's also a clear dividing point between radical Islamists and moderates. Even the ones that agree with the ends, they often do not justify the means, in this case.


> Did we have to imprison or kill most German's or Japanese to achieve victory over them?  No.


Of the German/Japanese radicals that did not surrender or stand down when commanded, we had to have imprisoned, killed or converted. Since no one has the stomach to convert these radicals, we'll have to settle for the other two options. 


> The enemy is not a lunatic fringe, and seems to be, from the firm and unswerving level of attacks and opposition against us in the last 15 years, a substantial portion of the Muslim world - at least, this is what the Pew Research Center finds:
> 
> _*In the predominantly Muslim countries surveyed, anger toward the United States remains pervasive, although the level of hatred has eased somewhat and support for the war on terrorism has inched up. Osama bin Laden, however, is viewed favorably by large percentages in Pakistan (65%), Jordan (55%) and Morocco (45%). Even in Turkey, where bin Laden is highly unpopular, as many as 31% say that suicide attacks against Americans and other Westerners in Iraq are justifiable. Majorities in all four Muslim nations surveyed doubt the sincerity of the war on terrorism. Instead, most say it is an effort to control Mideast oil and to dominate the world.*_
> 
> http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=206
> 
> They must of interviewed all the Salafists, eh?


I disagree that the "enemy" can simply be defined as someone who hates or dislikes the US. There are many people in this country whom think that suicide attacks are justifiable. I doubt those people interviewed in Turkey were wearing Bin Laden tshirts, so I would also doubt that they are Salafists. Again, you are blurring distinctions here. Bin Laden may not be popular in Turkey, but Mein Kampf sure is. I'm sure that there are many who just want to see the US get punched a few more times by anyone. But of those who actually want bin Laden to "win", those that have the same values and goals, well they certainly could be described as Salafists, couldn't they?


> So, what you seem to suggest is that there is no way to undercut the enemies will to fight (of which addressing specific grievances is one way) and that the entire Islamic world is one big Masada?


No. I am saying that there is no room for appeasement and there are plenty of ways to undercut our enemies.


> As much as applaud you for your trips to the front lines of cyberspace, I'm not sure how we can take the words of a few internet blusterers like you and I to represent the motives and motivations of the enemy.


A few? How about thousands upon thousands..

Regardless, if you're not monitoring the internet, you're not paying attention to a major front. There are plenty of chat rooms, web sites and forums dedicated to our destruction. You might want to disregard the average Joe's opinion, but it's generally not a Good Idea.


> Why you mention PMC's is beyond me.
> 
> _Allahu Akbar_ is a very common term amongst Muslims - I heard Bosnian Muslims use it for many things.  As well, it is used for many different occasions - a Tajik tribal leader could use it to express gratitude for the great dinner:
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allah_Akbar


I know what Allahu Ackbar means. That's not the point. The point is, they are not thinking about Iraq or Palestine when they are about to attack. They are thinking about Allah, and their misinterpretation of what they believe Allah is telling them to do, as read in the Qu'ran. They are not striking a blow FOR Iraq, they are striking a blow AGAINST what they see as infidels.


> I'm sensing that you've got your cultural blinders on good and tight - you seem to take a long-standing practice in the Muslim world as a sign of terrorist extremism.


No. You misunderstand.


> Distorted views of the world...hmm, I see - the Black and White thing again.  Looks like this one is going to come to a close pretty quick; no point in me trying to undercut your pillar of moral superiority.


Well, you've completely misunderstood my point, which was *not* that saying Allahu Ackbar (being a Muslim) makes one a terrorist..


> Tell me, if there was only two people in the world - you and one of the enemy - who would be right?


That depends on the disagreement, doesn't it. 


> You never answered my question - are all of our enemies relying on a convention of their Faith to be pathological liars?  None of them ever say what they mean?


I am saying, that's the PR is not the Reality. The handouts, the posters, the tape recordings, the videos, all claiming what the left here like to typify as legitimate grievances. Iraq. Guantanamo Bay. Etc. They have their "experts" and public relation organizations who outwardly seem well spoken and moderate, but when you look at their past statements and associates you get a better view of their true beliefs. Which has very little to do with Iraq, and a lot more to do with our culture. (Foreign policy vs Domestic policy) (What we do vs. Who we are) I am saying that amongst the terrorists there are certainly a minority who are doing it simply for Iraq, or simply for Gitmo. I'm not saying that Iraq does not tick off the others. But those who chose to go to war based Soley on those events are a small minority. Most of these terrorist cells have been around for some time. Now amongst the domestic insurgents! is a different story, I would say that it's far more likely that such issues drum up more recruits. I seperate terrorists from insurgents, they are different beasts. It's you who wants to paint with a broad brush and define them all as insurgents. This nullifies any deterrent effect that a terrorist label aquires, as any true Muslim abhors the slaughter of innocents. It's a dividing line and point of distinction that must not be hidden or swept under by an insurgent label.


----------



## McG

> *This in not a war*
> By TIMOTHY GARTON ASH
> Saturday, July 9, 2005 Updated at 9:49 AM EDT
> Globe and Mail Update
> 
> When the bombs hit my native city, I was asleep in California. Waking, I watched the wounded emerging from those familiar London tube stations and the wreckage of the No. 30 bus, all mediated through American television. One American commentator said, "This shows we live in a world at war." And every fibre in my body cried: No, that is not the lesson of London.
> 
> London knows first-hand what war is like. It remembers the Second World War in its bricks and stones, the way New York cannot. While these bombings have produced the largest single casualty toll in London since 1945, this is not a war in the sense that American commentators like to imagine it.
> 
> Wars are won by armies. Armies backed by strong societies, economies and intelligence, to be sure; but still, armies. This one never will be.
> 
> For this is something else. Three things make such atrocities possible. First, there is the hate that makes human beings prepared to kill, and even to kill themselves, as suicide bombers, so as to take the hated with them. That is not new. It has causes. Some of them can be removed.
> 
> Second, there is the fact that the haters can move so freely among the hated, through cheap, mass public transport both within and across borders. Many live among them already, as a result of mass migration. This is new, certainly on this scale.
> 
> Finally, there is one of the great motors of history -- changes, or what we laughably call "advances," in the technology of killing. In our age of asymmetric warfare, very small groups of determined people can wound whole societies. All it needs is 10 pounds of high explosive in a backpack left on an underground train.
> 
> There will be more of this. Terrorism is not a single army that can be defeated, like Hitler's Wehrmacht. It's a technique, a means to an end, made more widely available by those "advances" in the technology of killing. It will be used, and used again. To some extent, we will have to learn to live with it, as we do with other chronic threats.
> 
> This is where London is most impressive. The capital's police chiefs had already warned that the question was "not if, but when" a terrorist attack would come. Contingency plans for the emergency services were in place, and seem to have worked reasonably well. The matter-of-fact phlegmatism, sobriety and determination with which Londoners met Thursday's attacks reflected long experience, notably of 30 years of IRA bombings, as well as national temperament.
> 
> "Just getting on with it," as Londoners do, is the best answer ordinary people can give to the terrorists. I must say they made me even more proud of my native city than did the success for London's bid to host the 2012 Olympics, announced the day before.
> 
> How much freedom are we now prepared to sacrifice in the name of security? There is a real danger that countries like the United States and the United Kingdom move toward a national security state, with further curtailment of civil liberties. That must not be -- for it will cost us liberty without bringing us any guarantee of security. I, for one, would rather remain more free, and face a marginally higher risk of being blown up by a terrorist bomb.
> 
> This does not mean being passive in response to these atrocities. But the right response does not lie, as commentators on America's Fox News would have us believe, in more military firepower to zap "the enemy" in Iraq or elsewhere. It lies in skilled policing and intelligent policy.
> 
> Quietly refusing the melodramatic metaphor of war, London's Metropolitan Police described the sites of the tube and bus bombings as "crime scenes." That's right. Crimes. Working in the most ethnically diverse city in the world, they have developed patient techniques of community relations and intelligence-gathering, as well as detection after the event.
> 
> That won't stop every attack. It didn't stop this one. But skilled policing at home, not soldiering abroad, is the way to reduce the threat from terrorists who operate and sometimes, as in the Madrid bombings last year, have themselves lived for years in the immigrant communities of our great cities. If that is true of London and Madrid, it applies equally to Toronto, Paris, Sydney or Berlin.
> 
> Then there is intelligent policy. It was right to drive al-Qaeda out of Afghanistan, by force of arms. By contrast, it becomes increasingly clear that the invasion of Iraq was a mistake, almost certainly creating more terrorists that it eliminated. But now we have to make the best of a bad job there.
> 
> The last thing we should do in response to this attack is to scuttle out of Iraq. On the contrary, now is the time for all democracies to rally round the cause of building a peaceful and halfway free Iraq, while insisting on further changes in occupation policy from a sobered United States, no longer infused with the neo-conservative hubris of three years ago.
> 
> A peace settlement between Israel and Palestine would remove another great recruiting sergeant for Islamist terrorists. And, yes, working toward the modernization, liberalization and eventual democratization of the wider Middle East is the only certain, long-term way to drain the swamp in which terrorist mosquitoes breed. Here, it is Europe rather than the United States which needs to wake up, urgently, to the imperative of doing more.
> 
> These days, events that happen faraway, in Khartoum or Kandahar, impact directly upon us, sometimes fatally as we commute to work, sitting in the Underground train between Kings Cross and Russell Square. There is no such thing as foreign policy any more. This is perhaps the deepest lesson of the London bombings.
> 
> No, this is not a war in any familiar sense of the term. It is, however, the beginning of a long struggle, in which the conventional distinction between domestic and foreign policy no longer applies. For example, the way we treat our immigrants affects what happens in the Middle East, and our policies in the Middle East affect the way our immigrants will behave. No developed liberal democracy in the world can afford not to have a foreign policy in regions vital to our security.
> 
> Both Europe and the world's other English-speaking democracies need to learn the lessons of London, and fast. But let's be sure we learn the right lessons.
> 
> _Timothy Garton Ash is a professor of European studies at the University of Oxford, and the author of eight books of political writing, most recently Free World: Why a Crisis of the West Reveals the Opportunity of Our Time._


----------



## McG

> *A war without end, an enemy without leaders*
> As global death toll climbs, bin Laden hunter sees need for a change of strategy
> The Associated Press
> (Printed: Edmonton Journal)
> Sunday, July 10, 2005
> 
> New York and Washington. Bali, Riyadh, Istanbul, Madrid. And now London. When will it end?  No time soon, experts say. One terrorism researcher sees the prospect of "endless" war.  Adds the man who tracked Osama bin Laden for the CIA, "I don't think it's even started yet."
> 
> An Associated Press survey of longtime students of international terrorism finds them ever more convinced the world has entered a long siege in a new kind of war. They believe al-Qaeda is mutating into a global insurgency, technologically astute and almost leaderless.
> 
> Michael Scheuer, the ex-CIA analyst, says that rather than move toward solutions, the U.S. took a big step backward by invading Iraq.
> 
> The 5,362 deaths from terrorism worldwide between March 2004 and March 2005 were almost double the total for the same 12-month period before the 2003 U.S. invasion.
> 
> "We're at the point where jihad is self-sustaining" where Islamic "holy warriors" in Iraq fight America with or without allegiance to al-Qaeda, Scheuer said.
> 
> Thursday's attacks on London's transit system mirrored last year's bombings of Madrid commuter trains, and both point to an al-Qaeda evolving into a movement whose isolated leaders need only offer video or Internet inspiration to local jihadists who carry out the strikes.
> 
> A group using al-Qaeda's name made a claim of responsibility, otherwise unconfirmed, for the London attacks. Experts say the bombings bore the hallmarks of al-Qaeda.
> 
> The movement's evolution has given rise to a "virtual network that is extremely adaptable," said Jonathan Stevenson of the International Institute for Strategic Studies.
> 
> The movement adapted, for example, by switching from targeting aviation, where security was reinforced after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, to the softer targets of mass transit.
> 
> Such compartmentalized groupings, in touch electronically but with little central control, "are going to be a prototype for understanding where terrorist movements are going in the 21st century," said Cynthia Combs, co-author of a terrorism encyclopedia.
> 
> Combs said the so-called Earth and Animal Liberation fronts in the United States are examples -- if less lethal ones -- of "leaderless" militant movements based on isolated cells. She also said it's not unrealistic that another American example -- far-right militia cells -- might make common cause someday with foreign terrorists against the U.S. government.
> 
> Bruce Hoffman, the veteran RAND Corp. specialist who fears an "endless war," dismisses talk of al-Qaeda's back having been broken by the capture of some leaders.
> 
> "From the terrorists' point of view, it seems they have calculated they need to do just one significant terrorist attack a year in another capital, and it regenerates the same fear and anxieties," said Hoffman, who was an adviser to the U.S. occupation authorities in Iraq.
> 
> What should be broken, he said, is the cycle of terrorist recruitment through the generations.
> 
> He and most of the other half-dozen experts said the world's richer powers must address underlying causes -- lessen the appeal of radicalism by improving economies, political rights and education in Arab and Muslim countries.
> 
> Not all agree this is an answer. Stephen Sloan, another veteran scholar in the field, prescribes stoicism.  The American, British and other target publics must give their intelligence and police agencies time to close ranks globally and crush the challenge, said Sloan, of the University of Central Florida.  "The public has to have the resolve to face the reality there will be other incidents," he said.


----------



## McG

> *Can the war on terrorism be won?*
> As long as there are individuals who buy into an ideology of hate and who are intent on carrying out such barbaric attacks, there is very little government leaders can do to eliminate altogether these atrocious and indiscriminate acts
> _W. Andy Knight
> Edmonton Journal Freelance
> Monday, July 11, 2005_
> 
> By carrying out Thursday's orchestrated bomb attacks in London's subway system -- considered the worst assault on the city since the Second World War -- organized terrorist organizations have once again demonstrated why the Anglo-American war on terrorism cannot be won.
> 
> The four coordinated bomb blasts that killed over 50 people and injured 700-plus during the height of rush hour did more than merely shut down London's transport system. It had an instant impact on the London stock market, it clouded the opening of the G-8 Summit in Gleneagles, Scotland, and it put a damper on the giddy victory celebrations a day after London won the bid to host the 2012 Olympics.
> 
> A group calling itself "The Secret Organization of al-Qaeda in Europe" claimed responsibility for the bombings and announced that these actions were in retaliation for Britain's involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan.
> 
> Although so far this claim hasn't been officially verified, the synchronicity of the attacks is eerily reminiscent of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda on the World Trade Centre buildings and the Pentagon.
> 
> If, in fact, there is an al-Qaeda connection to the London attacks, the governments of Italy and Denmark should brace themselves for similar terrorist onslaughts. The same al-Qaeda group in Europe has also claimed responsibility for the last major terror attack in Europe -- the March 2004 string of bombs that hit commuter trains in Madrid and killed 191people. The group has vowed to take revenge on all countries that have joined the Anglo-American "coalition of the willing" in the war in Iraq, but has singled out Italy and Denmark in particular.
> 
> Italy is the closest ally of the U.S. in continental Europe and the third largest Western member of the coalition forces in Iraq today. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has acknowledged that because of Italy's role in Iraq, the country is bracing for a terrorist attack.
> 
> Despite the overwhelming opposition of the people of Denmark to their country's involvement in the Iraq war, Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen, like British Prime Minister Tony Blair, has resisted public pressure to withdraw military forces from Iraq. Denmark's 500 plus troops are being used to train Iraqi security forces based in the southern part of the country. Denmark, like Italy, is on heightened security. But as its Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller said recently, it is only a matter of time before the terrorists "slip through the net."
> 
> Whether or not "The Secret Organization of al-Qaeda in Europe" carried out the London attacks, it is clear that U.S. and British intelligence organizations were unable to intercept the perpetrators. It is a grim reminder that terrorists can strike anywhere and at any time of their choosing, and that our governments are unable to stop them.
> 
> Not that our leaders will concede this. Immediately after the bombings, both Tony Blair and George Bush announced to the world that the U.S. and Britain will not be cowed by terrorists, that they will not yield to such boldface attempts to terrorize the American and British populations, and that the war on terror will continue until it is won.
> 
> While one cannot question these leaders' resolve, major questions will continue to be raised about their ability to "win the war on terrorism."
> 
> As the Israelis have discovered, *terror cannot be eliminated, but only contained*. As long as there are individuals who buy into an ideology of hate and who are intent on carrying out such barbaric attacks, there is very little that government leaders, even those from the most powerful countries in the world, can do to eliminate altogether these atrocious and indiscriminate acts.
> 
> Canada is not immune from terrorism. While we are not directly in the gunsights of al-Qaeda, our military forces are engaged in the U.S. led war on terror in places like Afghanistan. Therefore, we would be wise not to delude ourselves into thinking that terrorism cannot happen here.
> 
> Each Canadian citizen ought to be vigilant and observant whenever they travel on buses, trains, ships and airliners. We should demand that our governments have emergency plans in place should something like the London attacks or the Sept. 11 attacks occur on our soil. But we should never be lulled into believing our political leaders when they say that the war on terrorism will be won.
> 
> Conventional wars pit armed military forces against other armed military forces. *The war on terrorism is unconventional. The targets are shadowy figures distributed across many nations and operating in cells with the ability to act without central command and leadership. It is not easy to identify these cells or to locate the individuals that comprise them. * There is no way of knowing how long this war will last. *Like the Hydra of Greek folklore, when one terrorist cell is coercively eliminated another one seems to pop up in its place*.
> 
> To be even marginally successful, our efforts will require the cooperation and collaboration of the entire international community, not just a small coalition of states -- however powerful -- to dry up the source of funds that terrorists use to finance their attacks, to monitor their movements, and to arrest terrorist suspects. However, some of the countries in our international community are sponsors of terrorism or are quite willing to turn a blind eye to terrorist activity that are specifically aimed at the world's hegemonic power and its allies.
> 
> Subduing terror will also require the cooperation of non-state actors; including some who may have connections to the terrorists. It will also involve training a new corps of youthful intelligence agents who can speak the language of the terrorists, who understand the culture of those suspected of terrorism, and who are willing to sacrifice their own lives for the values that we hold dear.
> 
> Some of this is certainly possible; some is possible in theory. But can the war on terror be finally and irrevocably "won"? Observe New York, Washington, Bali, Hebron, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Madrid, Beslan, and London, and you be the judge.
> 
> _W. Andy Knight is professor of international relations at the University of Alberta._


----------



## McG

> *Capture hearts of Muslims to end terrorism*
> Attacks in Canada are likely and unpreventable, emergency preparedness expert says
> _Mohammed Adam
> CanWest News Service with files from The Canadian Press
> (Printed in the Edmonton Journal)
> Monday, July 11, 2005_
> 
> TORONTO -- Canada is a likely target for terrorism but there is little the country can do to prevent a large-scale disaster similar to last week's subway bombings in London, says the executive director for the Canadian Centre for Emergency Preparedness.
> 
> "London knew that its underground was a prime target and they were unable to prevent it," Adrian Gordon said in an interview Saturday on the first day of a World Conference on Disaster Management being held in Toronto.
> 
> "We are going to be unable to prevent something similar from happening in Canada -- which it probably will -- because there is only so much one can do."
> 
> Gordon and other security and emergency relief experts from more than 50 countries began the conference with a call for a dramatic rethinking of the global strategy on terrorism.
> 
> The experts say the free world has done a good job so far using counterterrorism measures and military force to combat terrorism. But it hasn't done as well in understanding and tackling the disenchantment that creates it.
> 
> They say the al-Qaeda terror network's development into a global movement that is increasingly attracting new recruits warrants a "challenge to the assumptions to the war on terror."
> 
> Former Scotland Yard anti-terrorism expert Peter Power says the *West must embark on a new campaign for the hearts and minds of Muslims, especially the young ones*. And it has to critically re-examine government policies to find out if they are feeding the fires of hatred in the Muslim world.
> 
> "Yes, we have to attack and annihilate those who seek to kill us, and so there's no point in having a dialogue with al-Qaeda, because they want to kill us," said Power, who spent 20 years as a Scotland Yard counterterrorism official during the heyday of the IRA terror campaign.
> 
> "But we are in a long game and we've got to get into the Muslim communities, go to the mullahs, go to the teachers, go to the children and understand what is happening. *We may not prevent the bomb next year, but we could be getting the preventive process ready to stop the bomb in five years*."
> 
> Gordon agreed. "*The war on terrorism is necessary, but it can't all be meeting force with force*," he said. "It seems that there is a great reluctance to deal with root causes of terrorism that are intrinsically linked with foreign policies. But we need to spend a lot more time looking at those causes."
> 
> Originally meant to focus on the threat of pandemics and natural disasters, the conference has been overshadowed by last week's terror attacks in London. Anne McLellan, the deputy prime minister and public safety minister, is to address the more than 1,000 delegates and experts today on what lies ahead for Canada.
> 
> Over the next three days, the experts will focus on the practicalities of fighting terrorism and natural disasters.
> 
> Power, who is now an international security consultant, says what he finds troubling is that despite the war on terror, the hatred of the West -- especially the U.S. -- is growing, not abating.
> 
> Power says it is that kind of mind-set that the West has to deal with, and argues it is vital to try to understand why so many men and women around the world feel this way. And clearly, he said, there has to be more to it than the oft-held belief that "they hate our freedoms."
> 
> He said Britain had to make an effort to understand the IRA, which had killed thousands of people, in order to mount an effective campaign against the organization.
> 
> The free world must do the same in the Muslim world.


----------



## McG

Infanteer said:
			
		

> The problem I have with title of "terrorism", "terrorists" and "War on Terror" is that it automatically brings up the very loose definition of terrorism that I talked about above.  As well, terrorism has, due to its historical connotations that associate it with anarchists, 5th columnist communists, and state-sponsered groups like Abu Nidal, a legal implication.  We put wanted posters up of these men, convict them in absentia of crimes in our State, and say that the Rule of Law will deal with them.  This carries the connotation that it is a criminal act of murder or assault, rather than one of war (where combatants are legitimately inflicting casulties upon the enemy).  Terrorism implies individuals who act against civilians - what we are seeing (IMHO) is a movement; one of those who view themselves as soldiers and view the victims as legitimate targets of Jihad.  Putting them into a paradigm of terrorist criminals may handicap our efforts to defeat them by giving us an incomplete understanding of who the enemy is.  Sure, this may run contrary to our existing defintion of "war" and "soldiers", but we all know that the Geneva Convention, the Hague Conventions and the Laws of Land Warfare don't extend far beyond the borders of the signatories.  Let's not pound their square peg into our round hole.
> 
> All I've looked at regarding the current situation leads me to believe that there is nothing criminal about it; they've declared war, announced Jihad, and issued Fatwas.  We can denigrate them, label them fascists, and attempt to poke holes in their authority to do so, but, as subsequent events have shown, it should be as real as Germany crossing into Poland or Japan attacking Pearl Harbour.


  We are at war with the enemy, but there is very much that is criminal about some of the enemy's tactics.  The Hague and Geneva conventions have achieved customary status (meaning even non-signatories are held to be governed by these international laws).  Identifying individuals as war or humanitarian law criminals may do noting to win the war.  However, holding the murderers accountable gives us a tool to ensure they are punished and locked away well after the war is over.  We did not pretend that the holocaust was legitimate because the Nazis executed it through a war, and we should not pretend the terrorists are employing legitimate means either.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Look at Afghanistan - the Soviets dispersed the Afghans in days, driving there tanks in and saying "Zdravstvuite, Comrades!"  13 years later, the Afghans were still fighting and any hope for a Soviet backed Communist government fell.  Does our current situation not seem to be a replay of this?


I'd have to do a little more investigating before I could answer this.  However, just as a thinking point: Was the Soviet approach in Afghanistan similar to the Russian approach in Chechnya? (i.e.: very heavy handed & not much in the way of reconstruction)  Could it be that Soviet failure in Afghanistan was a failure to win a â Å“hearts & mindsâ ? campaign?  Could it be that Soviet failure in Afghanistan was a failure to establish institutions (esp security agencies) that would sustain themsleves?  Could it be that Soviet failure in Afghanistan was because the Afghanis new that the Soviets had no intentions of returning that country to its own independant destiny?



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Here is where I do have a problem - you point to a "terrorist ideology"; but if what I advocated above (Islamic Insurgency based upon Jihad against trasgression of dar al-Islam by infidels and apostates) has any foundation, then the "terrorist ideology" doesn't exist.  I'm not sure we are being attacked because they are poor.  The Afghans lived in a slagheap before, and they were our Allies because they were killing atheist Soviets.


I think you are over simplifying the meaning behind "terrorist ideology."  It has room for â Å“Jihad against trasgression of dar al-Islam by infidels and apostates,â ? but it also includes identifying the west as responsible for certain hardships or alienation.



			
				Dare said:
			
		

> I understand why you consider it total war. It is not Total War. It has a wide spectrum, yes, but it is not all encompassing, as of yet.


The concept of "total war" was evolved describing states fighting states.  Obviously, to apply it to our current enemy (which does not exist as a state) requires some literary license.  Our enemy cannot mobilize the full resources of the state to draft armies and manufacture weapons.  The enemy does not have the firepower to put us into a MAD nuclear battle.  However, make no mistake, the enemy is putting every available resource into this war.  The enemy does not consider the principal of proportionality when determining valid targets.  The enemy is determined to not only destroy our ability to fight, but to destroy our society.


----------



## couchcommander

Bah I hate wading into these things, but...

Infanteer,

The people we are dealing with are indeed terrorists IMO. This can be seen in the methods they use to acheive their goals, namely employing tactics which are designed more to instill fear in the general population than to do serious damage to their target (our nations as a whole). Furthermore, these individuals and groups are pursuing very specific aims, though each groups particular reasons differ, in large part it is to get us out of middle east.   

Finally these groups and individuals are indeed conducting criminals acts (and IMO need to be dealt with accordingly). They cannot declare war on a nation state anymore than you or I could (well, we could, but it would be meaningless...). Though there are indeed cases where this "War on Terror" will lead us into "war" (I say "war" because if the US decides, like it has for the last half century, to forgo the requirement of international law to actually _declare war_ before invading a country, then it's difficult for me to call it war proper), ie when we encounter a state that is sponsoring terrorism, like Afghanistan, Iraq, and what will likely end up being Iran, NK, Syria, and a host of other smaller targets; groups that carry out attacks independantly of a state are criminals, however organized and effective they might be. This is because they are indeed committing a crime, both in the state in whch they launch their attack, and in the state from which they operate. They are not a state, I wouldn't even call them a nation. They are not a government. They have no authority to proclaim legislation, govern, declare war, etc.; they are citizens of another state (or sometimes our own) who are breaking laws.   

Regarding the notion that we are in a state of total war, sorry MCG but I really have to disagree. IMO Right now we are engaged in a very low intensity conflict with dispersed and heterogenous combatants who are pursuing actions against us on a realtively infrequent basis using a limited set of resources. 

When every single person who believes in this extremist cause picks up a rifle and does everything they possibly can to kill or injure our soldiers and citizens whenever possible using every single resource they can get their hands on, then THEY will be in a state of total war, though I doubt we would be. 

[edited to sound less like I was proclaiming gospel....]


----------



## Infanteer

MCG said:
			
		

> We are at war with the enemy, but there is very much that is criminal about some of the enemy's tactics.   The Hague and Geneva conventions have achieved customary status (meaning even non-signatories are held to be governed by these international laws).



I think you'll have to dig deep to find a point where the Hague and Geneva conventions where applicable to a "4th Generation Foe" like Al Qaeda and the "Islamic Insurgency" (let alone a Middle Eastern state).  We can say that it is customary, but seeing how most folks in that area of town haven't given it _de jure_ (in writing) or _de facto_ (in their actions) recognition means that us placing their actions within this Western construct of international law is a stretch.



> Identifying individuals as war or humanitarian law criminals may do noting to win the war.   However, holding the murderers accountable gives us a tool to ensure they are punished and locked away well after the war is over.



I think holding them accountable as murderers is only a facade.  As I've consistenly argued, I believe these folks have declared war in an appropriate manner within their socio-legal system (Fatwas and Jihad) and that they target our civilians and our infrastructure because it is where we are vulnerable - just as we did when we levelled German and Japanese cities with thousand bomber raids.  To me, labelling them criminal (and going after them in such a manner) is like labelling them cowardly; it does nothing but hype up the rhetoric.

To me, the biggest effort should be in undermining them to their own people.  When we call them murderers and convict them of crimes, we only convince ourselves that we are right.  But we won't truely be right until we are victorious and we have destroyed the will of the enemy to resist.  We should put our energy and our policies in pointing out how these people are wrong within their cultural framework (re: Islam) as opposed to ours.  Sounds like a Psyops job rather than a legal one (the latest piece by William Lind discusses this in detail - check it out here).



> We did not pretend that the holocaust was legitimate because the Nazis executed it through a war, and we should not pretend the terrorists are employing legitimate means either.



Apples and oranges.  The Nazi's persecuted their own people, while the Islamists have made frequent and clear pronouncments of their intentions to declare war upon the West and to attack us where they can.  Was the 9/11 attack really a case of underhanded duplicity that nobody saw coming, or should it have been plainly freaking obvious that we would get hit considering that they did it in 1993 and didn't quite pull it off....



> I'd have to do a little more investigating before I could answer this.   However, just as a thinking point: Was the Soviet approach in Afghanistan similar to the Russian approach in Chechnya? (i.e.: very heavy handed & not much in the way of reconstruction)   Could it be that Soviet failure in Afghanistan was a failure to win a â Å“hearts & mindsâ ? campaign?   Could it be that Soviet failure in Afghanistan was a failure to establish institutions (esp security agencies) that would sustain themsleves?   Could it be that Soviet failure in Afghanistan was because the Afghanis new that the Soviets had no intentions of returning that country to its own independant destiny?



As I've said, our intentions are much better than the Soviets, but I think relying on this might miss the point.  Sure, Soviet brutality did drive many to the Mujihadeen, but they were doing it to drive "atheist invaders" out of their country.  All the "big picture" things don't lead me to believe that our invasion could be seen as anything different than the Soviets, the British, the Indians, the Persians, or Alexander.  3,000 years of recorded history seems to point to these folks as being xenophobic and distrustful of other peoples (especially infidels like us) showing them how to live.

Who knows though - from my understanding, we've moved in upon Afghanistan at a time when it is more fractured than usual.  The oddity of the Taliban rendered apart Afghanistan's historically strong religious and tribal framework, giving us an oppurtunity to exploit by getting in while the Afghans are simply worn out.  Needless to say, I remain suspicious of the end-state of our efforts there....



> I think you are over simplifying the meaning behind "terrorist ideology."   It has room for â Å“Jihad against trasgression of dar al-Islam by infidels and apostates,â ? but it also includes identifying the west as responsible for certain hardships or alienation.



I was targetting "terrorist ideology" because I feel it puts them on the level of nutjobs like the Unibomber.  I think that their ideology is far more grounded and complex than that.



> The concept of "total war" was evolved describing states fighting states.   Obviously, to apply it to our current enemy (which does not exist as a state) requires some literary license.   Our enemy cannot mobilize the full resources of the state to draft armies and manufacture weapons.   The enemy does not have the firepower to put us into a MAD nuclear battle.   However, make no mistake, the enemy is putting every available resource into this war.   The enemy does not consider the principal of proportionality when determining valid targets.   The enemy is determined to not only destroy our ability to fight, but to destroy our society.



Agreed - some may not see destruction of our way of life as an immediate goal, but success tends to snowball into expectation, and it would be foolhardy to think that many groups within the "Insurgency" would stop at the immediate goals of getting us out of _Dar al-Islam_.


----------



## Infanteer

couchcommander said:
			
		

> Infanteer,
> 
> The people we are dealing with are indeed terrorists IMO. This can be seen in the methods they use to acheive their goals, namely employing tactics which are designed more to instill fear in the general population than to do serious damage to their target (our nations as a whole).



The 9/11 attacks or the Madrid bombings didn't do serious damage to their targets?!?   In my opinion, drubbing the economy of an Information Age state and affecting the elections (to your favour) of a liberal democracy seem to be "serious".

These men use terrorist tactics  (I don't deny it) but within a framework of Total War - they see their attacks as neccesary in undercutting our will on the mental and, more importantly, the moral Levels of War.   As such, I put their terrorist attacks on the level of Acts of War (things we've done in the past - the OSS in WWII and Strategic Bombing of enemy cities) rather than on the level of lunatic fringe groups that conduct attacks to generally be a nuisence.



> Furthermore, these individuals and groups are pursuing very specific aims, though each groups particular reasons differ, in large part it is to get us out of middle east.



Agree.   Probably best desribed as an "NGO", I view the Islamic Insurgency as a wide array of groups with a wide array of aims - we've been noticing them of late because Osama bin Laden and Co. has done a bang-up job of focusing their attention on the United States and the West in general - this is why we have Algerian, Filipino and Ugandan groups swearing fealty to Al Qaeda and expanding beyond their domestic squabbles.



> Finally these groups and individuals are indeed conducting criminals acts (and IMO need to be dealt with accordingly).



See above regarding criminality.



> They cannot declare war on a nation state anymore than you or I could (well, we could, but it would be meaningless...).



Why not?   They have (very publically) and they have backed up their words with actions.   I follow the line of people like William Lind and Martin van Crevald that this war is a "4th Generation" one in which the State has lost its monopoly on war - we now have groups, gangs, tribes, and organizations doing so.   The legality of whether they can is moot because they have.



> Though there are indeed cases where this "War on Terror" will lead us into "war" (I say "war" because if the US decides, like it has for the last half century, to forgo the requirement of international law to actually _declare war_ before invading a country, then it's difficult for me to call it war proper), ie when we encounter a state that is sponsoring terrorism, like Afghanistan, Iraq, and what will likely end up being Iran, NK, Syria, and a host of other smaller targets; groups that carry out attacks independantly of a state are criminals, however organized and effective they might be. This is because they are indeed committing a crime, both in the state in whch they launch their attack, and in the state from which they operate. They are not a state, I wouldn't even call them a nation. They are not a government. They have no authority to proclaim legislation, govern, declare war, etc.; they are citizens of another state (or sometimes our own) who are breaking laws.



Again, bashing a square peg into a round hole with an inappropriate Western framework of war and legality.   How does the ramrodding all these snazzy conventions tied to Western tradition and the Westphalian model of the State do us any good against a foe who has, since the _Hijra_ of Mohammed, looked to the _Qu'ran_ and the _Hadith_ for guidence (and not to the Peace of Westphalia or the Geneva Conventions)?

As I mentioned above in my response to McG, I'd rather be focussed on undermining their efforts through their reference point and not ours.

3 years in, and Al Qaeda seems to be doing better than Imperial Japan was in 1944.   Let's move on about whether these guys are legally the enemy or just a modern day Bonnie and Clyde.   I'll again fall back to Martin van Crevald and The Transformation of War as a rough guide.



> Regarding the notion that we are in a state of total war, sorry MCG but I really have to disagree. IMO Right now we are engaged in a very low intensity conflict with dispersed and heterogenous combatants who are pursuing actions against us on a realtively infrequent basis using a limited set of resources.



As I've said before, the war pervades every facet within all societies involved, is, like the past "total" conflicts is based upon socio-political orders (authoritarian monarchies, fascism, communism, and now fundamentalism), and has dire consequences for failure on either side (in other words, you won't walk away the same if you lose).   There are no "rear areas" and no safe havens; everybody and everything has become a target (including London subways and Saddam Hussein), whether they like it or not.

Intensity is inconsquential - getting nailed with a 707 is just as intense as getting shelled by a Soviet Artilley Brigade (I'd imagine, I've never experience either)



> When every single person who believes in this extremist cause picks up a rifle and does everything they possibly can to kill or injure our soldiers and citizens whenever possible using every single resource they can get their hands on, then THEY will be in a state of total war, though I doubt we would be.



If they are willing to go this far and we aren't, then perhaps we are in trouble, are we not?   After all, so many of the threads in these forums are calls for the Canadian Public to wake up and smell the roses...


----------



## McG

Infanteer said:
			
		

> I was targetting "terrorist ideology" because I feel it puts them on the level of nutjobs like the Unibomber.   I think that their ideology is far more grounded and complex than that.


It might be better to think of "terrorist ideology" as putting them on the same level as â Å“nut-jobsâ ? like Hitler and his national socialist ideology.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> 3,000 years of recorded history seems to point to these folks as being xenophobic and distrustful of other peoples (especially infidels like us) showing them how to live.


Which is why reconstruction has to be seen helping them get back to living under their own path.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> To me, the biggest effort should be in undermining them to their own people.   When we call them murderers and convict them of crimes, we only convince ourselves that we are right.   But we won't truely be right until we are victorious and we have destroyed the will of the enemy to resist.   We should put our energy and our policies in pointing out how these people are wrong within their cultural framework (re: Islam) as opposed to ours.   Sounds like a Psyops job rather than a legal one (the latest piece by William Lind discusses this in detail - check it out here).


Agreed, but . . . 


			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> I'd rather be focussed on undermining their efforts through their reference point and not ours.


one COA need not be mutually exclusive of the other.   We must do both.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> I think holding them accountable as murderers is only a facade.   ...   To me, labelling them criminal (and going after them in such a manner) is like labelling them cowardly; it does nothing but hype up the rhetoric.


If we do not hold the enemy accountable to customary international law, then it legitimizes their tactics.   I'd rather not send the message that the elementary school in town is a legitimate target of war.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> As I've consistenly argued, I believe these folks have declared war in an appropriate manner within their socio-legal system (Fatwas and Jihad) and that they target our civilians and our infrastructure because it is where we are vulnerable - just as we did when we levelled German and Japanese cities with thousand bomber raids.


After the Second World War, we looked back at the horror of some tactics (of both sides), did some re-thinking of what was right, and humanitarian law has evolved.   While legal in 1945, things such as the London Blitz and the fire bombing of Dresden would violate international law today.


... too bad that MMI was not writing her essay now.   This thread would certainly give her more to look at now.


----------



## Infanteer

MCG said:
			
		

> It might be better to think of "terrorist ideology" as putting them on the same level as â Å“nut-jobsâ ? like Hitler and his national socialist ideology.



Hitler made up his own ideology while sitting in jail - the only thing that invalidated it was the fact that we levelled it to the ground (both figuratively and literally).   From what I understand, Osama bin Laden has grounded his cause in 1300 years of Islamic history and a string of events which, no denying, are happening (we do support Israel, we are in the Middle East, we have invaded Iraq, we do dip our fingers in the Oil - the morality of these isn't what I'm debating, just the fact that they are happening).   It seems that many in the Islamic world, from reactionary to conservative to liberal, agree with his message to varying degrees.

I'm curious as to where we are going with the definition "nut job"?   Is it merely some one who uses force to achieve their own means?   As I said before, this would be the rule, and not the exception.



> Which is why reconstruction has to be seen helping them get back to living under their own path.



Reconstruction of civil society sure, but as I alluded to before, I'm not sure Mr Karzai is going to be too legitimate considering he never fought in any of the Afghan wars and he walks around guarded by Americans.   Do you not agree that this could be construed as "puppet" by many?

Also, we may move from simple reconstruction to "searching for monsters to destroy" - this could get us involved in other peoples fights.   I've read some stuff that makes a good point that the Pashtun (nor Pakistan) may not sit well with the Afghanistan that we are building in our image.



> Agreed, but . . . one COA need not be mutually exclusive of the other.   We must do both.



No, but if one COA simply inflames the enemy, then is it the right thing to do?   I have the feeling that we earn scorn by retaliating to an attack by sicking the New York 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals on them.   It is plainly obvious what language the enemy understands, so lets give him his full measure and leave the rest until after the game.



> If we do not hold the enemy accountable to customary international law, then it legitimizes their tactics.   I'd rather not send the message that the elementary school in town is a legitimate target of war.



Nor I, but until most of the Islamic world takes to the streets to oppose nailing a school with a bomb, than customary international law does nothing.   If we have to bend our message of disapproval into their rules, than so be it.



> After the Second World War, we looked back at the horror of some tactics (of both sides), did some re-thinking of what was right, and humanitarian law has evolved.   While legal in 1945, things such as the London Blitz and the fire bombing of Dresden would violate international law today.



Well, some of this I consider a bit of revisionism -   I don't consider the bombings to be the wrong thing; it was done in the proper context of Total War and contributed to victory.   We like to pretend that we're better because we can use PGM's now, but we in the West still reserve the right to loose megatons of destructive power upon entire cities if we must.   As discussed elsewhere, I don't believe in progress - we humans are as nasty and brutish as we were when the Walls of Jericho fell....


----------



## a_majoor

> *And Then They Came After Us*
> We're at war. How about acting like it?
> 
> First the terrorists of the Middle East went after the Israelis. From 1967 we witnessed 40 years of bombers, child murdering, airline hijacking, suicide murdering, and gratuitous shooting. We in the West usually cried crocodile tears, and then came up with all sorts of reasons to allow such Middle Eastern killers a pass.
> 
> Yasser Arafat, replete with holster and rants at the U.N., had become a â Å“moderateâ ? and was thus free to steal millions of his good-behavior money. If Hamas got European cash, it would become reasonable, ostracize its â Å“military wing,â ? and cease its lynching and vigilantism.
> 
> When some tried to explain that Wars 1-3 (1947, 1956, 1967) had nothing to do with the West Bank, such bothersome details fell on deaf ears.
> 
> When it was pointed out that Germans were not blowing up Poles to get back lost parts of East Prussia nor were Tibetans sending suicide bombers into Chinese cities to recover their country, such analogies were caricatured.
> 
> When the call for a â Å“Right of Returnâ ? was making the rounds, few cared to listen that over a half-million forgotten Jews had been cleansed from Syria, Iraq, and Egypt, and lost billions in property.
> 
> When the U.N. and the EU talked about â Å“refugee camps,â ? none asked why for a half-century the Arab world could not build decent housing for its victimized brethren, or why 1 million Arabs voted in Israel, but not one freely in any Arab country.
> 
> The security fence became â Å“The Wall,â ? and evoked slurs that it was analogous to barriers in Korea or Berlin that more often kept people in than out. Few wondered why Arabs who wished to destroy Israel would mind not being able to live or visit Israel.
> 
> In any case, anti-Semitism, oil, fear of terrorism â â€ all that and more fooled us into believing that Israel's problems were confined to Israel. So we ended up with a utopian Europe favoring a pre-modern, terrorist-run, Palestinian thugocracy over the liberal democracy in Israel. The Jews, it was thought, stirred up a hornet's nest, and so let them get stung on their own.
> 
> We in the United States preened that we were the â Å“honest broker.â ? After the Camp David accords we tried to be an intermediary to both sides, ignoring that one party had created a liberal and democratic society, while the other remained under the thrall of a tribal gang.
> 
> Billions of dollars poured into frontline states like Jordan and Egypt. Arafat himself got tens of millions, though none of it ever seemed to show up in good housing, roads, or power plants for his people. The terror continued, enhanced rather than arrested, by Western largess and Israeli concessions.
> 
> *Then the Islamists declared war on the United States. A quarter century of mass murdering of Americans followed in Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, East Africa, the first effort to topple the World Trade Center, and the attack on the USS Cole.*
> 
> We gave billions to Jordan, the Palestinians, and the Egyptians. Afghanistan was saved from the Soviets through U.S. aid. Kuwait was restored after Saddam's annexation, and the holocaust of Bosnians and Kosovars halted by the American Air Force. Americans welcomed thousands of Arabs to our shores and allowed hundreds of madrassas and mosques to preach zealotry, anti-Semitism, and jihad without much scrutiny.
> 
> Then came September 11 and the almost instant canonization of bin Laden.
> 
> Suddenly, the prior cheap shots at Israel under siege weren't so cheap. It proved easy to castigate Israelis who went into Jenin, but not so when we needed to do the same in Fallujah.
> 
> It was easy to slander the Israelis' scrutiny of Arabs in their midst, but then suddenly a few residents in our own country were found to be engaging in bomb making, taking up jihadist pilgrimages to Afghanistan, and mapping out terrorist operations.
> 
> Apparently, the hatred of radical Islam was not just predicated on the â Å“occupationâ ? of the West Bank. Instead it involved the pretexts of Americans protecting Saudi Arabia from another Iraqi attack, the United Nations boycott of Iraq, the removal of the Taliban and Saddam, and always as well as the Crusades and the Reconquista.
> 
> But Europe was supposedly different. Unlike the United States, it was correct on the Middle East, and disarmed after the Cold War. Indeed, the European Union was pacifistic, socialist, and guilt-ridden about former colonialism.
> 
> Hundreds of thousands of Muslims were left alone in unassimilated European ghettoes and allowed to preach or promulgate any particular hatred of the day they wished. Conspire to kill a Salmon Rushdie, talk of liquidating the â Å“apes and pigs,â ? distribute Mein Kampf and the Protocols, or plot in the cities of France and Germany to blow up the Pentagon and the World Trade Center â â€ all that was about things â Å“over thereâ ? and in a strange way was thought to ensure that Europe got a pass at home.
> 
> But the trump card was always triangulation against the United States. Most recently anti-Americanism was good street theater in Rome, Paris, London, and the capitals of the â Å“goodâ ? West.
> 
> *But then came Madrid â â€ and the disturbing fact that after the shameful appeasement of its withdrawal from Iraq, further plots were hatched against Spanish justices and passenger trains.
> *
> *Surely a Holland would be exempt â â€ Holland of wide-open Amsterdam fame where anything goes and Muslim radicals could hate in peace. Then came the butchering of Theo Van Gogh and the death threats against parliamentarian Hirsi Ali â â€ and always defiance and promises of more to come rather than apologies for their hatred.
> *
> *Yet was not Britain different? After all, its capital was dubbed Londonistan for its hospitality to Muslims across the globe. Radical imams openly preached jihad against the United States to their flock as thanks for being given generous welfare subsidies from her majesty's government. But it was the United States, not liberal Britain, that evoked such understandable hatred.
> *
> But now?
> 
> After Holland, Madrid, and London, European operatives go to Israel not to harangue Jews about the West Bank, but to receive tips about preventing suicide bombings. And the cowboy Patriot Act to now-panicked European parliaments perhaps seems not so illiberal after all.
> 
> So it is was becoming clear that butchery by radical Muslims in Bali, Darfur, Iraq, the Philippines Thailand, Turkey, Tunisia, and Iraq was not so tied to particular and â Å“understandableâ ? Islamic grievances.
> 
> *Perhaps the jihadist killing was not over the West Bank or U.S. hegemony after all, but rather symptoms of a global pathology of young male Islamic radicals blaming all others for their own self-inflicted miseries, convinced that attacks on the infidel would win political concessions, restore pride, and prove to Israelis, Europeans, Americans â â€ and about everybody else on the globe â â€ that Middle Eastern warriors were full of confidence and pride after all.*
> 
> _Meanwhile an odd thing happened. It turns out that the jihadists were cowards and bullies, and thus selective in their targets of hatred. A billion Chinese were left alone by radical Islam â â€ even though the Chinese were secularists and mostly godless, as well as ruthless to their own Uighur Muslim minorities. Had bin Laden issued a fatwa against Beijing and slammed an airliner into a skyscraper in Shanghai, there is no telling what a nuclear China might have done.
> 
> India too got mostly a pass, other than the occasional murdering by Pakistani zealots. Yet India makes no effort to apologize to Muslims. When extremists occasionally riot and kill, they usually cease quickly before the response of a much more unpredictable angry populace._
> 
> What can we learn from all this?
> 
> Jihadists hardly target particular countries for their â Å“unfairâ ? foreign policies, since nations on five continents suffer jihadist attacks and thus all apparently must embrace an unfair foreign policy of some sort.
> 
> Typical after the London bombing is the ubiquitous Muslim spokesman who when asked to condemn terrorism, starts out by deploring such killing, assuring that it has nothing to do with Islam, yet then ending by inserting the infamous â Å“butâ ? â â€ as he closes with references about the West Bank, Israel, and all sorts of mitigating factors. Almost no secular Middle Easterners or religious officials write or state flatly, â Å“Islamic terrorism is murder, pure and simple evil. End of story, no ifs or buts about it.â ?
> 
> Second, thinking that the jihadists will target only Israel eventually leads to emboldened attacks on the United States. Assuming America is the only target assures terrorism against Europe. *Civilizations will either hang separately or triumph over barbarism together.* It is that simple â â€ and past time for Europe and the United States to rediscover their common heritage and shared aims in eradicating this plague of Islamic fascism.
> 
> Third,* Islamicists are selective in their attacks and hatred. So far global jihad avoids two billion Indians and Chinese, despite the fact that their countries are far tougher on Muslims than is the United States or Europe. In other words, the Islamicists target those whom they think they can intimidate and blackmail.*
> 
> Unfettered immigration, billions in cash grants to Arab autocracies, alliances of convenience with dictatorships, triangulation with Middle Eastern patrons of terror, blaming the Jews â â€ civilization has tried all that.
> 
> It is time to relearn the lessons from the Cold War, when we saw millions of noble Poles, Romanians, Hungarians, and Czechs as enslaved under autocracy and a hateful ideology, and in need of democracy before they could confront the Communist terror in their midst.
> 
> But until the Wall fell, we did not send billions in aid to their Eastern European dictatorships nor travel freely to Prague or Warsaw nor admit millions of Communist-ruled Bulgarians and Albanians onto our shores.
> 
> â â€ Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson200507220816.asp


----------



## a_majoor

A lovely photo essay to remind us all on just who exactly we are dealing with. We think this started on 9/11, but then again....

http://theanchoressonline.com/2005/07/21/everything-that-came-before-iraq-war/


----------



## I_am_John_Galt

I just posted this on another thread, but John Howard's comments seem appropriate here, too:





> PRIME MIN. HOWARD: Could I start by saying the prime minister and I were having a discussion when we heard about it. My first reaction was to get some more information. And I really don't want to add to what the prime minister has said. It's a matter for the police and a matter for the British authorities to talk in detail about what has happened here.
> 
> Can I just say very directly, Paul, on the issue of the policies of my government and indeed the policies of the British and American governments on Iraq, that the first point of reference is that once a country allows its foreign policy to be determined by terrorism, it's given the game away, to use the vernacular. And no Australian government that I lead will ever have policies determined by terrorism or terrorist threats, and no self-respecting government of any political stripe in Australia would allow that to happen.
> 
> Can I remind you that the murder of 88 Australians in Bali took place before the operation in Iraq.
> 
> And I remind you that the 11th of September occurred before the operation in Iraq.
> 
> Can I also remind you that the very first occasion that bin Laden specifically referred to Australia was in the context of Australia's involvement in liberating the people of East Timor. Are people by implication suggesting we shouldn't have done that?
> 
> When a group claimed responsibility on the website for the attacks on the 7th of July, they talked about British policy not just in Iraq, but in Afghanistan. Are people suggesting we shouldn't be in Afghanistan?
> 
> When Sergio de Mello was murdered in Iraq -- a brave man, a distinguished international diplomat, a person immensely respected for his work in the United Nations -- when al Qaeda gloated about that, they referred specifically to the role that de Mello had carried out in East Timor because he was the United Nations administrator in East Timor.
> 
> Now I don't know the mind of the terrorists. By definition, you can't put yourself in the mind of a successful suicide bomber. I can only look at objective facts, and the objective facts are as I've cited. The objective evidence is that Australia was a terrorist target long before the operation in Iraq. And indeed, all the evidence, as distinct from the suppositions, suggests to me that this is about hatred of a way of life, this is about the perverted use of principles of the great world religion that, at its root, preaches peace and cooperation. And I think we lose sight of the challenge we have if we allow ourselves to see these attacks in the context of particular circumstances rather than the abuse through a perverted ideology of people and their murder.
> 
> PRIME MIN. BLAIR: And I agree 100 percent with that. (Laughter.)


http://corner.nationalreview.com/05_07_17_corner-archive.asp#070312


----------



## devil39

Garth Pritchard is a straight shooter and a great guy.  And a true professional.


----------



## McG

Infanteer said:
			
		

> From what I understand, Osama bin Laden has grounded his cause in 1300 years of Islamic history and a string of events which, no denying, are happening.   It seems that many in the Islamic world, from reactionary to conservative to liberal, agree with his message to varying degrees.


This does not make the â Å“terrorist ideologyâ ? any less of an ideology.   It is in fact a nationalist ideology (and even in western nations, nationalism has managed to fuse itself with conservative, liberal, and socialist ideologies).   Like other ideologies it inculcates people to its views (including teaching them not to be influenced by opposing ideologies), it advocates reforms in the structures of society, it prescribes a solution to perfect human behaviour (adherence to Islam), and it includes a path to implementing the ideology (militant jihad that sees civil populations as legitimate targets).   



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> I'm curious as to where we are going with the definition "nut job"?


Just threw it in to quote your use.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Reconstruction of civil society sure, but as I alluded to before, I'm not sure Mr Karzai is going to be too legitimate considering he never fought in any of the Afghan wars and he walks around guarded by Americans.   Do you not agree that this could be construed as "puppet" by many?


Once again, this is why elections are important.



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Well, some of this I consider a bit of revisionism - I don't consider the bombings to be the wrong thing; it was done in the proper context of Total War and contributed to victory.


City bombing in the Second World War could really devolve into a thread of its own.   Some attacks were certainly against legitimate targets, but others were launched against questionable targets (and any military gain from these attacks was typically well down on the list of objectives).   In the end, the world did not know any better back then.   We do now.   Thus, using these horrors of our past is inappropriate to legitimise terror tactics today

More to follow.


----------



## Slim

devil39 said:
			
		

> Garth Pritchard is a straight shooter and a great guy.   And a true professional.



What his article said was pretty frightening though...Unfortunately I believe it 100%

Slim


----------



## Infanteer

MCG said:
			
		

> This does not make the "terrorist ideology" any less of an ideology.   It is in fact a nationalist ideology (and even in western nations, nationalism has managed to fuse itself with conservative, liberal, and socialist ideologies).   Like other ideologies it inculcates people to its views (including teaching them not to be influenced by opposing ideologies), it advocates reforms in the structures of society, it prescribes a solution to perfect human behaviour (adherence to Islam), and it includes a path to implementing the ideology (militant jihad that sees civil populations as legitimate targets).



Ok, sure.   Again, I question the use of the term "terrorist ideology" as it relegates this movement to the fringe, which I don't believe it is.   As well, "terrorist ideology" seems to imply that random violence is the main focus and the endstate of such a pattern of thought, which it isn't.   I'd say that Islamists are no more prone to using violence to achieve their means then the mulititude of other human societes (one only has to look at the history of the West for the last 100 years to bear that out) - they only arrive at the end point in a different manner.

I'd rather refer to it as an "Islamist ideology", and we can put it on the pedestel with our "Liberal Democratic ideology".   Just as when "Liberal Democratic ideology" faced off against "Communism/Bolshevism", in the end it will be conviction, will, and resilency that will show us which one is stronger.



			
				MCG said:
			
		

> Once again, this is why elections are important.



And once again, is throwing "instant elections" on a people in which the concept is foreign really workable?   From my understanding of Islam, popular will and representaion isn't a big factor in politics - it seems that the legitimacy of a ruler is found in his ability to protect and promote the _Shari'a_ and to have the support of the _Ulemma_.

Of course, there is some particularities of Afghan society with regards to tribal politics and the Loya Jirga, but pasting these institutions on a liberal democratic, Constitutional framework still seems to be stretch to me.   It took us a few hundred years of political and social evolution to figure out that popular elections worked for us - hell; women and non-Europeans (meaning, universal sufferage) haven't even had the vote for 100 years yet, so I think expecting others to pick it up as useful to civil society is a stretch.



			
				MCG said:
			
		

> In the end, the world did not know any better back then.



Ahh...the illusion (hubris?) of the notion of progress.   We didn't know better in 1944 when we levelled cities with bombers, so now we have nuclear weapons that can do the job with the press of a button.

I'm trying to guess the point in which we (in the West I'm assuming) purified ourselves of banality and became moral in our killing of other people.   I have no doubt in my mind that we could easily step back to that level of savagery if so desired - it's in the basic nature of humanity to do so.


----------



## The_Falcon

No offense to you Bossi, but the Garth Pritchard article was just a longer version of the sameone I posted under the Thread "CBC loses the truth".  But I still like what he says in this longer version.


----------



## Infanteer

I think the crux of the matter is that some people refuse to look at the enemy as "the enemy".  Kudos to Garth Pritchard for the good piece.


----------



## Slim

Infanteer said:
			
		

> I think the crux of the matter is that some people refuse to look at the enemy as "the enemy".   Kudos to Garth Pritchard for the good piece.



I wonder what their opinion will be if/when downtown Toronto/Montreal/Vacouver/Calgary start to go boom right under their smug little noses?!


----------



## The_Falcon

Slim said:
			
		

> I wonder what their opinion will be if/when downtown Toronto/Montreal/Vacouver/Calgary start to go boom right under their smug little noses?!



We all know the answer, CBC "There were serveral explosions (not bombings of course), in (insert city name here) this morning.  The cause of these explosions is not known at this point yet, early reports indicate they may have been caused by humans opposed to the Governments current military occupation of Afghanistan.  We have expert Gwynne Dyer hear at CBC world HQ in Toronto, to help us understand the present situation.  Gwynne your thoughts?"


----------



## tblakemore

Well, the station isn't called the *Communist Broadcasting Corporation* for nothing!!


----------



## Slim

Tristan Blakemore said:
			
		

> Well, the station isn't called the *Communist Broadcasting Corporation* for nothing!!



Well, with any luck the Freedom Fighters (Read: Murdering terrorist scumbags) would hit CBC first...I don't suppose we'de be that lucky though.

Kind of makes one wonder what the media in this country really want...Because under the theocratic auspises of the the Taliban and A.Q. they woiuldn't be able to say even a tenth of what they wanted to. 

Their only goal in life seems to be trying to get a rise out of people...And its not a new thing either. I saw an interview with PM Pierre Trudeau the other day during the FLQ crisis. He had just invoked the War Measures Act and deployed the crunchies to Ottawa and Montreal. Some jerkoff from the media was trying to give him a rough go and embarrass him on camera. I must say that even though I don't like what Trudeau did to the military he certainly gave better than he got and made the reported look like an ass...And did it so that the country actually realized it too!

Precious moments in history!

Slim


----------



## Cdn Blackshirt

Just as a side note, I accidentally ended up on the CBC last night and they were doing a special on the new Diamond Mine towns in the Northwest Territories.

Specifically, they managed to turn the mini-documentary into an indictment of the corporations for having the nerve to pay good wages to natives who otherwise would've been unemployed, because the natives were choosing to spend this newfound wealth in Yellowknife gambling and transitioning from alcohol abuse to crack and cocaine abuse.

In all seriousness, just as Martin made a good choice with Hillier to reengineer the CF, he needs to find someone else to reengineer the CBC....they do so much damage to this country with their apologist outlook, it's sickening....



Matthew.


----------



## a_majoor

A good summation of the enemy forces in WW IV; not just terrorists, and not just governments either. You might think of this as "outsourcing" warfare, Iranian strategic goals, Saudi finance and Syrian logistical support is being contracted out to radical Jihadi groups (with AQ being the best known) to do the actual "trigger work". 

In that sense the authour is correct, we are fighting a sucker's war since we are trying to kill wasps one at a time and not burning out their nests. In other threads, Infanteer has mentioned using local systems of belief to de legitamize the Jihadis, and I have spoken of using the "Cedar Revolution" model to break enemy governments and deny the power of the state to the Jihadis. A combination of these methods and others (such as economic carrots and sticks, pulling the plug on the middle eastern oil economy through reconfiguring our own economy, and the application of military power to high value targets) will be needed to take down the trheat to the West:



> *Coalition of Evil*
> The big picture of our war.
> 
> The al Qaeda watchers have a new chant: They tell us that the once-centralized terror organization is now largely decentralized, and that the separate cells have a great deal of autonomy. Osama bin Laden may still provide the ideology, but the locals do their own planning and operations. Thus, the Washington Post found that the expert consensus on the London attacks was that, yes, these people might be linked to al Qaeda in a broad, political/religious/ideological way, but the operation itself, like many in the recent past (Madrid, for example), was a local product.
> 
> To be sure, this claim is carefully hedged with language like â Å“but bin Laden (or Zawahiri or Zarqawi or whoever) still has a great deal of influence,â ? so that if it turns out that AQ is more centralized than not, they can still say â Å“I told you so.â ?
> 
> Nice to have that sort of flexibility. And they're right to be flexible, because there is every reason to believe that both statements are correct: *There are plenty of independent cells (indeed, there are plenty of terrorist groups), but there is intimate cooperation, which runs through the terror masters of Iran, Syria, and Saudi Arabia.*
> 
> Some of the smartest AQ watchers, like Peter Bergen, have always said that the organization is like a decentralized corporation, not a military style top-down structure. So the notion of highly independent cells is old hat, neither an analytic breakthrough nor, in fact, a recent development.
> 
> Many of the watchers have earned their credentials and are entitled to our respect, but they're groping pieces of the animal, not sensing its overall shape. Shortly after the liberation of Afghanistan, I wrote that it no longer made sense to talk about al Qaeda as the primary organizing force of the terror network, because al Qaeda had been shattered and had lost its operational base with the defeat of the Taliban. I suggested that there were many different terrorist groups â â€ the most important of which was, and is, Hezbollah â â€ and they would cooperate on a rough division of labor, depending on local capacity, expertise, connections, and so forth. But I also argued that there was now a new operational base: Iran, where bin Laden and several others had fled from Afghanistan. And I insisted that there would be considerable coherence in terrorist actions, because the mullahs would insist on overall guidance.
> 
> *The centrality of Iran in the terror network is the dirty secret that most everyone knows, but will not pronounce. Our military people in both Iraq and Afghanistan have copious evidence of the Iranian role in the terror war against us and our allies.* Every now and then Rumsfeld makes a passing reference to it. But we have known about Iranian assassination teams in Afghanistan ever since the fall of the Taliban, and we know that Iranians continue to fund, arm, and guide the forces of such terrorists as Gulbadin Hekmatyar. We know that Zarqawi operated out of Tehran for several years, and that one of his early successes â â€ the creation of Ansar al Islam in northern Iraq, well before the arrival of Coalition forces â â€ had Iranian approval and support. We also know that Zarqawi created a European terror network, again while in Tehran, and therefore the â Å“newsâ ? that he has been recycled into the European theater is not news at all. It is testimony to his, and the Iranians, central role in the terrorist enterprise. *And we know â â€ from documents and photographs captured in Iraq during military operations against the terrorists â â€ that the jihad in Iraq is powerfully supported by Damascus, Tehran, and Riyadh.*
> 
> The insistence that â Å“al Qaedaâ ? â â€ defined as the main enemy â â€ is highly decentralized has a lethal effect on designing an effective antiterrorist policy, for it reinforces the strategic paralysis that currently afflicts this administration. If we conceive the war against the terrorists as a long series of discrete engagements against separate groups in many countries, we will likely fail, beginning with Iraq. We have killed thousands of terrorists there, and arrested many more, and yet we clearly have not dominated them. I quite believe that we are gaining support and cooperation from the Iraqi people, and I am in awe of the bravery and skills of our military men and women. *But we are fighting a sucker's war in Iraq, because the terrorists get a great deal of their support from the Syrians, Saudis, and Iranians, all of whom are rolling in oil money, all of whom are maneuvering desperately for survival, because they fear our most potent weapon: the democratic revolution that is simmering throughout the region, most recently in a series of street battles in Iranian cities.*
> 
> *We can't win this thing unless we recognize the real dimensions of the enemy forces, and the global aspirations they harbor. The battle for Iraq is today's fight, but they intend to expand the war throughout the Western world. Indeed, that was their plan from the very beginning. From 9/11.* Here is a story (thanks to Captain Ed at â Å“Captain's Quartersâ ? http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/) that should make the matter clear to all of us. It appeared in the London Times on July 24:
> 
> Mohammed Afroze was sentenced (in Bombay, India) to seven years after he admitted that he had a role in an al Qaeda plot to attack London, the Rialto Towers building in Melbourne (Australia) and the Indian Parliament.
> 
> Afroze admitted that he and seven al Qaeda operatives planned to hijack aircraft at Heathrow and fly them into the two London landmarks. The suicide squad included men from Bangladesh, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, Afroze said. They booked seats on two Manchester-bound flights, but fled just before they were due to board.
> 
> If that's right â â€ and I would have expected a feeding frenzy over this court judgment, wouldn't you? â â€ then 9/11 was conceived as a global extravaganza, not just an attack against the United States. And I wonder if the â Å“cellsâ ? in India, Australia and Great Britain were all that decentralized. After all, they were coordinated for a specific date, weren't they?
> 
> I have long believed that when we finally unravel the 9/11 plot, we will find a great number of terrorist organizations involved, each playing its role in supporting the enterprise. I don't believe it's sensible to believe that these various groups, scattered around the world, could have coordinated such an undertaking only by their own efforts; we have seen too many terrorist screw-ups to take that one seriously (if Mr. Afroze is to be believed, for example, he and his guys chickened out at the last moment, just like numerous other suicide terrorists have).
> 
> President Bush's original instincts were right:* We are at war with a series of terrorist groups, supported by a group of nations, and it makes no sense to distinguish between them. We're fighting fiercely against the terror groups, and we're killing and defeating lots of them. But we're not nearly as vigorous as we should be in speeding up the fall of the mullahs, the Assads, and a Saudi royal family that has played the leading role in spreading the doctrines that inspire the terrorists.*
> 
> Can we move a bit faster, please?
> 
> â â€ Michael Ledeen, an NRO contributing editor, is most recently the author of The War Against the Terror Masters. He is resident scholar in the Freedom Chair at the American Enterprise Institute.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/ledeen/leeden200507270805.asp


----------



## mdh

What you have to understand about the CBC is that it's an institution dominated by aging baby boomers whose frame of reference was the Summer of Love in 1968, the Vietnam War and Watergate.   

Most of them have created sinecures within the CBC "system" and are generally so well entrenched that they are beyond reproach. To borrow some Gramsci - they are something of a class in themselves - establishing hegemony and imposing a kind of "dominant ideology" inside the corporation.

There is however what I like to call a CBC underclass because the corporation employs an astonishing number of freelancers, part-timers and other underemployed "personalities", writers and reporters. This underclass is in constant competition with each other for preferment and hiring - often with the view to getting a coveted permanent position within CBC. These preferments are granted by the aging overseers described above, and as a result, there is a high degree of ideological conformity required to survive and prosper.

Not surprisingly, therefore, they are almost overwhelmingly leftist in orientation (you know the type - wearing black all the time, hanging out in various trendy pleasure dens, complaining endlessly about the lack of a secure job in the "underfunded" CBC, always considering law school, always considering writing a novel, always considering going back to school and getting a PhD, etc, etc).

In terms of education, they are also overwhelming drawn from the liberal arts and have little knowledge or sympathy with business or science. (As for any serious knowledge of the military - forget it.)

Many are suffering from an odd mixture of "fame fever" and "the Hamlet complex" - to be or not to be - which makes them reluctant to adopt any value system that would impede what the pop psychologists would call "self-actualization." (Which BTW our senior NCOs are very good at instilling in recruits  >).

Typically, they will have an abiding contempt for what used to be called the "bourgeois" order and deliberately place themselves in opposition to middle-class values and other truisms they dismiss as conventional and arbitrary.

Consequently, they prefer bohemia to the suburbs and consider people who live there as conventional and uninteresting. Their taste for statist solutions and predilection for socialism in its more extreme forms is therefore a natural extension of this self-imposed social and cultural rebellion; (the statist tendency can be partly attributed to pure self-interest - since larger government spending benefits public institutions like the CBC.)

Relativism rules their lives to a degree most military people would find uncomfortable - if not antithetical to everything the military stands for. They often have a romantic fascination for the "rebel" (again for largely narcissistic reasons)   and a professed sympathy for the underdog - even if these categories are always applied within a leftist framework.

Their reaction to GWOT assumes that US imperialism is solely responsible - and the Iraq War irredeemable.   (It goes without saying that they would agree with Michael Moore's assessment of the Bush Administration.)

This has been amply demonstrated by the CBC's inability to adopt an editorial policy that labels the London bombers as "terrorists". But given the above description, is it any wonder?

Cheers, mdh


----------



## Slim

Cdn Blackshirt said:
			
		

> In all seriousness, just as Martin made a good choice with Hillier to reengineer the CF, he needs to find someone else to reengineer the CBC....they do so much damage to this country with their apologist outlook, it's sickening....
> Matthew.



Given what CBS and MDH have said about the CBC I think that the CDS himself would be perfect for the position. I, personally, would love to see someone like the CDS let loose on those baby-boomer asshats. i would also pay good money to be there when it happens!


----------



## jules

COMMENT: The madrassa industry

Ishtiaq Ahmed / Daily Times (Pakistan) / July 27, 2005 

The international jihad recruited idealist young Muslim men from all over the world for the Afghan war. Some of them went to the madrassas. This industry has now gone bust. Those who needed its products for fighting Communism are now selling off their shares. The Pakistani investors should watch out 

The bomb blasts of July 7, 2005 have been connected to religious schools known as madrassas in Pakistan which, according to the British police, three of the four suicide bombers visited recently. Their families have also confirmed that the visits did take place. For once the market for conspiracy theories about a Jewish-Hindu-Christian diabolical plot to defame Islam and Muslims may have a short life-span, although I have already received a barrage of emails, denying with amazing bull-headed obstinacy that the suicide bombers were British Muslims of Pakistani origin. Some totally wacky theories suggest that the three men of Pakistani-origin worked for the British intelligence which orchestrated the attacks to create a scare of Muslim terrorism. 

One of the suicide bombers, Muhammad Siddiq Khan, left behind a 14-month old daughter and a young wife. There is little doubt in my mind that Siddiq and his three younger comrades were idealists who had been brainwashed to believe that their faith and the ummah needed their supreme sacrifice. Whereas their mentors have yet not been traced and the entire network has not been uncovered, the fact remains that the jihadi factories (called madrassas) churning out a nihilistic worldview are still in business in Pakistan. 

We were told by no less than President Pervez Musharraf in January 2002 when he first publicly announced his about-turn on jihad that the madrassas had been doing useful work, providing shelter, food and religious education to children from poor families who had no means of supporting themselves. Consequently he did not plan to dismantle them, but that those which preached extremism and terrorism would be closed down. 

On the surface, such a description sounded sympathetic. Of course the general and his buddies never thought that it is not written in the stars that millions of Pakistani families should continue to remain poor and destitute so that they can only turn to the madrassas for help. 

Neither did he mention that until the Afghan jihad was taken up by Pakistan, there were few madrassas in Pakistan and they took in only as many pupils as were needed by the mosques. Caring for the poor was not their agenda. The madrassas corresponded roughly to the number of mosques under the control of different sub-sects of Deobandis, Barelwis, Ahl-e-Hadith, Shia and so on. In 1956 there were only 244 madrassas in Pakistan. Recent estimates range from 13,000 to 15,000 with an enrolment of 1.5 to two million (unpublished report by Dr Saleem Ali, Islamic Education and Conflict: Understanding the Madrassahs of Pakistan). 

The syllabi taught in those traditional madrassas was woefully archaic since much of it was based on assumptions that the earth was flat and the sun and moon rotated around it, while the stars were fixed lights in the seven-tier heaven. The laws and moral values taught also corresponded to a static worldview that made any notion of progress beyond the severely segregated societies of the 7th to 12th centuries impossible to grasp, much less accept. 

But in all honesty such madrassas produced generally decent, hardworking and frugal prayer leaders and minor and major scholars of Islam. I remember that the Maulvi Sahib in our immediate Deobandi mosque was a thorough gentleman and a good human being. The Barelwi maulvi a little further down the road was also a wonderful man. Their silly rivalries provided much amusement and both had a sense of humour. 

But things were never the same once the Afghan jihad started. The joint CIA-Saudi initiative resulted in a proliferation of madrassas, regardless of the genuine need for maulvis. Thanks to the CIA's 51 million US dollar grant to the University of Nebraska to produce pictorial textbooks glorifying jihad, killing, maiming and bombing other human beings was made sufficiently entertaining. Sadism could now be cultivated as a virtue. That was when madrassa doors were opened to the mass of the poor. 

The new "educationâ ? they received was to hate the Russians, later generalised to include any non-Muslim. Jews, Hindus and Christians figured prominently and out of it came the expression of a Yahud-Hunud-Nasara conspiracy against Islam. The phrase had never existed previously but because of its Arabic sounds, it went readily to the hearts and minds of the Islamists. The Buddhists did not fit into the Yahud-Hunud-Nasara formula. But the Taliban by destroying the Buddha statues at Bamiyan indicated that even Buddhists were against Islam and therefore their symbolic presence in Islamic Afghanistan had to be annihilated. 

Until then, the children of the poor were deliberately kept poor so landlords had a regular supply of rural workers whose labour and sweat could be exploited for a pittance. That's why establishing regular secular schools in the rural areas was strongly resisted. The urban poor also never got to school, ending up either as cheap industrial workers or as lumpen elements doing odd tasks in the informal sector of urban economies. 

The need for warriors against the Soviets in Afghanistan meant that a portion of the cheap but plentiful labour force of young men could easily be converted into fodder for jihad in Afghanistan or, later in the Indian-administered Kashmir or used against other targets in India and against religious and ethnic minorities in Pakistan. 

The poor are fodder for war and jihad anywhere in the world though they need leadership and education, technical and otherwise. So, the international jihad also recruited idealist young Muslim men from all over the world for the Afghan war. Some of them went to the madrassas and were trained to hate anyone who did not fit into a narrow and regimented worldview. This industry has now gone bust. Those who needed its products for fighting Communism are now selling off their shares. The Pakistani investors should also watch out. 

Some naÃƒÂ¯ve scholars believe that dismantling the madrassas is undemocratic since it violates the freedoms of association and speech and expression. I wonder if the Ku Klux Klan cannot invoke this democratic right to propagate its ideology all over the USA and establish racist madrassas. The absurdity of such arguments need not be stressed. 

Instead, people should demand that all Pakistani children should receive free and compulsory education based on human rights and all the literary and technical skills needed to create a humane, just and progressive Pakistan. Reformed syllabi based on both rationalist and sacred sciences monitored by the state should be taught in a reasonable number of religious seminaries. It would be best to bring all mosques and madrassas under direct state supervision. 

The author is an associate professor of political science at Stockholm University. He is the author of two books. 


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


----------



## amcd

on the topic of the use of 'terrorist by the media and partially, if not mostly, in response to mdh's excellently cogent post on the nature of the media in canada, I'd submit the following defense.

to me, the 7/7 event is best described this way: islamic militants carried out a terrorist attack against the citizens of london. now, that may well make the 7/7 bombers terrorists, but in order to make these terms equivalent you have to conflate the group (islamic militants) with their tactic (terrorism). maybe this would be appropriate if such a relationship held true always and everywhere, but it doesn't. 

there are groups using terrorist tactics that aren't predominantly motivated by islam (baathists, nepali communists, some kashmiri groups, turkish kurds, etc) and there are even groups using terrorist tactics that claim (some agree, some don't) to be anti-occupation 'insurgents' (baathists again, chechens, taliban). there are also islamic militant groups that sometimes attack military targets, which falls outside most standard definitions of the term terrorism. so, using the term 'terrorists' to describe the perpetrators of all of these varied activities is just imprecise. what purpose does using the term serve?

now, of course, there are emotional reasons for using the term terrorist, and that's how some of us operate, but our enemy isn't the tactic of terrorism, it's the stupid insanity of the people who carry out the attacks and, more than that, it's the ideological badlands that these islamic militant monkies inhabit which is our real enemy. 

it's this conspiratorial anti-liberal ideology, deeply if not widely supported among the foreign islamic community, that is the fundamental enemy. gwot, in the sense that it exists, isn't a war against terrorists, it's a war against ideas. but then wars of ideology aren't entirely new ('the germans weren't so bad, it's just their ideas i wanted to kill'). however, an asymmetrical global campaign against networked, non-state militants representing the extremist wing of one of the world's most influential religions is actually kinda new.  

on the other hand, back to the discussion about terrorism, for as long as there's been war, there's been attacks on civilian populations. justifications for the tactic vary, but any rationalization that works for us can also be used by our enemies.

and here's where there is perhaps a significant departure from, say, mdh's perspective. from my exposure to the dreaded 'pleasure den' dwellers (who am i kidding, if the pleasure den serves guinness, i'm there) there is among them a significant sense of doubt or critical distrust. whether inculcated by education, by experience or by a gift of temperament is perhaps irrelevant, but it's this sense of doubt that typifies the breed for me. among the things doubted are, for example, the assumption that our nation is always doing the right and the good thing. strangely, i believe you can hold this position of national self-doubt and still be patriotic, though some would possibly disagree. though perhaps controversial, I'd argue that critical dissent is indispensable for the maintenance of group sanity. a cursory examination of history will provide multiple examples of groups, nations and even civilizations going completely off the rails and heading collectively into a delusional death spiral. this is certainly something to be avoided.

in this sense perhaps the greatest danger to forward progress is to be convinced that you know the absolute truth and that you are doing the absolute good. this is not just the path to injustice and barbarism, it's also the path to fundamentalism and insanity. this very trait then, of critical doubt, is arguably what makes us different than the islamic militants, our current enemy. 

and so while the military are the able guardians of our national security, the liberally educated relativists are in fact the guardians of something equally important: clarity. 

conflating terms to artificially create a monolithic, comprehensible enemy doesn't serve any real purpose, all it really does is create confusion about the nature of the conflict.

or at least that's something the pleasure seeking narcissists might say to defend their non-use of the phrase terrorist to describe islamic militants. damn hedonists.

disclosure: though I am a member of the media, I do use the term terrorist occasionally, just because i dislike the suicidal bastards so damn much.


----------



## paracowboy

amcd said:
			
		

> on the topic of the use of 'terrorist by the media and partially, if not mostly, in response to mdh's excellently cogent post on the nature of the media in canada, I'd submit the following defense...disclosure: though I am a member of the media, I do use the term terrorist occasionally, just because i dislike the suicidal bastards so darn much. /quote]well said. Now, I have no problem with self-examination. Further, I certainly agree that we need starry-eyed idealists, to keep guys like me in check.
> My problem is the automatic assumption the media appears to hold, that the very nations which have given them a voice, are the bad guys.
> News flash: we are not.
> 
> 
> p.s. If you truly are a reporter, please kick Eric Margolis in the arse for me. Unless you are him. Then please ask someone else to do it for you.


----------



## amcd

paracowboy said:
			
		

> amcd said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> My problem is the automatic assumption the media appears to hold, that the very nations which have given them a voice, are the bad guys.
> News flash: we are not.
> p.s. If you truly are a reporter, please kick Eric Margolis in the arse for me. Unless you are him. Then please ask someone else to do it for you.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> yeah i hear what you're saying. much like any large group, the CF for example, among the media there is a wild range in perspectives, purpose and professionalism. but i can't speak for anyone but myself and my sense of the situation.
> 
> on that note, i haven't met anyone in the professional media who actively believes that we (the Canadian nation) are the bad guys in this conflict. however, many people i've met, including myself, do not hold the opinion that Canada is necessarily, automatically, right. that is to say: i don't assume that we are right now and will continue to be right forever.
> 
> i'm pretty sure that sentiment alone wouldn't sit well with a lot of people. it's certainly arguable.
> 
> p.s. i don't know eric margolis, but i did like his book: 'war at the top of the world.'
Click to expand...


----------



## paracowboy

> however, many people i've met, including myself, do not hold the opinion that Canada is necessarily, automatically, right. that is to say: i don't assume that we are right now and will continue to be right forever.


 well that makes several of us. I don't believe Canada has been right for a very long time. And with the lunatics running the asylum, the future doesn't look too rosy, either. 



> i don't know eric margolis, but i did like his book


hmm, that doesn't speak highly of your taste in reading material.


----------



## paracowboy

pretty good article (with one caveat) that says something similar:



> And Then They Came After Us
> We're at war. How about acting like it?
> by Victor Davis Hanson
> National Review Online
> First the terrorists of the Middle East went after the Israelis. From 1967 we witnessed 40 years of bombers, child murdering, airline hijacking, suicide murdering, and gratuitous shooting. We in the West usually cried crocodile tears, and then came up with all sorts of reasons to allow such Middle Eastern killers a pass.
> Yasser Arafat, replete with holster and rants at the U.N., had become a â Å“moderateâ ? and was thus free to steal millions of his good-behavior money. If Hamas got European cash, it would become reasonable, ostracize its â Å“military wing,â ? and cease its lynching and vigilantism.
> When some tried to explain that Wars 1-3 (1947, 1956, 1967) had nothing to do with the West Bank, such bothersome details fell on deaf ears.
> When it was pointed out that Germans were not blowing up Poles to get back lost parts of East Prussia nor were Tibetans sending suicide bombers into Chinese cities to recover their country, such analogies were caricatured.
> When the call for a â Å“Right of Returnâ ? was making the rounds, few cared to listen that over a half-million forgotten Jews had been cleansed from Syria, Iraq, and Egypt, and lost billions in property.
> When the U.N. and the EU talked about â Å“refugee camps,â ? none asked why for a half-century the Arab world could not build decent housing for its victimized brethren, or why 1 million Arabs voted in Israel, but not one freely in any Arab country.
> The security fence became â Å“The Wall,â ? and evoked slurs that it was analogous to barriers in Korea or Berlin that more often kept people in than out. Few wondered why Arabs who wished to destroy Israel would mind not being able to live or visit Israel.
> In any case, anti-Semitism, oil, fear of terrorism â â€ all that and more fooled us into believing that Israel's problems were confined to Israel. So we ended up with a utopian Europe favoring a pre-modern, terrorist-run, Palestinian thugocracy over the liberal democracy in Israel. The Jews, it was thought, stirred up a hornet's nest, and so let them get stung on their own.
> We in the United States preened that we were the â Å“honest broker.â ? After the Camp David accords we tried to be an intermediary to both sides, ignoring that one party had created a liberal and democratic society, while the other remained under the thrall of a tribal gang.
> Billions of dollars poured into frontline states like Jordan and Egypt. Arafat himself got tens of millions, though none of it ever seemed to show up in good housing, roads, or power plants for his people. The terror continued, enhanced rather than arrested, by Western largess and Israeli concessions.
> Then the Islamists declared war on the United States. A quarter century of mass murdering of Americans followed in Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, East Africa, the first effort to topple the World Trade Center, and the attack on the USS Cole.
> We gave billions to Jordan, the Palestinians, and the Egyptians. Afghanistan was saved from the Soviets through U.S. aid. Kuwait was restored after Saddam's annexation, and the holocaust of Bosnians and Kosovars halted by the American Air Force. Americans welcomed thousands of Arabs to our shores and allowed hundreds of madrassas and mosques to preach zealotry, anti-Semitism, and jihad without much scrutiny.
> Then came September 11 and the almost instant canonization of bin Laden.
> Suddenly, the prior cheap shots at Israel under siege weren't so cheap. It proved easy to castigate Israelis who went into Jenin, but not so when we needed to do the same in Fallujah.
> It was easy to slander the Israelis' scrutiny of Arabs in their midst, but then suddenly a few residents in our own country were found to be engaging in bomb making, taking up jihadist pilgrimages to Afghanistan, and mapping out terrorist operations.
> 
> Apparently, the hatred of radical Islam was not just predicated on the â Å“occupationâ ? of the West Bank. Instead it involved the pretexts of Americans protecting Saudi Arabia from another Iraqi attack, the United Nations boycott of Iraq, the removal of the Taliban and Saddam, and always as well as the Crusades and the Reconquista.
> But Europe was supposedly different. Unlike the United States, it was correct on the Middle East, and disarmed after the Cold War. Indeed, the European Union was pacifistic, socialist, and guilt-ridden about former colonialism.
> Hundreds of thousands of Muslims were left alone in unassimilated European ghettoes and allowed to preach or promulgate any particular hatred of the day they wished. Conspire to kill a Salmon Rushdie, talk of liquidating the â Å“apes and pigs,â ? distribute Mein Kampf and the Protocols, or plot in the cities of France and Germany to blow up the Pentagon and the World Trade Center â â€ all that was about things â Å“over thereâ ? and in a strange way was thought to ensure that Europe got a pass at home.
> But the trump card was always triangulation against the United States. Most recently anti-Americanism was good street theater in Rome, Paris, London, and the capitals of the â Å“goodâ ? West.
> 
> But then came Madrid â â€ and the disturbing fact that after the shameful appeasement of its withdrawal from Iraq, further plots were hatched against Spanish justices and passenger trains.
> 
> Surely a Holland would be exempt â â€ Holland of wide-open Amsterdam fame where anything goes and Muslim radicals could hate in peace. Then came the butchering of Theo Van Gogh and the death threats against parliamentarian Hirsi Ali â â€ and always defiance and promises of more to come rather than apologies for their hatred.
> 
> Yet was not Britain different? After all, its capital was dubbed Londonistan for its hospitality to Muslims across the globe. Radical imams openly preached jihad against the United States to their flock as thanks for being given generous welfare subsidies from her majesty's government. But it was the United States, not liberal Britain, that evoked such understandable hatred.
> 
> But now?
> 
> After Holland, Madrid, and London, European operatives go to Israel not to harangue Jews about the West Bank, but to receive tips about preventing suicide bombings. And the cowboy Patriot Act to now-panicked European parliaments perhaps seems not so illiberal after all.
> 
> So it is was becoming clear that butchery by radical Muslims in Bali, Darfur, Iraq, the Philippines Thailand, Turkey, Tunisia, and Iraq was not so tied to particular and â Å“understandableâ ? Islamic grievances.
> 
> Perhaps the jihadist killing was not over the West Bank or U.S. hegemony after all, but rather symptoms of a global pathology of young male Islamic radicals blaming all others for their own self-inflicted miseries, convinced that attacks on the infidel would win political concessions, restore pride, and prove to Israelis, Europeans, Americans â â€ and about everybody else on the globe â â€ that Middle Eastern warriors were full of confidence and pride after all.
> 
> Meanwhile an odd thing happened. It turns out that the jihadists were cowards and bullies, and thus selective in their targets of hatred. A billion Chinese were left alone by radical Islam â â€ even though the Chinese were secularists and mostly godless, as well as ruthless to their own Uighur Muslim minorities. Had bin Laden issued a fatwa against Beijing and slammed an airliner into a skyscraper in Shanghai, there is no telling what a nuclear China might have done.
> 
> India too got mostly a pass, other than the occasional murdering by Pakistani zealots. Yet India makes no effort to apologize to Muslims. When extremists occasionally riot and kill, they usually cease quickly before the response of a much more unpredictable angry populace.
> 
> What can we learn from all this?
> 
> Jihadists hardly target particular countries for their â Å“unfairâ ? foreign policies, since nations on five continents suffer jihadist attacks and thus all apparently must embrace an unfair foreign policy of some sort.
> 
> Typical after the London bombing is the ubiquitous Muslim spokesman who when asked to condemn terrorism, starts out by deploring such killing, assuring that it has nothing to do with Islam, yet then ending by inserting the infamous â Å“butâ ? â â€ as he closes with references about the West Bank, Israel, and all sorts of mitigating factors. Almost no secular Middle Easterners or religious officials write or state flatly, â Å“Islamic terrorism is murder, pure and simple evil. End of story, no ifs or buts about it.â ?
> 
> Second, thinking that the jihadists will target only Israel eventually leads to emboldened attacks on the United States. Assuming America is the only target assures terrorism against Europe. Civilizations will either hang separately or triumph over barbarism together. It is that simple â â€ and past time for Europe and the United States to rediscover their common heritage and shared aims in eradicating this plague of Islamic fascism.
> 
> Third, Islamicists are selective in their attacks and hatred. So far global jihad avoids two billion Indians and Chinese, despite the fact that their countries are far tougher on Muslims than is the United States or Europe. In other words, the Islamicists target those whom they think they can intimidate and blackmail.
> 
> Unfettered immigration, billions in cash grants to Arab autocracies, alliances of convenience with dictatorships, triangulation with Middle Eastern patrons of terror, blaming the Jews â â€ civilization has tried all that.
> 
> It is time to relearn the lessons from the Cold War, when we saw millions of noble Poles, Romanians, Hungarians, and Czechs as enslaved under autocracy and a hateful ideology, and in need of democracy before they could confront the Communist terror in their midst.
> 
> But until the Wall fell, we did not send billions in aid to their Eastern European dictatorships nor travel freely to Prague or Warsaw nor admit millions of Communist-ruled Bulgarians and Albanians onto our shores.



- I have one quibble with the article: Hanson seems to be saying that being ruthless against the Islamo-loonies will prevent attacks, and cites India and China as examples of countries that have been ruthless against their Muslim radicals and who have not been seriously attacked. 
But (actually, let's make that: *BUT, duhn duhn duhnnn*!) he ignores Russia. Russia has been more ruthless than even the Chinese have been in Tibet, and it doesn't seem to have bought them much peace, at least in Chechnya and Dagestan. Or, for that matter, in Moscow, where Chechen's have struck (twice) although not for quite a while.


----------



## mdh

> yeah i hear what you're saying. much like any large group, the CF for example, among the media there is a wild range in perspectives, purpose and professionalism. but i can't speak for anyone but myself and my sense of the situation.



Hi amcd,

This is a good point and one that we need to keep in mind.  There are plenty of active (and potential) supporters of the CF in the media and we need always remind ourselves that not every reporter is out to get the army.

The National Post, for example, has been pretty fair in its coverage, and its editorial stance has been exemplary (from a CF point of view).

I think we need to regard the media as another dimension of the battlefield - like assessing terrain, supply or enemy strength -it's a reality that commanders need to deal with - whether they like it or not. 

In sum, I think we need understand how the media operates and use that knowledge to our advantage.

cheers, mdh


----------



## Britney Spears

Well this guy obviously knows very little about China. The ethnic based strife amongst the Uigurs and Khazaks are just that, ethnic, despite OBL's efforts to radicalize the movement, which was never particularly popular or prevalent anyway.  There are just as many ethnic Chinese(Hui) Muslims (who's communities have existed since the 7th century) in China as there are Khazak and Uigur Muslims, (who in any case are ethnically Turco-Mongolian, and have very little in comon with Wahhabi Arabs), but we haven't seen too many Chinese jihadis or fatwas, now, have we?

As for India, well last time I checked they were still in a SHOOTING war in Kashmir and have been for what, 20 years now? 

Note to Neo-con dimwits: Muslims all over the world are NOT the same and do NOT share the same goals as OBL. Get over it already.


----------



## McG

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Ok, sure.   Again, I question the use of the term "terrorist ideology" as it relegates this movement to the fringe, which I don't believe it is.   As well, "terrorist ideology" seems to imply that random violence is the main focus and the endstate of such a pattern of thought, which it isn't. ...
> 
> I'd rather refer to it as an "Islamist ideology", and we can put it on the pedestel with our "Liberal Democratic ideology".   Just as when "Liberal Democratic ideology" faced off against "Communism/Bolshevism", in the end it will be conviction, will, and resilency that will show us which one is stronger.


I feel that terrorism, while not the endstate, is thoroughly engrained in the ideology as the means to achieve its Islamic nationalist end-state (much as violent uprising was part of communist ideology).   As I see it, we are at war with the terrorists while the insurgencies are just the enemy's reaction to us brining the fight to him. (If we stayed behind our boarders the only enemies we would encounter would be the terrorists bringing the fight to us).  I don't like "Islamist ideology" as it is not sufficiently specific as to link it with the ideology of the terrorists as opposed to some pacifist or less violent sort of Islamic nationalism. 



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Ahh...the illusion (hubris?) of the notion of progress.   We didn't know better in 1944 when we levelled cities with bombers, so now we have nuclear weapons that can do the job with the press of a button.


As I've stated, further analyses of WW II bombing campaigns would overwhelm this discussion.   Some targets were legitimate & others were morally suspect (though not illegal at the time).   Much of it depends on the objectives of the mission planners and an examination of proportionality.   Regardless, using these horrors of our past is inappropriate to legitimise terror tactics today.   A nation's civilian population is not a legitimate military target. (but that is not to say that a civilian should be safe if standing in the beaten zone when a legitimate target is hit)



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> ... if one COA simply inflames the enemy, then is it the right thing to do?   I have the feeling that we earn scorn by retaliating to an attack by sicking the New York 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals on them.   It is plainly obvious what language the enemy understands, so lets give him his full measure and leave the rest until after the game.
> 
> ... until most of the Islamic world takes to the streets to oppose nailing a school with a bomb, than customary international law does nothing.   If we have to bend our message of disapproval into their rules, than so be it.


Perhaps the New York 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals is not the appropriate arena to try a war criminal.   But, I do not think the enemy becomes enflamed by our persecuting the perpetrators of these crimes.   Some may not pay it any attention, if they have no regard for international customary law . . . but that is a far cry from being enflamed.   At the same time, many potential terrorists were born & raised in the west.   Their understanding of cultural institutions & norms will be different than that of potential terrorists raised in the middle east.   These western terrorists may understand the legal message sent by convictions of terrorists & their supporters.

. . . and, at the very least, holding terrorists responsible as the criminals they are will give us one more tool to lock them away and keep the public safe.


----------



## Cdn Blackshirt

From this mornings Globe and Mail:  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20050729/IMAMS/TPNational

The most frustrating part is the views is who I would view as a moderate (Tarek Fatah) only has a following of approximately 100 whilst Hindy can draw 2,000 per week.




Matthew.   




> LEADERS CLASH OVER WHO SPEAKS FOR MUSLIMS IN CANADA
> By COLIN FREEZE
> 
> Friday, July 29, 2005 Page A4
> 
> As a small group of conciliatory Muslim leaders met with Prime Minister Paul Martin last night, a war of words broke out between two other leaders whose irreconcilable world views stand as bookends to the diverse opinions of nearly 600,000 Canadian Muslims.
> 
> "Imams like Aly Hindy are holding the entire Muslim community as a hostage. A vast number of Muslim Canadians don't want to have their leadership from almost medieval imams," Tarek Fatah of the Muslim Canadian Congress told the CBC yesterday.
> 
> *Meanwhile, Mr. Hindy -- who has given more than 20 news media interviews this week urging Muslims not to co-operate with Canadian security agencies -- once again took to the airwaves to say that people like him, and not Westernized Muslims like Mr. Fatah, are the true voice of Islam in Canada. *
> 
> The controversial imam defended his decision not to put his name on the recent sheaf of signed statements from Islamic leaders condemning recent terrorist strikes in the United Kingdom. "We've already condemned terrorism, this is obvious," Mr. Hindy said. "Why don't the churches, for example, condemn terrorism done by George Bush and Tony Blair?"
> 
> So, while the Prime Minister held a meeting that organizers called historic, crucial conversations are taking place in mosques, basements and banquet halls as Muslims in Canada debate what it means to be Muslim in Canada.
> 
> In Islam, as in all religions, factions wage a perpetual battle for souls. Within Canada's burgeoning community, debate rages as to how the seventh century's Prophet Mohammed would have wanted his followers to live today.
> 
> Dozens of Muslim groups have formed, and often they feud. Young men and women use Internet forums to seek guidance from leaders on issues important to them -- for example, whether it's halal (proper) or haram (forbidden) to use chat rooms to arrange dates.
> 
> Conferences devoted to Islam fill the SkyDome -- even though last year a fundamentalist imam issued a pre-emptive legal opinion, or fatwa, condemning such a conference for content that was bida, or too innovative to be supported by Islamic tradition.
> 
> Many Muslims find it difficult to say what is mainstream.
> 
> "Who speaks for Canadian Muslims? I would say any Muslim in the sense that there is no Vatican in Islam," said Salim Mansur, a newspaper columnist based in Southern Ontario.
> 
> He added that the differences are so great that "any organization that claims that they are the legitimate spokesman for a body of people that are so diverse as Muslims -- for that very claim they should be dismissed as a buffoon."
> 
> *Nader Hashemi, a political scientist who teaches Middle Eastern studies at the University of Toronto, said the dominant strain of Islam in Canada is a harder-line version of the religion than most people realize. *
> 
> "The imams who have been preaching in Canadian mosques have been imports, people not born and raised in Canada, and their training tends to be in the theological seminaries of the Muslim world," he said.
> 
> "When they come here, there is an intellectual chasm between the training they've received in the Muslim world and the reality of secular modernity here in Canada," Mr. Hashemi said. "It's not changing yet but it's going to have to change."
> 
> He said that younger Muslims who were born in Canada are seeking a newer generation of leaders whose opinions are more in keeping with their own. In fact, he said, young people cringe at the "often embarrassing" remarks of older leaders.
> 
> Historically, the Canadian Islamic Congress, which claims to represent the majority of Canadian Muslims, has probably been the most quoted Muslim group.
> 
> Lately, however, the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations has been generating a lot of attention. Last week, it organized a statement signed by 120 imams condemning terrorism, and it arranged last night's meeting with Mr. Martin.
> 
> Other groups are coming to the fore. "I think they [young Muslims] are searching," said Shelina Merani, the 35-year-old spokeswoman for a group called Muslim-Presence Canada. "Sometimes when you go into a mosque you hear stuff you may not agree with." Other groups too, such as the Ihya Foundation, have denounced the U.K. attacks and have organized peace concerts.
> 
> What's constant among Muslims is a certain amount of infighting. Last night, for example, the Muslim Canadian Congress denounced what it called the "photo-op" with the Prime Minister, saying that Mr. Martin ought to know better than to associate with "a group of imams who are better known for their support of segregation, misogyny and homophobia."
> 
> Contrary to his earlier remarks to the CBC, Mr. Fatah of the MCC said in an interview that he prefers the likes of the "medieval" Mr. Hindy to other imams, whom he said present themselves as moderates when they are actually hard-liners.
> 
> "Aly Hindy, at least, is consistent," he said.
> 
> Disparate voices
> 
> When Prime Minister Paul Martin met with a group of Muslim leaders last night, he actually met only a small sampling of the Islamic leaders in Canada. With a Muslim population of 600,000 and new groups popping up daily, there is no shortage of conflicting Islamic opinions. Some prominent leaders who did not attend last night's meeting include:
> 
> TAREK FATAH
> 
> Group: Muslim Canadian Congress.
> 
> Claimed membership: 100.
> 
> Leaning: Outspokenly liberal.
> 
> Positions: Religion and state must be separate; women can lead prayers; Sharia religious tribunals in Ontario will cause more harm than good.
> 
> Representative quote: "We believe in Islam as a progressive, liberal, pluralistic and democratic religion."
> 
> Controversies: Too "modernist and reformist" to speak for Islam, rival groups say.
> 
> MOHAMED ELMASRY
> 
> Group: Canadian Islamic Congress.
> 
> Claimed membership: More than 50,000 individuals.
> 
> Leaning: Conservative mainstream.
> 
> Positions: Male speakers should lead prayers; Canadian Forces should get out of Afghanistan; Ottawa has been "targeting a religious minority -- with devastating consequences."
> 
> Representative quote: "You have to be a caring citizen of this country; at the same time you have to practise your religion."
> 
> ALY HINDY
> 
> Group: Salaheddin Islamic Centre.
> 
> Claimed membership: More than 2,000 weekly congregants.
> 
> Leaning: Sunni fundamentalist.
> 
> Positions: Muslims should not co-operate with Canadian security agencies; Shia Islam is an "invention;" President George W. Bush is stoking a firestorm of Muslim fury.
> 
> Representative quote: "We believe CSIS should stop terrorizing us."
> 
> Controversies: Claims Ottawa spies on him, his mosque, his family, his acquaintances and has blocked some of his bank accounts.


----------



## Vigilant

Would that make PAffOs our shock troops in that arena? :


----------



## Edward Campbell

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> ...
> Note to Neo-con dimwits: Muslims all over the world are NOT the same and do NOT share the same goals as OBL. Get over it already.



I Agree.  We need to recognize, identify and understand our enemy - starting with acknowledging that we have real enemies - and stop worrying about the other, neutral and even friendly, folks.  Three *Principles of War* apply:

"¢	Selection and maintenance of the aim (the _master_ principle),

"¢	Economy of effort, and

"¢	Concentration of force.

Those who want a war on Islam, or a _war on terror_ in my opinion, ignore all three principles and, worse they ignore all three without understanding what they are doing.*  We need to keep focused on the aim: the defeat of the (loosely allied) Arab extremist, fundamentalist Islamic _movements_ which are making war on us.  When we accomplish that _war aim_ we can get on with _winning the peace_ by promoting or provoking a new Arab-Islamic _enlightenment_ which ought to address the famous 'root causes.'  We need to use the right forces - intelligence, political military, economic, security - in the right way and in the right places: at home and abroad.

----------

* It is always OK to ignore or violate rules and principles and the like _so long as you understand_ that you are doing so and have considered the consequences.  It is a major error to fail to understand rules and principles.


----------



## amcd

mdh: though clearly improving, the CF's method of dealing with the media still kind of baffles me. it seems to me that, especially in a time of rising support among Canadians, the media is perhaps the single best way for the CF to help create a more accurate representation of itself among the public. 

(now, surely the media plays some role in the public's lack of awareness, but if you'd ever tried to report on the CF you'd know why -- it's a secret kingdom full of arcane bureaucracy and useless factionalism, where the best interests of the soldiers, the CF, or even of Canada, are often overcome by numb self-interest and epic unresponsiveness. hmm, that made me feel better!)

as a result, even among the people paying attention there are still bucketloads of misconceptions about the capabilities, professionalism and purpose of the CF and its missions like afghanistan. witness c.parrish's most recent dumbness for a good example. commendably, hillier seems to understand this, though he may be a little high profile to start playing 'PAFO army of one.'  a lot of senior officers seem to understand this as well, but somehow understanding doesn't translate into action. who knows though, maybe it will soon. i do think things are improving.

ps. i'm a little let down that you didn't take a run at my defense of liberal relativism and cbc policy. i had my helmet strapped on and was prepared for some serious incoming.  

vigilant: if you ever want to get a pafo going, call him/her a 'commando' or, if you're really daring, use 'PR commando.' slip it into casual conversation for best effect. be careful though, they give those guys guns too.  :skull:


----------



## mdh

> ps. i'm a little let down that you didn't take a run at my defense of liberal relativism and cbc policy. i had my helmet strapped on and was prepared for some serious incoming.



The day's not over yet  

As a former media guy myself (with a little bit of PAFO experience at the reserve level) I have a few comments, but work is keeping me busy - stand by,

cheers, mdh


----------



## mdh

> Would that make PAffOs our shock troops in that arena?



Yes


----------



## a_majoor

a_majoor said:
			
		

> A good summation of the enemy forces in WW IV; not just terrorists, and not just governments either. You might think of this as "outsourcing" warfare, Iranian strategic goals, Saudi finance and Syrian logistical support is being contracted out to radical Jihadi groups (with AQ being the best known) to do the actual "trigger work".



Not recognizing the dimensions of the problem is a big part of it, another is building support for the war on the back of 30 second sound bites. Although libertarians, Neo and Paleo Cons (among others) know this isn't the whole story, declaring a "War on Terror" is easier to say and for the general public to "understand" than explaining how a shifting coalition of disparate states with conflicting goals have managed to push this far.

Of course, there are real opportunities here for us to exploit. The Iranian goals of regional hegemony, backed by nuclear arms and control over the oil reserves are exclusive to the spread of Islamic fundamentalism by the Saudis (who view the Iranians as "Persians", and who feel the Iranians are apostates anyway), or the secular dictatorship model favored by the Ba'ath party. The common fear of the Americans and the West, and the realization that America stands between them and their goals (and the desire for popular American culture threatens the social norms which prop up their regimes) unites them to the extent of providing money, training and safe haven for the Jihadis.  

In addition to all the _other_ things we have to do (read Infanteer and Edward Campbell's posts in particular), our intelligence agencies should be sowing the seeds of mutual suspicion between the sponsoring states, and trying to fan the premature breakdown of the alliance of convenience which exists today. (If National Socialist Germany and Imperial Japan had won WWII, how long would it have been before they started fighting each other?). This is a difficult goal to achieve, so long as fear and hatred of the American is the overriding imperative, Iran might not be as concerned with the number of _madrasas_ Saudi Arabia is placing in an arc around Iran.

The other weapons the Coalition needs to wield are economic and cultural stressors against the brittle structures of these authoritarian societies. Given enough stress, popular discontent against the regimes will be strengthened, giving local "Cedar Revolutions" more chances to take root and collapse the State from within. Once again, this has to be handled with a delicate hand, to make sure the resulting anger is directed inwards (i.e. manipulating the price of cooking oil vs broad economic sanctions).

This is a 4GW war, with the enemy attempting to weaken our will to resist by using semi random terror attacks. We have the tools, but not yet the unified means of weilding them effectively. It is going to be a long war for all of us.


----------



## mdh

Incoming...



> to me, the 7/7 event is best described this way: islamic militants carried out a terrorist attack against the citizens of london. now, that may well make the 7/7 bombers terrorists, but in order to make these terms equivalent you have to conflate the group (islamic militants) with their tactic (terrorism). maybe this would be appropriate if such a relationship held true always and everywhere, but it doesn't.



In other words "terrorists" are "swarthy opponents of US foreign policy" - as Christopher Hitchens used to say before he switched sides. It seems to me that you're being jesuitical here. Not all Islamic militants are terrorists - but there is no doubt that the London bombers used terror as a tactic - and they were all Islamic militants. Is that a meaningful distinction? Or mere tautology.



> there are groups using terrorist tactics that aren't predominantly motivated by islam (baathists, nepali communists, some kashmiri groups, turkish kurds, etc) and there are even groups using terrorist tactics that claim (some agree, some don't) to be anti-occupation 'insurgents' (baathists again, chechens, taliban). there are also islamic militant groups that sometimes attack military targets, which falls outside most standard definitions of the term terrorism. so, using the term 'terrorists' to describe the perpetrators of all of these varied activities is just imprecise. what purpose does using the term serve?



This is a restatement of the first point, isn't it? "One man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist." I really don't have any problem describing the Baathists/Chechens/Nepalese Communists as terrorists when they employ tactics designed to kill the innocent. A suicide bomber targeting children is a terrorist whatever cause he or she espouses. How much precision do you really need?



> now, of course, there are emotional reasons for using the term terrorist, and that's how some of us operate, but our enemy isn't the tactic of terrorism, it's the stupid insanity of the people who carry out the attacks and, more than that, it's the ideological badlands that these islamic militant monkies inhabit which is our real enemy.



Once again - a distinction without a difference. If we are going to assign an unacceptable cost to Islamic radicalism and its attendant terrorism, we need to target the "ideological badlands" and discredit the ideas that animates the insurgency. There must be a cost to Wahabism and the states which support it - including Saudi Arabia.   That cost is already apparent - there are more Crusaders now in the Middle East and Afghanistan then ever before. But I do agree, fundamentally. We need to be very clear about who the enemy really is. The CBC has concluded that it's the Bush Administration.



> it's this conspiratorial anti-liberal ideology, deeply if not widely supported among the foreign islamic community, that is the fundamental enemy. gwot, in the sense that it exists, isn't a war against terrorists, it's a war against ideas. but then wars of ideology aren't entirely new ('the germans weren't so bad, it's just their ideas i wanted to kill'). however, an asymmetrical global campaign against networked, non-state militants representing the extremist wing of one of the world's most influential religions is actually kinda new.



Britain's chattering classes have been shocked by the "kinda new" features of this version of terrorism - namely that Britain as an idea has been rejected by a significant portion of its Islamic immigrant population - while radical Islam as an idea inspired four UK-born muslims to kill scores of their fellow citizens. You are right though - this is a war of ideology and ideas. Unfortunately the CBC refuses to see the value of western ideas in combating and discrediting radical Islam. One man's freedom fighter.... 



> on the other hand, back to the discussion about terrorism, for as long as there's been war, there's been attacks on civilian populations. justifications for the tactic vary, but any rationalization that works for us can also be used by our enemies.



Yes there have been attacks on civilian populations in the past -- Guernica, Dresden. But so what? Our enemies will always make rationalizations to justify the use of terrorism.   We need to be firm in our conviction that we are better then they are because we live in a liberal democratic society -- and they are opposed to it. Otherwise, why bother?



> and here's where there is perhaps a significant departure from, say, mdh's perspective. from my exposure to the dreaded 'pleasure den' dwellers (who am i kidding, if the pleasure den serves guinness, i'm there) there is among them a significant sense of doubt or critical distrust. whether inculcated by education, by experience or by a gift of temperament is perhaps irrelevant, but it's this sense of doubt that typifies the breed for me. among the things doubted are, for example, the assumption that our nation is always doing the right and the good thing. strangely, i believe you can hold this position of national self-doubt and still be patriotic, though some would possibly disagree. though perhaps controversial, I'd argue that critical dissent is indispensable for the maintenance of group sanity. a cursory examination of history will provide multiple examples of groups, nations and even civilizations going completely off the rails and heading collectively into a delusional death spiral. this is certainly something to be avoided.



Orwell struggled with this question as well. His conclusion was that the left of his age was incapable of recognizing evil when it was staring them in the face. As a patriot he was willing to take a stand - for Britain not the working class. I would suggest that our national self-doubt has morphed in civilizational self-loathing - see today's National Post for an excellent piece on this very notion. However I agree that the CBC has put a premium on critical dissent - mostly of the Chomsky-ite variety and re-reading my post on the CBC I realize I should have added that every good CBCer has a copy of "Manufacturing Consent" on his or her bedside table. Chomsky has had an enormous influence on the CBC - in fact I would go further and suggest that the corporation is broadly Chomsky-ite in orientation (more so than Marx, Lenin, Mao, or even Larry Zolf.) 



> in this sense perhaps the greatest danger to forward progress is to be convinced that you know the absolute truth and that you are doing the absolute good. this is not just the path to injustice and barbarism, it's also the path to fundamentalism and insanity. this very trait then, of critical doubt, is arguably what makes us different than the islamic militants, our current enemy.



Are there not absolute truths we must defend against Islamic extremism? Such as the emancipation of women? That one example makes us very different from the Islamic militants -- and rather progressive, no?



> and so while the military are the able guardians of our national security, the liberally educated relativists are in fact the guardians of something equally important: clarity.



Here you reveal yourself as the old-fashioned liberal you really are. Is there an H.L. Mencken in the house?    Liberal relativism - which connotes a tradition of open-mindedness - should also admit that some western values and achievements are a good thing _relative_ to other cultures. You would never know that watching Newsworld's conveyor belt of anti-western, anti-Bush propaganda on shows like the Passionate Eye. Again Chomsky rules the CBC's view of the world. This is not liberal relativism - it's a form of nihilism (and it's one of the main reasons why Hitchens - one of the great journos of our time - broke with his comrades. And why he despites Chomsky.)



> conflating terms to artificially create a monolithic, comprehensible enemy doesn't serve any real purpose, all it really does is create confusion about the nature of the conflict.



I agree that we need to have some level of sophistication when it comes to analysing our enemies - but not to the point where we paralyze ourselves into inaction by over-analysing our enemies and erecting an anti-monolithic legitimacy to them they don't deserve. In short let's not deflate to avoid a conflate. 



> or at least that's something the pleasure seeking narcissists might say to defend their non-use of the phrase terrorist to describe islamic militants. darn hedonists.



Al Quaeda, OBL and the boyz in the cave could probably use a bit of hedonism_ in this world_ -- instead of being fixated on getting laid in the next world by scores of vestal virgins in the palm groves of Paradise.

Great points all,   
Cheers, mdh


----------



## McG

amcd said:
			
		

> (now, surely the media plays some role in the public's lack of awareness, but if you'd ever tried to report on the CF you'd know why -- it's a secret kingdom full of arcane bureaucracy and useless factionalism, where the best interests of the soldiers, the CF, or even of Canada, are often overcome by numb self-interest and epic unresponsiveness. hmm, that made me feel better!)


This idea is very closely related to the argument I've been making: intentionally selecting language to sugar coat our job has actually hurt the CF by imparing the publics understanding of who we are, what we do, and how we do it.

http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/32840/post-245434.html#msg245434
http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/32944/post-244648.html#msg244648


----------



## Fishbone Jones

> Freedman: Our ticking bomb is political correctness
> 
> By Ilana Freedman / Local Columnist
> 
> Friday, July 29, 2005
> 
> July has been a cruel month. A shocking attack by suicide terrorists left 56 morning commuters in London dead. Scarcely two weeks later, three car bombs in Sharm-el-Sheikh, Egypt, killed 88 tourists and locals. And the next day, an early morning bomb under a train in Dagestan, Russia, left a woman passenger dead.
> 
> In one week alone, the city of Baghdad witnessed 22 car bombs, including 10 in one day that killed nearly 100 people.
> 
> It has been a busy and bloody month for terrorists. Their mission has been to kill as many people as possible. As I have pointed out before in this column, the victims were not innocent "bystanders." They were the terrorists' intended targets. Their only crime was happening to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
> 
> Did I say "terrorists?" What was I thinking! Britain's BBC and Canada's CBC have made it policy to avoid using the "T" word, which they call "judgmental." When referring to the four men who blew up 56 people in London, they prefer to conjecture that they "may have been radicalized." These men, who packed nails into the explosives they carried in order to inflict the greatest suffering possible, were only "attackers." And the man whose rented car was found in a densely populated area containing 16, "ready-made" bombs set to deploy, was merely "a would-be bomber."
> 
> Get real, people! This is not a game. The first rule of war is: know your enemy. And we'd better start calling it what it is, because like it or not, we are at war. Our enemy is a global network of radical Islamist groups who have declared war on America and on our democratic way of life.
> 
> They have made no secret about their plans to turn our own country into a Muslim society governed by "sharia" law. They have extended their war to include our allies. And beyond that, they have targeted their historic enemies (Europeans), whom they call "crusaders." They also include the lands where they once held the reigns of power and then lost it (Spain), and those whom they consider "apostates" (other Muslims whose Islam is not sufficiently radical to please them).
> 
> Radical Islam is at the center of nearly every conflict in this deeply troubled world, from the Sudan to Indonesia, from the Philippines to Nigeria, from Pakistan to Lebanon, from Israel to the UK, from the Ivory Coast to the United States.
> 
> These terrorists justify their violence against civilians by shifting the blame onto others -- the Americans, the Jews, the British, and in fact, all dhimmis (non-Muslims). For example, terrorists frequently blame their need for brutal attacks against the West on the existence of Israel. It's a nice story, but it's a lie. In reality, Islam's hatred of Jews goes back nearly 1,400 years.
> 
> In 627, Muhammad ordered the massacre of 900 Jewish men in Medina and then sent their widows and children into slavery. A millennium later, Muslims were still murdering Jews in Palestine, long before the state of Israel was established in 1948. The existence of Israel may be a convenient excuse for terrorism that many are willing to accept without examination, but it is a perversion of historical fact.
> 
> Osama bin Laden took the lie one step further. When he threw down the gauntlet with his now famous fatwah, issued in February 1998, he blamed the United States for the misery of Muslims worldwide. He accused Americans of "occupying the lands of Islam in the holiest of places, the Arabian Peninsula, plundering its riches, dictating to its rulers, humiliating its people, terrorizing its neighbors, and turning its bases in the Peninsula into a spearhead through which to fight the neighboring Muslim peoples." He therefore called on Muslims everywhere to "kill the Americans and their allies -- civilians and military."
> 
> It is easy for others to blame us for their own shortcomings, to accuse us of interfering when we come to their aid. But for us to accept that blame, and by doing so become the victim, is the depth of folly. When our overriding need for political correctness prevents us from addressing the danger that faces us, we put ourselves at great risk.
> 
> Our need for absolution for crimes we did not commit makes us weak in the face of a violent and cruel enemy. We bend over backwards to avoid giving offense to those who have offended us and flagellate ourselves for breaches of manners. But people who murder other people with whom they disagree and then blame it on their victims, do not have sensitivities that should be catered to.
> 
> The truth remains that man is accountable for his actions. He who murders is responsible for his crime. Our enemies has made it clear that their goal is to destroy us. They will neither negotiate nor accept compromise, which they view as weakness. It is therefore time for us to rethink our posture and the manner in which we deal with the threat that confronts us.
> 
> As long as terrorists confined their activities to the Middle East, we felt safe. When they struck in Madrid, we were shaken, but we still felt reasonably secure. The longer nothing happened in the United States, the safer we felt. Now they have struck in London, a city not unlike New York, Chicago, or Los Angeles.
> 
> Are we listening? The threat will not be going away any time soon. On the contrary, the attacks are coming more frequently and they are getting closer. Do we remember 9/11? Are we naive enough to think it can not happen here again?
> 
> As long as we refuse to acknowledge that there is danger, we will not be safe at all. The first step that we must take is to recognize that we are at war and to stop the insanity of a culture of political correctness that is putting us all at risk.
> 
> Ilana Freedman is a specialist in counter-terrorism and Managing Partner of Gerard Group International LLC. She welcomes your comments and questions at ilana@gerardgroup.com
> 
> http://www.metrowestdailynews.com/columnists/view.bg?articleid=104859



Why can't we find stuff like this in our newspapers? :


----------



## mdh

> If it blows up buses and subways, it must be a terrorist
> by George Jonas
> CanWest Publications
> July 21, 2005
> 
> Talk about coincidence. Just as I started writing this column, someone on CBC-TV called this month's bombing of the London public transport system "a terrorist attack." By the time I shifted my glance from the computer to the television screen, the station cut to a commercial, so I can't identify the offender.
> 
> If he was an employee, he took a chance. An internal memo warns that calling terrorist attacks "terrorist attacks" is against CBC policy.
> 
> The word should be "attack," pure and simple, or rather neither simple nor pure, but Pharisaically correct. Contemporary disciples of the ancient Pharisee sect -- whose name has become a synonym for self-righteous hypocrisy -- have long infested public broadcasters such as the CBC and the BBC. Now they're proclaiming that reporters should use only "neutral language." Describing terrorist attacks as plain-vanilla "attacks," say the latter-day Pharisees, permits viewers and listeners "to form their own conclusions" about just what kind of attacks they were.
> 
> Needless to say, the CBC's reluctance to influence the audience's deliberations doesn't extend to all issues. The same news organizations that won't call terrorists terrorists --- CBC, BBC, Reuters, and others of their ilk -- have no qualms about tainting the audience's opinion in relation to things that seem morally clear to them. The CBC doesn't insist that reporters describe a company's act of dumping toxic waste in "neutral language" and leave the word "pollution" to the viewers. Nor does Mother Corp demand attribution for such as emotionally loaded word as "murder." CBC reporters can say: "A witness described the murder" rather than: "A witness described the accused throttling the victim in an act the police characterized as 'murder.'" They can say: "A man was charged with molesting a child" rather than: "After a child was fondled, a crown attorney called a man a "child molester.'"
> 
> But reporters can't call a suicide bomber blowing up a London bus a terrorist attack. Let viewers "make their own judgment" about what to call it. The CBC won't make judgments for them. Perish the thought. We tell people what happened; we don't tell them what to think. We're pure as the driven snow.
> 
> Such concern for purity is unnecessary, of course, when it comes to self-evident evils like pollution. It's reserved for acts about which CBC bosses feel ambivalent themselves, such as Arab/Muslim terrorists blowing up commuter trains or flying airliners into skyscrapers. The CBC's top brass seems to regard such acts as morally ambiguous, as "controversial," as being below the threshold of society's moral consensus, as acts about which opinions are divided.
> 
> This may come as a surprise to Canadians who think there's considerable moral consensus about blowing up bus or subway riders. Most people believe (to put it mildly) that it's wrong. Most people also think that if news of this consensus hasn't yet reached the CBC, it's the public broadcaster that's out of society's moral loop.
> 
> There's nothing more distasteful than the sight of cowardice, intellectual muddle, and a fascination with violence masquerading as journalistic objectivity. There's nothing more ridiculous than the confused belief that the moral high ground lies in some no-man's land between good and evil. It's unnecessary to decide whether this moral confusion is combined with a hidden political agenda. While it's possible that some news organizations have been infiltrated by agents or supporters of al-Qaeda or Islamofascsim, I'd hesitate to ascribe to malice anything that can be explained by stupidity.
> 
> Some well-meaning members of the chattering classes open their minds so wide (as the saying goes) that their brains fall out. They persuade themselves that it's narrow-minded prejudice to call Dracula a vampire: Just describe what he does and let the readers or viewers decide what he is. But a refusal to call something by its proper and customary name is inaccurate reporting no less than it would be to attach a false, arbitrary or tendentious label to something. If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck it's likely to be a duck -- and not calling a duck a duck makes it a canard.
> 
> Not calling terrorism terrorism is a canard (the French word meaning duck as well as false news.) I think the CBC's deliberate practice of canard-journalism is a disgrace. My old employer (I spent 23 years on CBC staff) would do better to emulate Arab and Muslim commentators, like Abdel Rahman al-Rashed on Al-Arabiya, who have since the London bombings come out to call and condemn terrorists as terrorists.



Here's another interesting take on this from George Jonas - a former CBC type himself, cheers, mdh


----------



## Cdn Blackshirt

.....and France surprisingly steps up to take the lead.

Bravo,


Matthew.   

P.S.  To Brittany, I consider myself in the Neo-Con camp in that I think intervention is necessary in order to avoid a larger clash of civilizations, am not a nitwit, and don't consider all muslims to be the same.  Bottom Line:  It's hypocritical for you to brand a group (neo-cons, inaccurately I might add) for supposedly branding another (muslims), and as such would request you reconsider your tactic, specifically because your behaviour is exactly the same as the behaviour would chastise others for....

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/core/Content/displayPrintable.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/07/30/ncleric30.xml&site=5

France ejects 12 Islamic 'preachers of hate'
By Colin Randall in Paris
(Filed: 30/07/2005)

The gulf between British and French treatment of preachers of hatred and violence was thrown sharply into focus yesterday when France announced the summary expulsion of a dozen Islamists between now and the end of August.

A tough new anti-terrorism package was unveiled by Nicolas Sarkozy, the interior minister and a popular centre-Right politician. 

   
Nicolas Sarkozy: 'We have to act against radical preachers' 
His proposals reflect French determination to act swiftly against extremists in defiance of the human rights lobby, which is noticeably less vocal in France than in Britain.

Imams and their followers who fuel anti-western feeling among impressionable young French Muslims will be rounded up and returned to their countries of origin, most commonly in France's case to its former north African colonies.

Mr Sarkozy also revealed that as many as 12 French mosques associated with provocative anti-western preaching were under surveillance. Imams indulging in inflammatory rhetoric will be expelled even if their religious status is recognised by mainstream Muslim bodies. 

Those who have assumed French citizenship will not be protected from deportation. Mr Sarkozy said he will reactivate measures, "already available in our penal code but simply not used", to strip undesirables of their adopted nationality. "We have to act against radical preachers capable of influencing the youngest and most weak-minded," Mr Sarkozy told the French daily Le Parisien. 

The first to be caught in the new round of expulsions is an Algerian, Rena Ameuroud, whose brother Abderraham was jailed in France earlier this year for his part in a jihadist training exercise in the Fontainebleau forest south of Paris. He faces immediate deportation for allegedly urging fellow-worshippers at a Parisian mosque to engage in "holy war".

At least seven French nationals are now known to have been killed while fighting with anti-coalition insurgents in Iraq, in some cases as suicide bombers, the minister said. A further 10 are believed still to be there. France, which has Europe's largest Muslim population with estimates varying from five to nine million out of a population of 60 million, has long prided itself on its stern approach to terrorism. 

Mr Sarkozy's crackdown on those "promoting radical Islamist polemic" was disclosed at the end of a week that began with French anger at Britain's failure to extradite the alleged financier of Islamist bombings in Paris in the mid-1990s. Rachid Ramda, 35, an Algerian, has been held for 10 years while fighting attempts to return him to stand trial. Survivors and victims' relatives who gathered this week at the St Michel station in the heart of Paris to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the worst attack, which killed eight, called on Britain to "stop protecting" Ramda.

They are unimpressed by his supporters' claims that he is a "gentle and peaceful" man who devotes his time in the Belmarsh top-security jail in south-east London to learning the Koran by heart, studying English literature and comforting other Muslim prisoners. Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, has approved Ramda's extradition - as did his predecessor David Blunkett - but his removal depends on High Court proceedings.

French ministers and commentators have long expressed exasperation at British handling of individuals who support terrorism, arguing that greater emphasis is being placed on their human rights rather than on security interests.

colin.randall@telegraph.co.uk

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


----------



## McG

> *To win the war on terrorism we must break cycle of violence*
> Canada's new security action plan should be guided by Gandhi
> _The Edmonton Journal
> Thursday, July 21, 2005
> Re: "Can the war on terror be won?" by Andy Knight, Opinion, July 11._
> 
> I want to compliment Knight for his insightful article on terrorism. I believe we should analyse the mindset of terrorists to try to determine what drives them into such destructive violence.
> 
> Unfortunately, one could easily conclude from Knight's article that there is no hope, when he suggests that the entire international community must co-operate to deny funding to terrorism. However, some members of this community actually fund the terrorists to reduce the influence of the hegemonic nations who dominate the world.
> 
> The war on terrorism will certainly be difficult to win, but there is, I believe, another approach. I agree with Knight that the London bombings were probably the result of dissatisfaction in other countries with the war on Iraq. Undoubtedly, many also believe that they must stop, by any means available, the western nations gaining complete control of world oil supplies.
> 
> Our government is designing a Canadian Security Action Plan. I hope it will consider this plan. The danger of attacks to Canada will, in my opinion, be in direct proportion to our government's support of the use of armed force in the world. Our hope lies in exploring how we can solve our problems without recourse to lethal violence. We must give peace a chance.
> 
> As long as we accept the premise that our only security lies in more powerful weapons than our presumed enemies, we are eliminating any hope future generations may have, for this presupposes that violence and lawlessness will continue to characterize international relations. Prime Minister Paul Martin's doubling of our military budget in the next five years is a retrograde step and increases our danger.
> 
> I believe there are more possibilities than are indicated in Knight's article. These will be difficult to implement, but they have a far better chance of success. They follow in the tradition of Mahatma Gandhi and his successful campaign to remove the British from India after they had ruled there for more than 200 years. More recently, Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu used these same approaches to overcome apartheid in South Africa.
> 
> We must show the peoples of the world that violence of one person or nation against another only results in reciprocal violence. This sets up a self-perpetuating cycle of violence. We must break this cycle of violence if we are to bequeath to our children a world that is not headed for self-destruction.
> 
> With the weapons of mass destruction available today on the one hand, and the willingness of fanatics to become suicide bombers on the other, it is clear that we must try other paradigms to ensure personal and international security. Killing has become an industrialized science, and is leading increasingly to the depersonalization and demonization of the other, and the dehumanization of ourselves.
> 
> This self-destructive competition must stop. Mikhail Gorbachev realized this when he opted out of the Cold-War competition which was destroying both the Soviets and the West and threatening the entire world with a nuclear holocaust. His peacemaking efforts should be studied and replicated.
> 
> Canada is the most logical nation to demonstrate a new security paradigm because most of us feel relatively safe at this time. We Canadians should start by telling our governments to stop giving people of other nations reasons to fear and hate us by:
> 
> - eliminating the production of guns and other weapons designed solely to kill other human beings. Thousands of guns produced in Canada are still being used to kill people in other parts of the world;
> 
> - assertively leading a campaign of other middle powers for a more democratic United Nations, free from domination of the great powers. A truly democratic UN is our most hopeful path to peace;
> 
> - providing troops only for UN peacekeeping and ensuring that our troops are trained to make peace instead of war;
> 
> We must leave our children and grandchildren a sustainable and peaceful world. The prospects of this occurring by using current paradigms are bleak. We must, and can, do better.
> 
> _Rhyl Stollery, Edmonton_


Rebutal:


> *Pacifism won't win the war on terror*
> _The Edmonton Journal
> July 25, 2005
> 
> Re: "To win the war on terrorism we must break cycle of violence: Canada's new security action plan should be guided by Gandhi," by Rhyl Stollery, Letters, July 21._
> 
> While I appreciate that many people are philosophically committed to pacificism, Rhyl Stollery speciously appeals to the tradition of non-violence advocated by Gandhi in India and Mandela and Tutu in South Africa as successful paradigms for our present problems with terrorism.
> 
> In doing so, he fails to appreciate that the "enemy" in all these cases was governed by the rule of law and ideologically committed to ideals of democracy and freedom or, at least, had strong roots in these traditions. As such, their acts of oppression were fundamentally at odds with their own ideological commitments; an inconsistency that ultimately resulted in a reform from within.
> 
> Terrorists, on the other hand, are committed to an ideology of hate, fuelled by religious fanaticism and a world view in which there are only two kinds of people: those who submit and those who must die. Their actions are largely consistent with their ideology and so they will not reform.
> 
> The terrorists have no respect for the rule of law, democracy or freedom. If the world that respects these ideals does nothing, these terrorists will wage war against all the governments of Muslim lands in an effort to institute a radical form of Islam as seen in prewar Afghanistan. They will continue their jihad against Israel, Europe, and the rest of the world.
> 
> These are their stated goals. You will not and cannot reason with them.
> 
> Contrary to Stollery's claims, history has shown that the rule of law, democracy, and freedom are preserved, perhaps paradoxically, by a strong military and security policy. The Second World War and the Cold War are obvious cases in point.
> 
> Indeed, it is ironic that Stollery should invoke Gorbachev as a model statesman for non-proliferation without acknowledging that American militarization prevented the expansion of Soviet domination and ultimately forced the Soviet-American detente.
> 
> Rather than non-violence or pacificism, the world needs to stand in unity, prepared to wage war when necessary to end tyranny. Humanity is endowed with an inalienable right to basic freedom and equality. In Europe and North America, our ancestors fought for those rights, attained them, and protected them. Should we not fight to see those rights realized throughout the world?
> 
> If we did, perhaps then we could even start talking about some forms of demilitarization. But as long as we tolerate even one tyrannical government, the world will remain a place of violence and lawlessness and I will be thankful for the American and British militaries.
> 
> _Ken Ristau, Edmonton_


----------



## paracowboy

good rebuttal. Fly poop: Mandela does not belong with the Mahatma. Mandela murdered people.


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## amcd

MDH wrote:
Not all Islamic militants are terrorists - but there is no doubt that the London bombers used terror as a tactic - and they were all Islamic militants. Is that a meaningful distinction? Or mere tautology.

When you ask whether it's a meaningful distinction or a tautology you've hit directly into the heart of the matter. That's precisely the question to ask. The rest of my post was laying out my evidence for the 'meaningful distinction' side and, in order to do that, I had to wade tangentially through a mass of supporting arguments which can all be reduced to one simple question: what, exactly, is going on here?   

Looking over my argument and your objections, I can see that I wasn't forceful on one major point, but which once I say it, you will probably agree that I meant it â â€œ I don't think we are fighting 'terrorists' at all. I think this is something new, something that we maybe don't even have a word for yet. 

It's a revolutionary social/religious movement spearheaded by a vanguard of militants networked into a global guerrilla force. The movement has massive public support, something simple terrorists don't have. (I have mucho evidence for this last assertion, but it's a bit dry.) 

â Å“The size of bin Laden's organization, its political goals, and its enduring relationship with a fundamentalist Islamic social movement provide strong evidence that Al-Qaeda is not a terrorist group but an insurgency,â ? writes Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel Michael F. Morris in 'Al-Qaeda as Insurgency,' a paper written for the U.S. Army War College strategic research project. â Å“The disparate nature of the threat â â€œ in essence a global, but somewhat leisurely-paced guerrilla war â â€œ makes it difficult to focus an effective strategic response.â ? 

Calling them terrorists, who are really just politically minded criminals, undermines the danger this situation represents. In your post you said the enemy doesn't deserve legitimacy, well, I wish it were that easy. I would submit that they are in fact a very legitimate enemy, and that if they keep their little struggle going for 50 years or so, we're going to be looking at whole new world. 

My defense of the non-use of 'terrorist' in the media is based on this understanding of the situation. The word is at once sensational and vague, threatening and confusing â â€œ and it simply doesn't help. Our ethical/moral outrage over their tactics doesn't give us strength; it just makes it easier for them to achieve their goals. The longer we fail to recognize what's happening, the harder it'll be to defuse the situation.

Now, I'm not saying the CBC shares my position, I don't really know or care what their rationale is, but by insisting on precision I think they are actually doing the right thing. 

On the other hand, this: 

We need to be firm in our conviction that we are better then they are because we live in a liberal democratic society -- and they are opposed to it. Otherwise, why bother?

is very tricky. What do you mean by 'better?' Do you mean that our 'liberal democracy' gives us more right to exist? I'm truly not being coy, I just don't know the substantive meaning of the term 'better' in this usage. 

(As a side note, I definitely do not agree with Hitchens' statement (terrorists=swarthy opponents). I wouldn't claim that Hitchens' statement was true, directly or indirectly, but I do appreciate a good straw man when I see one.)

You made some very good points (emancipation of women, relativism=nihilism) and I would respond to them all, except for that I can't because the capital region liberal relativists debating club is meeting down at the gun range for our weekly shoot. We have these adorable little Hitchens pictures we put up as targets. It's excellent fun. Until we get too hammered, then we start quoting German philosophers and talking earnestly about futility and the death of meaning. It's very 19th century. 

Regards.


----------



## mdh

> I had to wade tangentially through a mass of supporting arguments which can all be reduced to one simple question: what, exactly, is going on here?



amcd,

Don't get me wrong. I'm not suggesting that you be like David Jansen in the Green Berets, and head down to the nearest recruiting station to sign up and fight the GWOT. (Although if you're interested there are some excellent reserve units in the capital region  )

I don't think we are really all that far apart. Journos need to ask tough questions and find out what's really going on. The Army is like another other institution - it makes mistakes, and in this present instance - with our troops heading to Kandahar - we have to get it right. 

Certainly the public derseves nothing less - and we need accurate and sustained debate about these issues. (If you're interested there are have been several threads under the politics section on what constitutes the nature of this threat.) 

But we will have agree to disagree on the utility of the term terrorist and its use in the media. (George Jonas' piece -posted above - sums up the argument far more eloquently that I can.)

WRT to the CF and the media, I don't have much to offer as a counter-argument.  The CF needs to do a better job working with the media.  They are better now then they used to be - and there are a lot of very good PAFFOs out there.  However, as you noted, I suspect the chain of command (especially within NDHQ) often mitigates against their counsel.

Cheers, mdh


----------



## amcd

mdh,

jonas wrote: 

If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck it's likely to be a duck -- and not calling a duck a duck makes it a canard.

I'd note:

The longer we persist in believing that because it quacks, it's a duck, the harder it'll be to pry its teeth off our head when we finally realize it's actually an alligator that's evolved a quacking call to fool its prey. It's not a duck at all, much less a canard.

Of course, I might be ringing the 'ice berg dead ahead' warning bell a little vigorously, but I just spent two months working on this general story (gwot) and I've talked to a lot of smart dudes who are growing more than a little concerned. 

I have enjoyed the debate though. 

Thanks,
amcd


----------



## mdh

> I have enjoyed the debate though.



Ditto,

cheers, mdh


----------



## a_majoor

A look at some of the enemy "foot soldiers".



> *The Notting Hill Gang*
> A signal event's lessons.
> 
> British police had surrounded the flat in Notting Hill where two of the suspects from the July 21 bombing had holed up. Negotiations had commenced, but promised to be short and sharp. Snipers took up positions and police demanded the suspects come out unclothed and with their hands up.
> 
> "I have rights!" Ramzi Mohammed wailed from inside.
> 
> How ironic. Yes, you do have rights Ramzi â â€ all the rights guaranteed you by the liberal democracy you have pledged to destroy. Rights enshrined in some of the oldest laws of their kind in the world. The same rights enjoyed by the innocent commuters you sought to maim and kill. Rights worth commending; and worth defending.
> 
> Moments later the two emerged, as instructed, nearly naked, hands high, in what is certain to be another iconic photo from the global struggle against violent extremism. This is the way it ends sometimes, stripped on a balcony http://www.flickr.com/photos/finkangel/29706707/in/pool-bomb/, dragged from a spider hole http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:SaddamSpiderHole.jpg, or rousted from a safe house in dirty underwear http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/38901000/jpg/_38901107_khalid_ap_203body.jpg.
> 
> "I have rights!" Mohammed repeated to the police. What rights would he enjoy in his ideal society, the utopia promised by his version of sharia? We saw it in the rules the Afghans suffered under during the Taliban tyranny, or the ukases Khomeini bestowed on Iran and under which Iranians largely still suffer today. Imagine Mohammed's due-process guarantees in the system he was fighting for â â€ torture, ritual readings of some Koranic verses, followed by beheading, or perhaps hanging from a construction crane http://www.iranian.com/BTW/2004/September/Hanging/Images/photo.jpg or soccer goal, or a bullet in the head if he was lucky.
> 
> But tell us, Ramzi, why did they take you alive? Why didn't you go out in a blaze of gunfire and glory, seeking what you would call martyrdom, paradise, perhaps taking a few infidels with you? Oh, but that was never in the game plan. Investigators say that after their attack fizzled the bombers scattered to their homes and began a round of cell-phone recriminations. They apparently had not made contingency plans for total equipment failure, so they sat around complaining to each other. With the moment passed and lacking adequate training to adapt creatively, the prospective jihadist warriors played phone tag until they were captured.
> 
> One of the plotters, Osman Hussain, was picked up in Italy sitting on his brother's sofa. He admitted he was involved in the attacks, but denied he is a terrorist. "We didn't want to kill, just sow terror," he allegedly claimed (yes, in the same breath that he denied being a terrorist â â€ something must be lost in the translation). It is not much of a defense; the captured nail-bombs and other explosive devices demonstrate a desire to wreak devastation on people, to kill and cripple. Hussain, through a public defender, is now seeking to invoke rights under Italian law to fight extradition. If it were Saudi Arabia he would be dead already.
> 
> This is typical of the people we are fighting in this war.* It is true that they are dangerous characters; the trail of casualties they have left attests to that. But there is a tendency to overstate their abilities, their motivation, their devotion to the cause. They are portrayed as patient, long-term planners, guileful, dedicated, inspired, pursuing their objectives with a cold and terrible intensity. However, frequently they are none of these things; in this case, the bombers were a clutch of pathetic wretches living on the public dole who could not accomplish their own mass suicide.* The contemporary term of art for a terrorist is a "super-empowered individual," which is a pretty extravagant expression for violent misfits acting out an anti-social pathology.
> 
> *Generally speaking, terrorists are cowards*. They hide behind masks, make surprise attacks on the innocent and helpless, and take pride and apparently pleasure in ritually beheading unarmed, bound men. However, when cornered they do not fight to the death or scream oaths to justify their cause; they lie about their involvement and demand their rights to due process. And this is not limited to the foot soldiers; even Osama bin Laden took over a year to admit complicity in the 9/11 attacks.
> 
> Capturing an entire terrorist cell intact is a signal event. Usually there are few left alive after an attack of this nature. The authorities now have the bombers, their weapons, and numerous documents and computer hard drives. They will learn a great deal. And the lesson for the rest of us is that there is no moral relativism in this conflict. *Those of us who uphold the principles of the free society are better than the radical Islamic terrorists, and we should not be afraid to declare it. Western society and its ideal of human liberty is superior to the despotic social order they want to force on the world, so much so that they seek to use the guarantees promised citizens of the liberal states to preserve their miserable lives. And we so venerate our principles that we will give them the chance.*
> 
> â â€ James S. Robbins is senior fellow in national-security affairs at the American Foreign Policy Council, a trustee for the Leaders for Liberty Foundation, and an NRO contributor.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/robbins/robbins200508010812.asp


----------



## Infanteer

Interesting, but the end of the article undermines it by turning into moralistic preaching (which is kind of irrelevent if we are analyzing the enemy).   His generalizing of the enemy as _"cowards"_ and _"typical of the people we are fighting in this war"_ smells of broad-brush blustering from the arm-chair - indeed, his opinions certainly don't jibe with the analysis of the enemy structure in an excellent Statfor discussed over at Lightfighter.

As well, the statement that _"the contemporary term of art for a terrorist is a "super-empowered individual," which is a pretty extravagant expression for violent misfits acting out an anti-social pathology."_ also sucks, as it falls into the "depraved psycho" trap and really gives no credence to the varied groups that are partaking in the Islamic Insurgency, as highlighted with the Long Tail Theory.

These sods were definately bottom tier members of the AQ network and I'm willing to bet that they were cowardly amateurs (as the article linked above suggests).   They certainly weren't hardened like the guys down in Spain who immolated themselves and the apartment block when they realized they were done for.

All in all, I give the article two thumbs down for utility....


----------



## a_majoor

One of the problems is fighting WW IV is the difficulty in articulating what exactly needs to be done, and getting support to doing it.



> *Torn Apart Over Iraq*
> Why do we keep fighting each other over Iraq?
> 
> Isolationists
> Most paleocons did not support either the attack on Afghanistan or Iraq - and did not in the sincere belief it was not in the interest of the United States. From the Right they believed both were a waste of precious American resources overseas, and would only prompt another dangerous increase in the powers of the federal government here at home. Their worry was not so much in the use of violence against radical Islamicists, but rather the cost to the United States, both in the short-term in lives and treasure, and the long-term implications of "imperialismâ ? on the fabric of the republic.
> 
> Many agreed on the Left that Afghanistan and especially Iraq were bad ideas. Their much different complaint was no so much it weakened American interests here or abroad (otherwise they would support the war), but that America is by nature suspect in its use of power and oppresses third-world poor abroad. The lexicon of left-wing anti-Americanism is multifaceted: colonialist, hegemonic, imperialist, racist, or capitalist. Take your pick: We were attacking indigenous peoples either for profit (e.g, Halliburton, the mythical Afghanistan pipeline, the transnational oil companies, private contractors, etc.), or out of racism and ethnocentric chauvinism.
> 
> Punitivists
> Liberals, moderates, and conservatives could all fall into this second group, who supported the removal of the Taliban and to a lesser degree Saddam Hussein. Although some realists of both parties thought the Iraqi war, unlike Afghanistan, was a mistake, perhaps slightly more supported it nonetheless - with the proviso that we summarily leave on completion, our mission being to weaken the nexus of Baathism, petrol-dollars, and terrorism, not the impractical notion of prompting democracy.
> 
> To the Punitivists, the no-fly-zones, Operation Desert Fox, and the Oil-for-Food embargo of the last decade (keeping Saddam in his "boxâ ?) was the right template, as was the earlier bombing of Milosevic's forces from the air. *There is a limited logic of sorts to their vision: Do not let the terrorist enemies of the United States close enough to our conventional military, and do not squander our assets in theaters far from our real worries in Korea, China, or Europe. If a Mullah Omar or Saddam pops up, smack them down, and don't get involved in the larger existential questions of why or how they are there in the first place. In their view, a 9/11 was not so much a refutation of their strategy of chronic reprisals with cruise missiles and bombs to pay back each terrorist incident, but a simple tactical lapse on the part of our home defenses - and thus correctable in the future.*
> 
> Democratizers
> Sometimes called neoconservatives, neo-Wilsonians, idealists - and far worse - this group also, at least originally, was made up of moderate Democrats and Republicans. *They felt a long-term solution to the quarter-century pathology of the Middle East after September 11 (at least dating back to the Iranian hostage-taking of 1979) was possible only by staying on after the removal of the Taliban and Saddam and changing the political landscape to give the Arab street a third choice beyond radical Islam and either leftwing or rightwing dictatorship.*
> 
> While it is common to say that the removal of Saddam was on the pre-September 11 presidential agenda - thus the now much quoted January 26, 1998, Project for a New American Century letter to President Clinton of 1998 calling for Saddam's removal - it probably was not. Neither President Bush, Vice-President Cheney, Secretary of State Powell nor National Security Advisor Rice signed the request for preemption. George W. Bush campaigned against nation-building of the type Clinton had engaged in the Balkans, and was worried about dispersing our military in peace-keeping theaters where they were asked to do things other than just fight.
> 
> September 11 changed all that.
> 
> The Brawl
> Three facts stand out about the current political infighting.
> 
> First, the American people were not so much ideological as prone to align themselves with the group that seemed to best ensure their own security at the least cost. Right before the March 2003 war, there was an overwhelming consensus to remove Saddam. But the messy occupation eroded that margin substantially. Perhaps only 40 percent still support the notion of taking Saddam out and staying on to create a democracy. Another 60 percent are probably evenly divided in thinking post facto that we should never have gone in, or left as soon as his statue fell.
> 
> *Someone could write an interesting article on the changing attitudes of our elites, especially U.S. senators and pundits - with then and now quotes - whose views reflected the changing pulse of the battlefield. Reading the transcripts of what over 70 senators (especially Senators Kerry and Clinton) said about the October 2002 Senate resolution authorizing the use of force to remove Saddam seems surreal these days.*
> 
> But the flavor is perhaps best summed up in a comprehensive January 2003 speech, less than four months before the war that Sen. Kerry gave at Georgetown University:
> 
> "Without question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime. He presents a particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation. He miscalculated an eight-year war with Iran. He miscalculated the invasion of Kuwait. He miscalculated America's response to that act of naked aggression. He miscalculated the result of setting oilrigs on fire. He miscalculated the impact of sending scuds into Israel and trying to assassinate an American President. He miscalculated his own military strength. He miscalculated the Arab world's response to his misconduct. And now he is miscalculating America's response to his continued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction."
> 
> When the war looked like it would be over in three weeks, most supported it. When it seemed like the terrorist insurrection would go on indefinitely most did not. If it looks today like a democracy will stabilize, and spread to adjoining countries, all will be for it even still.
> 
> Second, strange alliances have emerged. The American Conservative and The Nation always agreed that we had no business in Iraq - and perhaps Afghanistan as well. The Council on Foreign Relations Establishment luminaries on both Left and Right, from veterans in the Carter administration to the Bush I Cabinet, voiced realist worries that transcended their own past political differences over the Cold War, the Balkans, and Central America. Just as there was no telling a far-Left from a far-Right pundit in condemning Iraq, so too it was just as impossible to determine whether a realist critic had once worked for Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George Bush I, or Bill Clinton.
> 
> Third, morality and ethics were adduced by all parties, as the American people couldn't quite sort out whether intervening or keeping out in the end cost or took more lives. The isolationists thought that they had the moral high ground by ensuring that at least none would be lost in an American war. To them we "stirred upâ ? terrorists abroad rather than were "fighting them over there rather than here.â ?
> 
> The neo-Wilsonians countered that there was already constant death in Saddam's Iraq and intervention would prove the least costly course - and eventually prevent more September 11-like attacks, and thus save far more people than were lost in the war proper.
> 
> Realists who valued stability over idealism seemed to think that more would die in the new Middle East democratic conundrum than under Saddam's police state or the Syrian reign over Lebanon.
> 
> The Ironies
> *A number of other strange phenomena framed the debate. Critics allege Iraq was all about "getting oil.â ? But after the invasion, the price of America's imported petroleum skyrocketed. And far from stealing Iraq's national resources, for the first time in memory its oil reserves were in the hands of a constitutional government, beyond the control of both the Hussein kleptocracy and French and Russian concessions.
> *
> In some sense, George W. Bush tried to address the perceived failure of the 1991 war of not removing Saddam after ejecting him from Kuwait - which invariably was a sort of critique of his own father's policy. In turn, George H. W. Bush insisted that his limited objective was the right decision - and thus implicitly cast doubt on the present course of his son. When one compares the prior and present roles of both Bush I and Bush II advisers, you can draw any conclusion you like: "We are correcting our prior error,â ? "We didn't learn from our prior wisdom of not intervening,â ? or "We are still arguing with each other.â ?
> 
> Another oddity is the much-quoted "Iraqi people.â ? Criticism of the war from the Left claimed that we killed civilians and were only imperial in our computations. But polls continued to reveal that the majority in Iraq favors Americans staying until stability is assured, and assumes things are still better than under Saddam.
> 
> The Arab world claimed America was unpopular for its past support for dictators - and even more so for its present effort to rectify that by either removing or ostracizing strongmen.
> 
> Iraq was alleged as the font for Islamic terrorism, but the terrorists in London equally blamed Afghanistan; bin Laden connected his war to U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia and the U.N. Oil-for-Food program; while Australians were killed in Bali for things like East Timor - and on and on.
> 
> Those who worried that we were making Iraq a mess also claimed our reconstruction of that mess was a waste of precious American dollars better spent at home.
> 
> Some who cried, "We needed more troopsâ ? were often the same who said there should never have been any troops in Iraq at all.
> 
> Those who agitated that the U.N. should have approved the war did not say the same in 1999 - when we neither had the U.N. or even the U.S. Senate on record sanctioning our bombers.
> 
> Freeing Iraq may strengthen Iran if Baghdad goes theocratic - or may speed its fall if Iraq's new democracy energizes the Persian masses.
> 
> What Does it All Mean?
> So why this growing angry divide at home about Iraq? First, the war crystallized preexisting but fundamental philosophical differences among segments of the American people.
> 
> Consider all the conflicting refrains:
> 
> We are a republic, not an empire and should husband our resources for ourselves;
> 
> No, we are a pathological presence abroad and should husband and redistribute our resources for our own poor;
> 
> No, we are a constabulatory force that should not take sides per se, but rather enforce order and stability in a global commercial system of free markets and trade;
> 
> No, morally we cannot enjoy democracy at home while allowing it to die abroad;
> 
> No, realistically our ultimate security rests with as many democracies overseas as possible.
> 
> These same fault lines were emerging in 1999 with the bombing of Serbia, but were arrested by the capitulation of Milosevic and the quick conclusion to the war.
> 
> Second, we had two national elections of 2002 and 2004. In both cases, it was natural that it was in the interest of the opposition party (the Democrats) to prove that the present policy (since the war was never presented as one requiring abject sacrifice to ensure our very survival) was not working - and, contrarily, the current group in power (the Republicans) to assure that it was.
> 
> Had the so-called war on terror that started on September 11, 2001 ended by September 2002, before the congressional elections of autumn 2002, then, like Bill Clinton's Balkan war, it would not have become as polarizing.
> 
> *Third and most important, is the battlefield, the final adjudicator of political disagreement. War more often creates political reality, rather than politics determining the course of the war. If the United States winds down its presence, curtails its losses while Iraqis beat the terrorists and ensure a democratic government, then the victory, to paraphrase John F. Kennedy, will still have a thousand fathers. WMD controversies will be a distant memory.
> *
> But if the insurrection increases, topples the government, and we withdraw from a new Lebanon, then the Iraqi defeat will be an orphan.
> 
> *My own view remains absolutely unchanged - that we were right, in both a practical and a moral sense, in removing Saddam, that despite depressing lows and giddy highs, the democratic reconstruction of Iraq will work out, that an emerging constitutional government will make both Americans safer and the Middle East in general more stable, that preexisting jihadists are flocking to Iraq and being defeated rather than being created ex nihilo, that anti-Americanism will gradually subside in the Muslim world as millions see that we are consistent in our support of democratic reform, that the United States military has proved itself the preeminent fighting force in the world today and is on the offensive in Iraq and winning a difficult asymmetrical campaign, and that old allies in Europe and Japan and new ones from India to Russia will slowly come to appreciate American constancy and leadership as never before.*
> 
> But I am not naÃƒÂ¯ve enough to think that most Americans at this moment would agree with all - or any - of that.
> 
> - Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson200508080827.asp


----------



## a_majoor

The next theater for WWIV



> * Iran the Model*
> Iran moves, we don't.
> 
> Iranian President Ahmadi Nezhad has been busy putting together a cabinet for the Islamic republic, and while all real power remains firmly in the clammy hands of Supreme Leader Khamenei, it's worth taking a look at some of the new ministers, if only because it tells us two important things: (1) The face the regime wishes to show to the world at large, and (2) the policies the regime intends to unleash on the long-suffering Iranian people.
> 
> Who's Who
> Let's start with the interior minister, Hojatoll-Islam Mostafa Pour-Mohammadi. He was formerly the number-two man in the ministry of intelligence and security â â€ where he was directly in charge of the foreign section (and thus the sorts of foreign operations now running full bore in Iraq and Afghanistan) â â€ and, even more significantly, the man in charge of those matters in the office of the supreme leader.
> 
> Pour-Mohammadi comes from a sartorially celebrated family; his father and brother are tailors for leading clergy. Indeed, they prepared the raiments for both bin Laden and Zawahiri in their recent videos, in which their clothing was distinctively Iranian.
> 
> The minister for intelligence and security is Hojjatol-Islam Gholam-Hossein Mohseni Ezhei, from Isfahan, where he acquired a reputation as a particularly vicious and barbaric head of the Islamic tribunals which regularly issued brutal sentences. He has been special prosecutor in the intelligence ministry, where he was also in charge of key personnel decisions, and at present he is judge and prosecutor for the special tribunal of the clergy.
> 
> To Mohammed-Hossein Saffar-Harandi of Tehran goes the ironically named ministry of culture and Islamic guidance. In reality, that ministry's key role is to provide cover for external intelligence operations. For a decade, Saffar-Harandi was the director of the political bureau of the Revolutionary Guards, in which he holds the rank of brigadier general, and for which he was the commander of southern Iran.
> 
> The foreign minister is Manoucher Mottaki, whose long diplomatic career (he has been ambassador to both Japan and Turkey, and deputy foreign minister) has included the sensitive role as liaison between the foreign ministry and the revolutionary guards. While he was ambassador to Ankara, numerous Iranian dissidents were murdered and others kidnapped.
> 
> And then there is the defense minister, Mostafa Mohammad-Najjar, another brigadier general in the revolutionary Guards, where he has been since its official formation in 1979. As several commentators have pointed out, he was the commander of the RG forces in Lebanon in 1983, when the Marine barracks were blown up by the Guards and Hezbollah. So we owe him one.
> 
> The mullahs have torn off their conciliatory mask in order to bare their fangs to us, the Europeans, and the Iranian people. If we had an Iran strategy worthy of the name, our confused leaders would have pointed out the remarkable interview with the chief nuclear affairs negotiator, Hossein Musavian. It was broadcast on Iranian television August 4th, and made it quite clear that the Iranians deliberately tricked the Europeans into giving the mullahs an extra year to complete a vital part of their nuclear program in Isfahan.
> 
> *"Thanks to the negotiations with Europe," he bragged, "we gained another year, in which we completed...Isfahan." This was quite a coup, at least in Musavian's humble opinion: "We suspended (the enrichment program) in Isfahan in October 2004, although we were required to do so in October 2003...Today we are in a position of power: (the program) in Isfahan is complete and UF4 and UF6 gases are being produced. We have a stockpile of products, and...we have managed to convert 36 tons of yellow cake into gas and store it..."*
> 
> President Chirac? Chancellor Schroeder? Prime Minister Blair? How do you all intend to answer your parliamentary inquiries? You were all gulled by the mullahs (or, to put the darkest light on the matter, willing accomplices).
> 
> Meanwhile, the mullahs are killing us. Time published a long report from Baghdad on August 14, entitled "Inside Iran's Secret War for Iraq," which lays out chapter and verse of the mullahs' longstanding efforts â â€ often coordinated with Assad's Syria â â€ to drive us out of Iraq. It is the first time I've seen a major publication confirm what I reported months before Operation Iraqi Freedom: planning for the terror war against Coalition forces in Iraq "began before the U.S. invaded." And Time quotes a "British military intelligence officer about the relative inattention paid to the murderous Iranian activities. 'It's as though we are sleepwalking'."
> 
> Got Iran Policy?
> Instead of devoting hours of prime time coverage to the ravings of a broken mother, our media would do better to ask this administration why, four years after 9/11, it still has no Iran policy.
> 
> Perhaps, although one cannot say more than that, we are paying more attention. First came the announcement that American forces in Iraq found a cache of Iranian weapons, and had also captured a truck with shaped explosives entering Iraq from Iran. Then, talking to journalists on his plane during a South American swing on August 17, Rumsfeld said that U.S. forces have found Iranian weapons in Iraq "on more than one occasion over the past couple of months."
> 
> And so? These are straws in a very strong wind, and they will be blown away unless President Bush, Secretaries Rice and Rumsfeld, and Security Adviser Hadley at long last craft a serious policy to bring the terror war to bear on Tehran, as the president should have demanded on 9/12. The list of proven Iranian actions in the terror war against us is a very long one. To take just a few: In July, Assistant Secretary of State David Welch testified to the House International Relations Committee that "Iranian cadre were training Hizballah fighters in Lebanon," which Representative Tom Lantos quite reasonably found "profoundly disturbing." Hezbollah is operating in Iraq, and its infamous operational chieftain, Imad Mughniyah, remains at large even though the US Government has put a very high price on his head for decades. *U.S. special forces in Hilla last fall captured documents and photographs of known Iraqi terrorists meeting with Syrian and Iranian intelligence officers in Syria. The celebrated Spanish magistrate Baltasar Garzon publicly stated that, after the liberation of Afghanistan, al Qaeda reconstituted its leadership in Iran, where they convened a strategic summit in November, 2002. One of the participants was a Syrian named Mustafa Setmariam Nasar, who is now suspected by British authorities of being one of the masterminds of the lethal terrorist attack in London. According to Spanish newspapers, "Intelligence reports from foreign agencies last year placed Nasar in Iran."
> *
> The seemingly inescapable fact is that Iran is waging war on us, we are well aware of it, and we are not responding, even though most Iranians are dreaming of the day that the United States supports them against the mullahs. Hardly a day goes by without anti-regime demonstrations in one Iranian city or another, involving students, workers, intellectuals, and even some very important clergymen. The number of Iranian dissidents on hunger strike is growing. Akbar Ganji hovers between life and death in a hospital in Tehran. Yet, aside from occasional statements of compassion, there is no hint of action from the Bush administration.
> 
> This inaction has recently been buttressed by two fanciful "estimates" from the intelligence community. The first reassuringly forecast that Iran is a good ten years away from nuclear weapons; the second insisted that no revolution is in the Iranian works. To which the only proper response is a belly laugh. I'm personally willing to bet the farm against any intel-type willing to take the wager that Iran will have atomic bombs in a period closer to ten days than to ten years. And the "no revolution in the works" prediction comes, as Eli Lake of the splendid New York Sun wrote yesterday, from the same people who made the same prediction just before the fall of the Shah and who confidently told Ronald Reagan that the Soviet Empire was here to stay. Somebody should ask the deep thinkers to name three revolutions that occurred without outside support, and when they fail, they should then be asked how they could make such an assessment without discussing the key variable: our support or lack thereof.
> 
> As if that were not enough, our expert community, in and out of government, incessantly warns that if we were to support the democratic opposition in Iran, it would actually hurt the chances of revolution, because the Iranians would be so angry they would rally around the mullahs in a blind nationalistic spasm. The deep thinkers should take a look at the mullahs' reaction to the ongoing revolt in Awaz, in Khuzistan province. The regime has blamed the whole thing on the British Government. This produced a memorable response from the British Ahwazi friendship society:
> 
> Protestors are armed with rocks, tyres and anything else they can use in acts of civil disobedience. They do not have guns. Is Asefi afraid the British are smuggling rocks into Iran to overthrow the Revolutionary Guards? Does he think Ahwazis need special training from the British in order to throw rocks?
> 
> The mullahs always blame their troubles on foreigners, and yet the Iranian people remain opposed to the regime, and many of the most popular dissidents openly ask the West, and particularly the United States, to help them.
> 
> Well, Mr. President? To use the language of one of your favorite games, it's time to call or fold. Indeed, if you're planning to stay at the table, you might even raise: President Ahmadi Nezhad was not in the American embassy in Tehran in 1979, but he was hard at work in Evin Prison, where some of the hostages were interrogated. You've got every good reason to tell him to forget about coming to New York this fall to pose at the U.N. That would send a ripple of hope through the Iranian populace, now interpreting our willingness to let him come here as a sign of acquiescence. And while you're at it, why don't you ask the Europeans to show at least some symbolic courage. They've failed to stem the Iranian nuclear program. It's obviously a wasted effort to ask the U.N. to apply sanctions, since China and/or Russia will quash it (and in fact, sanctions are the last thing we should want, since they would punish the Iranian people, not the beturbaned tyrants in power). Put the mark of Cain on the mullahs: propose that the Europeans to join with you in asking for a ban of Iran from all international athletic competition. And ask the international trade union organizations to support their brothers and sisters in Iran, many of whom have not been paid for months, despite the cascade of petrodollars.
> 
> Enough already. Let's roll.
> 
> â â€ Michael Ledeen, an NRO contributing editor, is most recently the author of The War Against the Terror Masters. He is resident scholar in the Freedom Chair at the American Enterprise Institute.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/ledeen/ledeen200508191008.asp


----------



## a_majoor

The roots of WW IV are quite complex, this article describes the process which created the phenomina known as "IslamoFascism". As has been pointed out in other posts/threads, this is a simple term to describe a complex phenomina, but it is illustrative and helps guide our thinking:

http://victorhanson.com/articles/ibrahim090405.html



> *From Nationalism to Fascism to Terror*
> Parallels between Germany and the Arab World
> by Ray Ibrahim
> Private Papers
> 
> On occasion, one finds a historical pattern that provides a paradigm useful for interpreting contemporary world events.  One such paradigm is the almost eerie parallel between Germany's history - its progress from Nationalism to Fascism and ultimately Terror - and the recent history of the Arab world.
> 
> Nationalism, of course, originated in Europe. But what nationalism came to mean or embody to any particular people varied over time and place, and its articulation had much to do with specific historical circumstances.  *As a result, two highly antithetical forms of nationalism eventually emerged: the one, rooted in the Enlightenment, was aligned with liberal and "rationalist" thinking; the other, child of Romanticism, came to embody everything primordial: race, "blood," language, culture, and religion. * Consider, for example, the different sorts of nationalisms espoused by France and Germany. In France, nationalism was connected with concepts of individual liberty, rational cosmopolitanism, and citizenship. Germany's later nationalism was built almost purely on a sentimental regard for the supposedly heroic past and the mystic blood-ties of the volk.
> 
> Thus nations like Germany put more emphasis on the volk than on the citizen, and on the geist, the unique, defining "spirit" of the people, than on civic rights or political structures. According to the 18th-century German philosopher Herder, "Nature produces families; the most natural state therefore is one people [volk] with a natural character. . . .  Nothing seems more obviously opposed to the purpose of government than the unnatural enlargement of states, the wild mixing together of different human species and nations under one scepter."
> 
> As to why German nationalism developed along these lines, two considerations are important.  First, when threatened, a people often find solace by withdrawing into solidarity with others who share a same common background - racially, linguistically, culturally, theologically, and historically-while viewing all who do not share in these common primordial bonds as the dreaded "Others."  Conveniently enough, during the birth of German nationalism, there was in fact another hostile Other - the French.
> 
> Secondly, prior to 1871, the "German nation" was in fact composed of many petty kingdoms and principalities.  After the Napoleonic invasions, it became urgent for Germans to define and assert themselves through unification.  What better way to find cohesion than falling back on common traditions and values?  It is around this time that German history - or better, Teutonic myth - came to play a leading role in shaping the national consciousness: Wagnerian operas, based on the heroic Teutonic past, became popular. Historical characters like Arminius, who vanquished the Roman legions in the Teutoburg Forest in 9A.D., became objects of veneration, if not emulation.
> 
> Similarly, Arab nationalism developed along "romantic" lines. After nearly five centuries of foreign rule - from Ottomans to the Western colonial powers, primarily French and British - the Arab peoples, in order to find cohesion and identity in the rising world of nation-states, fell back on primordial bonds of kin, religion, shared history, and culture.  And just as in Germany, the liberal principles of Enlightenment nationalism came to be inextricably linked with the Arab peoples' oppressors (the French and British), giving the Arabs even more reason to shun "Western" liberal-democratic nationalism as a foreign import, a product of the oppressive Other.
> 
> Moreover, again similar to Germany, the so-called "Arab world" was - and still is - in reality made up of some 20 different states that needed some ready-made ideology in order to unify quickly.  Arab political scientist Bassam Tibi sums this phenomenon well:
> 
> _Arab nationalism in the colonial period, which persists until the present time, is intellectually related to Italian and German nationalisms, which have been defined by C.J. Hayes as 'counternationalism'. . . .  Arab nationalism, once francophile and partly anglophile, changed with the British and French colonisation of the area and became anti-British and anti-French, and germanophile. . . .  It [germanophilia] was closely connected with the historical circumstances which influenced Arab nationalism.  Furthermore, the germanophilia was narrow and one sided.  The German ideology absorbed by the Arab intellectuals at this time was confined to a set of nationalist ideas which had gained particular currency during the period of the Napoleonic Wars [i.e., when the Germans were most threatened by the Other].  These ideas carried notions of romantic irrationalism and a hatred of the French to extremes.  They excluded from consideration the philosophers influenced by the Enlightenment . . . on the grounds of what was considered to be their universalism.  They were particularly attracted by the notion of the 'People,' [Volk] as defined by German Romanticism, which they proceeded to apply to the Arab nation [emphases added]._
> 
> Like Herder before them, Arab thinkers came to make similar assertions regarding the concept of the nation.  For instance, Sati al-Husri (1882-1968), a very influential political figure, would "praise German Romanticism for having brought about the idea of the nation as distinct from the state, well before the French or British ever did.  He then fused the German concept of the nation with the Arabic concept of 'group solidarity' (asabiyya), which he derived from Ibn Khaldun."  For al-Husri, Unity was more than mere blood; there was a spiritual quality as well. Husri did not specify the form of government that could best effect the regeneration of the Arab nation he favored. He did not rule out political dictatorship, was certainly aware of the totalitarian aspects of his thinking, and, like many of his Arab contemporaries, expressed some admiration for fascism. *For Husri, freedom did not mean democracy or constitutionalism; it meant national unity. For him, nation (umma) denoted a group of people bound together by mutually recognized ties of language and history. This was distinct in his mind from state (dawla), a sovereign and independent people living on common land within fixed borders. It should be emphasized that umma for Husri was a purely secular entity, not a religious one [emphasis added].*
> 
> More to the point, many concepts that were embodied in German words and that were central to Germany's nationalism - Geist and Volk - had their exact counterparts in Arabic words which also held important connotations for Arab nationalists, e.g.., Ruh (spirit) and Umma.  Even today, these concepts are still prevalent in much of Arab political writings.  Political scientist Hamid Rabi (d. 1989) "finds the German national school worthy of consideration . . . and admires the way the German thinkers, when faced with the humiliation of the French conquest, delved into their own Teutonic heritage in search of cultural and civilisational roots that raised the Germans' awareness of their national distinctiveness and 'authenticity.'"
> 
> Even though Germany and the Arab world have faced similar circumstances, thereby generating similar responses, there is one final element that helped increase radicalization: war, defeat, and humiliation, as experienced by Germany in WWI and the Arab debacle at the hands of the Israelis in 1967, the culmination of Islam's long decline before the rising power of Europe.  As a result, both Germany and the Arab world, after experiencing these defeats to their arch-enemies - their most despised Other - proceeded to fall into a stricter, more radical mode of primordial nationalist thinking.
> 
> Far from abating, German nationalism, after Germany's defeat in 1918 in WWI would become more ossified; race, and all "authentically German" aspects (e.g., culture, history) came to have an even more exaggerated importance to many Germans in defining themselves (again, vis-ÃƒÂ -vis the Other).  This is when that ever so tenuous line separating nationalism from fascism was crossed.  With the rise of the Nazi party, German nationalism went to the extreme: the supposed superiority of the Aryan race (while quite popular during the turn of the century already) became the starting point for the ensuing (and megalomaniacal) German world view.  All "non-Aryans" - gypsies, Slavs, and of course the Jews - were ostracized or slaughtered; "deviants" (i.e., obviously non true-blooded Germans, such as homosexuals and liberals in general) were also persecuted.  All things became black or white, good or bad, right or wrong.  A "right" form of "German" conduct was expected from the people. Democracy was nonsense.  Women were expected to lead traditional lives, keeping their husbands and families their first priority.    Medieval German symbols and even pagan cults dedicated to the dark gods of the Teutoburg Wald (such as Wotan) became commonplace.  Indeed, that the Nazi party itself was greatly associated with the swastika - a historic, Teutonic symbol - demonstrates the importance that perceived attachments with the past had for the Germans.
> 
> An ideal example of the radicalization that Germany experienced is well demonstrated by the life of an average German man who fought in WWI and underwent a profound change - that is, the Fuhrer himself, Adolf Hitler.  The evidence indicates that Hitler had little personal bitterness towards Jews (not withstanding his purported vow of vengeance on the art academy that rejected him and was possibly headed by Jews).  Yet after the German defeat of WWI, increasingly to both Hitler and other Germans the Jews became even more singled out as traitors to the Fatherland - after all, they were not "true" Germans.  As for Germanic history/legend, Hitler was a zealous fan: his favorite books were about Teutonic gods and pure German lineages; Wagner's wildly passionate dramas of the heroic and romantic held a special place in his heart.  Hitler himself would proclaim, "Any who wish to understand me must first understand Wagner."  Thus on the eve of WWII, Germany, once defeated and humiliated a mere two decades ago, stood taller and prouder than ever, with a form of uncompromising and ruthless nationalism.
> 
> Based on this brief outline of Germany's overall transformation after their major defeat, many parallels with Arab responses vis-ÃƒÂ -vis the continuous Arab defeats to Israel (not to mention recent American humiliations) can be discerned.  Again, an enemy Other - the Jews - helped shape a people's nationalism.  With one disastrous defeat after another - 1948, 1956, 1967, 1973 (accompanied with extreme humiliation and indignation) - at the hands of the Jews, many Arabs, far from forfeiting their primordial form of nationalism, have delved deeper into their roots, seeking for elements that are glorious and heroic, and most importantly, that are authentically "Arab" - and what can be more "authentically" Arab than Islam itself, founded by an Arabian Prophet, revealed in the Arabian tongue, and preaching victory in face of oppression?
> 
> *In many respects, it is precisely for this reason that there has been an Islamic resurgence in parts of the Arab world: seen by some as the Ruh of the "true" Arab Umma, many Arabs, trying to rationalize why they have fallen from once proud heights, have found the answer in Islam.  In their frantic search for identity and cohesion vis-ÃƒÂ -vis the Jewish menace, many Arabs find in Islamic fundamentalism the logical conclusion of nationalism, for it provides a divinely sanctioned identity - and a war commanded by God Himself. Thus out of an already romantic (i.e., fascist) though disaffected nationalism, Islamic Fundamentalism was born.*
> 
> So even though Islam is a religion, the historic rise of Islamic fundamentalism betrays certain commonalities with the German response of Nazism.  And that it is also a religion, gives it more import and legitimacy, as God himself is at the heart of it.  The Jew becomes a more pronounced and hence more despised Other: for now he is no longer just a foreign invader; he is also an impious infidel defiling God's holy lands.  And just as was the case in Nazi Germany, a greater intolerance for others takes place: non-Muslims are condemned and often persecuted.  Right and wrong ossify; conformity to "correct" Islamic conduct is stressed.  Deviants such as homosexuals are rooted out.  Jihad takes on renewed and urgent importance; talk of the crusades and heroes like Saladin (compare with Arminius) become commonplace.  Osama bin Laden et. al. are very fond of musing on and evoking the prowess, dignity, and piety of Islam's forbears - such as 7th century Khalid, "the Sword of Allah."  Women are to return to traditional roles - husbands and family are prioritized.  And, just as symbols of Germany's historic past (e.g., the swastika) played an important role in keeping the link with the glorious and "authentic" past alive, so too do Arab symbols become prominent: beards, turbans, and veils - back by popular demand - are to an extent symbolic, evidencing this link to the past.
> 
> And so, in certain respects, Islamic fundamentalism is an old phenomenon in a different form. Just as for Germany, wars and wounded egos have produced a vicious backlash in many parts of the Arab world.  But these commonalities and shared histories are not only instructive regarding the causes of Nazism and Islamic fundamentalism; perhaps they can also shed some light on how to handle the latter.



Certainly, we cannot undo history, and appeasment never works for long ("pay the Danegeld and you never get rid of the Dane"). Germany and Imperial Japan needed to have their societies destroyed and their ruling ideologies humiliated in order to end the threat of National Socialism and State Shinto, perhaps we need to steel ourselves to do the same to the Arab world to achieve victory.


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## Infanteer

Although the plea to romanticism is apt (in a basic, human sense), that is about all I will give this article.   To me, it is typical Western misunderstanding; want to understand Militant Islam?   Let's write 3/4 of the article on German history....

In my opinion, any article which attempts to discuss Global Salafi thought and doesn't mention Qutb, Tammiyah, or the Ikhwan is off the mark.   In my understanding, much of militant Islamic thought came to the fore as a movement *against* pan-Arab nationalism, not as a complementary evolution with it.   Certainly, this is what Qutb's works say (I've got it sitting right in front of me) - the fact that he wrote it while imprisoned by the quintessential pan-Arab nationalists, the Nasirists in Egypt, seems to further that notion.   The failure of the Arab states to deal with a tiny Israel certainly plays a role, but I think Qutb's notion of _jahiliyyah_ and its view towards the internal workings of the Arab states needs to be accounted for when considering it.   The militant Islam we are dealing with today finds its roots in Egypt, not Germany, and its incubation in Afghanistan, not Israel.


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## mdh

Qutb has been one of the most influential theorists of modern Islam in the 20th century. But I think it's more accurate to say he rejected_ secular_ nationalism - (mostly of the Baathist variety) - and advocated for a kind of theocratic nationalism or pan-nationalism in its place   - or if you prefer the Caliphate - or in the more modern sense - the Koran, the Imam, plus electricity and a police force. 

Moreover I wouldn't underestimate the amount of western influence on Qutb - he was educated in the US afterall - even if he dismissed America as decadent. He was very aware of western material progress.

I don't know what a Qutb state would have looked like - but wouldn't Iran and Taliban Afghanistan have been close contenders? Are they not - to borrow the Marxist term - the islamic praxis?

But it seems to me that analysing modern islam (as necessary as it is) is akin to analysing socialism - the nuances and sectarianism are so numerous that it can easily paralyze the analyst so that one cannot make any useful generalizations that help the layperson understand what they're up against. (I never had much patience for the "on the one hand, but on the other hand", school of analyses - at least not if it become a variety of _reductio ad absurdum_).

The "roots" of modern fundamentalism appear so multitudinous that they defy easy categorization. 

But isn't it the raw and simple idea that really inspires so many disparate (ethnic and national) groups to embrace jihad - the raw and simple idea that the west is wicked and decadent and materialist? If you look at the London bombers in profile - I'm willing to bet they wouldn't have known Qutb from Harry Potter - at least in any sophisticated sense. I'm sure Qutb was just a series of bowdlerized slogans for these boys. 

What really mattered was a twisted fealty to an islamic god and the necessity of making the infidel pay a price.

cheers, mdh

Here is a profile on Qutb in the Guardian:
   




> Qutb, regarded as the father of modern fundamentalism and described by his (Arab) biographer as "the most famous personality of the Muslim world in the second half of the 20th century", is being increasingly cited as the figure who has most influenced the al-Qaida leader. Yet outside the Muslim world, he remains virtually unknown.
> Qutb was the most influential advocate in modern times of jihad, or Islamic holy war, and the chief developer of doctrines that legitimise violent Muslim resistance to regimes that claim to be Muslim, but whose implementation of Islamic precepts is judged to be imperfect. Although Qutb is particularly popular in Saudi Arabia, his copious writings have been translated into most of the languages of the Islamic world. In the 1960s and 70s, when many Afghan religious scholars came under the influence of the Muslim Brotherhood, Qutb's ideas attracted particular interest in the faculty of religious law in Kabul, and the scholar Burhanuddin Rabbani translated him into the Afghan language of Dari. However, though Qutb is studied everywhere from Malaysia to Morocco, there are many versions of fundamentalism and his writings have been read and interpreted in many ways (and some Islamic fundamentalists have actually written polemics against Qutb's version of Islam).
> 
> Qutb was born in 1906, in Mush, a small village in Upper Egypt. Later he was to look back on the superstition and backwardness of village life. He was mostly educated at Dar al-'Ulum, a secular secondary college, and subsequently worked for the Egyptian ministry of education as an inspector of schools. In the 1930s and 40s he led a second life as a literary man about town. He haunted cafes, published literary criticism as well as a not particularly successful novel.
> 
> Everything changed in 1948 when he was sent to study education in the US. It was a fateful decision. Perhaps those who sent him thought that it would broaden his horizons. What happened was that on the voyage out he decided that his only salvation lay in an unswerving allegiance to Islam. Almost immediately his newfound resolve was tested on the liner, as a drunken American woman attempted to seduce him. Qutb did not succumb, nor was he later won over by the charms of the American way of life. He was repelled by prejudice against Arabs and shocked by the freedom that American men allowed their women. He described the churches as "entertainment centres and sexual playgrounds". After two and a half years of exposure to western civilisation he knew that he hated it and, on his return to Egypt in 1951, he joined the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood.
> 
> In the early 1950s the Muslim Brotherhood was in transition, as many of its members abandoned faith in gradualism and education as the way to bring about an Islamic revolution in Egypt and came to espouse violence instead. Qutb followed a similar trajectory. In 1954, he and many other Muslim Brothers were rounded up by Nasser's regime. He was to spend 10 years in prison. Though conditions were harsh, Qutb was not prevented from writing. He was released in 1964, then rearrested in 1965 after members of the Muslim Brotherhood had attempted to assassinate Nasser. He was routinely tortured before being brought to trial and then hanged on August 29 1966.
> 
> What Qutb wrote is of more significance than his somewhat shadowy life. His major work is Fi Zalal al-Koran (In the Shadow of the Koran), a commentary on the Koran in 30 volumes which began to appear in 1952 and was completed in prison. Apart from its length, two things are striking about the commentary: first, Qutb's unfailing sensitivity to the Koran's literary qualities; secondly, Qutb's relentless insistence on the unconditional demands made upon those believers. From his reading of the Koran, he deduced that the Christians are all destined for heck and in other, shorter, later works he polemicised against Christians, Jews and the western way of life.
> 
> Orientalism was another engine of the Jewish conspiracy: "It would be extremely short-sighted of us to fall into the illusion that when the Jews and Christians discuss Islamic beliefs or Islamic history or when they make proposals concerning Muslim society or Muslim politics or economics, they will be doing it with good intentions."
> 
> However, Qutb's fiercest polemics were reserved for those who were Muslims - or rather, those who claimed that they were Muslims. Neither Egypt under Nasser's dictatorship nor Arabia under the Saudi monarchy had made any serious attempt to implement the Shari'a, or religious law. More generally, the territories of Islam were governed by corrupt, westernised dictators and princes whose spiritually heedless and ignorant ways could only be compared to those of the Jahili Arabs - that is to say, to the pagan ways of the Arabs prior to the coming of Mohammed and the revelation of the Koran.
> 
> The corrupt regimes had to be resisted and overthrown. In order to find a hallowed precedent and legitimisation for such resistance Qutb had to go back to the era of the Mameluke Sultans of Egypt and to the writings of Ibn Taymiyya (1268-1328). Taymiyya, a somewhat curmudgeonly Islamic purist, had been outspoken in his opposition to almost everything that was not explicitly sanctioned by the Koran and the Prophet and his intransigence several times led him into conflict with the Mamelukes and, consequently, imprisonment.
> 
> However, when they found themselves at war with the Muslim Mongol Ilkhans of Iran, the Mamelukes asked him for a judgment sanctioning the holiness of their cause and, surprisingly, he obliged. He declared that, though the Mongols might have professed Islam, they did not follow absolutely all the prescriptions of the religion and that therefore they were Jahili pagans against whom jihad had to be waged. Taymiyya's verdict has underwritten Islamic resistance movements from the 1950s onwards. It was cited by the assassins of Sadat in 1981 and it is also used to justify the struggle against the Saudi monarchy.
> 
> Qutb seems to have rejected all kinds of government, secular and theocratic, and, on one reading at least, he seems to advocate a kind of anarcho-Islam. On the one hand his writings have exercised a formative influence on the Taliban, who, under the leadership of the shy, rustic Mullah Omar seem to have been concentrating on implementating the Shari'a in one country under the governance of the Mullahs. On the other hand, Qutb's works have also influenced al-Qaida, which, under the leadership of the flamboyant and camera-loving Bin Laden, seems to aim at a global jihad that will end with all men under direct, unmediated rule of Allah.
> 
> In the context of that global programme, the destruction of the twin towers, spectacular atrocity though it was, is merely a by-blow in al-Qaida's current campaign. Neither the US nor Israel is Bin Laden's primary target - rather it is Bin Laden's homeland, Saudi Arabia. The corrupt and repressive royal house, like the Mongol Ilkhanate of the 14th century, is damned as a Jahili scandal. Therefore, al-Qaida's primary task is to liberate the holy cities of Mecca and Medina from their rule. Though the current policy of the princes of the Arabian peninsula seems to be to sit on their hands and hope that al-Qaida and its allies will pick on someone else first, it is unlikely that they will be so lucky.
> 
> · Robert Irwin is Middle East editor of the Times Literary Supplement


----------



## Infanteer

> *Terminal Debate*
> 
> By BERNARD HAYKEL
> Published: October 11, 2005
> 
> WHEN Iraq's most notorious terrorist, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, declared a "full-scale war" on Iraq's Shiites on Sept. 14, he appeared to be speaking for all or most jihadis. But Mr. Zarqawi's war on Shiites is deeply unpopular in some quarters of his own movement. In fact, growing splits among jihadis are beginning to undermine the theological and legal justifications for suicide bombing. And as that emerging schism takes its toll on the jihadi movement, it could well present an opportunity for Western governments to combat jihadism itself.
> 
> The simple fact is that many jihadis believe the war in Iraq is not going well. Too many Muslims are being killed. Images of that slaughter, conveyed by satellite television and the Internet throughout the Muslim world, are eroding global support for the jihadi cause. There are strong indications from jihadi Web sites and online journals, confirmed by conversations I have had while doing research among Salafis, or scriptural literalists, that the suicide attacks are turning many Muslims against the jihadis altogether.
> 
> The movement's leadership is sensitive to Muslim public opinion. Mr. Zarqawi's mentor, Abu Mohammed al-Maqdisi, has denounced the campaign against Shiites as un-Islamic. Other prominent radical Islamists have advanced similar criticisms. And in a letter made public last week, Al Qaeda's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, cautioned Mr. Zarqawi against particularly gruesome executions and attacks on Iraqi civilians for fear of their negative impact on the global jihadi cause.
> 
> To be sure, the alternatives these critics recommend are no less violent. Rather, many of the movement's dissidents suggest that jihadis diminish their efforts in Iraq and revert to spectacular attacks in the West, like those that took place on Sept. 11. These, such thinkers maintain, are singularly popular among Muslims and the only effective means of doing long-term damage to the West.
> 
> Still, Western governments should encourage the debate among jihadis because, if the promise of absolute salvation through suicide attacks is thrown into question by some within the jihadi movement, potential recruits may come to doubt the wisdom of engaging in such tactics.
> 
> The prevailing jihadi theoretical argument consists in saying that there is religious sanction for the killing of Muslim civilians, and that neither the innocent victims nor the bombers are doomed to suffer in heck. Jihadi claims about the certainty of salvation are the most important tools in their recruitment efforts. But they are also so fractious and unstable as to comprise the movement's Achilles' heel. In order to sustain these claims, theorists quote examples from the Prophet Muhammad's time that permit the targeting of Muslim civilians in war. They then draw tendentious analogies between these cases and today's political situation. For example, jihadis falsely claim that Iraqi civilians are being held as human shields by the occupying forces.
> 
> Furthermore, in Iraq, the jihadis bank on the fact that their attacks primarily kill Shiites. The fighters presume that their Sunni brethren, who consider Shiites to be heretics, will either approve or turn a blind eye. This policy is clearly failing, except among the radical Salafis in Saudi Arabia whose hatred for Shiites exceeds even that for the United States.
> 
> Not only are some jihadis queasy about targeting Shiites, but particularly following the London bombings, some jihadis have questioned the targeting of civilians more generally. One major jihadi ideologue, Abu Baseer al-Tartusi, has issued a fatwa arguing that all suicide bombing that targets Muslims, or innocent non-Muslims, is unlawful.
> 
> Abu Baseer, a Syrian who lives in Britain, no doubt fears that in Britain's changing legal climate, he might be extradited to his homeland, where he would face certain imprisonment and torture. Some jihadis have excoriated him on Internet message boards for placing self-preservation above religious conviction. But the important point is that real chinks are widening in the jihadi ideological armor, whether by the real consequences of suicide attacks or because the religious justifications that have underpinned them are becoming untenable.
> 
> Arguments can be built on Abu Baseer's position that suicide attacks inevitably involve the killing of innocent civilians, including Muslims living in the West, and that these are difficult to justify in Islamic law. Rather than expelling him from his asylum in Britain, concerned authorities ought to allow Abu Baseer to remain in Britain and make his case, which amounts to one of the first principled arguments by a jihadi thinker against suicide bombings since 9/11. Any would-be suicide bomber will have to weigh these arguments.
> 
> The West needs to understand that reasoned debates take place within jihadi circles and that such reasoning can change minds. Indeed, Al Qaeda's most recent statements, like that of Mr. Zawahiri, betray an anxiety about these splits within the movement and seek to reassert the legitimacy of suicide attacks both in Iraq and in the West.
> 
> THE West should refrain from interfering in this evolving debate. Western governments should not shut down jihadi Web sites or expel the movement's dissenters, many of whom reside in the West or write from prisons in the Middle East. Rather, they should allow this process to take its course. By employing extreme tactics, the jihadis have laid bare the contradictions within their own movement. Their internal debates about suicide tactics are a sign of weakness - and of the fraying of the consensus Al Qaeda so carefully built over the last decade.
> 
> _Bernard Haykel, an associate professor of Islamic Studies at New York University and a 2005 Carnegie Scholar, is the author of "Revival and Reform in Islam."_
> 
> (Source:   NYT)



Perhaps, as Kennan noted about Bolshevism, Militant Islam (especially of the Salafist variety) contains the seeds of its own collapse.   This is undoubtably something to exploit.


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## Dare

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Perhaps, as Kennan noted about Bolshevism, Militant Islam (especially of the Salafist variety) contains the seeds of its own collapse.  This is undoubtably something to exploit.


I agree with that. This ties in with my previous motion about this war needing an increased effort on religious conversion. I think that this also should be a military objective, not just left to those of us on the internet, and private citizens. The code book to their "programming" is readily available. A teddy bear may turn children. Good deeds, like building schools,  may turn others. Appealing to the heart goes only so far, lasts only so long and is often easily reversed. Yet, only a reasonable and direct confrontation of ideas will turn the hardcore (the ones actually doing most of the damage), and ultimately win the day. Talk to them! Absolutely!! Just be aware, they're likely trying to convert you, as well.   

A policy of non-interference, on the other hand, I think is a poor idea. We should do whatever we can to advance the dialog forward and away. Suicide bombings are not an entirely new tactic in their essence. It is the reaction that we give which has triggered the response from moderation and put questions where there was unquestioning authority and timidity.


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## paracowboy

'conversion' is a bad idea. Why would they trade one form of spiritual extortion for another? We need to get them to realize that the extremists in their faith are leading them down a path of destruction. That is happening, at a grass-roots level. Start talking about 'conversion,' however, and you're going to rile up the moderates and even those who are openly friendly to us.


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## Infanteer

Conversion?  The enemy has been saying that we are out to supplant Islam with a Judeo-Christian crusade, so why would we want to play right to their tune?  Para is right, we need to convince mainstream Islam that extremism will get them nowhere - probably with a carrot and stick approach, but I start to feel we need more and more stick these days.


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## Glorified Ape

Dare said:
			
		

> I agree with that. This ties in with my previous motion about this war needing an increased effort on religious conversion. I think that this also should be a military objective, not just left to those of us on the internet, and private citizens. The code book to their "programming" is readily available. A teddy bear may turn children. Good deeds, like building schools,   may turn others. Appealing to the heart goes only so far, lasts only so long and is often easily reversed. Yet, only a reasonable and direct confrontation of ideas will turn the hardcore (the ones actually doing most of the damage), and ultimately win the day.



Using a tool of violence (the military) to promote religious conversion? Sounds like a very very bad idea and one more characteristic of totalitarianism than democracy. The hardcore are likely to get more hardcore, and more support from the non-hardcore, if you have a military-led religious conversion campaign. Or any conversion campaign, for that matter. As soon as you start trying to promote a religion, you turn the conflict into an explicitly religious one where the stakes are the survival of the faith. I can't think of an easier way to completely polarize the situation (more than it is presently) and remove any semblance of legitimacy from Western involvement in the ME than to turn an attempted political conversion effort into a religious one. 

As Infanteer said, any efforts at conversion would only validate the opposition's claim that the West is out to destroy/convert Islam and that's likely to turn a great number of existing and potential supporters into vehement opponents. That's to say nothing of the moral repugnancy of such a practice.


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## couchcommander

Perhaps, as Kennan noted about Bolshevism, Militant Islam (especially of the Salafist variety) contains the seeds of its own collapse.   This is undoubtably something to exploit.

Indeed, very true. 

As unfortunate as the circumstances are of the people in Iran (and before in Iraq), trying to forcibly change the situation and bring about relative harmony between these states and the west by direct military intervention will not (is not?) working. It is having about the same affect as forcibly trying to change the Soviet Union to a democratic, capitalist society would have hand when Stalin was around (when the populace did in fact believe in what they were doing, or at least a big enough portion to cause all types of trouble). 

It's an unfortunate, and ironic, consequence of our greed for resources that we are in fact dependant upon the states with which was are now engaged in pseudo conflict with. Fundamentally, the best option to deal with this situation, and the same option that brought down the soviet union (or more appropriately allowed itself to self distruct without bringing the rest of the world with it), would be containment. Extensive economic, political, and social containment until a series of demands for reforms are met (probably take 50-100 years). We can combine this with occasional air strikes to ensure they do not ever aquire WMD, and massive military force should they ever undertake offensive action. Otherwise, just wait until the people have had enough of living in squalor and reject fundamentalism (as the soviet people ended up rejecting communism), and then welcome them with open arms into our great socieities. 

But alas, as I said, we need their oil, so in the end, who's really got who by the balls?


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## a_majoor

couchcommander said:
			
		

> It's an unfortunate, and ironic, consequence of our greed for resources that we are in fact dependant upon the states with which was are now engaged in pseudo conflict with. Fundamentally, the best option to deal with this situation, and the same option that brought down the soviet union (or more appropriately allowed itself to self distruct without bringing the rest of the world with it), would be containment. Extensive economic, political, and social containment until a series of demands for reforms are met (probably take 50-100 years). We can combine this with occasional air strikes to ensure they do not ever aquire WMD, and massive military force should they ever undertake offensive action. Otherwise, just wait until the people have had enough of living in squalor and reject fundamentalism (as the soviet people ended up rejecting communism), and then welcome them with open arms into our great socieities.



Although we like living a comfortable lifestyle, we get our resources by the always successful method of buying them from a willing vendor. Believers of the "We are in the war for Oil" paradigm might stop and consider that Canada has a huge stockpile of oil, water, minerals, agricultural resource and so on. If "greed" was the motivating factor, then shipping 150,000 servicemen halfway around the world "for oil" makes no sense at all, since they could accomplish that goal with a short drive north of the 49th parallel.

The implosion of the USSR wasn't caused by the population living in squalor; their conditions were far worse in the 1930s. The reasons were two fold; first the United States began mounting challenges in the political, diplomatic, economic and military spheres, which the USSR was structurally unable to meet. The second reason was the chosen method of response (Perestrioka) relaxed the central control that the CPSU help over the USSR in an attempt to bring creativity and initiative to bear on the problems of a stagnent economy, only to discover the age old truth that people are in it for themselves and their families. Once the genie was out of the bottle, there was no practical way of reversing course.

The Cedar Revolution in Lebanon, and the current drives towards a democratic, free market Iraq, and the student protests against the Theocracy in Iran represent the real means of isolating the Jihadis from the populations. Western military presence provides security and allows the civil populations to carry out their activities in a more protected atmosphere (the Lebanese people have hated Syrian occupation for 27 years, but until 150,000 armed coalition servicemen occupied Iraq they had no way to protest in saftey). In the short term, the Jihadis, Ba'athists, Autocrats and Theocrats can always deamonize the coalition to distract their populations, but time is actually on our side, if we have the patience and will. People in Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran and other countries will eventually wonder why conditions seem so different on the other side of the fence, and why the supposed enemy is not attacking or otherwise threatening them (the people, not the regime).

That is the way for the West to achieve victory. Judicious use of military force to provide security for the masses while allowing them to expend their energies on themselves, and mounting military, economic and diplomatic challenges that the Ba'athists, Autocrats and Theocrats are unable to respond to, colapsing their brittle regimes.


----------



## TCBF

"One of the problems is fighting WW IV is the difficulty in articulating what exactly needs to be done, and getting support to doing it."

- Yep.  the other problem is convincing the Western World that we are fighting World War IV.

Tom


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## couchcommander

Hey a_majoor,



			
				a_majoor said:
			
		

> Although we like living a comfortable lifestyle, we get our resources by the always successful method of buying them from a willing vendor. Believers of the "We are in the war for Oil" paradigm might stop and consider that Canada has a huge stockpile of oil, water, minerals, agricultural resource and so on. If "greed" was the motivating factor, then shipping 150,000 servicemen halfway around the world "for oil" makes no sense at all, since they could accomplish that goal with a short drive north of the 49th parallel.


I must have not conveyed what I was trying to say. In this particular post I was not pushing the thought that Iraq was invaded for primarily strategic economic reasons (different argument... though just quickly on that note, the "oil" we have here in Canada is very different than the oil they have in the middle east, and is primary used for different products.... but that is neither here nor there). In this case I was just pointing out that we can't go on an all out offensive against these states even if we wanted to, as they have the oil we need (thus our balls....ouch). 




> The implosion of the USSR wasn't caused by the population living in squalor; their conditions were far worse in the 1930s.



I agree. One will find that the populations that become the most revolutionary are not the ones who are the worst off (people who are too busy looking for food don't care about governments, whereas someone who has food and hears a rumour that there might not be food in the future will loose it). 



> The reasons were two fold; first the United States began mounting challenges in the political, diplomatic, economic and military spheres, which the USSR was structurally unable to meet. The second reason was the chosen method of response (Perestrioka) relaxed the central control that the CPSU help over the USSR in an attempt to bring creativity and initiative to bear on the problems of a stagnent economy, only to discover the age old truth that people are in it for themselves and their families. Once the genie was out of the bottle, there was no practical way of reversing course.


I personallly think two fold is way too much of an understatment. Yes indeed the US was putting pressure on the USSR... anymore than they had for the past 30 years.... that is really debatable. But in the end it is of course fair to say that pressures (IMO mostly on the soviet economy due to the arms race) from the US if anything greatly sped up the collaspe of the soviet union. "Structually unable to meet" is a great phrase, and very very true. Ah this is a such broad topic, I've spent four months in seminar on THIS specific topic alone to only come to the conclusion that there were many, many "possible" causes.   You particular suggestion regarding Perestroika does indeed have a lot of weight, and in any event I believe that it did indeed contribute to the collaspe, on top of many other things, and of those was a steadily decreasing standard of living vs. the westernized world (not an absolute decrease in the standard of living). 



> The Cedar Revolution in Lebanon, and the current drives towards a democratic, free market Iraq, and the student protests against the Theocracy in Iran represent the real means of isolating the Jihadis from the populations.


Just shows what can happen, even if we don't take direct military action. 



> Western military presence provides security and allows the civil populations to carry out their activities in a more protected atmosphere (the Lebanese people have hated Syrian occupation for 27 years, but until 150,000 armed coalition servicemen occupied Iraq they had no way to protest in saftey).


I don't agree, I think it had more to do with a series of political and social events in Lebanon (ie a deep routed and long standing movement with widespread sympathies, combined with a trigger, and a weak syrian response (I think we've got at this particular point before... lol). 



> In the short term, the Jihadis, Ba'athists, Autocrats and Theocrats can always deamonize the coalition to distract their populations, but time is actually on our side, if we have the patience and will. People in Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran and other countries will eventually wonder why conditions seem so different on the other side of the fence, and why the supposed enemy is not attacking or otherwise threatening them (the people, not the regime).



I agree 100%



> That is the way for the West to achieve victory. Judicious use of military force  Concerted international pressure (ie non-UN), a judicious use of "non-conventional means" to provide security for the masses while allowing them to expend their energies on themselves, and mounting military, economic and diplomatic challenges that the Ba'athists, Autocrats and Theocrats are unable to respond to, combined with a demonstrated ability and will to then aid the revolutionaries once they have begun the uprising, will collaspe their brittle regimes.



Ah, much better.


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## a_majoor

> That is the way for the West to achieve victory. Judicious use of military force  Concerted international pressure (ie non-UN), a judicious use of "non-conventional means" to provide security for the masses while allowing them to expend their energies on themselves, and mounting military, economic and diplomatic challenges that the Ba'athists, Autocrats and Theocrats are unable to respond to, combined with a demonstrated ability and will to then aid the revolutionaries once they have begun the uprising, will collaspe their brittle regimes.



You are coming along quite nicely couchcommander, and I will soon have you in the clutches of the Straussian cabal  .

Our main point of disagreement seems to be not in the ways, but rather the means. I have a lesser view of the use of "concerted international pressure", since there are very few historical examples of this working without the backing of force. What event got results (we will argue about positive or negative another day), an edict from the Roman Senate or dispatching the Legions? A Papal Bull or the Crusades? The march by the Fascist regimes of Europe or edicts from the League of Nations?

Even in the case of Syria, many nations have made statements calling of Syria to withdraw from Lebanon, but the Ba'athists had no incentive to do so. Perhaps the weak response this time had to do with the chilling effect of a massive military machine on the other border. Judicious military response can cover a lot of ground, random bombing and cruise missile attacks are not "it", but everything from SF teams finding and neutralizing key players and assets of the "enemy" to various "nation building" tasks can fill the bill.


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## mdh

> You are coming along quite nicely couchcommander, and I will soon have you in the clutches of the Straussian cabal  .



Hey whatever happened to opsec?????  

cheers, mdh


----------



## couchcommander

a_majoor said:
			
		

> You are coming along quite nicely couchcommander, and I will soon have you in the clutches of the Straussian cabal   .



NEVER!! I forgot to mention a nice big helping of touchy feely respect and good will towards your fellow human beings, regardless of the choices they make!



> Our main point of disagreement seems to be not in the ways, but rather the means.



Yea I'd agree with that. I think in the end we both want to have nations who are not threatening us, and whose populace is happy and well treated (for me, this does not necessarily mean democracy, though this is often the best route)?



> I have a lesser view of the use of "concerted international pressure", since there are very few historical examples of this working without the backing of force. What event got results (we will argue about positive or negative another day), an edict from the Roman Senate or dispatching the Legions? A Papal Bull or the Crusades? The march by the Fascist regimes of Europe or edicts from the League of Nations?



I would argue that these things may have more immediate impact, but their lasting value is often times not that good. Realtively permanent solutions (IMO) can really only be had when the parties involved are all satisfied with said solution (or one side will always be looking for a way out). Using force to impose settlements, at least in recent history (think colonialism) doesn't have that good of a track record. 

This, to me, means that military force should only really be used to enforce widespread popular movements (if the revolutionaries actually want you there), not to try and start one. This then presents a couple of benefits. Firstly, not everyone is your enemy, you at least have some indiginous allies, and hopefully this is the majority. Secondly, the hard part with which we seem to have the most trouble with, "winning hearts and minds" if you will, is already done for you. Thirdly, you don't look like an evil imperialist empire, but rather a liberator (will help when trying to continue the fight later on, and with gathering allies). 

Re: international pressure

I'm always of a big proponent of the old (very old) maxim of "If you want peace, prepare for war" (Vegetius, Epitoma Rei Militaris). You cannot have absolutely no way of stopping someone from doing something, and still have them listen to you when you tell them to stop.

Having the resources to back up demands (such as, no genocide, which to me is one of the few grounds on which those responsible should be immediately "extricated" from country by whatever means necessary and immediately put on trial), makes them much more forceful. 

Furthermore, league of nations edicts, UN resolutions.... the reason they carry no weight is because they carry no weight, rarely do the nations who put together the resolution actually do what they say they are going to do, and rarely do the resolutions go far enough. Whereas if we (the G8) were to say to someone like Mugabe, and actually mean it, that unless you bring about democratic reforms we will not engage in any type of social, political, or economic interactions except those that are humanitarian in nature; and furthermore if you continue to presist in this we will ensure, by whatever means necessary, that your remaining term in office will be your last; I think we would have a much better reaction. 



> Even in the case of Syria, many nations have made statements calling of Syria to withdraw from Lebanon, but the Ba'athists had no incentive to do so. Perhaps the weak response this time had to do with the chilling effect of a massive military machine on the other border. Judicious military response can cover a lot of ground, random bombing and cruise missile attacks are not "it", but everything from SF teams finding and neutralizing key players and assets of the "enemy" to various "nation building" tasks can fill the bill.



I'd agree with the SF teams bit as a last resort, but I think that the US was, at the time, and even now, incapable of actuallly invading Syria, and they knew it.

Now bombing it into the stone age, that's another story.... that definately may have factored into their thinking if the US suggested it. However that threat could have credible and exercise whether or not the US was in Iraq. 

Throughout all of this, though, we have to remember that these people are not us, and they may have very different views about what is a "good" society. IMO as long as that vision does directly threaten us, or the well being of other peoples (minorities within said nations), we should help them along their path. Of course if this vision does directly threaten us (Western Nations should be obliterated, etc.), ignore it, contain it, wait for it to pass, and only respond or use force if necessary, and then only as a restorative, not punitive or reformative, measure. 

EDIT:

Interesting thing popped up

http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2005/10/31/csis051031.html

One of the not so good effects of overt and judicious military action when it is not generally perceived as a good thing.


----------



## a_majoor

couchcommander said:
			
		

> I would argue that these things may have more immediate impact, but their lasting value is often times not that good. Realtively permanent solutions (IMO) can really only be had when the parties involved are all satisfied with said solution (or one side will always be looking for a way out). Using force to impose settlements, at least in recent history (think colonialism) doesn't have that good of a track record.



I suspect the citizens of Carthage might tend to disagree



> I'm always of a big proponent of the old (very old) maxim of "If you want peace, prepare for war" (Vegetius, Epitoma Rei Militaris). You cannot have absolutely no way of stopping someone from doing something, and still have them listen to you when you tell them to stop.
> 
> Having the resources to back up demands (such as, no genocide, which to me is one of the few grounds on which those responsible should be immediately "extricated" from country by whatever means necessary and immediately put on trial), makes them much more forceful.
> 
> Furthermore, league of nations edicts, UN resolutions.... the reason they carry no weight is because they carry no weight, rarely do the nations who put together the resolution actually do what they say they are going to do, and rarely do the resolutions go far enough. Whereas if we (the G8) were to say to someone like Mugabe, and actually mean it, that unless you bring about democratic reforms we will not engage in any type of social, political, or economic interactions except those that are humanitarian in nature; and furthermore if you continue to presist in this we will ensure, by whatever means necessary, that your remaining term in office will be your last; I think we would have a much better reaction.



You seem to want to take your proposition and eat it too. How exactly do you expect these things to happen unless there is the ability and will to put muscle behind these pious statements. Canada is notorious for preaching on the world stage without follow through, it has gotten to the point that even rock stars like Bono have emerged from their hedonistic stupor to criticise Canada's lack of contribution/response to some of these crisis you have named. 



> I'd agree with the SF teams bit as a last resort, but I think that the US was, at the time, and even now, incapable of actuallly invading Syria, and they knew it.
> 
> Now bombing it into the stone age, that's another story.... that definately may have factored into their thinking if the US suggested it. However that threat could have credible and exercise whether or not the US was in Iraq.



There are several threads on this very topic, I am a big believer in the idea that the US has the ability to deliver incapacitating "head shots" to offensive regimes, their primary weakness today is the ability to follow up quickly enough to stabilize the country and establish a working government (the last time they did this was in 1945, so Iraq and Afghanistan represent some hard OJT on the subject). Rest assured, if the Americans fell there is a compelling reason to do so (like nuclear provocation), action WILL happen.



> Throughout all of this, though, we have to remember that these people are not us, and they may have very different views about what is a "good" society. IMO as long as that vision does directly threaten us, or the well being of other peoples (minorities within said nations), we should help them along their path. Of course if this vision does directly threaten us (Western Nations should be obliterated, etc.), ignore it, contain it, wait for it to pass, and only respond or use force if necessary, and then only as a restorative, not punitive or reformative, measure.



Before you can restore or rebuild, you need to excise the cancer. Sanctions and "International Pressure" have track records similar to using homeopathy in curing cancer, wheras direct action works more like a scaple and chemotherapy. Iraq is simply undergoing an intensive course of chemo right now.

(edited to remove annoying nested quotes)


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## couchcommander

a_majoor said:
			
		

> I suspect the citizens of Carthage might tend to disagree


Yes indeed, but that was before the idea of a nation even existed. Once we see the birth of nationalism (ie recent history), trying to force a population to do something, and continue to do it for a long period of time, via large scale military force applied by another "nation" does not have that many examples of success (of course that is unless you completely and utterly destroy the will of the population to fight, but I don't think we will be engaging in any World War's any time soon, IMO. So unless we are prepared to go into all out combat against civilian populations (ie bomb their cities to the ground), to me this doesn't seem like a method that has that good of a chance of being a semi-permanent solution). 

The point is it's like me arguing with my girlfriend. If I have any hope of her actually being happy with what the end result is, it'd better seem to her that it is her idea in the end (even if it's not). 



> You seem to want to take your proposition and eat it too. How exactly do you expect these things to happen unless there is the ability and will to put muscle behind these pious statements. Canada is notorious for preaching on the world stage without follow through, it has gotten to the point that even rock stars like Bono have emerged from their hedonistic stupor to criticise Canada's lack of contribution/response to some of these crisis you have named.


That's exactly what I am saying though. a) we need to firstly have the ability to enforce whatever it is we are trying to enforce, b) we need the people whom we are trying to enforce it upon BELIEVE we have the ability to do so. 

In large part this is done by carefully choosing precisely what it is you are threatening, ie don't threaten invasion if a) you really don't have the ability to control the country afterwards, and b) a much less intentsive, surgical operation would have, over time, the desired result. So for the example of mugabe, don't threaten to invade and remove him, threaten to kill him with a sniper or use SF to extracate him from the country, and all of his cronies. 

The point of this is that indeed we need a strong and powerful military, but, hopefully, have to never use it. 

If our threats are credible and believed, they will most likely be heeded. 

And on your last point here, I am not really supportive of our position vis a vis Mugabe, the Sudan, etc. 



> There are several threads on this very topic, I am a big believer in the idea that the US has the ability to deliver incapacitating "head shots" to offensive regimes, their primary weakness today is the ability to follow up quickly enough to stabilize the country and establish a working government (the last time they did this was in 1945, so Iraq and Afghanistan represent some hard OJT on the subject). Rest assured, if the Americans fell there is a compelling reason to do so (like nuclear provocation), action WILL happen.


Fair enough, but one does have to realize that even American arms have limits.



> Before you can restore or rebuild, you need to excise the cancer. Sanctions and "International Pressure" have track records similar to using homeopathy in curing cancer, wheras direct action works more like a scaple and chemotherapy. Iraq is simply undergoing an intensive course of chemo right now.



Containment has shown itself to be a very effective treatment for Authoritaranism Tyrantitis (the elephant in the room example is of course the Soviet Union, which so happened to collaspe whilst the US policy regarding it was containment). 

And sure, but do you remove the entire brain, or, like some of the newest and most sucessful emerging treatments, do you cut off it's oxygen supply and slowly watch it wither away until the body goes and desposes of the empty shell that was the tumour on it's own?


----------



## Infanteer

couchcommander said:
			
		

> Yes indeed, but that was before the idea of a nation even existed.



What are you talking about - "nationalism" is merely tribalism writ large.  Look at Athenian or Roman citizenship laws.


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## paracowboy

couch, you're ignoring the fact that the "containing" of the Soviet Union involved fighting wars all over the globe, with both sides at times committing large numbers of conventional forces.


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## couchcommander

Infanteer said:
			
		

> What are you talking about - "nationalism" is merely tribalism writ large.   Look at Athenian or Roman citizenship laws.



Duiker and Speilvogel give a good synopsis "Nationalism arose out of an awareness of being part of a community that has common institutions, traditions, language, and custos. This community is called a nation, and the primary political loyalties would be to the nation. Nationalism did not become a popular force for change until the French Revolution. From then on, nationalists came to believe that each nationality should have its own government. Thus the Germans, who were not united, wanted national unity in a German nation-state with one central gvoernemtn. Subject peoples such as the Hungarians, wanted the right to establish their own autonomy rather than be subject to a German minority in the multinational Austrian Empire".

The germans are a good example. Though they have had many many small city states, and people did indeed feel attachment to these city states (as was the case in Roman or Hellenistic times), there nationalist sentiments, once realized, belonged to the "German" nation (the entire collection of city states who as a whole shared this identity), which went beyong these political boundaries. The same thing happened in Greece and Italy once this was realized. Belonging, as a citizen, to a political entity such as a city state does not constitute nationalism. 

To further make my point:

"...nationalism too, has its roots in the French Revolution" - Merriman

"Nationalism...arose so largely in reaction against the international Napoleonic system.... It was the most pervasive and least crystallized of the new 'isms'." - Palmer, Colton, Kramer.

And Para,

You're absolutely right. And should this become necessary (ie if one of these states tried to forcibly break out of containment), then the absolutely right thing to do would be to respond with overwhemling force, but only in so far as to restore the situation (ie they did not ever directly attack the soviet union, just try and prevent it from growing). If a massive, conventional war were to break out as a result of this policy, then so be it.


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## Infanteer

I don't know who Duiker, Speilvogel, Merriman, Palmer, Colton, and Kramer are and, due to the fact that you provide no context, I don't really care.   You say _"Nationalism arose out of an awareness of being part of a community that has common institutions, traditions, language, and custos. This community is called a nation, and the primary political loyalties would be to the nation"_ - common customs, institutions and language is a tribal characteristic; it is what seperated the Gauls from the Romans from the Greeks from the Egyptians.   Your are referring to nationalism in its modern form in which it is tied intimately to the Westphalian State.   But _Senatus Populusque Romanus_ means just as much as the examples you provide, so don't make something out of nothing.

With regards to your the subject matter being discussed, the "nation" that many extremist Muslims refer to (including the Salafists) is the _ummah_ and it is far older than the French Revolution; it is derived from the _Qu'ran_ and has roots in the Caliphate of the Prophet's Companions.


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## couchcommander

Infanteer said:
			
		

> I don't know who Duiker, Speilvogel, Merriman, Palmer, Colton, and Kramer are and, due to the fact that you provide no context, I don't really care.   You say _"Nationalism arose out of an awareness of being part of a community that has common institutions, traditions, language, and custos. This community is called a nation, and the primary political loyalties would be to the nation"_ - common customs, institutions and language is a tribal characteristic; it is what seperated the Gauls from the Romans from the Greeks from the Egyptians.   Your are referring to nationalism in its modern form in which it is tied intimately to the Westphalian State.   But _Senatus Populusque Romanus_ means just as much as the examples you provide, so don't make something out of nothing.



Duiker, William and Spielvogel, Jackson. 2004. _World History_. 520. Belmont: Thomson Wadsworth. 

Merriman, John. 2004. _A History of Modern Europe_. 470. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. 

Palmer, R, et al. 2002. _A History of the Modern World_. 445. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 

Sorry for using such general texts in referencing my statement, unfortunately it's the only thing on the topic I have in my library that I could easily find (most of it is 20th century warfare, french revolution, reformation, or really, really, old books). 

I was bringing these up to support my statement that nationalism was a fairly recent thing, which I think they do.   

Back during Roman times yes indeed you did have Gauls or Greeks, but this identity meant much less to them than their affliliation to a particular state, ie Athens, Sparta, Corinth, etc. Egyptians would not really have identified themselves with their fellow egyptians due to an idea of a egyptian "nation", but because they all under the control of a certain Pharaoh, as europeans did with their lords and kings in the dark and middle ages. SPQR does indeed come close to being a nation, but once again falls short as this was largely a political construction, and not social or cultural indentity (think of the Hapsburg empire vs. the German and Slavic nations that were contained within it). 

The history of modern european national groups predates 1648, they were just not thought of as a primary indentifying factor until the 19th century. 

EDIT: In the end I guess you could call it trumped up tribalism... but I would still argue that the size of the groups invovled and the forcefulness of their sense of common identity presents very special and hard to overcome problems

EDIT to your EDIT:

I had always been under the impression that though they were Muslims, they were still Syrian, Iraqi, Lebanese, much as there are Catholics but still Spanards, Portugese, etc. Even if you are right, I think, their feeling of nationalism in regards to ie Lebanese, is still very strong, and as thus we see the rebellion against the Syrians despite the fact that they are both Muslims. 

EDIT ^ 3:

This actually makes for "double jeopardy" if you will, as they will not only hate us from imposing "american" values upon their "whatever, say Iranian" nation, but also because we are the infidels who are attacking their "unmah" nation. This actually adds to my point, I believe, that trying to use over military force will not really be that sucessful in the long run.


----------



## Infanteer

couchcommander said:
			
		

> Duiker, William and Spielvogel, Jackson. 2004. _World History_. 520. Belmont: Thomson I had always been under the impression that though they were Muslims, they were still Syrian, Iraqi, Lebanese, much as there are Catholics but still Spanards, Portugese, etc. Even if you are right, I think, their feeling of nationalism in regards to ie Lebanese, is still very strong, and as thus we see the rebellion against the Syrians despite the fact that they are both Muslims.



So, you think the insurgency in Iraq is based upon the notion of "Iraqi"?   The Shi'ites who flocked to Moqtada al-Sadr's banner had their reasons for doing so (and so did those who sided with al-Sistani).   The Sunni Insurgency has its own impetus (it is largely under the banner of _Ansar al-Sunnah_, AFAIK) while the foreign element is there for its own reasons (this is related to fighting Americans and the concept of the _ummah_ that I refered to above).   The foreigners had ties to some Kurdish sects (MUK?), but now seem to have gathered under the Jordanian Abu Musib al-Zarqawi and his Tawid organization (AQ in Iraq).   The other Kurdish factions have their own beef with everyone around them (including our buds the Turks).   Throughout these relationships, we see tribal instinct manifesting itself through religious, ethnic and base tribal groupings.

There is nothing "Iraqi" about this - "Iraq" was the formulation of a "state" out of three seperate Turkish provinces.   It was usurped by what is largely a tribal faction, the Sunni Tikritis (a minority) which used Ba'athist Arab Nationalism to justify what was essentially a tribal putsch in an area with a Shia majority (hence why Saddam Hussein al-Tikriti dropped the last part; tribalism didn't jibe with the whole Ba'ath idea).

You'd see the same in Syria and Lebanon.   You think Syria is entralled by the notion of "Syrian" nationalism?   You've got the same situation as existed in Iraq except the religious scenario is revered - the Assad clan is from the Shi'ite minority Alawites who pulled the same stunt over the majority Sunni population.   Want to see how "Syrian nationalism" turned out?   Look up Hama.   Lebanon is a clash between changing demographics between Christian Moronites, the Druze, and the Shi'ites.   For good measure, throw some Sunnis in there, the odd Palestinian and the Israelis.   Beirut was a nice place, and it may look nice now with "Cedar Revolution" but I have no doubt that the tribalism beneath the whole situation can easily rip the fabric that is "Lebanon" apart again - read Beirut to Jerulsalem by Friedman for a good look at this.   We've already seen some of these tremors with the violence in Beirut and the pro-Syrian rallies that tend to take place after the anti-Syrian rallies.

As I said above, the characteristics of nationalism are nothing new; kin-group preference and selection is something hardwired into the human psyche - "Nationalism" in the Western political sense is when you tie this to the Westphalian Nation state - getting the vast "tribal" identities of Britain or France or Germany to focus on some common themes (Kirkhill can talk about this in detail).   It is largely foreign to the area we are discussing which has its own unique cultural understanding of where tribal loyalties lie (as I mentioned, the _ummah_ is one very important one).

The biggest mistake you can make when looking at the Arabs, the Indians, the Chinese or the Martians is looking at them through the bias of Western thought.   You say that new-fangled "nationalism" provides some will to resist which seems to imply that that capability was lacking before the advent of some complex political idea from France.   I'd say this is a lack of understanding of what can drive the Arab, or any other entity that falls back on its tribal base, to fight.   Read the Gallic Wars; tribalism led to Gaulish fighting the Romans and each other for a variety of reasons and it will have the same effect in the Arab world.


----------



## a_majoor

Most of what we "know" about WW IV is wrong, and here is an analysis of why this is so. Read the entire thing here:

http://www.nationalreview.com/script/printpage.p?ref=/interrogatory/miniter200511030759.asp



> *Myth Busting*
> Getting at truths in the war on terror.
> 
> Q&A by Kathryn Jean Lopez
> 
> Everything you know about the war on terror is false? Well, not quite. But Rich Miniter has homed in on 22 myths, which comprises his new book, Disinformation : 22 Media Myths That Undermine the War on Terror. He recently talked about some of them with National Review Online editor Kathryn Lopez.
> 
> Lopez: And the CIA isn't to blame for him?
> 
> Miniter: I guess '80s music has made a comeback, but memories of 1980s history are fading fast. Yes, the CIA funded Afghans fighting for their country against the Soviets, but virtually all of that CIA money went through the ISI, Pakistan's feared intelligence service. The money was earmarked for seven different factions of the resistance â â€ all of them Afghan. Meanwhile, the Saudis funded a separate and parallel program for Muslim radicals drawn from across the Muslim world. Bottom line: Bin Laden was funded by the Saudis, not by us. I interviewed all three of the CIA station chiefs responsible for managing the Afghan war. All denied that any CIA money went to any Arabs, let alone bin Laden. I also pored over every bin Laden interview conducted in any language from the 1980s to today. In every single instance bin Laden is asked about CIA money, he denies it.
> 
> Maybe bin Laden did not get the Talking Points Memo or the e-mail from the DailyKos crowd, and doesn't know he's bucking the antiwar party line.
> 
> ****
> 
> Miniter: There are so many differences between the Vietnam War and the Iraq war that I had to write a 10,000-word chapter just to present all of the evidence. Basically, Iraq is Vietnam in reverse. Vietnam began with a small but growing insurgency and ended with tanks and division-strength infantry assaults on our forces. In Iraq, we destroyed the tanks and vanquished the army in a few weeks. The insurgency in Iraq is estimated today at 20,000 men. In 1966, Viet Cong and North Vietnamese regulars had combined troop strength of 700,000. By 1973, they had 1 million men under arms. North Vietnam had two superpowers supplying cutting-edge weapons; the most the insurgents in Iraq can hope for is car-bomb expertise from Iran and Syria. Ho Chi Minh was a compelling leader whose propaganda promised a better life for peasants. Al-Zarqawi is a Jordanian street thug who gets no respect in Iraq and offers no vision of a better life. I could go on and on about all of the important differences. Once you read this chapter, you will be able to shoot down liberals at cocktail parties for the next 20 years.
> 
> As for the 2,000, why does the press treat brave men and women as mere statistics? Instead of merely telling us that they died, don't we owe it to these fallen soldiers to say how they died? Many of them died heroically, saving the lives of others.
> 
> Lopez: Speaking of deaths . . . we haven't killed 100,000 innocent Iraqis?
> 
> Miniter: When I investigated the 100,000 dead-civilians claim, I was surprised at how quickly it fell apart. The 100,000 figure is based on a single study in a British medical journal published just days before the 2004 elections. The authors were open about their anti-Bush bias. They got the 100,000 by knocking on doors in 33 neighborhoods across Iraq. They simply asked Iraqis how many civilian deaths they knew about. They did not take any steps to avoid double counting. They didn't demand any proof, such as a funeral notice or a newspaper clipping. Instead they decided to just trust Iraqis to give them straight dope. So if you interview Baghdad Bob you know what kind of answers you're going to get. In that chapter, I also uncovered four other major technical flaws with that study. The 100,000 dead civilians claim is provably false.
> 
> ****
> 
> Lopez: How much information is the fault of foreign sources â â€ with agendas? And lazy American journalists picking them up?
> 
> Miniter: Quite a bit. The myth that bin Laden is on dialysis came from Pakistan's intelligence service via its newspapers. Pakistan also gave us the myth that Mossad warned the Jews to stay home on 9/11. That is classic disinformation. The media generates a lot of these myths by giving credence to ideologically motivated critics â â€ and they have grown too lazy to check. A lot of what we think about as liberal bias is really just poor editing. Editors don't push reporters to present evidence or to evaluate what anonymous sources are telling them. A simple question from a single editor could have saved Newsweek a lot of embarrassment: Can a U.S.-issued Koran actually fit down the bowl of an Army toilet? And 60 Minutes could have saved itself some grief by asking just how credible the claims of General Lebed that Russian suitcase-sized nuclear devices had gone missing. Lebed was known for his wild stories, and U.S. officials had monitored the destruction of such portable nukes years before the story broke.
> 
> Lopez: Speaking of foreign entryways, why do you pile on Canada?
> 
> Miniter: Because the Canadian border is the real threat, at least from al-Qaeda terrorists. No al-Qaeda operatives have been captured along the southern border, but a number have slipped in from Canada, including Ahmed Ressam, who planned to blow up Los Angles International Airport in 1999. When you read all the evidence, you will know why the FBI worries more about the threat from the north . . .
> ****
> 
> Lopez: Which myth most surprised you?
> 
> Miniter: Several ones really surprised me. The notion that terrorism is caused by poverty especially. It turns out that the average al-Qaeda member is from an intact family, has at least a college degree, is more likely to be married than not, and was not particularly religious until he joined a terror cell.  A former CIA officer who is now a forensic psychiatrist lays out fascinating information about what really causes terrorism in chapter 16 and describes the techniques used to keep these otherwise promising people on the path to murder. That was an eye-opener to me, and I have been interviewing intelligence officers for years.
> 
> Another surprise was that we did find some WMDs in Iraq. Okay, no stockpiles, but artillery shells loaded with sarin gas as well as other chemical weapons. The antiwar crowd always says "no evidence" â â€ nada, zip, zero â â€ and they are provably wrong.
> 
> Lopez: You should get these myths on postcards. Have them at the door at the bar down the block. Think of the impact on public opinion!
> 
> Miniter: Getting the myth onto a postcard is easy. Getting all of the evidence against it on a postcard would require really small font. We'd have to give all patrons little magnifying glasses.
> 
> ****
> Lopez: Is this war â â€ the Iraq part in particular â â€ salvageable? Katie Couric makes me feel like it's not.
> 
> Miniter: Yeah, she's my favorite military expert too. I have been to Iraq and I think that we are winning. The press simply doesn't play up allied victories; they save that precious air time for the next car bomb. Consider the recent campaign in a place called Tall Afar, near the Syrian border. An Iraqi-American force (with more Iraqis than Americans) took on dug insurgents in A series of battles in September 2005. The enemy was quickly beaten and more than 100 terrorists were taken prisoner. Tall Afar was important because it cut a key enemy supply route from Syria to Baghdad and drove the enemy out of its desert strongholds. Or consider that the al-Zarqawi master bomb-maker was recently captured in Northern Iraq, as well as a bomb factory. And so on. Nor has it escaped the notice of Iraqis that most of the victims of the insurgency are civilians and most of suicide bombers are foreigners, some 60 percent hail from Saudi Arabia according to the death notices posted on jihadist websites. *The war reporting from Iraq is shockingly one-sided, partly because some of the fixers and translators employed by some Western journalists once worked from Saddam's regime. *
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/interrogatory/miniter200511030759.asp



The business about Canada should give us the collective shivers


----------



## Acorn

a_majoor said:
			
		

> The business about Canada should give us the collective shivers



Especially since it's such bovine excrement. Who, besides Ressam, is he talking about? Also, what's the whole story about how Ressam was picked up?


----------



## paracowboy

Acorn said:
			
		

> Especially since it's such bovine excrement.


no it isn't. We've had several RCMP, former RCMP, CSIS, and former CSIS types appear in the media over the past several years warning us that we are over-run with terrorists and spies. We have been for decades. We allowed Hezbollah and HAMAS to operate from here for how long? We allowed the Cubans to run a spy ring out of their embassy, and now we have the Chinese stealing everything that isn't nailed down, info-wise.

Let's face it, when it comes to anything resembling Intelligence work, we always screw it up. That's why the Brits and Yanks booted us out of the ISTAR meetings in Bosnia last decade. That's why we had CSIS types losing top-secret files outside of bars, but not losing their jops. And if incompetence doesn't screw us up, our "leader's" concerns with making personal profit at the expense of the nation does it for us.


----------



## Infanteer

paracowboy said:
			
		

> no it isn't. We've had several RCMP, former RCMP, CSIS, and former CSIS types appear in the media over the past several years warning us that we are over-run with terrorists and spies. We have been for decades. We allowed Hezbollah and HAMAS to operate from here for how long? We allowed the Cubans to run a spy ring out of their embassy, and now we have the Chinese stealing everything that isn't nailed down, info-wise.



Yes, but is this unique to Canada?  Is Canada the staging point for operations?  I think this is a problem shared with the Brits and the Americans which is what Acorn was getting at.  9/11 and the London Metro bombings were done by groups that worked within those respective countries.


----------



## a_majoor

Canada has the unique problem of not only having to deal with terrorists who are in this country to attack us, but also those who are in country to attack the United States. The proximity of the target and the rather porous border are inviting to wuold be terrorists, as is the rather lax law enforcement here (the alleged bombing ring broken by CISIS, the RCMP and the CBA included a person who was here for several years after being denyed a refugee claim.)

The consequences of a successful attack on the United States mounted from Canada would be swift, severe and painful, as we are much easier to reach and "influence" than other terrorist havens. As Infanteer poits out, you can find these people under almost any rock, but given our proximity to the US, I think we should be paying a "LOT" more attention to this matter tha we do.


----------



## Britney Spears

Wow, Strawman Much?

Thanks sarge, I actually had a half-ass intention to read his book, because he touts it as an "even handed" overview, giving both Liberals and Conservatives a fair shake. Well, scratch that Idea.





> Miniter: I guess '80s music has made a comeback, but memories of 1980s history are fading fast. Yes, the CIA funded Afghans fighting for their country against the Soviets, but virtually all of that CIA money went through the ISI, Pakistan's feared intelligence service. The money was earmarked for seven different factions of the resistance â â€ all of them Afghan. Meanwhile, the Saudis funded a separate and parallel program for Muslim radicals drawn from across the Muslim world. Bottom line: Bin Laden was funded by the Saudis, not by us. I interviewed all three of the CIA station chiefs responsible for managing the Afghan war. All denied that any CIA money went to any Arabs, let alone bin Laden. I also pored over every bin Laden interview conducted in any language from the 1980s to today.



The CIA, Saudi, and ISI efforts were all loosely connected. Whether the CIA was _to blame_ for bin Laden is a matter of opinion, but it would be disingenoious to claim that there was absolutely no connection. 



> In every single instance bin Laden is asked about CIA money, he denies it.



Really? You mean he denies that he was funded by his avowed enemy? Who woulda thunk it?  :



> Miniter: There are so many differences between the Vietnam War and the Iraq war that I had to write a 10,000-word chapter just to present all of the evidence. Basically, Iraq is Vietnam in reverse. Vietnam began with a small but growing insurgency and ended with tanks and division-strength infantry assaults on our forces.
> In Iraq, we destroyed the tanks and vanquished the army in a few weeks. The insurgency in Iraq is estimated today at 20,000 men. In 1966, Viet Cong and North Vietnamese regulars had combined troop strength of 700,000. By 1973, they had 1 million men under arms. North Vietnam had two superpowers supplying cutting-edge weapons; the most the insurgents in Iraq can hope for is car-bomb expertise from Iran and Syria. Ho Chi Minh was a compelling leader whose propaganda promised a better life for peasants. Al-Zarqawi is a Jordanian street thug who gets no respect in Iraq and offers no vision of a better life. I could go on and on about all of the important differences. Once you read this chapter, you will be able to shoot down liberals at cocktail parties for the next 20 years.



Yah, and in Vietnam , the enemies were Vietnamese, and in Iraq, they are Iraqis. Whoope-di-doo. Of course, the fact that both involve a small insurgent force, with sanctuaries across foreign borders, fighting a superior invading western army has no relevence at all. 



> The 100,000 dead civilians claim is provably false.



Really?

I assume <a href=http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7967-2004Oct28.html>this</a> is the report he is talking about.


> The estimate is based on a September door-to-door survey of 988 Iraqi households -- containing 7,868 people in 33 neighborhoods -- selected to provide a representative sampling. *Two survey teams gathered detailed information about the date, cause and circumstances of any deaths in the 14.6 months before the invasion and the 17.8 months after it, documenting the fatalities with death certificates in most cases.*
> 
> The project was designed by Les Roberts and Gilbert M. Burnham of the Center for International Emergency, Disaster and Refugee Studies at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore; Richard Garfield of Columbia University in New York; and Riyadh Lafta and Jamal Kudhairi of Baghdad's Al-Mustansiriya University College of Medicine.
> 
> Based on the number of Iraqi fatalities recorded by the survey teams, the researchers calculated that the death rate since the invasion had increased from 5 percent annually to 7.9 percent. That works out to an excess of about 100,000 deaths since the war, the researchers reported in a paper released early by the Lancet, a British medical journal.
> 
> The researchers called their estimate conservative because they excluded deaths in Fallujah, a city west of Baghdad that has been the scene of particularly intense fighting and has accounted for a disproportionately large number of deaths in the survey.
> 
> "We are quite confident that there's been somewhere in the neighborhood of 100,000 deaths, but it could be much higher," Roberts said.






> A lot of what we think about as liberal bias is really just poor editing.


     




> The notion that terrorism is caused by poverty especially. It turns out that the average al-Qaeda member is from an intact family, has at least a college degree, is more likely to be married than not, and was not particularly religious until he joined a terror cell.



This is the dumbest thing I've read all week. The leaders of the French revolution were all rich too, so the French Revolution had NOTHING to do with social-economic difficulties either, right? Succesful insurgencies are NEVER led by poor peasants. The point is that terrorism is a RESULT of social-economic circumstances in general among Arab and Middle Eastern countries, the failure of secular-nationalist regimes in Egypt and Syria, and many many other factors, but, of course, attempting to address THOSE issues is just showing weakness.  : 




> Another surprise was that we did find some WMDs in Iraq. Okay, no stockpiles, but artillery shells loaded with sarin gas as well as other chemical weapons. The antiwar crowd always says "no evidence" â â€ nada, zip, zero â â€ and they are provably wrong.



Maybe they should tell the Border patrol to keep a lookout for any suspicious looking Arabs driving gun tractors  towing 152mm howitzers trying to cross the border? This is a strawman again. We KNOW the Iraqis have chemical weapons, they used a whole bunch of them against Iran 20 years ago. I don't think we are talking about the same "WMD"s here. 



> The press simply doesn't play up allied victories; they save that precious air time for the next car bomb. Consider the recent campaign in a place called Tall Afar, near the Syrian border. An Iraqi-American force (with more Iraqis than Americans) took on dug insurgents in A series of battles in September 2005. The enemy was quickly beaten and more than 100 terrorists were taken prisoner. Tall Afar was important because it cut a key enemy supply route from Syria to Baghdad and drove the enemy out of its desert strongholds. Or consider that the al-Zarqawi master bomb-maker was recently captured in Northern Iraq, as well as a bomb factory. And so on.



But Iraq and Vietnam are completely different! 




> Nor has it escaped the notice of Iraqis that most of the victims of the insurgency are civilians and most of suicide bombers are foreigners, some 60 percent hail from Saudi Arabia according to the death notices posted on jihadist websites.



And this is the GOOD news? So if all the terrorists were in Saudi Arabia, why was IRAQ invaded? I thought the whole point of invading Iraq was to, you know, hunt terrorists? so where are all those Iraqi terrorists? 

Never mind, my liberal mind was just never meant to do these kind of twists.....


Of course, for you youngsters who are still unclear, _The National Review_ is a fairly well established conservative wank-rag. take it with a few bushels of salt, mmkay?


----------



## paracowboy

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Yes, but is this unique to Canada?   Is Canada the staging point for operations?   I think this is a problem shared with the Brits and the Americans which is what Acorn was getting at.   9/11 and the London Metro bombings were done by groups that worked within those respective countries.


gotcha. Makes sense. a_majoor covered any points I would have brought up, and Brits got the rest.
And I can't believe I agree with* both * a_majoor and Brits in the same thread. 

Actually, I can't believe I agree with almost every point Brits brought up. I must be dehydrated or something.


----------



## a_majoor

Since Britney and I almost never agree on anything (its a love match, OK?), then the planets must really be out of whack.

Much of what is being said in the book challenges "conventional" wisdom, and I will admit I havn't read the book yet either. Most of the relentless hyping of "Its another Viet Nam, no blood for oil, WMDs etc." is never challenged, and it will be interesting to see the basis for these counter claims. (If he is repeating various blogs I will be steamed; I can read Instapundit for free). I suppose the worst result is the pro and anti war strawmen will get to hug one anther.



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> The leaders of the French revolution were all rich too, so the French Revolution had NOTHING to do with social-economic difficulties either, right? Succesful insurgencies are NEVER led by poor peasants. The point is that terrorism is a RESULT of social-economic circumstances in general among Arab and Middle Eastern countries, the failure of secular-nationalist regimes in Egypt and Syria, and many many other factors, but, of course, attempting to address THOSE issues is just showing weakness.   :



Certainly the leaders of most revolutions were well off, but these people are not trying to assist the poor peasantry, they are using the discontent of the underclass to propell their own acsent into the halls of power. "The Coming of the French Revolution" is a good starting point to explore that thesis, certainly the "will to power" argument explains things more fully than most other ideas on the causes of revolutions. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0691007519/104-1553119-7997527?v=glance

Addressing the inequities and injustices of the Ba'athist, Theocratic and Authoratarian states in the middle east will certainly pull the rug out from under the Jihadis, as there will be less and less discontent to tap into. The Cedar Revolution in Lebanon must be scaring the hell out of them, and it should be noted that much of the Jihadi activity in Iraq is specifically directed against the economic recovery and emerging local leadership (politicians, police, educators, the judiciary etc.) in order to keep the people (and thus recruiting pool) discontented and to prevent the possibility of a civil order emerging which shuts them out of power. The fact that many Sunni leaders decided to get on board for the constitutional referendum shows that they know the "exploiting the peasants" model isn't working any more, or isn't a sure fire means to claim and maintain their positions.


----------



## 48Highlander

Brit, you start off with some good points, but I think you got a wee bit wound up and managed to miss a few things.



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Yah, and in Vietnam , the enemies were Vietnamese, and in Iraq, they are Iraqis. Whoope-di-doo. Of course, the fact that both involve a small insurgent force, with sanctuaries across foreign borders, fighting a superior invading western army has no relevence at all.



You could say the same thing about many modern wars.   Does that mean that any war which involves an insurgent force operating against a superior force is "just like vietnam"?   The similarities between the Iraq and Vietnam campaigns are so few and far between that attempting to draw any serious parallel is ludicrous.




			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> I assume <a href=http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7967-2004Oct28.html>this</a> is the report he is talking about.



You seem to have missed an important sentence in the article you quoted:

"Based on the number of Iraqi fatalities recorded by the survey teams, the researchers calculated that the death rate since the invasion had increased from 5 percent annually to 7.9 percent. That works out to an excess of about 100,000 deaths since the war, the researchers reported in a paper released early by the Lancet, a British medical journal."

In other words, the 2.9% increase in TOTAL deaths equals out to about 100,000 more dead in that period than in the same period before the war.   Now, how many of those deaths can be attributed to coalition forces?   Insurgents are currently killing 600+ civilians a month, however, this "study" makes no effort to distinguish between deaths caused by the coalition, and deaths caused by the insurgency.   Moreover, as far as I can tell, the "estimate" also includes Iraqis who are PART of the insurgency!   So the figure is at the very least highly misleading, and, in my opinion, a flat out lie.



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Maybe they should tell the Border patrol to keep a lookout for any suspicious looking Arabs driving gun tractors   towing 152mm howitzers trying to cross the border? This is a strawman again. We KNOW the Iraqis have chemical weapons, they used a whole bunch of them against Iran 20 years ago. I don't think we are talking about the same "WMD"s here.



The point is, the existance of chemical weapons of any type validates another reason which the US gave for the invasion.   Sadam claimed to have destroyed all of his stockpiles.   Obviously he lied.



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> And this is the GOOD news? So if all the terrorists were in Saudi Arabia, why was IRAQ invaded? I thought the whole point of invading Iraq was to, you know, hunt terrorists? so where are all those Iraqi terrorists?



Wether they're hunting Syrian terrorists in Iraq, or Iraqi terrorists, or any type of terrorist, it's still "hunting terrorists"    Nobody ever claimed that there was a huge threat from Iraqi terrorists, in fact I don't recall ever hearing the term untill now.   Ther were many reasons to invade Iraq as you well know.


----------



## Infanteer

Mark Sageman's Understanding Terrorist Networks debunks the claim that the CIA "made" bin Laden or funded him.  The CIA funnelled money through the ISI who supported the Afghan _Mujihadeen_ organizations (I think there was 4 principle ones) that were built around Afghan tribal lines.  The Arab-Afghans, where bin Laden and Co. got their spurs, was funded and supported through Sheikh Abdullah Azzam's _Maktab al-Khadamat_.  Two seperate pipelines.  The Taliban, who gradually became allied with the Arab-Afghans who stuck around (_Al-Qa'ida_), had nothing to do with the _mujihadeen_ fighting off the Soviets - this is a point which many people miss; a large percentage of the Taliban never fought during the Soviet occupation.  They were a reactionary organization based in the _madrassas_ in the refugee communities on the Afghan-Pakistan border - they crossed into Afghanistan following the squabbling and infighting amongst the tribal warlords who were in power after fighting off the Soviet Union.


----------



## Britney Spears

> You could say the same thing about many modern wars.  Does that mean that any war which involves an insurgent force operating against a superior force is "just like vietnam"?



No, but then I don't really like sweeping generalizations of any sort. I don't know if Miniter's words were in response to any particular critic. 




> The similarities between the Iraq and Vietnam campaigns are so few and far between that attempting to draw any serious parallel is ludicrous.



*shrug*. I'll meet you half way and admit that there are many differences, but it _is_ essentially the same kind of war, with an insurgent force supported by foreigners living amongst an indifferent native population. 




> You seem to have missed an important sentence in the article you quoted:
> 
> "Based on the number of Iraqi fatalities recorded by the survey teams, the researchers calculated that the death rate since the invasion had increased from 5 percent annually to 7.9 percent. That works out to an excess of about 100,000 deaths since the war, the researchers reported in a paper released early by the Lancet, a British medical journal."
> 
> In other words, the 2.9% increase in TOTAL deaths equals out to about 100,000 more dead in that period than in the same period before the war.  Now, how many of those deaths can be attributed to coalition forces?  Insurgents are currently killing 600+ civilians a month, however, this "study" makes no effort to distinguish between deaths caused by the coalition, and deaths caused by the insurgency.  Moreover, as far as I can tell, the "estimate" also includes Iraqis who are PART of the insurgency!  So the figure is at the very least highly misleading, and, in my opinion, a flat out lie.



Read it again. The article is titled *100,000 Civilian Deaths Estimated in Iraq*, not 100,000 civillian death due to coalition action. So, no, it isn't "provably false" or a "flat out lie" is it? I mean, it might be PROVABLY false if the Coalition Authority kept tags on civillian deaths themselves, but they don't, so oh well.....




> The point is, the existance of chemical weapons of any type validates another reason which the US gave for the invasion.  Sadam claimed to have destroyed all of his stockpiles.  Obviously he lied.



Fine, but were these a reasonable threat to the security of the US homeland? I think this is probably the reason why most people are unconvinced on the WMD issue.



> Wether they're hunting Syrian terrorists in Iraq, or Iraqi terrorists, or any type of terrorist, it's still "hunting terrorists" Smiley  Nobody ever claimed that there was a huge threat from Iraqi terrorists, in fact I don't recall ever hearing the term untill now


.  

OK, so them you are admitting that there was no threat of an Iraqi 9/11 style terrorist attack on the US? 



> Ther were many reasons to invade Iraq as you well know.



No doubt there were, but more and more Americans are liking those reasons less and less. The problem now is that Bush has created a self fulfilling prophecy. Al-Qaida certainly IS in Iraq now, and to end the occupation now will be disastrous.


----------



## 48Highlander

Britney Spears said:
			
		

> *shrug*. I'll meet you half way and admit that there are many differences, but it _is_ essentially the same kind of war, with an insurgent force supported by foreigners living amongst an indifferent native population.



I can go with that.



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> Read it again. The article is titled *100,000 Civilian Deaths Estimated in Iraq*, not 100,000 civillian death due to coalition action. So, no, it isn't "provably false" or a "flat out lie" is it? I mean, it might be PROVABLY false if the Coalition Authority kept tags on civillian deaths themselves, but they don't, so oh well.....



Alright, let me rephrase.   The article itself is simply highly misleading, as displayed by the fact that numerous organizations claim the 100,000 dead as civilians killed by US soldiers.   The claims by numerous peacenick and anti-Bush organizations that the US is directly responsible for 100,000 civilian deaths in Iraq - THAT is an outright lie.



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> OK, so them you are admitting that there was no threat of an Iraqi 9/11 style terrorist attack on the US?



Deffinitely.   Did anyone ever claim there was?   Yeah, they made mention of ties between Sadam and various terrorist leaders, they mentioned that he funded/rewarded suicide bombers who attacked targets in Israel, and they made the claim that there may be terrorist training camps in Iraq.   However, I can't recall anyone in the US administration ever claiming there was a serious threat of a terrorist attack from Iraq.



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> No doubt there were, but more and more Americans are liking those reasons less and less. The problem now is that Bush has created a self fulfilling prophecy. Al-Qaida certainly IS in Iraq now, and to end the occupation now will be disastrous.



That's something anyone with a military background should have realized from the start.   If American civilians thought this was going to be one of Clintons bomb-and-run campaigns, that's their own problem.   Bush is deffinitely in it for the long haul; let's hope his succesor posseses the same level of dedication.


----------



## Britney Spears

> Alright, let me rephrase.  The article itself is simply highly misleading, as displayed by the fact that numerous organizations claim the 100,000 dead as civilians killed by US soldiers.  The claims by numerous peacenick and anti-Bush organizations that the US is directly responsible for 100,000 civilian deaths in Iraq - THAT is an outright lie.



Look back in the original article:



> Lopez: Speaking of deaths . . . we haven't killed 100,000 innocent Iraqis?



So, to answer the interviewer's question using the evidence from the survey, NO, the US has not "Killed 100,000 innocent Iraqis". The authors of the survey never made the claim.

However, Miniter responds:



> The authors were open about their anti-Bush bias.



I have looked at several sources and none of them mention that" Les Roberts and Gilbert M. Burnham of the Center for International Emergency, Disaster and Refugee Studies at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore; Richard Garfield of Columbia University in New York; and Riyadh Lafta and Jamal Kudhairi of Baghdad's Al-Mustansiriya University College of Medicine" are openly anti-Bush. 

He also claims that:


> They got the 100,000 by knocking on doors in 33 neighborhoods across Iraq. They simply asked Iraqis how many civilian deaths they knew about.
> They did not take any steps to avoid double counting. They didn't demand any proof, such as a funeral notice or a newspaper clipping. Instead they decided to just trust Iraqis to give them straight dope.



When the survey authors specifically state that 



> The estimate is based on a September door-to-door survey of 988 Iraqi households -- containing 7,868 people in 33 neighborhoods -- selected to provide a representative sampling.* Two survey teams gathered detailed information about the date, cause and circumstances of any deaths in the 14.6 months before the invasion and the 17.8 months after it, documenting the fatalities with death certificates in most cases.*



Miniter also states that:


> So if you interview Baghdad Bob you know what kind of answers you're going to get.



Thereby comparing the cumulative reliability of 988 Iraqi households to "Baghdad Bob". How Charming. They must LOVE this guy over there, if he had ever actually served in Iraq.




> The 100,000 dead civilians claim is provably false.



Maybe he "proves" it in his book, but if this interview is at all representative of this guy's political stance and discourse level, I somehow doubt it.

I think that if Mr. Miniter ever showed up at a liberal cocktail party, he won't be the one doing the shooting.


----------



## 48Highlander

In his defence, the article states "documenting the fatalities with death certificates *in most cases*."

What exactly "most cases" means is unclear.  Also, since they were working with a fairly small segment of the population, even small errors could make their figure meaningless.

As well, at this stage it's pretty much a he-said-she-said argument.  He claims to have done research into it and have determined that they cant back up their figures.  They claim to have done a scientific study and can back up their figures with solid evidence.  So who do you beleive?

Although I do agree that his "discourse level" leaves a lot to be desired.  His arguments are just as misleading as the "myths" he claims to be attempting to expose.


----------



## Infanteer

F$%K - are you guys going to Iraq debate?!?  The thread is "Fighting and Winning the War on Terror", not the "morality of Iraq".  We're there already and people are dying everyday - settle everything?


----------



## Britney Spears

OK 48th you dirty sod, I went to the Lacet site, registered, read the WHOLE REPORT, brushed off my old stats formulas and worked through their numbers, so I can give you (and our readers) the down lo'.

- There is nothing technically flawed in their survey.

- "Most cases" means 81% in a random sample.

- The figure of 100,000 is just a guess. The report itself acknowledges that it is on a 95% CI 8000 - 194000 (That puts Standard Deviation at a whopping 56,000!).  

- The survey ended in Oct. 2004.

- The survey did not include data from the aree of Falluja, because the number of deaths was so disproportionatly high as to be considered an outlier.



So there you have it. The figure is far from definitive, and of limited accuracy. "Provably false"? You decide.


----------



## 48Highlander

Infanteer said:
			
		

> F$%K - are you guys going to Iraq debate?!?   The thread is "Fighting and Winning the War on Terror", not the "morality of Iraq".   We're there already and people are dying everyday - settle everything?



Nobody mentioned morality, we're debating the article that was posted earlier.



			
				Britney Spears said:
			
		

> OK 48th you dirty sod, I went to the Lacet site, registered, read the WHOLE REPORT, brushed off my old stats formulas and worked through their numbers, so I can give you (and our readers) the down lo'.



Thanks brit


----------



## Acorn

paracowboy said:
			
		

> no it isn't. We've had several RCMP, former RCMP, CSIS, and former CSIS types appear in the media over the past several years warning us that we are over-run with terrorists and spies. We have been for decades. We allowed Hezbollah and HAMAS to operate from here for how long? We allowed the Cubans to run a spy ring out of their embassy, and now we have the Chinese stealing everything that isn't nailed down, info-wise.
> 
> Let's face it, when it comes to anything resembling Intelligence work, we always screw it up. That's why the Brits and Yanks booted us out of the ISTAR meetings in Bosnia last decade. That's why we had CSIS types losing top-secret files outside of bars, but not losing their jops. And if incompetence doesn't screw us up, our "leader's" concerns with making personal profit at the expense of the nation does it for us.



The article mentioned "a number" of *A-Q* operatives that entered the US from Canada. Other than Ressam, can you name any? That's why its Bovine Excrement.

Yes, we have a problem with those who have found their ways to our shores who work for various terrorist orgs. Their existence is not so much a function of our Intelligence capability as of our weak laws. Something you should consider though, is the fact that pre-9/11 it was far easier to legally get into the US than Canada. In fact, up to that point roughly 70% of all refugee claimants in Canada had arrived across our southern border. The Minutemen were looking the wrong way at the time, I guess.


----------



## a_majoor

It seems the unassimilated Muslim population in France has boiled over (with the possibility that this might spread to other European nations?) This exerpt from the Belmont Club has some interesting points, especially in the last paragraph as to the various groups jockying for power:

http://fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com/2005/11/where-to.html



> The riots have already reached 20 suburbs of Paris. The Reuters story suggests they may now be spreading to other cities. French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy is hinting darkly of conspiracies. Should one conclude even more serious developments are in the offing? I don't know. I think that neither Sarkozy nor the conspirators he refers to understand the exact potential of this thing, which is behaving like a chaotic system whose trajectory is difficult to predict except in the very short term.
> 
> Ideally, Sarkozy would be looking to simplify the situation by fixing some variables so that the remainder of the system will behave in a more linear manner; gradually damping it down until it can be controlled. But splits within the French cabinet have done the opposite: they have added more variables to the mix and now it's shake, rattle and roll.
> 
> In these situations, as most rabble-rousers know, there is typically a race on the ground to see who can 'harness' the energies unleashed to best advantage. My own guess, without any special knowledge, is that 'community moderates', ideological radicals and even gangsters are in a derby to see who can control events. The French government by contrast, seems tied up in knots and is casting around for leverage, a way to get a handle on the events of the past week. Things could stop tomorrow or zoom off in some unexpected direction.



The forces of order better get in there quick.


----------



## 48Highlander

Acorn said:
			
		

> Something you should consider though, is the fact that pre-9/11 it was far easier to legally get into the US than Canada. In fact, up to that point roughly 70% of all refugee claimants in Canada had arrived across our southern border. The Minutemen were looking the wrong way at the time, I guess.



Now you're being silly.  He was talking about known terrorists running around in Canada without us doing much about it.  You're talking about mainly legitemate refugee claimants who arrived in the US on a visitors visa and then crossed the border to apply for refugee status here.  A bit of a difference don't you think?  Theres a good reason for them going through the US too - generaly speaking it's easier to get a visa to visit the US, while it's much easier to claim refugee status in Canada, and failing that, to stay in the country illigaly.


----------



## Acorn

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Now you're being silly.   He was talking about known terrorists running around in Canada without us doing much about it.   You're talking about mainly legitemate refugee claimants who arrived in the US on a visitors visa and then crossed the border to apply for refugee status here.   A bit of a difference don't you think?   Theres a good reason for them going through the US too - generaly speaking it's easier to get a visa to visit the US, while it's much easier to claim refugee status in Canada, and failing that, to stay in the country illigaly.



Now who's being silly? He claimed a number of terrorists, unnamed other than Ressam, who infiltrated the US through Canada. Who were they?

A refugee claimant to Canada who enters via the US is NOT a legit claimant. Most of them wanted to be in the US in the first place, but ended up coming here because we had a lax system compared to the US and it was dead easy to sneak in. We now have a "Country of First Refuge" agreement with the states. That being said, don't you think it's silly to claim that somehow all of the "terrorists" we have here are legal Landed Immigrants (most aren't) and then blame our lax system, when most of said terrorists hit our territory pre-9/11? 

I agree our system isn't handling it very well, but before the Yanks start examining the splinter in our eye, they should look to the 2x4 in their own. They had 20 terrorists "running around" in the US pre-9/11. How many do they still have? Will they blame Canada again (like with the 9/11 terrorists - none of whom had entered the US through Canada)?


----------



## 48Highlander

Sorry, I'm not privy to CSIS and RCMP info, so I can't tell you how many of "our" terrorists entered through the US.  I also cannot tell you how many terrorists or potential terrorists entered the US from our side of the border - those who are caught never actual;y get to BE terrorists since they get deported or locked away, and their capture generaly doesn't make more than a 5 sentence paragraph in some obscure newspaper.  I do however recall hearing of several individuals being caught crossing in to the US who were suspected to be plotting some sort of terrorist act.  I do not recall exact names or dates, probably due to the fact that it WAS nothing more than a 5 sentence paragraph in some obscure newspaper.

And just to be clear, I never claimed that the terrorists on our shores are "Legal Landed Imigrants", and I'm not too sure where you got that idea...

Also, I don't recall the US blaming Canada for the 9/11 terrorists, other than a few comments by individuals who should have known better.  What I do recall is that they got concerned about the fact that we had some 50+ known terrorist groups operating in our country.  Since they were working on improving the way they handled immigration and terrorism, I don't think it was unreasonable of them to ask us to improve our system as well.


----------



## Acorn

So, a few lines in some obscure newspaper? Ressam certainly made more than that. I'd suspect that any others would have been as big news. The article claims Ressam and others. I want to know who the others are. 

"..other than a few comments..." Like Fox news? The most popular news channel in the US? Yeah, that's obscure. 

That the US is concerned doesn't surprise me, nor do I think we should treat it lightly (either the terrorists or the US reaction - however misinformed). As for the 50+ terrorist groups, I'm sure you mean to include those groups who have loose ties to real terrorist groups - like those who provide funding through otherwise humanitarian status. Maybe groups like the United Way. I suppose Maher Arar is actually guilty, and it's all one big Islamic conspiracy supported by the Liberal party.

Frankly, I'm a bit sick and tired of the knee-jerk readiness of people on this site to defend all that is American and slag all that is Canadian. The readiness to treat the National Review as gospel, but denigrate anything from the Globe and Mail. Get some perspective folks.


----------



## Infanteer

Acorn said:
			
		

> Frankly, I'm a bit sick and tired of the knee-jerk readiness of people on this site to defend all that is American and slag all that is Canadian. The readiness to treat the National Review as gospel, but denigrate anything from the Globe and Mail. Get some perspective folks.



You make a point - isn't this something many accuse the opposite end of the spectrum of doing all the time?  A few juxtoposition of words in that statement would fit the bill for some posts on these boards (I'm sure a few of mine would fit the bill too.... ^-^).

The TruthTM is a slippery thing.

Cheers,
Infanteer


----------



## 48Highlander

We have perspective, that's why we slag anything from the Toronto Star or National Post  ;D

Sure, have it your way, no terrorists have ever crossed into the US from Canada except for Ressam.  The Americans are having a fit over nothing.  Canada in fact has a GREAT legal system, a WONDERFULL immigration system, and the Liberals are the BEST government we could EVER hope for.  Oh yeah, and anything printed in the National Post is gospel, whereas anything in the NRO or Fox News is, ofcourse, horrible lies by those evil republicans.

I don't know man, if I'm going to go to either extreme I think I'd prefer to go the other way.  At least the yanks are getting things done, wether or not the results turn out the way they intended.  It's much better than the indifference and complacancy shown towards most problems by our own government.


----------



## Infanteer

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Sure, have it your way, no terrorists have ever crossed into the US from Canada except for Ressam.  The Americans are having a fit over nothing.  Canada in fact has a GREAT legal system, a WONDERFULL immigration system, and the Liberals are the BEST government we could EVER hope for.  Oh yeah, and anything printed in the National Post is gospel, whereas anything in the NRO or Fox News is, ofcourse, horrible lies by those evil republicans.
> 
> I don't know man, if I'm going to go to either extreme I think I'd prefer to go the other way.  At least the yanks are getting things done, wether or not the results turn out the way they intended.  It's much better than the indifference and complacancy shown towards most problems by our own government.



Now why would you say that?  Does criticising one extreme imply that the exact opposite must be true?  Talk about jumping to conclusions.  :

As Obi-wan would say, _"Only the Sith deal in Absolutes!"_


----------



## 48Highlander

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Now why would you say that?   Does criticising one extreme imply that the exact opposite must be true?   Talk about jumping to conclusions.   :
> 
> As Obi-wan would say, _"Only the Sith deal in Absolutes!"_



Yes master.  Yet the dark side tempts one so.

Alright, so I was being a bit facetious.  Just saying if I HAVE to pick an extreme, I'd rather go far right wing and start blowing away anything that may be a threat then go far left and live the remaining 10 minutes of my life with my head in the sand.  Personaly I prefer to stay centered.

Common sense and past experience tell us we have an axtremely pourous border, very lax immigration policies, and a multitude of terrorist orgaizations working within our borders.  I'm not sure what Acorn is trying to prove, other than that we tend to assume more terrorists have gone to the US from here than is actualy provable.


----------



## a_majoor

Meanwhile, in one of the active theaters:

http://www.nationalreview.com/owens/owens200511070904.asp



> the publication of a letter from al Qaeda's number-two official, Ayman al-Zawahiri, to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the bandit-in-chief of al Qaeda in Iraq, which lays out al Qaeda's long-range plan for Iraq and the rest of the region. According to the Washington Post of October 7:
> 
> _The letter of instructions and requests outlines a four-stage plan, according to officials: First, expel American forces from Iraq. Second, establish a caliphate over as much of Iraq as possible. Third, extend the jihad to neighboring countries, with specific reference to Egypt and the Levant â â€ a term that describes Syria and Lebanon. And finally, war against Israel._
> 
> The article continues:
> 
> . . . _bin Laden's deputy also purportedly makes clear that the war would not end with an American withdrawal and that anything other than religious rule in Iraq would be dangerous. "And it is that the Mujaheddin must not have their mission end with the expulsion of the Americans from Iraq, and then lay down their weapons, and silence the fighting zeal. We will return to having the secularists and traitors holding sway over us," the letter reportedly says._
> 
> We are beholden to al-Zawahiri for reminding us why the stakes in Iraq are so high.



This also ties in somewhat with the situation in France, where Islamic rioters are attempting to drive out the French Government from their areas. Purportedly local "Islamic Leaders" are trying to tell the French government to back off with the police and allow them to establish order in these neighbourhoods. Although there is no evidence that the Jihadis or their friends are directly involved, this certainly expands the scope of things, and if there is some help or direction from AQ or Iran, then it indicates they are attempting to mount an asymmetrical offensive against the West (a big if, of course).

The real danger is that the Jihadis will move in and establish themselves in the resulting power vaccum in the French neighbourhoods, just as they are attempting to establish themselves as the primary power by attacking legitimate leaders and symbols of authoraty, and destroying economic infrastructure to breed misery and expand their potential recruiting pool in Iraq.


----------



## Acorn

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Alright, so I was being a bit facetious.   Just saying if I HAVE to pick an extreme, I'd rather go far right wing and start blowing away anything that may be a threat then go far left and live the remaining 10 minutes of my life with my head in the sand.   Personaly I prefer to stay centered.



Facetious? How about silly? Where can you possibly conclude that my comments come anywhere near this:


> Sure, have it your way, no terrorists have ever crossed into the US from Canada except for Ressam.  The Americans are having a fit over nothing.  Canada in fact has a GREAT legal system, a WONDERFULL immigration system, and the Liberals are the BEST government we could EVER hope for.  Oh yeah, and anything printed in the National Post is gospel, whereas anything in the NRO or Fox News is, ofcourse, horrible lies by those evil republicans.



Your reading comprehension is severely clouded by your assumptions and bias. I am suprised at the comment agains the NP, though I suppose its new role as a Liberal Party house organ is the root of that. Any Canadian papers impress you? (Please don't say anything from the Sun chain....)



> Common sense and past experience tell us we have an axtremely pourous border, very lax immigration policies, and a multitude of terrorist orgaizations working within our borders.   I'm not sure what Acorn is trying to prove, other than that we tend to assume more terrorists have gone to the US from here than is actualy provable.



We have a pourous border between us an the US. Any lgical suggestions on how to fix that? Lax immigration policies? All right smart guy, what are those policies and why are they lax? Maybe if you know that you can suggest solutions rather than just slag the system. 

A "multitude" of terrorist organizations? What constitues a terrorist organisation?

What I'm trying to "prove" is that we need a little more critical thought, a little less bias-driven assumption. Otherwise you're just a mirror image of Naomi Klein - still biased and "lying with statistics" just at the other end of the political spectrum. The National Review needs as much a jaundiced look as the Toronto (Red) Star.


----------



## 48Highlander

Acorn said:
			
		

> Facetious? How about silly? Where can you possibly conclude that my comments come anywhere near this:



Where?   Um...how 'bout in what you wrote?   You asked what terrorists have crossed into the US from the Canadian side, other than Ressam.   To me, that indicates you beleive he was the only one.   You whined about "people on this site" treating the National Review as gospel while denigrating anything from the National Post (neither of which is truthful mind you), so I figgured you'd like it the other way around.   AND you complained about knee-jerk slagging of anything Canadian, so I figgured I'd throw in some compliments about our government etc.   So yes, facetious is the correct word, although silly fits too.   But at least I didn't try to compare terrorism with immigration rates   ;D



			
				Acorn said:
			
		

> We have a pourous border between us an the US. Any lgical suggestions on how to fix that? Lax immigration policies? All right smart guy, what are those policies and why are they lax? Maybe if you know that you can suggest solutions rather than just slag the system.



I've been suggesting solutions for years but nobody's been listening.   Really, coming up with "solutions" isn't even all that neccesary - I don't need the system massively changed, I'd just like them to apply a bit of common sense.   When a boat load of Chinese immigrants arrives on our shores, it generaly might be a bad idea to say "hey, listen guys, we're a little swamped with immigration hearings right now, so we're going to cut you lose for a while.   but make sure you show up for YOUR hearing!".   Then there's the idiotic quota systems which bring in individuals with next to no usable work or language skills from one country, while turning down educated proffesionals from another.   Followed by our refusal to reckognize equivalences in several fields including medical, which leads to fully qualified doctors working as janitors.   And there's deffinitely something wrong with a system where a deportation hearing takes over a year during which time the deportee receives publicaly funded legal council and can continue to live off the welfare system.   Ofcourse we also have problems actually getting deported individuals to STAY OUT.   I've lost track of how many times I've read about a criminal getting arrested for commiting a crime who had already been deported several times.

So you want solutions?   Refugee claimants show up and we're too busy to proccess 'em?   Send 'em back!   Hire more immigrations workers for future cases, but in the meanwhile get rid of the problem.   Can't seem to keep deportees out of the country?   Get better screening procedures.   There's so many things that could be improved just by applying some common sense!




			
				Acorn said:
			
		

> A "multitude" of terrorist organizations? What constitues a terrorist organisation?



Now we're REALLY getting silly



			
				Acorn said:
			
		

> What I'm trying to "prove" is that we need a little more critical thought, a little less bias-driven assumption. Otherwise you're just a mirror image of Naomi Klein - still biased and "lying with statistics" just at the other end of the political spectrum. The National Review needs as much a jaundiced look as the Toronto (Red) Star.



On that we can agree, however, a little bias isn't a bad thing.   I know that articles in both the NRO and the Star are likely to be inaccurate, so I tend to disregaurd them if I see contrary information from a more reliable source.   Similarily, when I hear about a problem in Canada with crime or immigration or something similar, I tend to beleive it untill I see evidence to the contrary.   Sure, it's a beleif grounded almost exclusively in bias, but so are most things that people beleive.


----------



## Acorn

You know, I normally don't find you this obtuse. I was going to post a long rebuttal, but I figured if you got this much wrong:


> Where?  Um...how 'bout in what you wrote?  You asked what terrorists have crossed into the US from the Canadian side, other than Ressam.  To me, that indicates you beleive he was the only one.  You whined about "people on this site" treating the National Review as gospel while denigrating anything from the National Post (neither of which is truthful mind you), so I figgured you'd like it the other way around.  AND you complained about knee-jerk slagging of anything Canadian, so I figgured I'd throw in some compliments about our government etc.  So yes, facetious is the correct word, although silly fits too.  But at least I didn't try to compare terrorism with immigration rates


Your inability to check your work, even from posts that are on the same page or only one page back, indicates that you need a little seasoning. Get your poop in one sock son. My writing wasn't that unclear.


----------



## Infanteer

You seem to be arguing something with Acorn but I can't figure out what it is.  Make your point and substantiate it with fact or quit chewing bandwidth up.


----------



## a_majoor

A description of operations along the Iraq/Syria border. There are lessons to be learned for us as well, substitute Afghanistan/Pakistan border and I think very similar conditions apply:

http://www.nationalreview.com/smitht/smith200511210820.asp



> The Badlands of Al Anbar
> Cutting the ratlines and quashing the insurgency in Western Iraq.
> 
> By W. Thomas Smith Jr.
> 
> Insurgencies are not put down in a fortnight. But considering the successes in the recent counter-insurgency sweep in Iraq's Al Anbar Province, one fact becomes obvious to anyone with so much as a sliver of an understanding of ground combat operations: Eliminating the insurgency in Iraq is best left to those who best know how to do it.
> 
> Not the White House: Americans learned the hard way in both Vietnam and the Iranian desert that the Oval Office should never call the tactical shots once forces are committed to action. President Bush understands this, and thus â â€ to all of our benefit â â€ does not micromanage his commanders in the field.
> 
> Certainly not the House and Senate: Many on Capitol Hill seem more concerned about scoring points with their stateside constituencies than they are the Marines and soldiers who must battle the enemy on the ground. And make no mistake, the ground along the Euphrates River valley and up along the Syrian border has been the stage of an ongoing series of running gun-battles between insurgents and coalition troops for months.
> 
> Therein lies the obvious: The troops on the ground, taking the fight to the enemy, are the ones who best know how to quash the insurgency. They are doing so systematically. The proof is in the results of their work (whether opponents of the war want to believe it or not), and the vast majority of those troops express no intention of abandoning that country with work to be done.
> 
> 
> STEEL CURTAIN
> Much of the most recent "work" is within the realm of Operation Steel Curtain, launched Nov. 5 against a string of villages and townships along the Iraqi-Syrian frontier. Steel Curtain is a subordinate operation to the larger, ongoing Operation Hunter, which began in July when U.S. and Iraqi forces began sweeping the Euphrates River valley with the dual-goal of cutting the insurgent ratlines from Syria and establishing a permanent Iraqi military presence in the Al Qaim region.
> 
> Success has been achieved in both cutting the lines and bolstering the presence. Additionally, nearly 40 weapons caches have been discovered and destroyed in just over two weeks, and civilian residents of the region are now leaving displacement (refugee) camps and returning to their homes.
> 
> But what makes Steel Curtain different from previous actions is that an increasing number of al Qaeda senior leaders are being captured or killed (a sign that the number of insurgent junior leaders and foot soldiers is decreasing), more outlaw towns and villages are being liberated (*thanks to human-source intelligence from residents disgusted by what the insurgents are doing to their country*), and a greater number of Iraqi soldiers are taking the lead in both scouting operations and offensive actions.
> 
> The biggest problem remains the porous borders.
> 
> 
> THE EUPHRATES RATLINES
> "The Syrian border is full of active smuggler routes that have been in use for centuries," says Lt. Col. Bryan P. McCoy, who commanded 3rd Battalion, 4th Marines in the Al Anbar Province during the invasion phase as well as the spring 2004 Fallujah operations. "During Saddam's era, they were used by black marketeers and Bedouin nomads. Now they are used by the insurgents."
> 
> McCoy, who currently serves as operations officer for the Marine Corps Training and Education Command, tells National Review Online, the smuggling routes are connected by a network of way-stations covering a vast region: Some border stretches are rural and isolated. Others are developed and populated.
> 
> *Of course, such an environment is conducive to the infiltration of foreign fighters and weapons, as well as the exfiltration of terrorists, regrouping guerrilla units, weapons merchants, and, yes, any type of weapon or weapons system Saddam Hussein might have wanted out of Iraq in 2003.*
> 
> The question is not so much how to shut down the border crossings â â€ there are simply too many â â€ but how best to interdict the border crossers.
> 
> *"The issue becomes persistent surveillance and a persistent presence over a very large area," McCoy says. "Meanwhile, you have to have a presence in the towns and cities, which â â€ due to the dense and dissected nature of that terrain â â€ requires a lot of people."
> 
> It's a simple question of numbers, he adds: "You're either in one place or you're in the other. The insurgents and the smugglers know where you are, and where you are not.
> And they use that information to their advantage."*
> 
> Nevertheless, Steel Curtain has freed the towns of Husaybah, Karabilah, and â â€ as I write this â â€ Coalition forces are rooting out the insurgents in Ubaydi. And with more Iraqi infantry companies coming online, a permanent security presence is being established in the region. "We have taken out a significant chunk of the al Qaeda leadership in these areas," Capt. Patrick Kerr, a spokesman for the 2nd Marine Division in Ramadi, tells NRO. "We believe these operations out west and the frequent disruption operations we are conducting throughout the province â â€ such as in Ramadi and Fallujah â â€ have severely impacted the insurgents' ability to fight."
> 
> 
> THE BAD GUYS
> The insurgents operating in the Euphrates River corridor are a mixed bag. Though reports vary from think tank to agency to commanders on the ground, most agree that many of the guerrilla leaders are al Qaeda Sunnis, whom U.S. forces officially refer to as al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI). The AQI guerrillas are led by Jordanian-born terrorist Abu Musab Al Zarqawi. Others are al Qaeda or AQI-sympathizing foreigners from various points throughout the Middle East, Africa, and Europe. Some are Hezbollah. Some Hamas. Some are Chechen, considered by many Marines and soldiers to be the toughest fighters in the insurgency. Many bad guys are simply poorly trained locals who have been whipped into a frenzy by older, more seasoned terrorists. Unfortunately, most of the young locals wind up as suicide bombers or as opium-pumped members of "sacrifice squads."
> 
> *Insurgent tactics run the gamut from Banzai-like suicide charges launched by the small "sacrifice squads" screaming "Allahu Akbar!" as they attack Marine riflemen â â€ suicide indeed â â€ to wiring houses and other buildings with bombs, taking families hostage (specifically using women and children as human shields), kidnapping children to force parents into compliance, and detonating bombs in civilian crowds.*
> 
> In all cases, weapons are plentiful: Assault rifles, light machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), mortars, and the biggest casualty producer of them all, the improvised explosive device (IED). The bad guys also have laptop computers, portable GPS receivers, cell and satellite phones, but almost no night-vision equipment.
> 
> Further east, toward Baghdad, the insurgency is similar in terms of weapons and tactics â â€ as evidenced by Friday's horrific mosque bombings and Saturday's attack on a funeral procession â â€ but has its roots stretching north into Iran.
> 
> 
> CROSSDRESSING GUERRILLAS
> Despite the dangers encountered in operations like Steel Curtain, U.S. and Iraqi forces are also enjoying what they see as desperate, even "comical," incidents on the part of AQI-insurgents, whom the Marines have dubbed "the mighty jihadi warriors."
> 
> In more than one instance â â€ and to the delight of American and Iraqi troops â â€ insurgents have been caught attempting to flee the battlefield dressed as women: Considered a particularly disgraceful act among Iraqis.
> 
> "They've proven to be cowards," says Kerr. "We found a number of them skulking among a flock of sheep trying to escape in Ubaydi, and there have been several instances of insurgents dressing up as women trying to escape."
> 
> In one instance, Iraqi soldiers discovered three foreign fighters dressed as women trying to enter an Iraqi displacement camp. "The Iraqi soldiers wound up killing them after the insurgents revealed their identity and tried to engage the Iraqi soldiers with AK-47s hidden under their dresses," says Kerr.
> 
> 
> THE SCOUT PLATOONS
> Currently, the Iraqi security forces are comprised of more than 200,000 Iraqi soldiers and paramilitary policemen. Of that number, some 15,000 Iraqi soldiers are operating in Al Anbar, and approximately 1,000 of those soldiers have been fighting shoulder-to-shoulder with 2,500 U.S. Marines, sailors, and soldiers in Steel Curtain. That's 10-times the 100 Iraqi soldiers who participated in Operation Spear, also in Al Anbar, in June.
> 
> *Many of the current numbers have been recruited locally where insurgents are now losing both face and ground. And many of the new recruits are serving in specially trained Scout Platoons (also known as "Desert Protectors"), hearkening back to the 19th-century American plains Indians who served as scouts with U.S. Army cavalry units. Like the Native American scouts in the Wild West, Iraqi scouts in Al Anbar are prized by U.S. forces for their courage, navigational skills, ability to relate with tribal leaders, and an understanding of local customs and dialects.
> 
> According to Kerr, the scouts and Iraqi infantry have had a huge impact on the success of Steel Curtain. "They have been the biggest difference between this operation and past operations in the area," he says. "They see things that U.S. forces just do not see. They recognize those who do not belong, and they are every bit as committed to eliminating the insurgency as their coalition counterparts."*
> 
> Steel Curtain is the first operation in which Iraqi Scout Platoons have been deployed.
> 
> A surge in recruiting numbers in untamed regions like the Al Anbar Province is not the only measure of progress American commanders are seeing within the Iraqi military. Iraqi units are performing well operationally, and Iraqi soldiers are now almost always the vanguard units kicking down the doors on any given mission. Still there are challenges for U.S. forces standing up the Iraqi units.
> 
> 
> A CULTURE OF "SHAME AND HONOR"
> "My biggest frustration is that they still operate under a centralized decision-making process," U.S. Army Col. Michael Cloy, a Fort Jackson, S.C.-based brigade commander and the senior military advisor for the 2nd Iraqi Army (Light) Infantry Division in Mosul, tells NRO. "Many of their subordinate leaders, even at division level, are tentative in their decision making for that reason. They will always look up for permission as opposed to operating on initiative. That's due to the fact that they've been beaten down for years. If anybody was seen as displaying initiative in the past, they were usually done away with."
> 
> Cloy says he and his officers are effectively coaching the Iraqi military officers on the various particulars of leadership â â€ especially when poor examples of decision-making are witnessed â â€ but with a gentle hand.
> 
> "We will pull the officer off to the side, but we have to be careful," says Cloy. "In this culture of shame and honor, you do not want to embarrass anybody. Sometimes we have to step back and repair the relationship."
> 
> Iraqis are learning to fight for themselves, and they're proving their worth as combat soldiers daily in operations like Steel Curtain. But the learning process is "slow and deliberate," says Cloy. "These things take time."
> 
> 
> THE CUT-AND-RUN CROWD
> Of course many â â€ who, again, don't understand the complexities of ground combat â â€ rail against President Bush for not conceding "defeat" and withdrawing U.S. forces from Iraq. But how could we responsibly withdraw from a fight â â€ that terrorists and terror-sponsoring nations fear we will win â â€ when we have the enemy on the ropes? Why should we shut down operations in Al Anbar and elsewhere in Iraq when we continue to glean solid intelligence from captured foreign fighters in that country about terrorist activities, worldwide? Why should we abandon a new nation and its people who we've made promises to, and they've responded in kind with their own enormous sacrifices and courageous votes? And why should we abandon a growing and remarkably developed military force that we've stood up from scratch in less than three years?
> 
> And despite what the cut-and-run crowd would have us believe, American troops on the ground are not deceptively recruited pawns in some unfortunate military adventure. U.S. soldiers and Marines in Al Anbar and elsewhere in Iraq know exactly what they are doing, and why. They also see the fruits of their labors, which, to their consternation, are rarely reported.
> 
> Speaking before a group of U.S. airmen in South Korea, Saturday, President Bush said, "There are some who say that the sacrifice is too great, and they urged us to set a date for withdrawal before we have completed our mission. Those who are in the fight know better."
> 
> Indeed, says Capt. Kerr, "We have the initiative and we intend to keep driving hard against these guys [insurgents]. Our goal is to stay on the offensive and capitalize on the considerable momentum we have."
> 
> â â€ A former U.S. Marine infantry leader and paratrooper, W. Thomas Smith Jr. writes about military issues and has covered conflict in the Balkans and on the West Bank. He is the author of four books, and his articles appear in a variety of publications.



The enemy is also concerned that they might be overtaken by events, as illustrated in this letter:



> a letter from al Qaeda second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahiri to Iraqi insurgent leader Abu Musab Zarqawi, dated July 9, 2005. In this letter, Zawahiri reminds Zarqawi that the war does not end with the expulsion of the American from Iraq. The danger is that the Americans might cut and run before Zarqawi is ready to fill the vacuum.
> 
> _The aftermath of the collapse of American power in Vietnam-and how they ran and left their agents-is noteworthy. Because of that, we must be ready starting now, before events overtake us, and before we are surprised by the conspiracies of the Americans and the United Nations and their plans to fill the void behind them. We must take the initiative and impose a fait accompli upon our enemies, instead of the enemy imposing one on us, wherein our lot would be to merely resist their schemes_.


----------



## a_majoor

More for the repository. The expansion of the ME Theater of Operation is certainly being resisted within the administration by the State Department and DOD certainly has resource constraints which might make a full scale military offensive impractical, but as the author points out, there are some possible alternatives:

http://www.nationalreview.com/ledeen/ledeen200511230844.asp



> *Engage!*
> If you want to win the debate, win the war.
> 
> More than three years ago, prior to the liberation of Iraq, I lamented that our great national debate on the war against terrorism was the wrong debate, because it was "about using our irresistible military might against a single country in order to bring down its leader, when we should be talking about using all our political, moral, and military genius to support a vast democratic revolution to liberate the peoples of the Middle East from their tyrannical rulers. That is our real mission, the essence of the war in which we are engaged, and the proper subject of our national debate."
> 
> The proper debate has still not been engaged, and the administration's failure to lead it bespeaks a grave failure of strategic vision. The war was narrowly aimed against the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein. But, as President Bush himself said after 9/11, it was logically and properly a war against both the terrorists themselves and against the regimes that foster, support, arm, train, indoctrinate, and guide the terrorist legions who are clamoring for our destruction.
> 
> Following the defeat of the Taliban, there were four such regimes: Iran, Iraq, Syria and Saudi Arabia. They were the true terror masters, without whose active support the terrorist groups would have been unable to mount a global jihad. They had â â€ and the surviving three still have â â€ two common denominators: all actively support terrorism in one way or another, and all are tyrannies.
> 
> Contrary to much of today's conventional wisdom, they did not all rest on religious fanaticism: Saddam had no religious standing, having come to power as a secular socialist, and the Assad family dictatorship has similar origins. They are not all Arabs: The Iranians (aside from a small minority in the south), would bridle at that misidentification. All share a common hatred for the Western world and unconcealed contempt for their own peoples, knowing full well that their oppressed citizens are a threat to their power and authority.
> 
> It is no accident that the terror masters work together, notwithstanding the oft-overstated differences between Arabs and Persians, and Sunnis and Shiites. The Syrians and Iranians worked hand-in-mailed-glove for years, supporting Hezbollah and other terror groups in occupied Lebanon. Nearly a decade before the overthrow of the shah of Iran, the Ayatollah Khomeini's fanatical Shiite Revolutionary Guards were trained in Lebanon by the Sunni terrorists of Yasser Arafat's al Fatah. They are working together today, to kill Iraqis and Coalition soldiers.
> 
> The most dangerous, and paradoxically the most vulnerable, of the terror masters was, and likely still is, Iran. Most everyone agrees that Iran played a unique role in the terror war that has been waged against the United States for nearly a quarter-century. According to the State Department's annual survey, Iran has long been the world's leading sponsor of international terror. Both Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad are Iranian creations and clients, which is why Imad Mugniyah of Hezbollah and Aywan al Zawahiri of Islamic Jihad and al-Qaeda keep showing up in Tehran, along with Abu Musab al Zarqawi, the leader of the jihad in Iraq who had operated out of Tehran for many years. Unsurprisingly, the 9/11 Commission found hard evidence of collusion between Iran and al-Qaeda, going back into the mid-nineties.
> 
> In 2002, I argued that our first move against the terror masters should be to give political and economic support to the Iranian people in their efforts to topple the mullahcracy. At that time, the streets of the country's major cities were filled with demonstrators almost every week. Had the democratic opposition received the same kind of help we gave to Solidarity in Poland, the anti-Milosevic forces in Yugoslavia, and the anti-Marcos movement in the Philippines, the mullahs might have been brought down then and there, thus making the war against Saddam, the Assads, and the pro-terrorist elements of the Saudi Royal Family much easier, and greatly reducing the requirement for military power. A strategy of actively supporting democratic revolution throughout the region was precisely what President Bush proposed, and it made good historical sense: It was of a piece with the dramatic spread of freedom in recent decades, including the defeat of the Soviet Empire.
> 
> It was objected that such a revolutionary mission was far too ambitious, and that prudence required us to move carefully, one case at a time, all the while mending our diplomatic fences with friends, allies, and undecideds. But, as so often happens, the "prudent" strategy proved more dangerous. Moving step by step â â€ first Iraq, then we'll see â â€ gave the surviving terror masters time to organize their counterattack before we liberated Iraq, and, as I predicted, the extra time was also used to develop the weapons of mass destruction that rightly concern us, and give urgency to our cause.
> 
> The long period of dawdling after the defeat of the Taliban, along with the failure of strategic vision that blinded us to the regional nature of the war, enabled the terror masters to develop a collective strategy, for which we were famously unprepared. Yet there was no excuse for us to be surprised, since, on the eve of Operation Iraqi Freedom, Syrian dictator Bashar Assad announced publicly that a terror war would be unleashed against us inside Iraq. That terror war would be modeled on the successful campaign against American forces in Lebanon in the mid-eighties. And so it was, including the Syrian-Iranian (Sunni-Shiite) alliance, often using Saudi jihadi volunteers.
> 
> *Like it or not, we are in a regional war, and it cannot be effectively prosecuted within a narrow national boundary. There will never be decent security in Iraq so long as the tyrants in Tehran and Damascus remain in power. They know that the spread of freedom is a terrible threat to them, and that if there were a successful democratic Iraq, their power and authority would be at risk. That is why they are waging an existential war against us in Iraq.*
> 
> It is virtually impossible to read the daily press without finding at least some further evidence of the Syrians' and the mullahs' deep involvement in the terror war in Iraq, and the Iranians are up to their necks in Afghanistan as well. Several weeks ago Afghan President Hamid Karzai said that playing defense against the terrorists in his country wasn't good enough. Karzai stressed that we need to take the fight to those foreign countries where the terrorists are trained, which certainly includes Iran. There is abundant information about joint Iranian/Syrian support for the terrorists in Iraq, even including photographs captured after the battle for Hilla last year, which showed terrorist leaders meeting in Syria with Iranian and Syrian military intelligence officials. This was confirmed to me by a translator who worked for U.S. special forces during and after the fighting, who also read documents with similar information in both Hilla and Fallujah.
> 
> Our most potent weapon against the terror masters is revolution, yet we are oddly feckless about supporting pro-democracy forces in either country. Nor is there any sign of support for the Iranian workers, who just last month staged a brief national strike. Workers need a strike fund to walk off the job and stay at home, a lesson mastered by Ayatollah Khomeini, who sent sacks of rice all over the country in the weeks leading up to massive strikes against the shah in 1979. The opposition groups need good communications tools, from cell and satellite phones to laptops and servers. It wouldn't be very difficult to organize this sort of support; it wasn't that hard in the eighties, when we did the same for Solidarity and other democratic forces in the Soviet Empire.
> 
> Alas, we have no policy to support regime change in Tehran or Damascus. Indeed, there is no policy at all, four long years after 9/11. A State Department official recently assured me that there were regular meetings on Iran, although there is still no consensus on what to do. Whether this is paralysis or appeasement is hard to say, but it is certainly no way to wage a war on terror.
> 
> If we were able to get past the basic strategic error â â€ reflected in the national debate as in our conduct on the ground in Iraq â â€ we might yet see that we hold the winning cards. Freedom has indeed spread throughout the region. Contrary to the confident predictions of many experts, many, perhaps most, Arabs and Muslims crave democracy, and are willing to take enormous risks to win it. Syria has received several devastating blows to its hegemony in Lebanon as the result of a popular uprising. The Egyptians and the Saudis have to at least pretend to hold free elections. The Iranian people are being beaten, tortured and killed as never before, but most every week there are large-scale demonstrations, reaching even to the oil-producing regions without which the mullahcracy would be brought to the verge of collapse. And there is an encouraging surge of pro-democracy enthusiasm in Syria itself. These people are the gravediggers of the old tyrannical order in the Middle East, and they deserve our help.
> 
> The main arguments against this policy are that the repressive regimes in Damascus and Tehran are firmly in control; that any meddling we do will backfire, driving potential democrats to the side of the regimes in a spasm of indignant nationalism; and that the democracy movements are poorly led, thus destined to fail. The people who are saying these things â â€ in the universities, the State Department, National Security Council and the Intelligence Community â â€ said much the same about our support for democratic revolution inside the Soviet Empire shortly before its collapse. They forgot Machiavelli's lesson that tyranny is the most unstable form of government, and they forgot how much the world changes when the United States moves against its enemies. Most experts thought Ronald Reagan was out of his mind when he undertook to bring down the Soviet Empire, and hardly a man alive believed that democratic revolution could bring down dictators in Georgia, the Ukraine, and Serbia. All these dictatorships were overthrown by a small active proportion of the population; in Iran, according to the regime's own public opinion polls, the overwhelming majority hate the mullahs. Why should it be more difficult to remove the Iranian Supreme Leader and the Syrian dictator than it was to send Mikhail Gorbachev into early retirement?
> 
> What is the alternative? If we do not engage, we will soon find ourselves facing a nuclear Iran that will surely be emboldened to increase its sponsorship of al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, Jamaah Islamiah, and Hamas, and will redouble its efforts to shatter Iraq's fragile democratic experiment. Which is the more prudent policy? Cautiously defending Iraq alone, or supporting the revolutionaries against the terror masters? Active support of the democratic forces in the Middle East would be the right policy, even if there were no terror war, and even if Iran were not a shallow breath away from atomic weapons. It is what America is all about.
> 
> Faster, confound it.
> 
> â â€ Michael Ledeen, an NRO contributing editor, is most recently the author of The War Against the Terror Masters. He is resident scholar in the Freedom Chair at the American Enterprise Institute


----------



## couchcommander

Back! Thucydides, Herodotus, the Talmud, Soviet defence spending in the 80's and interdependant co-arising have been sucessfully tackled, now onto things that really matter. 



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> So, you think the insurgency in Iraq is based upon the notion of "Iraqi"?   The Shi'ites who flocked to Moqtada al-Sadr's banner had their reasons for doing so (and so did those who sided with al-Sistani).   The Sunni Insurgency has its own impetus (it is largely under the banner of _Ansar al-Sunnah_, AFAIK) while the foreign element is there for its own reasons (this is related to fighting Americans and the concept of the _ummah_ that I refered to above).   The foreigners had ties to some Kurdish sects (MUK?), but now seem to have gathered under the Jordanian Abu Musib al-Zarqawi and his Tawid organization (AQ in Iraq).   The other Kurdish factions have their own beef with everyone around them (including our buds the Turks).   Throughout these relationships, we see tribal instinct manifesting itself through religious, ethnic and base tribal groupings.
> 
> There is nothing "Iraqi" about this - "Iraq" was the formulation of a "state" out of three seperate Turkish provinces.   It was usurped by what is largely a tribal faction, the Sunni Tikritis (a minority) which used Ba'athist Arab Nationalism to justify what was essentially a tribal putsch in an area with a Shia majority (hence why Saddam Hussein al-Tikriti dropped the last part; tribalism didn't jibe with the whole Ba'ath idea).
> 
> You'd see the same in Syria and Lebanon.   You think Syria is entralled by the notion of "Syrian" nationalism?   You've got the same situation as existed in Iraq except the religious scenario is revered - the Assad clan is from the Shi'ite minority Alawites who pulled the same stunt over the majority Sunni population.   Want to see how "Syrian nationalism" turned out?   Look up Hama.   Lebanon is a clash between changing demographics between Christian Moronites, the Druze, and the Shi'ites.   For good measure, throw some Sunnis in there, the odd Palestinian and the Israelis.   Beirut was a nice place, and it may look nice now with "Cedar Revolution" but I have no doubt that the tribalism beneath the whole situation can easily rip the fabric that is "Lebanon" apart again - read Beirut to Jerulsalem by Friedman for a good look at this.   We've already seen some of these tremors with the violence in Beirut and the pro-Syrian rallies that tend to take place after the anti-Syrian rallies.



No, you're right. Iraqi and Syrian have little to do with national groups in the middle east. Lebanon, IMO, does have an emerging national movement, and we can pick up some Syrian nationalism from time to time though I wouldn't put much credence in it's holding power. I was mistaken in pointing to Iraqi nationalism as a powerful resistant force.   

The nationalism we need to watch out for, and the sense of nationalism I was trying to identify (but did so stupidly) is Arab Nationalism, which is largely responsible for this almost automatic hostility towards the Americans for being on Arab land, regardless of what they do there. This is at least partly (along with religious beliefs) responsible for much of the foreign intervention in Iraq (interestly religous concerns turned out to be minimal to suicide bombers, most of them were pissed off that the americans were interefering in Arab lands...along with drugs and coercion). Regardless of whether an Arab is Egyptian, Iranian, Shiite or Sunni, they do have their Arab heritage in common, and across all these barriers will become offended and moved to action if they feel a fellow Arab is being sufficiently attacked (but like anything this can just be ignored, and IMO is still a developing movement)

Arab nationalism means that when we go into a middle eastern country not only are we pissing off the local tribes or religous sects, we are pissing off all of those who consider themselves Arab... which is a big problem.


> As I said above, the characteristics of nationalism are nothing new; kin-group preference and selection is something hardwired into the human psyche - "Nationalism" in the Western political sense is when you tie this to the Westphalian Nation state - getting the vast "tribal" identities of Britain or France or Germany to focus on some common themes (Kirkhill can talk about this in detail).   It is largely foreign to the area we are discussing which has its own unique cultural understanding of where tribal loyalties lie (as I mentioned, the _ummah_ is one very important one).


You're right, kin selection is a very powerful force, and is theorized to be behind much of what we normally perceive as "alturistic" acts. But no, I am still going to disagree with you in that it is not tied to the westphalian state, as the state itself has little to do with the nations contained within it. The arbirary political borders which we set up have in history rarely been in line with the outlines of national groups (except in modern day western europe where things have worked themselves out). This creates problems when these national groups discover themselves and wish to form their own nation states, and the colonial conflicts were characteristic of this.

You argue that nationalism is merly tribalism writ large. To me it seems that this would have to be taken very broadly. If you are simply saying that tribalism and nationlism are the same in that they are social phenomenons where people feel strong ties to other similar peoples, sure. However, these are two very different different concepts when one gets into how these behave, their specific characteristics, and usually the scale on which one is speaking. Typically a nation is a group that is much larger than a tribe, and often times encompasses many tribal groups. Different tribes, while sharing common languages, customs, and histories, will still indentify themselves as being distinct groups centered around the leaders of the local heirarchy (take the the Vandals and the Visigoths being two notable germanic tribes). Nations see past these local affiliations and look to the commonality shared by incredibly large groups of people.



> The biggest mistake you can make when looking at the Arabs, the Indians, the Chinese or the Martians is looking at them through the bias of Western thought.


Indeed



> You say that new-fangled "nationalism" provides some will to resist which seems to imply that that capability was lacking before the advent of some complex political idea from France.


I'm saying that given the typical scale of national groups and the ferocity with which history has demonstrated these groups willingness to fight to acheive their goals, especially when threatened by another national group, this force has to be taken into consideration. Comparing ancient occupations where this was not a concern with modern examples where nationalism has to be taken into account is not a wise course of action.



> I'd say this is a lack of understanding of what can drive the Arab, or any other entity that falls back on its tribal base, to fight.   Read the Gallic Wars; tribalism led to Gaulish fighting the Romans and each other for a variety of reasons and it will have the same effect in the Arab world.



Tribalism, exactly. All tribalism could muster was the Senones to attack Rome under Brennus, who were then quickly driven back by another army. All Ceasar does in the De Bello Gallico is divide Gaul into three bits, the Celts (Galli is what he calls them, Celtae being their language) being one of them. This was not a national group, nor even a tribal group, but a linguistic group. Indeed individual tribes or groups of tribes did attack the Romans but this was not because of some overreaching concern of the Gaulish nation but temporary alliances between tribal groups. 

And yes indeed tribalism is still a force in the Arab world, you are definately right about it. Do we need to be aware of it and exploit it? Yes. 

Are these tribal groups the same as Arab national groups? No. Do we need to be aware of these national groups and exploit them? Yes. Are these Arab national groups much larger than these tribal groups? yes 

And to my very point, can we then take examples from history where national groups did not play a role in determining the strength of resistance? not really. 

After the emergence of the idea of the nation in France in the 18th century we see these tribal groups beginning to recognize their common heritages and bond together forming even larger and more powerful groups. Arab nationalism is part of this outgrowth, it is not merly tribalism writ large (as you have pointed out, tribes are still widespread across Iraq, last I counted there were 150). Nationalism is a much larger force. 

And to clarify there may be smaller national forces at work than just pan-arabism, but to me it seems that pan-arabism is the largest and a cause for great concern. 

Thus, what I was trying to express before, was that overt military actions will most likely, IMO, not be very sucessful if we offend this Arab Identity by calously attacking and occupying various Arab states. We need to be more descreet about it and try not to collectively piss off 320 million people. 

Now to try and catch up on what the hell has been going on around here.


----------



## Glorified Ape

I'd wager nationalism is declining in importance. Group identification, even in the long-standing nations of the West, is becoming increasingly fractured. States where the concept of nationalism is in competition with powerful civil society elements such as religious sectarianism or ethnic sub-division are even more likely to have weak nation-based systems of loyalty. Such is the problem throughout much of Africa - strong civil societies and non-nation-state loyalties make for weak governments and collective action external to the democratic process. That's not to say that a people can't have loyalties to their sect, tribe, and nation all at the same time, but it seems to me that the nation, especially when present in the form of a nation-state, is taking a back seat to more personal/ground-level identities.


----------



## Infanteer

couchcommander said:
			
		

> Regardless of whether an Arab is Egyptian, Iranian, Shiite or Sunni, they do have their Arab heritage in common, and across all these barriers will become offended and moved to action if they feel a fellow Arab is being sufficiently attacked (but like anything this can just be ignored, and IMO is still a developing movement)



You are right out to lunch - Pakistani, Indonesian, and Persian Muslims are equally upset with what is going on.  Nassir went out of style after 1967 - look for Qutb and the _Ikhwan_.

As for the rest of the blahblahblah, I can't figure out what you're trying to say, because it's all based on your idea of Arab Nationalism which is a Cold War relic and has little real value in the politics that are driving _Dar al-Islam_ today.


----------



## Infanteer

Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> I'd wager nationalism is declining in importance.



Martin van Crevald would agree with you.  Infact, I'd argue that nationalism never really was important in most of the world - as I said before, when applied to the state level it is largely a Western construct and those who placed their loyalties elsewhere really had no need for it (except to pull it out when it meant US/Soviet funding and weapons to deal with the tribe next door).


----------



## couchcommander

Infanteer said:
			
		

> You are right out to lunch - Pakistani, Indonesian, and Persian Muslims are equally upset with what is going on.   Nassir went out of style after 1967 - look for Qutb and the _Ikhwan_.
> 
> As for the rest of the blahblahblah, I can't figure out what you're trying to say, because it's all based on your idea of Arab Nationalism which is a Cold War relic and has little real value in the politics that are driving _Dar al-Islam_ today.


Qutb is fringe figure on the extreme of Islamic fundamentalism and doesn't have a lot of pull with your everyday Arab. Infact he managed to piss off the egyptian population and now really only finds support with very very hardline extremists (in part due to the divisive nature of his message). 

And yes your right regarding the Pakistani's, Indonesians, etc.... doesn't mean there still isn't Arab nationalism. 

Would you not be upset if say.... Sweden was attacked? Especially if you and the majority of Swedes shared a common religon and worldview? Doesn't mean there is no such thing as Canadian nationalism (heh... well you get my point). 

Rest of what I was trying to say in once sentance: If we continue to overtly and callously attack Arab states we will come up against increasing resistance regardless of what we are trying to accomplish.


----------



## couchcommander

Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> I'd wager nationalism is declining in importance. Group identification, even in the long-standing nations of the West, is becoming increasingly fractured. States where the concept of nationalism is in competition with powerful civil society elements such as religious sectarianism or ethnic sub-division are even more likely to have weak nation-based systems of loyalty. Such is the problem throughout much of Africa - strong civil societies and non-nation-state loyalties make for weak governments and collective action external to the democratic process. That's not to say that a people can't have loyalties to their sect, tribe, and nation all at the same time, but it seems to me that the nation, especially when present in the form of a nation-state, is taking a back seat to more personal/ground-level identities.



You may be right about this. However, historically speaking it has been a very powerful movement, and my concern is just that we need to address this in forming our policy.


----------



## Infanteer

couchcommander said:
			
		

> Qutb is fringe figure on the extreme of Islamic fundamentalism and doesn't have a lot of pull with your everyday Arab. Infact he managed to piss off the egyptian population and now really only finds support with very very hardline extremists (in part due to the divisive nature of his message).



Fringe figure?   Now I know you are talking through your hat....



> And yes your right regarding the Pakistani's, Indonesians, etc.... doesn't mean there still isn't Arab nationalism.
> 
> Rest of what I was trying to say in once sentance: If we continue to overtly and callously attack Arab states we will come up against increasing resistance regardless of what we are trying to accomplish.



And, since you missed it the first and second time, the identity of "Arab" isn't the one driving folks these days - Arab Nationalism lost its lustere following its defeat at the hands of Israel; it doesn't seem to garner a strong sentiment from Arab populations; it's either below that (tribal sense) or above it (the _ummah_).


----------



## couchcommander

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Fringe figure?   Now I know you are talking through your hat....



Do you honestly think that your average muslim puts much if any bearing in Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq? It would be like looking to Strauss for your average westerner. Though he may be highly influencial in certain circles, including powerful ones, I don't see him affecting the decision making of your run of the mill guy (and it's your average run of the mill guy who will be having to decide whether or not he wants to risk the lives of his family to tell us about the mean men that are building bombs). 



> And, since you missed it the first and second time, the identity of "Arab" isn't the one driving folks these days - Arab Nationalism lost its lustere following its defeat at the hands of Israel; it doesn't seem to garner a strong sentiment from Arab populations; it's either below that (tribal sense) or above it (the _ummah_).



If you hear hooves, think horses, not zebras. Is some new and extreme thread of Islamic fundamentalism driving people to take up the sword against the infidels based upon some notion of a pure society, or alternatively deny us the intelligence we need (certain groups in society would like us to believe this, they would like it very much), or are they just pissed off because we are running around in lands occupied by people they feel a commonality with? 

Actual interviews with thwarted suicide bombers support the latter in the vast majority of cases combined with a strong sense of oppression and powerlessness.


----------



## Infanteer

couchcommander said:
			
		

> Do you honestly think that your average muslim puts much if any bearing in Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq? It would be like looking to Strauss for your average westerner.   Though he may be highly influencial in certain circles, including powerful ones, I don't see him affecting the decision making of your run of the mill guy (and it's your average run of the mill guy who will be having to decide whether or not he wants to risk the lives of his family to tell us about the mean men that are building bombs).
> 
> If you hear hooves, think horses, not zebras. Is some new and extreme thread of Islamic fundamentalism driving people to take up the sword against the infidels based upon some notion of a pure society, or alternatively deny us the intelligence we need (certain groups in society would like us to believe this, they would like it very much), or are they just pissed off because we are running around in lands occupied by people they feel a commonality with?



Do you honestly think that the average communist insurgent knew the finer points of Marx and Engels?   Instead of farting back what you Googled on Qutb, why don't you do some research in the direction I'm pointing you in.   I have two of his books sitting right infront of me, and if you'd familiarize yourself with them, you'd see themes that resonate within today's militant Islamist thought - considering this is the prime source of conflict in the region, I don't have any idea where you get off saying he is a "fringe writer" that nobody follows.

I don't care what your professor told you last week, get Arab Nationalism out of your head.   If you want to read a good account of its decline, look to the last chapter of Hourani's A History of the Arab Peoples - it goes into detail covering Arab disenchantment with pan-Arab Nationalism following its inability to lift their prosperity and power out of the marginalization of 200 years of being on the losing end of wars.   What supplanted this nationalism?   Islamic revivalism in a few varieties, of which Sayid Qutb's writings (read Milestones and Social Justice in Islam) are among the most influential to radicals who saw their own governments as part of the problem.   For an interesting Arab perspective on Qutb's writings on the Islamist movement, read Moussalli's Radical Islamic Fundamentalism: The Ideological and Political Discourse of Sayyid Qutb.

No analysis of the shift of Middle Eastern political sentiment to Islamist militancy would be complete without properly analyzing how Qutb's views were brought to the mainstream.   An indepth look at the _Ikhwan_, the "Muslim Brotherhood", should be undertaken.   Its earlier radical approach to politics and its rejection of nationalist, secular regimes is important in understanding the roots of the modern Islamic militant.   You can still see the support for the Islamist message of the Muslim Brotherhood today as its opposition to the heir to Nassir's regime in Egypt is quiet vocal, despite being a banned party (no thanks to the writings of Qutb)

The other very important reason to look at the Muslim Brotherhood is due to the links that were forged by those who joined its ranks.   Two disciples of Sayyid Qutb's teachings who would play big roles in furthering the development of the militant Islam were Sheikh Abdullah Azzam and Dr Ayman al-Zawahiri.   Azzam is famous for issuing the _Fatwa_ against the Soviets for their invasion of Afghanistan and starting Maktab al-Khadamat, an organization for funding, moving, equipping, and training Muslims from all over _Dar al-Islam_ to go to Afghanistan and fight a holy jihad (these fighters became known as the Arab Afghans).   This _Fatwa_ was not started in the name of Arab nationalism, but in defence of the Islamic faith and it attracted fighters from Morocco to the Philippines.   This fatwa generated the impetus for those we now see issued against the West and the United States in specific (Al Qa'ida's being the most well known).   Defence of the Faith, not defence of the Arab lands and peoples.

Azzam is also very important for another reason - he, along with his fellow Qutb disciple al-Zawahiri, took a young, devout, and very wealthy Osama bin-Laden under their wing.   Young bin Laden, motivated by his university studies in Jeddah, was influenced by the teachings of the 12th century Islamic scholar Ibn Taymiyya.   Incidentally, Taymiyya's works served as the basis for many of the concepts Qutb espoused - the impetus to fight off the Mongol invaders (who happened to have converted to Muslim) is the historical precedent central to Qutb's notion of _jahilliya_ - which is seen as a crucial piece of Islamic scholarship supporting the notion of sectarian violence within Islam.   Anyways, back to bin Laden and Co.   Bin Laden's role in the Afghan jihad and his service and friendship with both Azzam and al-Zawahiri served to help deepen his beliefs - combined with the success of the mujihadeen in pushing the Soviets out, it served to reinforce their viewpoint that God had justified their actions and beliefs by giving them victory.   This whole trail of radicalization is covered in detail in Michael Sheuer's Through Our Enemies' Eyes.   Pan-Arabism played no role in the development of bin Laden and the other Salafist fighters who gained real credibility in the Muslim world due to their service in Afghanistan.

As well, during this time the Iranian revolution kicked off and gathered steam.   Iran is Persian, so it has nothing to do with Arab Nationalism.   However, the Iranian movement really opened the door for dissent in Muslim countries as a state under Sharia that was run by the clerics was telling Muslims that they lived in apostasy under secular, nationalist regimes.   Qutb and the rest of the Salafist movement also espoused this view from within as a criticism for the failure of Arab nationalist regimes to deliver any sort of prosperity or or victory against Israel.   In response, the Saudi's let the Wahabbi's open the floodgates to prove that they were pious Muslims.   You start to see hardline Muslims get real pissed with Arab nationalists, as you saw with the Hama uprising in Syria.   This is where the movement to Islamist thought discussed by Hourani really takes a hard edge.

Moving along, bin Laden and al-Zawahiri form _Al Qa'ida_ (The Base) to serve as a network for the Arab Afghans that fought to defend the Faith in Afghanistan.   The key question nagging the leaders of the Arab Afghans is what to do next with their success.   Azzam was keen to return to his native Palestine and to declare jihad against Israel, uniting Islam against the next "near enemy" that had "invaded" _Dar al-Islam_.   Zawahiri also wanted to return home (in this case Egypt) to finish off the work that Qutb and the Muslim Brotherhood had started by overthowing the apostate regime in place there with his organization the Egyptian Islamic Jihad (EIJ).   Bin Laden had other ideas - he was convinced that the Salafist agenda could be pushed by fighting the other "far" enemy, the United States.   With the Soviets gone and rotting from the inside, he saw the US as the only thing left propping up the apostate regimes that resisted the Salafist vision of a unified Caliphate.   Bin Laden would (many suspect) take out Azzam with a bomb attack and co-opt Zawahiri to bring the focus of the movement into that of the *global Salafist jihad.*

The rest is history.   Al Qa'ida, as the base of the global Salafist jihad, is an Insurgency Organization, quite possible the first one to be seen on the global level.   It's goal is to unite the Islamic world and defend the Faith against apostasy.   It's short term objectives to meet this goal is to drive the US and the West from the Islamic world, undercutting regimes which oppose the Salafist ideology.   There is nothing "Arab" about this - it is pan-Islamic.   This is all covered in great detail on both the political level by Michael Sheuer and on the social/psychological level by Marc Sageman quite well.   *Al Qa'ida's message is that the US and the Israeli's are leading a crusade to subjugate and destroy the Islamic faith.* - they are shaping this message around Western policies and it is one that is fairly powerful in Islamic countries.   Again, so you get it this time, it is not based around one of Arab solidarity.   Infact, most Muslims, including Arabs, tend to see themselves as Muslims first and members of their nation-state second, as this Pew report suggests.   Many see extremism such as that represented by the global Salafist Jihad, as a threat, but that doesn't undo the fact that on a broad level, most Islamic nations (there are exceptions) seem to be seeing Islam as the prime factor in their identity.

Now, as for the specifics - the Islamic Insurgency, much like Communism, is not a monolith.   Each area, branch, and network of the movement has its own unique qualities which demand their own unique solutions.   I've touched upon this with the explanation of the tribal intricacies that are common to Mesopotamia and the Levant.   But this does not take away from the overwhelming influence that Islamist thought plays.   The Iraqi Insurgency is not fuelled by pan-Arabism, and Arab nationalism is not a threat to Western policies as you continue to claim (without any substantiation).   Organizations like Ansar al-Sunnah, one of the major players in the Sunni insurgency, are based around defence of the Sunni faith in what is a Shi'ite dominated area.   Notice the fact that they don't give a shit about their Arab Shia neighbours who they gladly attack.   Foreign fighters under the Jordanian Abu Musib al-Zarqawi's Tahwid organization do not flock to Iraq for the sake of the Arab peoples - they are Salafists who see the Americans as a crusader.

Islamist thought has many branches, some moderate, some violent - but they all have great appeal to the Muslim who has seen the Middle East and the Islamic world tugged along by the whim of the globalizing world.   This is where bin Laden's appeal comes from and why he is popular amongst many Muslims.   The violence, conflict and political upheaval that we see today is linked to the social movement away from nationalism and towards an Islamist outlook that Hourani discussed.   Much of the extremist thought that leads men to arms stems from thinkers like Qutb, who you obviously know jackshit about and are so apt to write off as a "fringe writer".   Within each conflict there are people that lash out for far simpler reasons (homeland is invaded, political repression, etc - after all, all politics is local) but they find their banner somewhere, and at the moment that banner is grounded in Islamist thought be it violent or benign.   I've yet to run into any serious information that argues that pan-Arab thought is what drives resistence and insurgency.

So, you have your marching orders.   Read, research, study, and keep up with current events.   Don't try to fool us into believing you figured things out between midterms and last weeks frat party because you can throw a few fancy terms and ideas on the forums.   I'm not in any way an expert, but this is stuff that a careful observer picks up on - stuff you'd be wise to look up if you want to seriously approach Middle Eastern politics.   Until then, spare us the bandwidth and....


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## Danjanou

Excellent post Infanteer. 

It never ceases to amaze me that these naÃƒÂ¯ve oxygen thieves racking up the student loans love to shove their "academic credentials" such as they are in our faces but fail to realize that some ( many?) of us poor dumb grunts have cracked a book or two, spent some time in the proverbial ivory towers, and can add a set a set of academic letters after our names as well. And that's in addition to the actual boots on the ground experience we bring to the table.


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## couchcommander

Infanteer,

(for the record here, snippy comments have been provoked)

Thank you for your chronology of the emergence of what we in the west have identified as Islamic extremism, and some of our explanations of how it might affect suicide bombers, insurgents, etc. I have actually had exposure to this material previously, and no, not just from wikipedia. 

However, as I stated before, Qutb, Islamic fundamentalism, Al-Qaeda take a back seat when you actually stop reading the half digested puke coming out of Conservative American media, and farting back out the incoherent chunks (I'm not sure which is worse, that or google hershy squirts?). 

It first really occured to me that the reasons behind the bombings and the insurgency could not be entirely attributed to fanatical religous extremism at the 10th annual interfaith symposium on terrorism held here at the U of A earlier this fall (sure beats google, and I am having a hard time remembering if it was before or after last weeks frat party.....). 

There it was pointed out that all religons have a history of terrorism, even in the modern sense. Timothy Mcvay (or however you spell it), Anti-semetic groups, militatant jewish settlers, etc. etc. Further, it was shown that Islam does not really support the position of the bombers, and that only by a very scewed interpretation of the Koran did it actually lend itself to terrorism. To me, it seemed, that basically every Islamic leader I had spoken too had that same message. To me, once again, it seemed as though one would almost have to _try_ and bend the words in the Koran to fit to an already existant anger.

Further, it was not hard to notice the level of anger in the room towards the "imperialist" United States. These people, who had joined together with Jews, Christian, Athetists, etc. to try and explore this phenomenon were certainly not islamic extremists, but yet the room rose to a standing ovation when one of the professors doing a presentation started into how the US was certainly no Ivory Tower, and how ignorant they were to believe that they could spread their idea of "democracy" (the quotations around this word cannot be stressed enough, there was almost a level of disgust when it was said, and no, it's not because he hated democracy in it's true sense, just that the US thought they had the answers to the worlds problems) by riding into these poor, downtrodden middle eastern country and killing hundreds of thousands of people. It did not matter to these people the circumstances surrounding their deaths, whether or not credible intelligence indicated the presence of high level targets or not. They were just pissed that the US was there, killing people.

Well, as you're probably thinking, this is all great, but so far all I've done is share my feelings... where's the proof. 

Those were my thoughts exactly. Given the fact that I had just had a thought contrary to every CNN newsclip I had seen over the past few years, I thought this warranted further reivew.

Firstly, being a student in my own Ivory Tower (unfortunately no letters behind my name yet, just wacky ideas), I turned to scholary journals. One of the first ones to catch my eye was a 2004 article in the international journal of public opinion research, an oxford publication, titled "World Opinion Surveys and The War in Iraq". In this of course it detailed the usual general resentment towards the US in non-western countries, and almost hatred in middle east, but a section entitled "Oil, Israel, Muslims, the World" (pg 249), offered some insight into the nature of this resentment. 

Outside the US and Britain, in the middle eastern countries surveyed, the majority of respondents said that the US "wanted to control mideast oil" and "dominate the world" and that they hadn't done a good enough job to prevent civilian casualties. These answers were attained from a series of polls conducted by reputible organizations and were now being published in a journal out of one of the most prestigous univerisites in the world. 

There was no mention of "kill the infidels" or "interfering in creating a pure society", just your average run of mill guy pissed off that the americans were heavy footidly trampling around in their backyard, and not doing a good job of preventing innocent people from dying.

Further, when asked whether or not the removal of suddam hussein would result in the region becoming more democratic, most middle eastern respondants diagreed (and no, I'm not saying I do). So not only do they think we are trampling around in their backyard, killing innocent civilians, but for no good reason either. 

Uh oh. I'm pretty sure this is one of the ways to spell "insurgent". 

The extent of this anger went even further. Of surveyed middle eastern countries, a majority of respondants thought that suicide bombings were "justified". Once again this was the general popuation. These are not the leaders of radical islamic sects in Iraq pronouncing intefadas or preaching about the great devil and the need for pure Islamic society, there are run of the mill muslims who's Imams, like the ones we have here, are quite adament that the Koran does not really justify terrorism. Hrm. CNN needs to find a new "expert" IMO.

Combine all of this with continuing questions as to the legality of the war, even in western journals. This quote is from the abstract of "From Unity to Polarization: International Law and the Use of Force against Iraq" in the European Journal of International Law. "The USA and UK have become increasingly isolated in their insistence that implied authorization by the Security Council, material breach by Iraq of the ceasefire regime and, for the UK, humanitarian intervention justify their use of force." Put it all together and we've got a lot of reasons for anger on the part of Arabs, and none of it has anything to do with Qutb or the Muslim Brotherhood. 

So, now that we have this construct of "how to build an insurgent sans fundamental Islam", I decided it might be prudent to compare it against actual insurgents. Using the biggest google fart I could muster, I dug up a number if interviews with actual attempted suicide bombers. The responses were interesting.

"Mukdi ultimately attributes his fateful decision to the death by shooting, when he was nine years old, of a much older playmate, and to two humiliating episodes at Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) checkpoints â â€ one of which occurred just a year before he decided to become a shahid." - http://www.worldpress.org/Mideast/1910.cfm

"Hamamreh said her prime motivation was personal, and she declined to elaborate. 

Another reason, she said, was the effect on her, along with all Palestinians, of the ongoing violence and what they see as their oppression at the hands of the Israeli occupation forces." - http://www.factsofisrael.com/blog/archives/000092.html

"OBEIDA KHALIL (translated): There are many reasons why I tried to carry out a suicide bombing. I was very young when the first Palestinian Intifada happened, but I saw how the Israelis killed little children and how they destroyed our houses. 

During this Intifada I was engaged, but four days before our wedding my fiancé was killed by the Israelis. Since then my family has started to carry out attacks. My brother and my female cousin were suicide bombers." - http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2004/s1042349.htm

"He spoke of how his faith in the US was shaken when, via a friend's illicitly imported satellite TV system, he saw 'barbaric, savage' pictures of civilian casualties of the fighting and bombing. The next blow came in the conflict's immediate aftermath, as looters ran unchecked through Baghdad. 

'When I saw the American soldiers watching and doing nothing as people took everything, I began to suspect the US was not here to help us but to destroy us,' he said. 

Abu Mujahed, whose real name is not known by The Observer, said: 'I thought it might be just the chaos of war but it got worse, not better.' 

He was not alone and swiftly found that many in the Adhamiya neighbourhood of Baghdad shared his anger and disappointment. The time had come. 'We realised. We had to act.' " - http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1302718,00.html

and my personal favourite:

"JR: What was the main reason for you deciding to become a suicide bomber? The one reason in particular. 

Hussam: The reason was because my friend was killed. 

The second reason I did it is because I didn't want to go to school. 

My parents forced me to go to school and I didn't feel like going. " - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3899015.stm


The thing that got me was though indeed most of them did feel they had a religous justification for committing the acts they did, it was only after the western world (or Israel) had enraged them to the point of homicide that these beliefs, in the majority of cases, came into play, not the other way around.

The other thing I noticed was a stark difference between these people, the actual perpatraitors of the crimes, and those who represented the organizations they "worked for". The people who didn't actually have to face American guns or blow themselves up were all fire and brimestone (to use a Christian analogy), but when you actually get down to the guy on the ground who is doing the killing, it's the fact that you killed his friend, occupied Arab or muslim lands, treated their societies with disrespect, etc. etc. that provoked them to action, not the writings of some extremist. 

So there we have it. Suicide bombers, iraqi insurgents... they are not in it due to some overreaching religous goal or belief (or, as you so heatidly assert, quite possibly not anger at US attacks at what they preceive to be their Arab nation either), they are in it becasue we, through our actions, have pissed them the fcuk off by using heavy handed military tactics and being insensitive to their attitudes and desires. 

Thus, we cannot continue to callously use overt miilitary actions to influence affairs in the middle east or we risk running into ever increasing resistance regardless of what we do. 

Danjanou:

Why would I be spending hours of my day reading these forums and debating various topics with the posters on it if felt you all didn't have something to add? I appreciate the perspectives that the diverse community on this forum can bring to the table, and the fact that many if not most of the posters have just as much knowledges on these topics as I do, and many of them, on top of having decades of more real world experience, also have much greater academic backgrounds. Doesn't stop me from disagreeing you, even if it uses up precious oxygen, and accusations of naivety can go both ways in this argument.


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## Bruce Monkhouse

Just exactly what Middle East country were the Americans occupying when the WTC was first bombed?

What exactly were we doing when the Air India plane was bombed?

I want the 10 minutes back I just wasted reading your post.

..and I must ask, what countries did you travel too so that you could reach all these "leaders"?
Quote,
_To me, it seemed, that basically every Islamic leader I had spoken too  had that same message._


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## couchcommander

Bruce Monkhouse said:
			
		

> Just exactly what Middle East country were the Americans occupying when the WTC was first bombed?


We had troops based in various middle eastern nations (I believe Bin Laden actually cited this) as well as the fact that we were supporting Israel against the Palestinians (I'm sure there are many other complaints as well)



> What exactly were we doing when the Air India plane was bombed?


... not really to do with the middle east I don't think, and I can't say I am really that knowledable on the details of it, but from what I understood it wasn't targetting us but the people on board? (I may be completely wrong on this, I can research it more of you want)



> I want the 10 minutes back I just wasted reading your post.



I'm hurt. 



> ..and I must ask, what countries did you travel too so that you could reach all these "leaders"?
> Quote,
> _To me, it seemed, that basically every Islamic leader I had spoken too  had that same message._



Glorious country of edmonton...we have a thriving local muslim community with links to the middle east. As I mentioned, that was just a part of forming my initial impressions, the actual evidence is below it, it was just this fact that tuned me to the idea that something was amiss.


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## Bruce Monkhouse

Quote,
_We had troops on based in various middle eastern nations(I believe Bin Laden actually cited this)  as well as the fact that we were supporting Israel against the Palestinians _ 

...so I guess we should "jihad" Germany, England, and others then as they have had or have troops based in Canada......and they support Denmark.


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## couchcommander

Bruce Monkhouse said:
			
		

> Quote,
> _We had troops on based in various middle eastern nations(I believe Bin Laden actually cited this)   as well as the fact that we were supporting Israel against the Palestinians _
> 
> ...so I guess we should "jihad" Germany, England, and others then as they have had or have troops based in Canada......and they support Denmark.



Well of course, I mean who likes Denmark???

Listen, you seem to be getting the impression I somehow support the bombers or don't support our involvement in afganistan or "left wing hippy", etc. 

To make things very clear - I support military action in the War on Terrorism. I think anyone that feels the need to kill innocent civilians should be killed themselves. I feel no "sympathy" towards the bombers. I think that, especially in afghanistan, we are doing some very very good work, and that should be used as a model for future interventions. My point is that we need to be careful, or no matter how good our intentions, we will be confronted with anger, hatred, violence, and ultimately failure of our goals. 

An additional bit.....

If we want to win the war are terror we either need to use such massive military force as to drive any will to resist from the very hearts of the people we are combating, or we need to be smart about it and prevent these people from arising in the first place. 

It seems to be it would be better to take the latter route.


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## Bruce Monkhouse

No, what I don't like is your assumption in your long post above is that somehow "we" created "those" people, go through history and you will see those with less usually attacked those with more...is that the fault of the person with more or visa-versa?


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## couchcommander

Of course it's not our fault (others might argue, not necessarily me, that it also goes the other way around as well though re the attacking). 


As well I didn't really think it was an assumption, to me it seemed like that is what these people are telling us, especially the Iraqi insurgent. In the interview actually states that he started out supporting the American invasion, and it was only after witnessing the actions of the Americans that his opinion turned. I dunno but that seems pretty causal to me, but I may be wrong.


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## couchcommander

Infanteer,

Reading through and verifying the PEW study you highlighted regarding the indentities, and then verifying it and checking the methodoloy..... fine, alright alright, no Arab nationalism driving it. You win on that point  (but nationalism still didn't come around till the french revolution.... which is why i think we started on this tac). 

However, I think my analysis throws considerable doubt upon your theory of radical islamism driving these people at the same time (especially the interviews with the actual insurgents).

Brings me to ask, is there something in between we are both missing? 

Or is it just as it seems... these people are getting angry at our actions because they think we are killing their friends, family, and fellow muslims for no good reason that they can see, while occupying lands and repressing peoples they have bonds with, plain and simple?... makes sense...


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## Infanteer

couchcommander said:
			
		

> However, as I stated before, Qutb, Islamic fundamentalism, Al-Qaeda take a back seat when you actually stop reading the half digested puke coming out of Conservative American media, and farting back out the incoherent chunks (I'm not sure which is worse, that or google hershy squirts?).



Lay off the crackpipe kid.   Where in any of my posts do you find a single source that can be considered a neo-con?   Nice strawman.



> It first really occured to me that the reasons behind the bombings and the insurgency could not be entirely attributed to fanatical religous extremism at the 10th annual interfaith symposium on terrorism held here at the U of A earlier this fall (sure beats google, and I am having a hard time remembering if it was before or after last weeks frat party.....).



It's nice to see that the leaders of the Islamic Insurgency ascended upon Edmonton to give you the low down.... :

I can't even begin to decipher what you prattled on about (like Bruce, I want my 10 minutes back), as you did nothing to back you original argument that Arab Nationalism is a new and strong force in the Middle East and that continued aggressive polices by the West will cause Arabs to band together and strike back.

Your exact claims were:



			
				couchcommander said:
			
		

> Once we see the birth of nationalism (ie recent history), trying to force a population to do something, and continue to do it for a long period of time, via large scale military force applied by another "nation" does not have that many examples of success


and


			
				couchcommander said:
			
		

> The nationalism we need to watch out for, and the sense of nationalism I was trying to identify (but did so stupidly) is Arab Nationalism, which is largely responsible for this almost automatic hostility towards the Americans for being on Arab land, regardless of what they do there.


and


> Arab nationalism means that when we go into a middle eastern country not only are we pissing off the local tribes or religous sects, we are pissing off all of those who consider themselves Arab... which is a big problem.



You've since admitted that you didn't know what you were talking about, so I am guessing that you pulled that fluff out of your ass.   Yet you still contend, after admitting your theory sunk like the Titanic, that Islamist thought is not the dominant form of social expression in the Middle East.   There is no "something in between" that we are both missing.   You state that:



> these people are getting angry at our actions because they think we are killing their friends, family, and fellow muslims for no good reason that they can see, while occupying lands and repressing peoples they have bonds with, plain and simple?... makes sense...



Everyone give a round of applause to Captain Obvious and his signaller Corporal Tips.   When did you realize that people go to war and risk death and dismemberment due to the fact that they feel they have a grievance and a cause to fight?   That's the biggest "no shit" I've seen in a long time.   *The problem here is that you are confusing two separate concepts - individual motivations to fight and ways in which these motivations are manifested in a group setting.*   Five Canadians will give you the reason they joined the Army, but you must look to higher level social and cultural trends to see what will bind these individual motivations and commit them to battle.   This is where Islamist thought, as the dominant form of social identity right now, comes in.   There is a whole multitude of reasons that a person will fight; William Lind's FMFM-1A: Fourth Generation War does an excellent job in highlighting this.   Yet most people don't just spontaneously go out and attack the enemy - they find an outlet for their anger and others who also find similar rational and outlooks in attacking the enemy; they need this to justify their emotions with their mores.   Once people establish the linkages for the outlet, you have a loose network of groupings of angry people that is aptly described in Thomas Hammes' The Sling and the Stone - this is the insurgent network, and the insurgent network feeds off of an ideological bearing which gives it its moral impetus to attack its opponents (just as a very similar network of Revolutionaries in the United States fed off of the ideology of Liberty and Independence in 1775).   Individual anger finds itself fed into a "fourth generation" ideological network, a network that has become an Islamic Insurgency which is bannered by the global Salafist jihad.

Don't believe me?   You gave testimonies of some US academic and 5 captured insurgents (who happened to fit your view).   Big whoop.   Are you going to determine social dynamics by the news testimony of 5 members of a group of organizations that contains tens of thousands of people?   Sure people have their own reasons to be pissed and to join the insurgency, but look how they are manifesting this anger.   Look at the names of the insurgent organizations in Iraq.   _Jaish Ansar al-Sunnah_ (Army of the Protectors of the Traditions), _Jaish al-Islami fi Iraq_ (The Islamic Army in Iraq), the "Swords of Righteousness Brigade" (our latest gang of hostage takers), and _Jama'at at-Tawhid wal-Jihad_ (Monotheism and Holy War Movement; now renamed "The Base in Mesopotamia").   Watch the videos of insurgent attacks and terrorist proclamations - that is Qu'ranic scripture in the background and they are yelling "Allahu Akbar".   If you can, get translations of the music that accompanies their propaganda videos; it's all stuff about driving the Zionist and the Crusader from _Dar al-Islam_ by attacking and killing him.   It isn't "Free Arabia" or "Sword of the Arab Defender" that is fighting the Americans, it is groups whos ties to radical Islamic thought is obvious in their proclamations, their actions, and their justifications of brutality.

Local insurgents are only one part of the equation.   Marc Sageman's detailed case studies (which I linked to in the above post) of terrorists finds that their motivation wasn't so primal; these were fairly well educated men who were living in the West and had no real histories of violence.   Their path to aggression is one of socialization, intensification of beliefs, and formal links into the Salfist network, one that is formed of "in-group love [rather] than out-group hate."   These people have entirely different personal experiences and yet, due to the fact that they run through the same ideological filter, their endstate (attacking Americans) is the same.

Both of these taken together serve to further underscore that when an angry Muslim in the Middle East or South Asia needs an outlet for his frustration and anger, it is going to be the entrenched views of Islamist thought (like that of Qutb) that will shape and direct that energy.   People are affected by policies - bin Laden and Co. speak to this anger and encourage violence as the solution.   If a guy's fruitstand gets run over, his mosque gets blown up, or he is stopped and stripped by Western soldiers then it only gives him further reason to believe that the preaching of the Salafi and the proclamations of bin Laden are infact correct and that Islam, his way of life, is under threat.   Then he gets organized and fights.

Of course, all of this is in the links I provided earlier; if you would have read them, you would have realized this....


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## couchcommander

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Lay off the crackpipe kid.   Where in any of my posts do you find a single source that can be considered a neo-con?   Nice strawman.


It was you who linked to Kramer, right gramps? Maybe not neo-con, but certainly didn't vote democrat.



> It's nice to see that the leaders of the Islamic Insurgency ascended upon Edmonton to give you the low down.... :


I thought it was nice of them too. 



> I can't even begin to decipher what you prattled on about (like Bruce, I want my 10 minutes back), as you did nothing to back you original argument that Arab Nationalism is a new and strong force in the Middle East and that continued aggressive polices by the West will cause Arabs to band together and strike back.


My intent was finding base motivations for insurgents, I had all but given up on the nationalism idea at this point as I was reviewing that PEW study. 



> You've since admitted that you didn't know what you were talking about, so I am guessing that you pulled that fluff out of your ***.


No, you presented a piece of hard, substaniated, methodologically sound evidence that blew my argument out of the water... continuing on that line of argument would have been stupid and rather useless other than to try and uphold my ego, makes more sense just to recognize the mistake. 



> Yet you still contend, after admitting your theory sunk like the Titanic, that Islamist thought is not the dominant form of social expression in the Middle East.   There is no "something in between" that we are both missing.


No, i contend that Islamism is not the primary motivating factor for the majority of insurgents. There was actually a book published to this effect, but for the life of me I can't remember the author, and thus have been unable to find it over the last few days. Hopefully I will, as he actually does a study of several hundred thwarted Palestinain suicide bombers and comes up with this same conclusion.... they were just pissed at what WE did to them. 



> Everyone give a round of applause to Captain Obvious and his signaller Corporal Tips.   When did you realize that people go to war and risk death and dismemberment due to the fact that they feel they have a grievance and a cause to fight?   That's the biggest "no crap" I've seen in a long time.



Wow, great.... so then maybe we should stop??? I am reminded of (what seems to be) DG-41's favorite saying "Doctor, it hurts when I do *this*..."



> *The problem here is that you are confusing two separate concepts - individual motivations to fight and ways in which these motivations are manifested in a group setting.*   Five Canadians will give you the reason they joined the Army, but you must look to higher level social and cultural trends to see what will bind these individual motivations and commit them to battle.   This is where Islamist thought, as the dominant form of social identity right now, comes in.   There is a whole multitude of reasons that a person will fight; William Lind's FMFM-1A: Fourth Generation War does an excellent job in highlighting this.   Yet most people don't just spontaneously go out and attack the enemy - they find an outlet for their anger and others who also find similar rational and outlooks in attacking the enemy; they need this to justify their emotions with their mores.   Once people establish the linkages for the outlet, you have a loose network of groupings of angry people that is aptly described in Thomas Hammes' The Sling and the Stone - this is the insurgent network, and the insurgent network feeds off of an ideological bearing which gives it its moral impetus to attack its opponents (just as a very similar network of Revolutionaries in the United States fed off of the ideology of Liberty and Independence in 1775).   Individual anger finds itself fed into a "fourth generation" ideological network, a network that has become an Islamic Insurgency which is bannered by the global Salafist jihad.


If we can prevent this anger from arising in the first place then we won't need to worry about sociological processes behind insurgencies. IE if we don't occupy muslims lands, or be seen killing muslims for what appears to the muslims to be no good reason.... then our problems are largely solved. I will make sure to look into those texts you've referenced. 



> Don't believe me?   You gave testimonies of some US academic and 5 captured insurgents (who happened to fit your view).   Big whoop.   Are you going to determine social dynamics by the news testimony of 5 members of a group of organizations that contains tens of thousands of people?   Sure people have their own reasons to be pissed and to join the insurgency, but look how they are manifesting this anger.


Prevent the anger in the first place, once again we don't need to worry about it. And these testamonies are just the ones that googled so that I could use as open source examples for you guys. There are many many more. 



> Look at the names of the insurgent organizations in Iraq.   _Jaish Ansar al-Sunnah_ (Army of the Protectors of the Traditions), _Jaish al-Islami fi Iraq_ (The Islamic Army in Iraq), the "Swords of Righteousness Brigade" (our latest gang of hostage takers), and _Jama'at at-Tawhid wal-Jihad_ (Monotheism and Holy War Movement; now renamed "The Base in Mesopotamia").   Watch the videos of insurgent attacks and terrorist proclamations - that is Qu'ranic scripture in the background and they are yelling "Allahu Akbar".   If you can, get translations of the music that accompanies their propaganda videos; it's all stuff about driving the Zionist and the Crusader from _Dar al-Islam_ by attacking and killing him.   It isn't "Free Arabia" or "Sword of the Arab Defender" that is fighting the Americans, it is groups whos ties to radical Islamic thought is obvious in their proclamations, their actions, and their justifications of brutality.


Sure I can accept that.



> Local insurgents are only one part of the equation.   Marc Sageman's detailed case studies (which I linked to in the above post) of terrorists finds that there motivation weren't so primal; these were fairly well educated men who were living in the West and had no real histories of violence.   Their path to aggression is one of socialization, intensification of beliefs, and formal links into the Salfist network, one that is formed of "in-group love [rather] than out-group hate."   These people have entirely different personal experiences and yet, due to the fact that they run through the same ideological filter, their endstate (attacking Americans) is the same.



Your right in that home grown terrorists are a different breed than local insurgents, in fact I would agree with this 100%. I think I posted something to this effect a long time ago about the sociological processes that I viewed might come into play in developing "home grown terrorism" Explaining why someone who feels repressed kills someone and someone who's best friend was blow apart by a bomb are two different things, IMO. 



> Both of these taken together serve to further underscore that when an angry Muslim in the Middle East or South Asia needs an outlet for his frustration and anger, it is going to be the entrenched views of Islamist thought (like that of Qutb) that will shape and direct that energy.   People are affected by policies - bin Laden and Co. speak to this anger and encourage violence as the solution.   If a guy's fruitstand gets run over, his mosque gets blown up, or he is stopped and stripped by Western soldiers then it only gives him further reason to believe that the preaching of the Salafi and the proclamations of bin Laden are infact correct and that Islam, his way of life, is under threat.   Then he gets organized and fights.



Stop the motivation to get angry in the first place, you stop this process.

To me it seemed as though your argument was these muslims wake up one day, decide that their lands are unpure, think that hey, this Qutb guy might be on to something, then go to the local Abu-Mart, pick up the suicide bombing for dummies kit, join a group with a bad video camera, and go find some infidels to BBQ as a pass into some virgins pants. Thus, to combat this, we need to attack Islamism and the "terrorist network", etc. etc. 

My point was that these people have primal motivations that come into place way before they start thinking of religious justications, and that if we stop pissing people off in the first place, we wouldn't have to deal with half as many terrorists as we have, nor would we really have to try and dismantel these so called "terrorist networks" (I put it in the alternate form of, if we continue to callously attack middle eastern countries for what appears to be no good reason... blah blah blah...)



> Of course, all of this is in the links I provided earlier; if you would have read them, you would have realized this....


Have I mentioned how you all get so cute when you're angry?


----------



## 48Highlander

couchcommander said:
			
		

> Wow, great.... so then maybe we should stop??? I am reminded of (what seems to be) DG-41's favorite saying "Doctor, it hurts when I do *this*..."
> If we can prevent this anger from arising in the first place then we won't need to worry about sociological processes behind insurgencies. IE if we don't occupy muslims lands, or be seen killing muslims for what appears to the muslims to be no good reason.... then our problems are largely solved. I will make sure to look into those texts you've referenced.
> Prevent the anger in the first place, once again we don't need to worry about it. And these testamonies are just the ones that googled so that I could use as open source examples for you guys. There are many many more.
> Sure I can accept that.



Wow.  Sure, ok, that's one way of thinking about it.  And I suppose that, in the case of a rape we could say "yes, well, she was wearing a short dress, so he was tempted", and then enact a law forbidding all short dresses so that no rapist will ever again be tempted.

I'd like to echo Infanteer's statement:



			
				Infanteer said:
			
		

> Lay off the crackpipe kid.



Even if we were willing to bow down to the terrorists and meet all of their demands, it would never be enough.  The modern day insurgency isn't motivated by any logical or realistic demands or grievences, it's motivated by a fantasy ideology and pure hatred with no logical cause.

If you're really interested in understanding why large masses of people sometimes do things that make no logical sense, check out this link:

http://www.policyreview.org/aug02/harris.html



Here's an excert:



> My first encounter with this particular kind of fantasy occurred when I was in college in the late sixties. A friend of mine and I got into a heated argument. Although we were both opposed to the Vietnam War, we discovered that we differed considerably on what counted as permissible forms of anti-war protest. To me the point of such protest was simple - to turn people against the war. Hence anything that was counterproductive to this purpose was politically irresponsible and should be severely censured. My friend thought otherwise; in fact, he was planning to join what by all accounts was to be a massively disruptive demonstration in Washington, and which in fact became one.
> 
> My friend did not disagree with me as to the likely counterproductive effects of such a demonstration. Instead, he argued that this simply did not matter. His answer was that even if it was counterproductive, even if it turned people against war protesters, indeed even if it made them more likely to support the continuation of the war, he would still participate in the demonstration and he would do so for one simple reason - because it was, in his words, good for his soul.
> 
> What I saw as a political act was not, for my friend, any such thing. It was not aimed at altering the minds of other people or persuading them to act differently. Its whole point was what it did for him.
> 
> And what it did for him was to provide him with a fantasy - a fantasy, namely, of taking part in the revolutionary struggle of the oppressed against their oppressors. By participating in a violent anti-war demonstration, he was in no sense aiming at coercing conformity with his view - for that would still have been a political objective. Instead, he took his part in order to confirm his ideological fantasy of marching on the right side of history, of feeling himself among the elect few who stood with the angels of historical inevitability. Thus, when he lay down in front of hapless commuters on the bridges over the Potomac, he had no interest in changing the minds of these commuters, no concern over whether they became angry at the protesters or not. They were there merely as props, as so many supernumeraries in his private psychodrama. The protest for him was not politics, but theater; and the significance of his role lay not in the political ends his actions might achieve, but rather in their symbolic value as ritual. In short, he was acting out a fantasy.





> To be a prop in someone else's fantasy is not a pleasant experience, especially when this someone else is trying to kill you, but that was the position of Ethiopia in the fantasy ideology of Italian fascism. And it is the position Americans have been placed in by the quite different fantasy ideology of radical Islam.
> 
> The terror attack of 9-11 was not designed to make us alter our policy, but was crafted for its effect on the terrorists themselves: It was a spectacular piece of theater. The targets were chosen by al Qaeda not through military calculation - in contrast, for example, to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor - but entirely because they stood as symbols of American power universally recognized by the Arab street. They were gigantic props in a grandiose spectacle in which the collective fantasy of radical Islam was brought vividly to life: A mere handful of Muslims, men whose will was absolutely pure, as proven by their martyrdom, brought down the haughty towers erected by the Great Satan. What better proof could there possibly be that God was on the side of radical Islam and that the end of the reign of the Great Satan was at hand?
> 
> As the purpose of the Italian invasion of Ethiopia was to prove to the Italians themselves that they were conquerors, so the purpose of 9-11 was not to create terror in the minds of the American people but to prove to the Arabs that Islamic purity, as interpreted by radical Islam, could triumph. The terror, which to us seems the central fact, is in the eyes of al Qaeda a by-product. Likewise, what al Qaeda and its followers see as central to the holy pageant of 9-11 - namely, the heroic martyrdom of the 19 hijackers - is interpreted by us quite differently. For us the hijackings, like the Palestinian "suicide" bombings, are viewed merely as a modus operandi, a technique that is incidental to a larger strategic purpose, a makeshift device, a low-tech stopgap. In short, Clausewitzian war carried out by other means - in this case by suicide.
> 
> But in the fantasy ideology of radical Islam, suicide is not a means to an end but an end in itself. Seen through the distorting prism of radical Islam, the act of suicide is transformed into that of martyrdom - martyrdom in all its transcendent glory and accompanied by the panoply of magical powers that religious tradition has always assigned to martyrdom.
> 
> In short, it is a mistake to try to fit such behavior into the mold created by our own categories and expectations. Nowhere is this more tellingly illustrated than on the videotape of Osama bin Laden discussing the attack. The tape makes clear that the final collapse of the World Trade Center was not part of the original terrorist scheme, which apparently assumed that the twin towers would not lose their structural integrity. But this fact gave to the event - in terms of al Qaeda's fantasy ideology - an even greater poignancy: Precisely because it had not been part of the original calculation, it was therefore to be understood as a manifestation of divine intervention. The 19 hijackers did not bring down the towers - God did.




I'd suggest reading the entire article, hopefuly it will help you figure out what you've been missing.


----------



## KevinB

The problem with Harris is he is looking at it as an isolated entity - rather than a entity that has mutated beyond his categorizations.

  He has a good point that the attacks where a way of showing the Muslim society that they could raise up and strike the West/US, and most importantly succeed.  The biggest failure of Al-Q would be a fizzle attack, and as such they train and only will make attempts that will have have high percentage to succeed -  However he neglects to mention that Al-Q is in Gen IV now and the cells are spinning off like a cancer, and  unrelated to the next - the perfect disease.  The Gen1, II international network is still very viable but in Afghan and Iraq -- other than funding the new blood is doing its thing without any guidance from above.  In my point of view the question is when will the Gen III and Gen IV cells attempt to hit the big time and go international  -- then you will have the ocean liners and theme parks attacked and real massacres will take place.

So you end up the requirement to kill the majority of the Gen III and IV pers in situ - or else they will migrate and turn their focus outward to draw us away from their homeland - and into ours.

OBL and Co. have no more control (or interest controlling) the footmen of the insurgency in Iraq and Afghan.  They have strategic targets - while they allows the pawns to be killing in great numbers to keep the eye on Iraq until the public tires.



- Cheers
Kevin


----------



## a_majoor

A much simpler explanation of the "Root Cause" of terrorism is the will to power. Since the Jihadis do not have the sort of cultural or intellectual background to compete with Western Civilization, they use naked force to threaten us and drive us away from the lands of Dar el Islam, but also they are very keen to unleash car bombs and beheadings against members of their own community.

The message of the West is pretty much "look at what you can do if you want"; while the Jihadis counter offer is "Do what we say, or else".


----------



## Gunnerlove

Time to step out of the box for a look back in time. 

When the Germans invaded Denmark during WW2 my grandfather along with his father and brothers resisted until they were all killed or deported. They felt it was their duty as citizens. Now not everyone felt the same way, and those who collaborated were dealt with during and after the war. 

I wonder how mass media would have influenced the conflict during the occupation of Denmark?


----------



## KevinB

:  Time to step back into reality...


----------



## a_majoor

Stepping back in: This applies not only to Iraq, but in various forms to Afghanistan and the multitude of smaller theaters of operation for the duration of WW IV. This also applies if the war widens to encompass Syria, Iran or Saudi Arabia as well.

http://www.nationalreview.com/owens/owens200512060813.asp



> *Strength & Constancy*
> It's a strategy.
> 
> In conjunction with President George W. Bush's public-diplomacy offensive to regain domestic support for the war effort, the National Security Council has now published a document entitled "National Strategy for Victory in Iraq." While the usual suspects have denounced it as more of the same, the fact is that it is a sound effort to outline what is necessary to achieve our goals in Iraq.
> 
> Properly understood, strategy refers to a plan for applying scarce means to achieve the nation's goals. Without a strategic framework for setting priorities and guiding the development and employment of the instruments of national power, it is difficult to evaluate proposed actions to ensure the nation's security and prosperity. Strategy making and implementation are dynamic processes, changing as the factors that influence the strategy change. Potential mismatches between ends and means create risks. If the risks resulting from an ends-means mismatch cannot be managed, ends must be reevaluated and scaled back, means must be increased, or the strategy must be adjusted.
> 
> In general, strategy serves three purposes. First, strategy relates ends, the goals of policy (interests and objectives) to the limited resources available to achieve them against an adversary who actively opposes the achievement of the ends.
> 
> Second, strategy contributes to the clarification of the ends of policy by helping establish priorities in light of constrained resources. Without establishing priorities among competing ends, all interests and all threats will appear equal. In the absence of strategy, planners will find themselves in the situation described by Frederick the Great: "He who attempts to defend too much defends nothing." Finally, strategy conceptualizes resources as means in support of policy. Resources are not means until strategy provides some understanding of how they will be organized and employed.
> 
> Strategy can be envisioned as the answers to a series of interrelated questions:
> 
> What conditions do we wish to prevail in the area of interest to us?
> 
> What steps do we need to take in order to achieve those conditions, i.e., what plan of action is most likely to bring about the desired conditions?
> 
> What combination of the instruments of power best supports the chosen strategic alternative?
> 
> What are the opportunity costs and risks associated with the preferred strategic alternative?
> 
> If we apply these various criteria to the Bush Iraq strategy, it comes out looking pretty good.
> 
> The Successes Continue
> 
> The document clearly describes victory as the desired outcome for Iraq. This would seem self-evident but the document recognizes that the goal will be achieved in stages. In the short term, success is defined as "making steady progress in fighting terrorists, meeting political milestones, building democratic institutions, and standing up security forces." By this measurement, our enterprise in Iraq has been successful.
> 
> Success in the "medium term" will be achieved when Iraq has a fully constitutional government in place, has taken the lead in the war against the terrorists and is providing its own security, and is on its way to achieving its economic potential. The elections in two weeks will constitute an important milestone in achieving victory in the medium term.
> 
> Final victory in Iraq will have been achieved when the country "is peaceful, united, stable, and secure, well integrated into the international community, and a full partner in the global war on terrorism." This is a big order and much has to happen to reach this goal - but the report makes clear what we aim to do.
> 
> "Victory in Iraq" points out that success in Iraq is a vital U.S. interest. "Iraq is the central front in the global war on terror. Failure in Iraq will embolden terrorists and expand their reach; success in Iraq will deal them a decisive and crippling blow." But U.S. interests extend beyond Iraq to the greater Middle East as a whole.
> 
> All too often, strategies do a fine job of describing the goal but don't address the plan to achieve the goals. But this is the essence of strategy: How do we apply scarce resources in the most effective way to bring about our desired end? If the president's Iraq strategy left this out, it would be a serious omission. But this is not the case. The document lays out three interconnected tracks that describe the "how" of the U.S. approach in Iraq. These tracks incorporate "eight pillars," or strategic objectives:
> 
> Defeat the Terrorists and Neutralize the Insurgency
> Transition Iraq to Security Self-Reliance
> Help Iraqis Form a National Compact for Democratic Government
> Help Iraq Build Government Capacity and Provide Essential Services
> Help Iraq Strengthen its Economy
> Help Iraq Strengthen the Rule of Law and Promote Civil Rights
> Increase International Support for Iraq
> Strengthen Public Understanding of Coalition Efforts and Public Isolation of the Insurgents
> 
> As sophisticated observers are always quick to point out, insurgencies are never won by military means alone. There must be a political track leading to a stable government. To bring about this outcome, the document calls for isolating the real enemy elements by driving a wedge between them and those who can be won over to the political process. The second component of the political track is to engage those outside the political process by inviting them to participate in the governing process if they are willing to turn away from violence Finally, the political track calls for building stable, pluralistic, and effective national institutions capable of protecting the interests of all Iraqis, enabling Iraq to be fully integrated into the international community.
> 
> But while military means are not sufficient to defeat an insurgency, they are nonetheless necessary. The security track focuses on defeating the terrorists while building up Iraqi forces. The security track also has three components: taking offensive action to clear areas of enemy control, killing and capturing enemy fighters and denying them safe-haven; holding areas that have been wrested from enemy control and using Iraqi security forces to extend the writ of the Iraqi government; and most critically, building up these security forces and improving "the capacity of local institutions to deliver services, advance the rule of law, and nurture civil society."
> 
> The final track of the strategy is economic. The elements of this track are to help the Iraqi government: restore Iraq's infrastructure enabling it to meet increasing demand and the needs of a growing economy; reform an Iraqi economy to make it self-sustaining; and build the capacity of "Iraqi institutions to maintain infrastructure, rejoin the international economic community, and improve the general welfare of all Iraqis."
> 
> This is a clear strategic roadmap, which establishes the desired outcome and outlines the steps necessary to achieve it. All the elements are mutually reinforcing. And the document includes an appendix that provides clear metrics for evaluating progress.
> 
> Perhaps most important, the strategy is flexible and adaptable, recognizing that our enemy in Iraq is sophisticated. War is, after all, still a struggle between two active wills, each trying to achieve its goals by subduing the other. It recognizes that although we have achieved most of our short-term and many of or medium-term goals, the kind of victory that means a favorable peace will take time. The strategy cannot be linked to a predetermined schedule. It depends on conditions on the ground. "No war has ever been won on a timetable and neither will this one. But lack of a timetable does not mean our posture in Iraq (both military and civilian) will remain static over time. As conditions change, our posture will change."
> 
> The document makes clear the risks of failure. If the United States does not prevail in Iraq, it "would become a safe haven from which terrorists could plan attacks against America, American interests abroad, and our allies." In addition, "Middle East reformers would never again fully trust American assurances of support for democracy and human rights in the region." The resulting "tribal and sectarian chaos would have major consequences for American security and interests in the region." Accordingly, says the document, losing is not an option.
> 
> But the risks associated with following the administration's strategic roadmap are real as well. The specter of civil war is always present, as well as the possibility that the terrorists will reemerge once the United States leaves: "Defeating the multi-headed enemy in Iraq - and ensuring that it cannot threaten Iraq's democratic gains once we leave - requires persistent effort across many fronts."
> 
> No Viable Alternatives
> 
> The reaction of the Democrats to "Victory in Iraq" has been predictable and is reminiscent of the response to Ronald Reagan's first "National Security Strategy" when it was published in 1987. All during his presidency, Reagan's critics constantly accused him of having no strategy except to spend more money on defense. They were blind to the fact that the main objective of Reagan's strategy was to exploit the Soviet "center of gravity," the weakness of communist economic organization. [_Interpolation,. We need to discover and exploit the Jihadi's "centre of gravity" as well, certainly much better than we are now._]
> 
> Reagan's "National Security Strategy" merely placed on paper what astute observers could ascertain on the basis of actions alone: that a critical element of Reagan's grand strategy was "to force the Soviet Union to bear the brunt of its domestic economic shortcomings in order to discourage excessive Soviet military expenditures and global adventurism." It did so by exploiting the economic mismatch between the U.S. and the Soviet Union: While the U.S. was spending a maximum of 6.3 percent of a large and growing gross domestic product (GDP) on defense, the Soviets were spending a considerably larger portion of a much smaller GDP on security. The fact was that the United States could afford an arms race; the Soviet Union could not.
> 
> Bush's critics are as wrong today as Reagan's were two decades ago. Long before this document was published, the Coalition was pursuing the three-track strategy described in "Victory in Iraq." The process began a year ago with the capture of Fallujah. Since then, Coalition forces have concentrated on interdicting the "ratlines" that permitted the insurgents to infiltrate into the heart of Iraq from the Syrian border. As Iraqi forces have improved, Coalition forces have not only been able to clear key regions, killing and capturing terrorists during the operations, but to apply force simultaneously, making it difficult for the enemy fighters to slip away to other locations. And because there are more Iraqi units able to pull their weight, Coalition forces are increasingly able to hold territory that the enemy once controlled.
> 
> Progress has not been constant, of course, because plans rarely work out the way they are supposed to. I hope NRO readers will forgive me for once more reminding them of the observation by Helmuth von Moltke, chief of the Prussian general staff during the wars of German unification, that "no plan of operation extends with any certainty beyond the first contact with the main hostile force. Only the layman thinks that he can see in the course of the campaign the consequent execution of the original idea with all the details thought out in advance and adhered to until the very end."
> 
> His observations apply in spades to Iraq. The commander, wrote Moltke, must keep his objective in mind, "undisturbed by the vicissitudes of events. But the path on which he hopes to reach it can never be firmly established in advance. Throughout the campaign he must make a series of decisions on the basis of situations that cannot be foreseen. The successive acts of war are thus not premeditated designs, but on the contrary are spontaneous acts guided by military measures. Everything depends on penetrating the uncertainty of veiled situations to evaluate the facts, to clarify the unknown, to make decisions rapidly, and then to carry them out with strength and constancy." In my estimation, the Bush administration and the commanders on the ground have done a reasonably good job of keeping the objective of the war in mind while "[evaluating] the facts, [clarifying] the unknown, [making] decisions rapidly, and then . . . [carrying] them out with strength and constancy." This is what has permitted the Coalition to wrest the initiative from the insurgents over the last year.
> 
> By all means, if the president's critics have a better strategy, let them present it. Of course, the dominant Copperhead faction of the Democratic party has nothing to offer but the demand that we pull out. Meanwhile, those with presidential aspirations try to have it both ways, criticizing the president's approach but trying to appear serious about national security by not taking the Murtha-Pelosi road. But they don't provide much of an alternative either - let's call it "Copperhead lite." For instance John Kerry calls for reducing U.S. forces in Iraq. But cutting U.S. combat power in Iraq would permit the enemy to recover the initiative that the Coalition seized last year in Fallujah. In fact, neither the Copperhead nor Copperhead lite plans for Iraq constitute serious strategic alternatives to the president's strategy. Alternative plans would serve only to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
> 
> - Mackubin Thomas Owens is an associate dean of academics and a professor of national-security affairs at the Naval War College in Newport, R.I. He is writing a history of U.S. civil-military relations.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/owens/owens200512060813.asp


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## a_majoor

Some further elaboration on the historical roots of the Jihadis. Their philosophies come from a time before modern nationalism, before the Crusades and indeed before the fall of the Eastern Roman Empire. As Ralph Peters once said, "we will be facing enemies from the Iliad and the Bible", referring to their motivations, which only seem alien to pampered and uneducated Westerners. (Read the classics; The Iliad, The History of the Pelloponessian Wars and so on. People think and act this way in about 3/4 of the world, the way *WE* think and act is totally alien to them....)

http://www.nationalreview.com/robbins/robbins200512130829.asp



> *Going Medieval*
> The nature of jihad and this war we're in.
> 
> One hears a lot about the Crusades when studying the terrorist threat, and almost exclusively in the form of an accusation. These centuries-old conflicts are raised whenever someone, whether from the region or not, seeks to activate the Western guilt complex. We have to understand this conflict from their point of view, one is told. Memories are long in the region. The time of Saladin is as though yesterday. Had the Europeans (and by extension Americans) not started it all with the Crusades, we might not have the problems we face today.
> 
> O.K., but what about their crusade? We are accustomed to looking at maps that show an area called "the Muslim world," stretching from West Africa across the Middle East to Southeast Asia, as though this always has been and must be; but before the time of Mohammed these same areas were Christian, Jewish, Hindu, or Zoroastrian, among others. How did they make the switch, and what happened when they did? This is the topic The Legacy of Jihad: Islamic Holy War and the Fate of Non-Muslims a new anthology edited by Andrew G. Bostom. This exhaustive, 759-page tome contains both primary-source material and interpretive essays, dating from the earliest period of Muslim expansion to the present day. One learns very quickly that the caliphate was established not by evangelism but by the sword, and the non-Muslims who were subjected to the rule of the caliphs were either forced to convert, allowed to live as social inferiors under a religious caste system called dhimmitude, or simply killed outright.
> 
> There was no question among the early Muslim scholars that their faith should spread to the four corners of the world, and as quickly as possible. According to Islamic teaching, the time before the advent of Mohammed was the period of Jahiliyyah, or ignorance of the guidance from God. Once Mohammed brought the word of God, there was no longer any excuse for ignorance. And once an area was liberated and its people enlightened, they could not go back. Any place that became Muslim had to stay Muslim; thus groups like al Qaeda define the hoped for neo-Caliphate as encompassing not only areas where Muslims currently live, but all such places were they ever had influence. More to the point, this is only the first phase of consolidation. They will not stop there. The ultimate step in the al Qaeda program is the conversion of the world to their brand of Islam, and the realization of the vision first pursued by Mohammed and his successors.
> 
> The Legacy of Jihad deals at some length with the medieval roots of jihad, and the classical Muslim theologians and jurists writing on topics of the necessity of expansion, the legality of war, and the legitimate ways in which people may be enslaved. Some of the arguments may seem antiquated to modern ways of thinking, but one can find references to these same thinkers in the contemporary writings of the terrorists and their spiritual godfathers. Ibn Taymiyah, for example, the 13th-century scholar who justified rebellion against the Mongol occupiers of Baghdad even though they had nominally converted to Islam, is included in this volume. Today he is invoked by Iraqi insurgents for a similar purpose. Sayyid Qutb, the 20th-century Egyptian dissident whose writings are generally recognized as the inspiration for the current radical Islamist movements, was also inspired by Ibn Taymiyah. The book includes an excerpt from his seminal work Milestones in which Qutb discusses in some detail the nature of jihad as he understood it - something that "cannot be achieved only by preaching."
> 
> The nature of jihad is of course one of the central questions of the conflict. Frequently I have had students from Muslim countries explain very passionately that our understanding of jihad is flawed. That what we think of as jihad - violent struggle to extend the domain of Islam - is actually the "lesser jihad." True jihad is a moral struggle within each person to enjoin the good and resist evil, what is called the "greater jihad." Some say further that the idea that force can be used to convert is not Islamic; it would make the greater jihad impossible because the convert would not sincerely believe. All this may be true, in their understanding of the faith, and I have no quarrel with it. Would that everyone felt that way.
> 
> Nevertheless, not all Muslims are as interested in this spiritual quest, and some of the more radical adherents of the faith are convinced that nonviolence is not an option. Andrew Bostom's book shows comprehensively the historical roots of this school of thought, and its continuity over the centuries to the present day. It helps one understand jihad operationally; its use, its claims to legitimacy, its perceived inevitability. Whether this is or is not the way most Muslims view the concept of jihad in its totality is not particularly relevant because people sincerely engaged in "greater jihad" are not a national-security threat. Likewise, those terrorists who have made "lesser jihad" their avocation have no use for fellow Muslims who are seeking only to bring themselves closer to God's ideal as they understand it. As the Ayatollah Khomeini said of those who argued that Islam was a religion of peace that prevents men from waging war, "I spit upon those foolish souls who make such a claim."
> 
> This is a book rich in detail. It contains writings that have not previously been available in English, and is a useful sourcebook for scholars and students interested in the topic. It is a useful companion to contemporary terrorist statements and writings - you might be surprised how much is borrowed from other writers. Clearly given the length, the language, and complexity (and gravity) of the topic it is not a book for light holiday reading. But for those who want to deepen their understanding of the means and motives of the terrorists, there is more in one place than any other book of its kind. And you won't have to feel guilty about the Crusades any more either.
> 
> - James S. Robbins is senior fellow in national-security affairs at the American Foreign Policy Council, a trustee for the Leaders for Liberty Foundation, and an NRO contributor.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/robbins/robbins200512130829.asp


----------



## Infanteer

Tell James S Robbins to quit cribbing my posts....


----------



## a_majoor

Yet more evidence this is a regional war. The Saudis, Iranians and Ba'athists have competing and mutually exclusive ideas of how the Middle East should look if they were in charge, but it is well to remember they have a common cause against the West and particularly the United States, since Western civilization has many "attractors" that would draw their native populations away from the ideologies they support, and only the United States has the military and economic power (and currently the will) to prevent any or all from acheiving their goals of regional hegemony. 

Spreading freedom, free markets and democracy is perhaps the only way to defang the threat and achieve victory, and yes, you can export freedom on the point of a bayonet (the ancient Athenians did so, and these democracies were mostly undone by conquest and the installation of an Oligarchy by the Spartans and their Pelloponessian allies. More recent object lessons are the former "National Socialist" Germany and the Japanese Empire). Toppling Iraq and spreading support for local movements (like the Ceadar Revolution in Lebanon) are elements of this strategy.

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/woolsey200512140823.asp



> *The Elephant in the Middle East Living Room*
> Watching Wahhabis.
> 
> By R. James Woolsey
> 
> Early in November, hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee examined hate literature being distributed in American mosques. This material had been translated and published earlier this year by Freedom House's Center for Religious Freedom. (I was chairman of Freedom House at the time and wrote the book's foreword.) The hearings examined these Saudi publications in the context of assessing Chairman Arlen Specter's proposed Saudi Arabia Accountability Act. In addition to the material presented at the hearings, the underlying role of Saudi Arabia's state religion, generally referred to in the West as Wahhabism, deserves expanded attention for a variety of reasons.
> 
> Recently President Bush addressed a number of the ideological aspects of this long war in which we are now engaged. As he has put it now on two occasions, "Islamofascism" is one plausible characterization of our enemy. Although this is a major step forward beyond designating "terror" as the enemy (we're certainly at war with more than a tactic, albeit a terrible one) there was still a major element missing in his presentation. The elephant in the Middle East living room is Wahhabism. Over the long run, this movement is in many ways the most dangerous of the ideological enemies we face.
> 
> Within Sunni Islam, along with several more moderate schools, there are two varieties of theocratic totalitarianism. Both of these are Salafists, believing that only a literal version of the model of rule implemented in the seventh century in Islam has ultimate legitimacy. Both have the objective of rule by a unified mosque and state; for some this theocracy is personified by the caliph. Different individuals in these movements emphasize different aspects, but generally the common objective is to unify first the Arab world under theocratic rule, then the Muslim world, then those regions that were once Muslim (e.g. Spain), then the rest of the world.
> 
> Such totalitarian visions seem crazy to most of us; we thus tend to underestimate their potency. Yet the Salafists' theocratic totalitarian dream has some features in common with the secular totalitarian dreams of the twentieth century, e.g., the Nazis' Thousand Year Reich, or the Communists' World Communism. The latter two movements produced tens of millions of deaths in the 20th century in part because, at least in their early stages, they engendered "fire in the minds of men" in Germany, Russia, and China and were able to establish national bases. Salafists had such a national base for the better part of a decade in Afghanistan and have had one controlling the Arabian Peninsula for some eight decades. They haven't attained the Nazis' and Communists' death totals yet, but this is only due to lack of power, not to less murderous or less totalitarian objectives.
> 
> Salafists of both jihadist and loyalist stripe, e.g. both al Qaeda and the Wahhabis, share basic views on all points but one. Both exhibit fanatical hatred of Shiite Muslims, Sufi Muslims, Jews, Christians, and democracy, and both brutally suppress women. They differ only on whether it is appropriate to carry out jihadist attacks against any enemy near or far now â â€ i.e. to murder Iraqi Shiite children getting candy, people working in the World Trade Center, etc. â â€ or whether to subordinate such efforts for the time being to the political needs of a particular state, i.e. Saudi Arabia.
> 
> The relationship between the Salafist jihadists such as al Qaeda and Salafist loyalists such as the Wahhabis is thus loosely analogous to that between the Trotskyites and the Stalinists of the 1930's. Trotskyites, like al Qaeda, believed it was justified to use violence anywhere while Stalinists, like the Wahhabis, showed primary allegiance to protecting "socialism in one country", i.e. the U.S.S.R. The fact that this difference was only a question of tactics didn't prevent the Trotskyites and Stalinists from being the most bitter of enemies â â€ Trotsky died in 1940 with a Stalinist axe in his skull.
> 
> The "IslamoNazi" Threat
> 
> Similarly, al Qaeda launches attacks in Saudi Arabia and the Saudis work with us to capture and kill al Qaeda members who threaten them. In this sense both Saudi government officials and probably even Wahhabi clerics are willing to "cooperate with the U.S. on counter-terrorism." But this cooperation does not negate the fact that al Qaeda and the Wahhabis share essentially the same underlying totalitarian theocratic ideology.  It is this common Salafist ideology that the Wahhabis have been spreading widely â â€ financed by $3-4 billion/year from the Saudi government and wealthy individuals in the Middle East over the last quarter century â â€ to the madrassas of Pakistan, the textbooks of Turkish children in Germany, and the mosques of Europe and the U.S. Alex Alexiev, senior fellow at the Center for Security Policy, testified before Congress on June 26, 2003, that this is approximately three-four times what the Soviets were spending on external propaganda and similar "active measures" at the peak of Moscow's power in the 1970s.
> 
> This underlying Salafist ideology being spread by the Wahhabis is fanatical and murderous, indeed explicitly genocidal. (The president's "Islamofascist" term is thus perhaps understated â â€ the Italian fascists were horrible, but not genocidal. "IslamoNazi" would be more accurate.)
> 
> For example, the BBC reported on July 18 of this year that a publication given to foreign workers in Saudi Arabia by the Islamic cultural center, which falls under the authority of the ministry of Islamic affairs, advocates the killing of "refusers" (Shia). The imam of Al-Haram in Mecca, (Islam's most holy mosque), Sheikh Abd Al-Rahman al-Sudayyis, was barred from Canada last year after the translation of his sermons calling Jews "the scum of the earth" and "monkeys and pigs" who should be "annihilated." Materials distributed by the Saudi government to the Al-Farouq Masjid mosque in Brooklyn call for the killing of homosexuals and converts from Islam to another religion.
> 
> Ideas Have Consequences
> 
> The direct consequences of such murderous teachings extend to the war in Iraq. In November of 2004, 26 Wahhabi clerics in Saudi Arabia published a call for jihad against the U.S. in Iraq. Because of the high religious status of the clerics within Saudi Arabia, the exhortation was widely interpreted as a fatwa, a religious ruling. Several Saudi suicide bombers and other terrorists captured in Iraq have indicated that it was this fatwa that had turned them to terrorism. Said one: "I hadn't thought of coming to Iraq, but I had fatwas . . . I read the communiqué of the 26 clerics ... ." During the battle for Fallujah in 2004 Saudi Sheikh Abd Al-Muhsin Al-Abikan said to the London daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, "What is happening in Falluja is the result of such fatwas ... [The resistance] is bringing about tragedy and destruction for Iraq, Falluja, and their residents." Nasser Sulayman al-Amer, one of the 26 signers of the call for jihad, admitted recently at a press conference in Kuwait that he had met with Iraqis on this matter. On November 13 of this year the Iraqi national-security adviser, Mowaffak Rubaie said: "Most of those who blow themselves up in Iraq are Saudi nationals."
> 
> Lost in Translation
> 
> Following the controversy over the 26 clerics' edict the Saudi government retracted it, in a sense. But the only two Saudi officials who released the retraction publicly were two Saudi ambassadors, those to the U.S. and the U.K. And the retractions were issued only in English.
> 
> Overbalancing such "retractions" of Wahhabi statements is the fact that Saudi education is turning toward, not away from, Wahhabi influence. In February of 2005 a secularist reformer, Muhammad Ahmad al-Rashid, headed the Saudi Education Ministry. As he was beginning to respond to internal criticism of curricula that incited hatred of non-Muslims and non-Wahhabi Muslims, he was replaced by Abdullah bin Saleh al-Obaid, a hard-core Wahhabi. Controlling 27 percent of the national budget, al-Obaid will have a substantial effect on the views of the next generation of Saudis. His views are illuminated by aspects of his background. From 1995 to 2002, al-Obaid headed the Muslim World League (MWL). According to the U.S. Treasury the MWL's Peshawar office was led by Wael Jalaidan, "one of the founders of al Qaeda." Moreover, the main arm of the MWL is the International Islamic Relief Organization (IIRO). The Egyptian magazine, Rose al-Youssef, describes the IIRO as "firmly entrenched with Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda organization." In March 2002 the U.S. headquarters representing both organizations was raided and closed by federal authorities. One of the officers of the closed branch in Herndon, Virginia, was al-Obaid. The Wall Street Journal describes him as "an official enmeshed in a terror financing controversy."
> 
> Thinly Veiled Totalitarianism
> 
> Wahhabi ideology is also totalitarian to a unique degree in its repression of women. In 2002 the world press carried stories of an extreme example: Religious police in Saudi Arabia forced some young girls fleeing a burning school back inside to their deaths because they were not properly veiled. This is a fanaticism that knows no bounds.
> 
> Words and beliefs have consequences, and totalitarians are often remarkably clear about what they will do once they have enough power. Many brushed aside Mein Kampf when it was first written but it turned out to be an excellent guide to the Nazis' behavior once they had the power to implement it. We ignore the Wahhabis' teaching of Salafist fanaticism at our peril.
> 
> The Struggle for Islam
> 
> There are two important points we must understand in dealing with this ideology and its teachings.
> 
> First of all, the rest of us â â€ Christians, Jews, other Muslims, followers of other religions, non-believers â â€ are under absolutely no obligation to accept the Wahhabis' and their apologists' claims that they represent "true Islam." This is equivalent to the claims of Torquemada in the 16th century to represent "true Christianity." He tortured and persecuted Jews, Muslims, and dissident Christians, burned many at the stake, and stole their property. We are under no obligation to take Torquemada's word that he represented "true Christianity" and would be under no obligation to take the word of any successor should one arise. By the same token, we are under no obligation to accept the Wahhabis' claim to represent the great and just religion of Islam.
> 
> Second, it is difficult for Americans to bring themselves to draw distinctions among those who claim they are following the requirements of their religion â â€ we generally do not want to quarrel with others' religious beliefs even if they seem very strange to us. But we must realize that murderous totalitarianism that claims religious sanction is different. We have defeated four major totalitarian movements in the last six and a half decades: German Nazism, Italian Fascism, Japanese Imperialism, and Soviet Communism. Only Japanese Imperialism had a major religious element. Communism however was secular, so our current generation of leaders has little experience with a totalitarian ideology that seeks to hide behind one of the world's great religions the way Torquemada cloaked his murderousness in claims to represent Christianity.  This makes it difficult for most Americans to understand IslamoNazism. We tend to regard each person's religious beliefs as a private matter. But we must learn to make an exception for theocratic totalitarianism masquerading as religion.
> 
> During the Cold War we had little difficulty in distinguishing between, say, the Khmer Rouge and German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, although both called themselves "Socialists." But it is harder for us to bring ourselves to distinguish between those who follow the Wahhabi party line on the one hand and, on the other, brave and decent individuals such the American Sufi leader Sheik Muhammad Hisham Kabbani, who has been warning Americans of the danger of Islamist terror since well before 9/11. We must get over this reluctance to challenge the perpetrators of and apologists for theocratic totalitarianism.
> 
> Cold War Lessons
> 
> Does taking on Wahhabism and its supporters mean that we must stand opposed to all cooperation with the government of Saudi Arabia, or attempt to change the Saudi regime in short order? No. *The needs of statecraft must also be considered*. We fought the Communist ideology in different ways from 1917 through the Cold War. But while we were fighting it, for nearly four years during World War II we were close allies of the Soviets, because we needed them with us against Hitler. Over the years we had commercial relations with them (they bought our wheat and Pepsis, we bought their oil) and some of us spent years negotiating arms-control agreements with them, sometimes to positive effect. In short, we worked as the need arose over the years with the Soviet state, but we generally kept up our ideological struggle against Communism, especially after 1947.
> 
> We need to keep this history in mind when dealing with the government of Saudi Arabia. The royal family has some reformers in it, including, to a mild degree, King Abdullah, with whom we may make some common cause. We need to work with the Saudi government on reform and, of course, on issues related to oil. But just as we took steps in the 1980s to try to limit Europe's dependence on Soviet natural-gas supplies we would be well advised today to reduce our own oil dependency. And we must never forget the underlying totalitarian ideology of the Saudi state.
> 
> How might we undertake to fight this Wahhabi ideology? Again, we should recall some Cold War lessons. By the 1950s, after a congressional attempt to outlaw Communism was struck down by the Supreme Court, and after Joseph McCarthy's attempt to spread guilt by association was defeated, we hit upon several ways to deal with our domestic Communists. We made them register. We infiltrated them with large numbers of FBI agents. We essentially made their lives miserable. It was legal for them and their front groups to exist â â€ indeed they perennially ran Gus Hall for President â â€ and they even recruited some spies for the Soviets. But despite their best efforts they were not a serious force in American life, nor did they succeed in undermining our ability to fight the Cold War. At the same time we made common cause with Democratic socialists around the world, just as we must make common cause today with the hundreds of millions of decent Muslims with whom we have no quarrel.
> 
> We should have a frank national discussion about how we may learn from this history and deal with Sunni theocratic totalitarianism â â€ so that we may help it join its secular cousins, Nazism and Communism (and its predecessor totalitarian religious movements such as Torquemada's Inquisition) where they all rightly belong: on the ash-heap of history.
> 
> â â€ R. James Woolsey is a former director of Central Intelligence
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/woolsey200512140823.asp


----------



## a_majoor

Bruce Monkhouse said:
			
		

> No, what I don't like is your assumption in your long post above is that somehow "we" created "those" people, go through history and you will see those with less usually attacked those with more...is that the fault of the person with more or visa-versa?



More evidence from history that we are fighting a regional war with far higher stakes then "oil" or "Realpolitik"





> *America's Earliest Terrorists*
> Lessons from America's first war against Islamic terror.
> 
> By Joshua E. London
> 
> At the dawn of a new century, a newly elected United States president was forced to confront a grave threat to the nation - an escalating series of unprovoked attacks on Americans by Muslim terrorists. Worse still, these Islamic partisans operated under the protection and sponsorship of rogue Arab states ruled by ruthless and cunning dictators.
> 
> Sluggish in recognizing the full nature of the threat, America entered the war well after the enemy's call to arms. Poorly planned and feebly executed, the American effort proceeded badly and at great expense - resulting in a hastily negotiated peace and an equally hasty declaration of victory.
> 
> As timely and familiar as these events may seem, they occurred more than two centuries ago. The president was Thomas Jefferson, and the terrorists were the Barbary pirates. Unfortunately, many of the easy lessons to be plucked from this experience have yet to be fully learned.
> 
> The Barbary states, modern-day Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya, are collectively known to the Arab world as the Maghrib ("Land of Sunset"), denoting Islam's territorial holdings west of Egypt. With the advance of Mohammed's armies into the Christian Levant in the seventh century, the Mediterranean was slowly transformed into the backwater frontier of the battles between crescent and cross. Battles raged on both land and sea, and religious piracy flourished.
> 
> The Maghrib served as a staging ground for Muslim piracy throughout the Mediterranean, and even parts of the Atlantic. America's struggle with the terror of Muslim piracy from the Barbary states began soon after the 13 colonies declared their independence from Britain in 1776, and continued for roughly four decades, finally ending in 1815.
> 
> Although there is much in the history of America's wars with the Barbary pirates that is of direct relevance to the current "war on terror," one aspect seems particularly instructive to informing our understanding of contemporary Islamic terrorists. Very simply put, the Barbary pirates were committed, militant Muslims who meant to do exactly what they said.
> 
> Take, for example, the 1786 meeting in London of Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja, the Tripolitan ambassador to Britain. As American ambassadors to France and Britain respectively, Jefferson and Adams met with Ambassador Adja to negotiate a peace treaty and protect the United States from the threat of Barbary piracy.
> 
> These future United States presidents questioned the ambassador as to why his government was so hostile to the new American republic even though America had done nothing to provoke any such animosity. Ambassador Adja answered them, as they reported to the Continental Congress, "that it was founded on the Laws of their Prophet, that it was written in their Koran, that all nations who should not have acknowledged their authority were sinners, that it was their right and duty to make war upon them wherever they could be found, and to make slaves of all they could take as Prisoners, and that every Musselman who should be slain in Battle was sure to go to Paradise."
> 
> Sound familiar?
> 
> The candor of that Tripolitan ambassador is admirable in its way, but it certainly foreshadows the equally forthright declarations of, say, the Shiite Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in the 1980s and the Sunni Osama bin Laden in the 1990s, not to mention the many pronouncements of their various minions, admirers, and followers. Note that America's Barbary experience took place well before colonialism entered the lands of Islam, before there were any oil interests dragging the U.S. into the fray, and long before the founding of the state of Israel.
> 
> America became entangled in the Islamic world and was dragged into a war with the Barbary states simply because of the religious obligation within Islam to bring belief to those who do not share it. This is not something limited to "radical" or "fundamentalist" Muslims.
> 
> Which is not to say that such obligations lead inevitably to physical conflict, at least not in principle. After all peaceful proselytizing among various religious groups continues apace throughout the world, but within the teachings of Islam, and the history of Muslims, this is a well-established militant thread.
> 
> The Islamic basis for piracy in the Mediterranean was an old doctrine relating to the physical or armed jihad, or struggle.
> 
> To Muslims in the heyday of Barbary piracy, there were, at least in principle, only two forces at play in the world: the Dar al-Islam, or House of Islam, and the Dar al-Harb, or House of War. The House of Islam meant Muslim governance and the unrivaled authority of the sharia, Islam's complex system of holy law. The House of War was simply everything that fell outside of the House of Islam - that area of the globe not under Muslim authority, where the infidel ruled. For Muslims, these two houses were perpetually at war - at least until mankind should finally embrace Allah and his teachings as revealed through his prophet, Mohammed.
> 
> The point of jihad is not to convert by force, but to remove the obstacles to the infidels' conversion so that they shall either convert or become a dhimmi (a non-Muslim who accepts Islamic dominion) and pay the jizya, or poll tax. The goal is to bring all of the Dar al-Harb into the peace of the Dar al-Islam, and to eradicate unbelief. The Koran also promises rewards to those who fight in the jihad, plunder and glory in this world and the delights of paradise in the next.
> 
> Although the piratical activities of Barbary genuinely degenerated over the centuries from pure considerations of the glory of jihad to less grandiose visions of booty and state revenues, it is important to remember that the religious foundations of the institution of piracy remained central.
> 
> Even after it became commonplace for the pirate captains or their crew to be renegade Europeans, it was essential that these former Christians "turn Turk" and convert to Islam before they could be accorded the honor of engagement in al-jihad fil-bahr, the holy war at sea.
> 
> In fact, the peoples of Barbary continued to consider the pirates as holy warriors even after the Barbary rulers began to allow non-religious commitments to command their strategic use of piracy. The changes that the religious institution of piracy underwent were natural, if pathological. Just as the concept of jihad is invoked by Muslim terrorists today to legitimize suicide bombings of noncombatants for political gain, so too al-jihad fil-bahr, the holy war at sea, served as the cornerstone of the Barbary states' interaction with Christendom.
> 
> In times of conflict, America tends to focus on personalities over ideas or movements, trying to play the man, not the board - as if capturing or killing Osama bin Laden, for example, would instantly end the present conflict. But such thinking loses sight of the fact that ideas have consequences. If one believes that God commands something, this belief is not likely to dissipate just because the person who elucidated it has been silenced. Islam, as a faith, is as essential a feature of the terrorist threat today as it was of the Barbary piracy over two centuries ago.
> 
> The Barbary pirates were not a "radical" or "fundamentalist" sect that had twisted religious doctrine for power and politics, or that came to recast aspects of their faith out of some form of insanity. They were simply a North African warrior caste involved in an armed jihad - a mainstream Muslim doctrine. This is how the Muslims understood Barbary piracy and armed jihad at the time, and, indeed, how the physical jihad has been understood since Mohammed revealed it as the prophecy of Allah.
> 
> Obviously, and thankfully, not every Muslim is obligated, or even really inclined, to take up this jihad. Indeed, many Muslims are loath to personally embrace this physical struggle. But that does not mean they are all opposed to such a struggle any more than the choice of many Westerners not to join the police force or the armed services means they do not support those institutions.
> 
> Whether "insurgents" are fighting in Iraq or "rebels" and "militants" are skirmishing in Chechnya or Hamas "activists" are detonating themselves in Israel, Westerners seem unwilling to bring attention to the most salient feature of all these groups: They claim to be acting in the name of Islam.
> It is very easy to chalk it all up to regional squabbles, economic depression, racism, or post-colonial nationalistic self-determinism. Such explanations undoubtedly enter into part of the equation - they are already part of the propaganda that clouds contemporary analysis. But as Thomas Jefferson and John Adams came to learn back in 1786, the situation becomes a lot clearer when you listen to the stated intentions and motivations of the terrorists and take them at face value.
> 
> - Joshua E. London is the author of Victory in Tripoli: How America's War with the Barbary Pirates Established the U.S. Navy and Shaped a Nation (John Wiley & Sons, September 2005); for more about the book visit
> www.victoryintripoli.com.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/london200512160955.asp


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## a_majoor

More evidence that the campaign is indeed regional



> *Khomeini Redux*
> Tehran Rising.
> 
> There are two key rules to keep in mind when looking at the world strategically. First is the inevitability of change. Stability is chimerical. The past century has seen at least five distinct strategic environments, depending on how you count them. Powers with global influence have risen and others have fallen — or both in the case of the Soviet Union. All countries seek security, and many of them also strive to increase their power and authority. When faced with a state pursuing an aggressive plan to achieve regional hegemony, the worst move is to seek to institutionalize the status quo. *The rising power won't accept it, though it might say it does; and the established powers will cling to the familiar, and grow complacent. The results are what you might expect; Europe in the late 1930s, for example.*
> 
> The second rule is to give credit to people that they are sincere in their beliefs. Western liberals, who prize reason, are subject to the tendency to explain away beliefs they consider unreasonable. Progress and freedom are inevitable because they are the natural courses of history. Ideologies that do not fit our predetermined vision of the future are not worth taking seriously. Extremism cannot triumph because it does not make sense. Therefore, the Bolsheviks and their successors were not really after global Communist revolution, even though they said they were. The Nazis would not really commit armed aggression and genocide, even though they advocated both. And while Khmer Rouge military leader Khieu Samphan's 1959 doctoral thesis identified the urban bourgeoisie as a parasite class that had to be removed to the countryside, they wouldn't really empty Phnom Penh of its 2.5 million citizens and subject them to collectivization, reeducation, and execution, would they? Isn't that just plain crazy?
> 
> *So when a freshly ambitious Iran claims it has "the inalienable right to have access to a nuclear fuel cycle," and radical President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who denies that Iran seeks to build nuclear weapons, states that Israel must be "wiped off the map," should we be concerned? Perhaps "concerned" is an understatement.*
> 
> Ilan Berman has written a useful new book that helps make sense of Iran's ambitions, and the means they are using to try to achieve them. "Tehran Rising: Iran's Challenge to the United States describes the consequences of the worst-case scenario, an emboldened nuclear-armed Iran establishing regional hegemony and continuing to utilize the cat's paw of terrorist surrogates that it has perfected in over 25 years of state sponsorship. *Iran is a prime example of what strategists refer to as a "nexus" state, combining hostility to the United States with nuclear potential and access to a global terrorist network.* This was the very combination of threats that made Saddam Hussein's Iraq a candidate for aggressive regime change. In addition, as the author notes, the Iran question goes well beyond the nuclear issue that is currently the focus of the world's attention. *The book is a comprehensive threat assessment that finds Iranian activity in other spheres of power (political and economic, as well as military) and in many parts of the world (the Middle East, the Caucasus, Central Asia, and even the Western Hemisphere).*
> 
> As with any state, the threat to U.S. interests comes not from Iran's capacity to make mischief, but its intention to do so. Ahmadinejad's assumption of the presidency last summer brought a more bellicose tone to Iranian rhetoric, which has increased these concerns. But there is some good news. As the author notes, two clocks are racing in Iran, the "nuclear" clock and the "regime change" clock. The United States, its allies, and Iran's neighbors have a vital interest in seeing that Iran experiences a democratic transition before the current regime can realize its nuclear ambitions.
> 
> *There are some indications that such a transition is on the horizon.* The Iranian population is young (the median age is just over 24 years old) and most did not live under the shah's regime — which was a model of progressive liberalism compared to the darkest days of the Khomeini theocracy. They have shown little interest in Ahmadinejad's desire to restore the revolutionary virtues of two decades ago; many scoffed when the Iranian Supreme Cultural Revolutionary Council issued an edict banning western music from state radio, saying that the "promotion of decadent and Western music should be avoided and the stress should be put on authorized, artistic, classical, and fine Iranian music." There is open agitation for liberal reform, and occasional riots and other forms of protest. It is possible that as the grip of the reactionaries tightens, the democratic elements could rally the Iranian people to participate in a "color revolution" of the types that have brought change in Georgia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, and Lebanon. Yet, these developments seem to be moving more slowly than the nuclear program, and in any case, the current regime is probably more determined to hold power — mobs in the streets sometimes make revolutions, and sometimes are treated to a "whiff of grapeshot." Let's not forget Tiananmen Square.
> 
> So what can be done? Berman notes that U.S. policy towards Iran has been ambiguous and contradictory over the years. For example, Iran is the number-one terrorist state sponsor, and is giving support to the insurgents in Iraq, yet somehow has not been called to account even as we fight a global war on terrorism. The U.S. is vitally concerned about the proliferation of WMD technologies, yet takes a backseat to the Europeans in trying to settle the Iranian nuclear issue. (In my opinion, this may be a good thing in that it places the Europeans on the frontlines and prevents them from simply being critical of the United States as we try to solve the issue — but that political benefit must be weighed against the possibility they will not get the job done.) Perhaps, as the author suggests, we can contain Iran through a diplomatic campaign to make other countries in the region understand the magnitude of the threat. However, if they have not figured that out by now (and if the behavior of countries like Turkey is any indication, they have not), what can the United States do to convince them?
> 
> I recommend Tehran Rising as a sober and objective assessment of the threats, both actual and potential, that the United States faces from Iran. One hopes the international community will increase the pressure on Tehran to forgo its nuclear ambitions before the matter has to be resolved by other means. So long as President Ahmadinejad continues to speak his mind publicly, the world will have no doubts as to the regime's intentions. We just have to take him at his word.
> 
> — James S. Robbins is senior fellow in national-security affairs at the American Foreign Policy Council, a trustee for the Leaders for Liberty Foundation, and an NRO contributor.
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/robbins/robbins200601030825.asp


----------



## a_majoor

Told you so (read the entire article here):

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/006/550kmbzd.asp



> *Saddam's Terror Training Camps *
> What the documents captured from the former Iraqi regime reveal--and why they should all be made public.
> by Stephen F. Hayes
> 01/16/2006, Volume 011, Issue 17
> 
> THE FORMER IRAQI REGIME OF Saddam Hussein trained thousands of radical Islamic terrorists from the region at camps in Iraq over the four years immediately preceding the U.S. invasion, according to documents and photographs recovered by the U.S. military in postwar Iraq. The existence and character of these documents has been confirmed to THE WEEKLY STANDARD by eleven U.S. government officials.
> 
> The secret training took place primarily at three camps--in Samarra, Ramadi, and Salman Pak--and was directed by elite Iraqi military units. Interviews by U.S. government interrogators with Iraqi regime officials and military leaders corroborate the documentary evidence. Many of the fighters were drawn from terrorist groups in northern Africa with close ties to al Qaeda, chief among them Algeria's GSPC and the Sudanese Islamic Army. *Some 2,000 terrorists were trained at these Iraqi camps each year from 1999 to 2002, putting the total number at or above 8,000. Intelligence officials believe that some of these terrorists returned to Iraq and are responsible for attacks against Americans and Iraqis.* According to three officials with knowledge of the intelligence on Iraqi training camps, White House and National Security Council officials were briefed on these findings in May 2005; senior Defense Department officials subsequently received the same briefing.
> 
> The photographs and documents on Iraqi training camps come from a collection of some 2 million "exploitable items" captured in postwar Iraq and Afghanistan. They include handwritten notes, typed documents, audiotapes, videotapes, compact discs, floppy discs, and computer hard drives. Taken together, this collection could give U.S. intelligence officials and policymakers an inside look at the activities of the former Iraqi regime in the months and years before the Iraq war.
> 
> The discovery of the information on jihadist training camps in Iraq would seem to have two major consequences:* It exposes the flawed assumptions of the experts and U.S. intelligence officials who told us for years that a secularist like Saddam Hussein would never work with Islamic radicals, any more than such jihadists would work with an infidel like the Iraqi dictator.* It also reminds us that valuable information remains buried in the mountain of documents recovered in Afghanistan and Iraq over the past four years.


----------



## a_majoor

Combine this information with Iran's nuclear ambitions, and it is pretty clear that Iran will have to com into play in order for there to be a successful resolution





> *“Who’s an Iraqi?”*
> It’s a regional war.
> 
> Of all the confusions surrounding the war in Iraq, perhaps none has clouded so many minds as the phony question, "are we fighting domestic insurgents or foreign terrorists?" The people who purport to answer this question with "data," should look again at the demographics of Iraq, Syria, and Iran, and they can start by asking themselves, "who's an Iraqi"?
> 
> That question is surprisingly difficult to answer, above all because, during the Iran-Iraq war, millions (I say millions) of Iraqi Shiites took the Iranian side, and went to Iran, where they remained for the better part of twenty years. During that time a large number of them were recruited by Iranian intelligence, folded into the terror network of the Revolutionary Guards and the intelligence ministry, and placed under the command of the Badr Brigade of the SCIRI ("Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq) or other radical Shiite groups.
> 
> When we liberated Iraq, many of them returned. What are they? Iraqis or Iranians? It's a surprisingly tough question. If, as is often the case, they show up as suicide terrorists or sharpshooters or IED manufacturers or spooks working for "insurgent" or "terrorist" groups, do they count as "foreign fighters" or "Iraqi insurgents"? They have Iraqi DNA, but Iranian ideology, and they are under effective Iranian control. But for the most part, it seems that our official bean counters in the intelligence community have defined them as "insurgents," which enables them to argue that we're basically fighting domestic groups. They can thus downplay the decisive role played by Iran (and, on the other side of Iraq, by Syria).
> 
> All this was underscored by a nifty story in the Washington Times two days ago (9 January), written by Sharon Behn: "Iraqis receive training in Iran." It's more of the same, albeit she falls into one of the tempting rhetorical traps set by our "analysts." She writes about young *Iraqis being sent to Iran by SCIRI for "political indoctrination and militia training," and later on refers to claims by the National Council of Resistance of Iran (better known as the MEK, the Mujaheddin Khalq) that "Tehran has been training Iraqi and other nationals in intelligence gathering and terrorists operations." If you read carefully, you'll see that the so-called militia training is really terrorism: "They (the Iranians) trained them (the young Iraqis)...to go out on patrol, to get people out of their houses, execute them and leave them on the street..."*
> 
> Let's stop talking about "militia training," okay? This is terrorist training. And let's stop the bogus "analysis" that turns Iranian-trained terrorists into "domestic insurgents" by punching find-and-replace. They're terrorists working at the behest of Iran. And let's (finally!) stop acting as if Sunnis and Shiites don't cooperate in the killing fields of the Middle East. Zarqawi's a Sunni and he has long been supported by Iran. The surviving bin Ladens are mostly in Iran, as is Zawahiri, Sunnis all.
> 
> The basic sermon remains as true as ever: We are playing a sucker's game in Iraq, because we are fighting in a single country even though we are engaged in a regional war. This guarantees we cannot win the broader war. Administration officials have struggled mightily to avoid this hard truth, because they want to be able to declare "victory" in Iraq as soon as possible, and then get out.
> 
> *But the hard truth remains, as does the unbreakable determination of Iran and Syria to drive us from Iraq. And if they succeed, they will not stop there. The leaders of Iran have told their people to prepare to "rule the world." You may be sure they will not declare victory simply because they have won the battle for Iraq.*
> 
> — Michael Ledeen, an NRO contributing editor, is most recently the author of The War Against the Terror Masters. He is resident scholar in the Freedom Chair at the American Enterprise Institute
> 
> http://www.nationalreview.com/ledeen/ledeen200601110825.asp


----------



## McG

> *Rumsfeld has epiphany over the 'I' word*
> The Associated Press
> Wednesday, November 30, 2005
> 
> More than 2 1/2 years into the Iraq war, Donald Rumsfeld has decided the enemy are not insurgents.
> 
> "This is a group of people who don't merit the word 'insurgency,' I think," Rumsfeld said Tuesday at a Pentagon news conference. He said the thought had come to him suddenly over the weekend.
> "It was an epiphany."
> 
> Rumsfeld's comments drew chuckles but had a serious side.
> 
> "I think that you can have a legitimate insurgency in a country that has popular support and has a cohesiveness and has a legitimate gripe," he said. "These people don't have a legitimate gripe." Still, he acknowledged that his point may not be supported by the standard definition of "insurgent." He promised to look it up.
> 
> Webster's New World College Dictionary defines the term "insurgent" as "rising up against established authority."
> 
> Even Gen. Peter Pace, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who stood beside Rumsfeld at the news conference, found it impossible to describe the fighting in Iraq without twice using the term "insurgent."
> 
> After the word slipped out the first time, Pace looked sheepishly at Rumsfeld and quipped apologetically, "I have to use the word 'insurgent' because I can't think of a better word right now."
> 
> Without missing a beat, Rumsfeld replied with a wide grin: "Enemies of the legitimate Iraqi government. How's that?"


----------



## a_majoor

This is a very profound article. It ties many arguments together in identifying the centers of gravity against the Salafist Islamic threat, and also shows how reagonal and external actors are shaping the conflict against us (the West). It really is WW IV.

Quick exerpt:


> But there is more than oil at stake in China’s strategic relations with Muslim countries. If 1979 marks the return of Islam in history, it also marks (more significantly than 1949 ever did) the return of China in history. Throughout the 1980s, China experienced phenomenal growth rates and was catching up fast with the West, when the advent of the information revolution widened the gap anew. Since the Chinese leadership cannot go into overdrive without destroying the social fabric (and ultimately its own power base), it can only hope to narrow the gap by slowing down the West. For Western historians, all this has a deja-vu all over again feel. Just as imperial latecomers like Germany and Japan did not hesitate to play the Islamic card for all it was worth in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, today China has — to put it mildly — no reason to be a priori hostile to the idea of using jihadism as a weapon of mass disruption against the West.
> 
> The congruence between the Islamic 4GW jihad and China’s own Unrestricted Warfare20 doctrine is therefore no surprise. This Sino-Islamic connection has been largely ignored by European elites too busy indulging in anti-American posturing instead. In the EU media, China is invariably portrayed as being all (economic) opportunities and no (political) threats; from the Spanish and French media in particular, one would never guess that China in fact has a rather proactive — and sophisticated — policy in Spain’s and France’s former colonies. As for the Islamic question, EU elites continue to believe that it can best be solved by keeping as much distance as possible between the U.S. approach (Broader Middle East and North Africa Initiative) and the EU approach (Euro-Med Partnership).21
> 
> The recent referenda on the EU Constitution have proven, if anything, how disconnected EU elites have become, not just from world realities, but from their own constituencies. It should now be clear to all that the intra-European gap between elites and public opinion is greater still (and in fact older) than the transatlantic gap between the U.S. and the EU. For Washington, there has never been a better time to do “European Outreach” and drive home the point that the existence of a “Sino-Islamic Connection” calls for closer transatlantic cooperation and a reassertion of the West. In short, if the Atlantic Alliance did not exist, it would have to be invented.



Read the rest here:

*World War IV As Fourth-Generation Warfare*
By Tony Corn

http://www.policyreview.org/000/corn.html


----------



## a_majoor

The manipulation of the press by the Jihadis (and the built in bias of some of the American and European press corps) is also a weapon in this battle; against us



> THE PRESS IN BAGHDAD: An interesting report from DefenseTech on how fear of the insurgency is affecting reporting:
> 
> _The abduction of 28-year-old Christian Science Monitor reporter Jill Carroll in Baghdad on Jan. 7 has had a profound effect on the city's Western press corps. More so than ever, *unembedded media in Baghdad are fortified in a handful of besieged hotels that are under constant surveillance by insurgent groups.* Few Western reporters ever leave these hotels, instead relying on local stringers to gather quotes and research stories. And some reporters are finally throwing in the towel, forever abandoning this relentless and unforgiving city. . . .
> 
> .S. Army Lt. Col. Barry Johnson has some sound *theories about the insurgents' media strategies. While stressing that he "can't speak for insurgent groups," Col. Johnson says these strategies "boil down to influencing the media environment ... to get attention away from progress."*
> 
> Whether there is much progress in Arab Iraq is certainly debatable, but it's apparent that the increasing inability of media to cover ANYTHING, much less coalition successes, is hurting the war effort. Iraq is a big, complicated problem, and as media flee or hunker down deeper in their hotel fortresses, the Western world's understanding of Iraq can only suffer._
> 
> There is a workable solution, and it's called embedding. No one protects journos as well as the U.S. and British militaries, but many media refuse to embed because they fear losing their objectivity. This is a valid fear, one even U.S. officers acknowledge, but what's better: slightly biased coverage? Or no coverage at all?
> 
> As the UPI's Pam Hess noted a while back,* the press seems relatively unconcerned about being manipulated by the insurgency, but deeply afraid of anything that might slant its reporting in favor of the U.S. military;* this is just another illustration of that phenomenon. *But terrorism is, of course, information war disguised as military action,* and manipulating the press is what the terrorists are all about. If the press were more resistant to such tactics, the terrorists would be less effective -- and, ironically, the press would be a less appealing target.


----------



## ready to go

I think, for them (Muslims) it is a Holy War. I also think we, as Christians, should defend our prophets, much the same as they have theirs. There is conflicting evidence on who's prophet is right. The Muslims believe they are the Chosen people and so do the Israelites. If Israel exists, Muhammad would be a false prophet. The Bible warns of false prophets as a sign of the End Times. 
Iran is a radical Muslim nation secretly building a bomb that will exterminate Isreal. Now factor in the effects of a Saudi Oil crisis and civil war in iraq. Mother nature will indefinitely pose as a threat to everybody, everywhere. This is what I see. I see this war changing the face of the earth forever and life as we know it.


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## ready to go

This war is nothing new. It is simply the modernized version of an aberrated conflict that has endured from as far back as history books can recount. This fact alone makes me wonder and scrutinize those history books because, truly, they only tell half of the story: the winner's half. With secret societies lurking amid the shadows and corruption at every level of mainstream society, I question the very foundation of our world. 
The fact that we can make a difference inspires me. Knowing that although some things must be done away with and global change is inevitable, we must find something truly worth dying for. Is democracy, high gas prices, lawyers and laptops worth it? Are we fighting for a world that allows us enough freedom to corrupt it? Are we dying to allow the rich-poor gap to expand even further and let vile rich men rape the earth for a few bucks? Personally, I think we need to rethink our whole plan of attack and formulate a solid ground for resolve. Our enemy is preying on this weak resolve. We are fighting for the things that we value dearly, yet have no true, lasting value. 
As I said before, this is a holy war. If we do not fight for God and God's will, not our own, we will all die in vain. Our world will crumble to ashes. We must take arms against the false prohpets who defile our salvation. The roots of this disease grow deep and the entire tree must be uprooted and replanted. Let us fight for this. It is God's Will.


----------



## Clément Barbeau Vermet

Well said ready to go... sounds like the ultimate fight against the evil (to me, at least). :evil:
Capitalism might not be perfect, but it is certainly FAR better then radical islamic regimes...


----------



## ready to go

> WASHINGTON, April 18 —As diplomats meeting in Moscow failed to reach agreement on how best to raise pressure on Iran over its nuclear program, the American and Iranian presidents, both using tough language, staked out unyielding positions today. In response to a reporter's question, President Bush declined to rule out a nuclear attack to stop Iran from building atomic weapons if diplomacy fails. "All options are on the table," he said. But Mr. Bush added, "We want to solve this issue diplomatically, and we're working hard to do so."
> 
> In Tehran, a defiant President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told the Iranian military that it had to be "constantly ready," and he warned bluntly that Iran would "cut off the hand of any aggressor," The Associated Press reported.
> 
> In Moscow, Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said diplomats of the five permanent United Nations Security Council members plus Germany had recognized the "need for a stiff response to Iran's flagrant violations of its international responsibilities," The Associated Press reported.
> 
> But he said talks on possible sanctions against Tehran had failed to produce an agreement. Mr. Burns said the United States expected Security Council action if Iran misses an April 28 deadline to stop uranium enrichment.
> 
> Neither Mr. Burns nor other American officials would say whether Russia and China had softened their opposition to sanctions.
> 
> Tensions over Iran have helped push oil prices to record highs. Crude oil for May delivery rose 90 cents today to settle at $71.35 a barrel, after trading as high as $71.60 on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
> 
> The diplomats meeting in Moscow hoped to narrow their own differences over how best to persuade Iran to halt work on nuclear weapons.
> 
> Mr. Ahmadinejad's warning came in a martial setting, at a Tehran parade commemorating Army Day that featured the latest in Iranian weaponry, The A.P. reported. Speaking hours before the Moscow meeting, he told the military that it must be prepared to defend Iran.
> 
> "Today, you are among the world's most powerful armies because you rely on God," Mr. Ahmadinejad declared.
> 
> "The land of Iran has created a powerful army that can powerfully defend the political borders and the integrity of the Iranian nation and cut off the hand of any aggressor and place the sign of disgrace on their forehead."
> 
> But he sought to underline that Iran bore no aggressive intentions unless attacked. "The power of our army will be no threat to any country," he said. "It is humble toward friends and a shooting star toward enemies."
> 
> The United States and Britain have said that if Iran continues uranium-enrichment activities past an April 28 deadline set by the Security Council, they will press for a resolution making the demand compulsory.
> 
> Russia and China, both with trade and strategic ties to Iran, have insisted that diplomacy will require more time. A Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman, Mikhail Kamynin, said earlier that "neither sanctions nor the use of force will lead to the solution of the problem," the Itar-Tass news agency reported. But Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called on Iran to halt uranium enrichment.
> 
> Mr. Bush, in brief comments made after announcing White House staffing changes, said that he would urge President Hu Jintao of China to increase Beijing's pressure on Iran when Mr. Hu visits the White House on Thursday.
> 
> The top Chinese nonproliferation official, Cui Tiankai, visited Tehran over the weekend to urge Iranian leaders to seek a negotiated solution, officials said.
> 
> Mr. Cui spent 90 minutes in Moscow today meeting with Mr. Burns ahead of the meeting there, said Sean McCormack, the State Department spokesman.
> 
> Mr. McCormack said, before the meeting had ended in Moscow, that diplomats were expected to weigh various ways for the Security Council to increase pressure on Iran, "whether that's sanctions or asset freezes or travel restrictions" on diplomats. He said there was also talk of ways that individual countries could increase the pressure on Iran.
> 
> Mr. Bush urged a united effort by countries "who recognize the danger of Iran having a nuclear weapon." The United States has been working closely with Britain, France and Germany on the issue.
> 
> The president's comment that "all options are on the table" came after a reporter asked whether, when Mr. Bush used those words previously, he meant to include the possibility of a nuclear strike.
> 
> "All options are on the table," Mr. Bush replied plainly, before adding, "We want to solve this issue diplomatically." The phrase has become a commonplace of administration officials since last summer in describing concerns about Iran.
> 
> It was used last month by Vice President Dick Cheney, who seemed to hint at military action or even the overthrow of the Tehran government. "We join other nations in sending that regime a clear message," Mr. Cheney said. "We will not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon."
> 
> He also said that the Security Council would "impose meaningful consequences" if Iran remained in defiance.
> 
> Mr. Ahmadinejad's speech was broadcast live on state-run Iranian television, and foreign military attachés attended the parade, during which Iran displayed radar-avoiding missiles and super-fast torpedoes.
> 
> Mr. Ahmadinejad, who has issued a series of highly provocative comments since coming to office, jolted outside observers last week by saying that Iran had enriched uranium using 164 centrifuges, a step that could lead either to the development of power generation or the construction of atomic bombs.
> 
> Iran also asserted that it is pursuing a far more sophisticated method of making atomic fuel, using a so-called P-2 centrifuge, which could greatly speed its progress to developing a nuclear weapon.
> 
> While Iran insists that it has the right to conduct research for civilian energy production, the United States has said that Iran lost world trust by hiding portions of its nuclear program for years.
> 
> American officials also point to Mr. Ahmadinejad's public calls for the destruction of Israel.



http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/18/world/middleeast/18cnd-iran.html?hp&ex=1145419200&en=cb696ef1f091d462&ei=5094&partner=homepage


----------



## a_majoor

Luckily, there are other institutional ways to deal with terrorism besides "kinetic effects"

http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/008476.php



> *Cartoon Jihad, Meet Cash Flow Jihad*
> by Joe Katzman at April 18, 2006 06:19 PM
> 
> Apparently, Hamas is finding it difficult to get a bank that will deal with them. M. Simon's response:
> 
> "That is interesting. The Islamics have pretty much shut down Western newspapers through the cartoon jihad. We have eliminated their cash flow (in places) through the money jihad. I'd put it down to lack of strategic thinking on the part of the Islamics.
> 
> See also my previous articles on jihadi money flow problems in Follow the Money and Follow the Gold."
> 
> *Iran is working to step into the breach with $50 million, of course, since Hamas shares its goal of genocide against the Jews.* Meanwhile, Hamas is calling for Arab help - truth is, $50 million doesn't go as far as it used to. Especially when you need to pay off your own supporters with jobs, and keep the Fatah people paid on some level so they don't take up arms. Qatar has also pledged $50 million... but the same article notes that despite promises to give the authority $55 million a month, Arab nations have not given any money since the Hamas election victory. apparently, it's due to a combination of their own wariness about Hamas, and US pressure.
> 
> The goal of all these efforts is to replace about $1 billion in aid from the West, plus the $55 million per month in taxes whose transfer has been halted by the state they do not recognize (seems fair - a state that doesn't exist can't gve you money). Yet throughout, the banking problem remains. Asking Arabs to give Hamas money for deposit in Persian banks isn't going to generate wild enthusiasm, so it will be fascinating to see how that one resolves.
> 
> Keep the tension on - it helps to keep the tension on.


----------



## a_majoor

Victor Davis Hanson offers a wide angle view of how the West is doing in WW IV; there is enough to be cautiously optomistic so long as we have the will to see it through to the finish.

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=Yjg5M2ExYTI5OTM4N2FkMzZkMDJkNThkZWU2Nzg2OWU=



> *For Better or Worse?*
> Is the U.S. better off with the Middle East as it is now than as it was before 2001?
> 
> By Victor Davis Hanson
> 
> After September 11, there were only seven sovereign countries in the Middle East that posed a real danger to the policies and, in some cases, the security of the United States—Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Syria. Ignoring the hysteria about the Sunni Triangle in Iraq, if we look at these states empirically, have they become more or less a threat in the last five years?
> 
> The Taliban in Afghanistan was actively harboring bin Laden and al Qaeda. Without their support, the mass murder on September 11 would have been difficult to pull off.
> 
> Iran was the chief sponsor of Hezbollah, which had killed more Americans than any other Islamist terror organization and was rumored to be at work on obtaining nuclear weapons.
> 
> In Iraq, Saddam Hussein’s agents were involved in the first World Trade Center bombing. They were also meeting with al Qaeda operatives throughout the 1990s and offering sanctuary both to al Qaeda offshoots in Kurdistan and, later, to veterans from Afghanistan. As the U.S. Senate observed in 2002, this was in addition to the general problems of no-fly zones, oil-for-food, violations of U.N. and 1991-armistice accords, and periodic retaliatory American bombing.
> 
> Libya was a de facto belligerent of the United States, provoking past U.S. air strikes on Tripolis. Among other things, it was involved in the Pan Am Lockerbie bombing and had a clandestine WMD program.
> 
> Pakistan had violated both U.N. and U.S. non-proliferation protocols. Its intelligence services were infiltrated by radical Islamists who were responsible for killing American diplomatic personnel and supplying the Taliban with support, as well as directly aiding al Qaeda operatives along the border.
> 
> Saudi Arabia, whose 15 subjects comprised the majority of the killers on 9/11, was stealthily giving blackmail money to Islamic terrorists to deflect their anti-Royal Family anger toward the United States. The kingdom’s vast financial clout subsidized radical “charities” and madrassas that offered at a global level the religious and ideological underpinnings for radical and violent Islamic extremism.
> 
> Syria had long swallowed most of Lebanon, and was a haven for anti-Western terrorists from Hamas to Hezbollah.
> 
> Four-and-a-half years after September 11, how has the United States fared in neutralizing these seven threats?
> 
> The Taliban is gone. In its place is the unthinkable—a parliamentary democracy that welcomes an open economy and foreign investment. Afghanistan is plagued still by drug-lords and resurgent terrorists, but after a successful war that removed the Taliban, the country hardly resembles the nightmare that existed before September 11.
> 
> Iran is closer to the bomb than ever, but there is at least worldwide scrutiny of its machinations, in a manner lacking in the past. Tehran is in a death struggle with the new Iraqi government, trying to undermine the democracy by transplanting its radical Shiite ganglia before a constitutional, diverse Iraqi culture energizes its own restive population that supposedly tires of the theocracy.
> 
> The thousands who died yearly under Saddam’s killing apparatus in Iraq have been followed by thousands killed in sectarian strife. Yet Saddam and his Baathist nightmare are gone from Iraq, offering hope where there was none. After three elections, a democratic government has emerged. Despite a terrible cost in American lives and wealth, so far elections have not been derailed, open civil war has not followed from the daily terror, and Americans are looking to reduce, not enlarge, their presence.
> 
> Libya is perhaps the strangest development of all. The United States is slowly exploring reestablishing diplomatic relations. Moammar Khadafy is giving up his WMD arsenal. And the country is suddenly open to cell phones, the Internet, satellite television, and is no longer a global financial conduit for international terrorism.
> 
> Pakistan is still run by a military dictator. But as a result of American bullying and financial enticement, it is slowly weeding out al Qaeda sympathizers from its government, which on rare occasions attacks terrorists residing in its borderlands. Indeed, al Qaeda seems to hate the present Pakistani government as much as it does the United States.
> 
> Saudi Arabia has gained enormous leverage as oil skyrocketed from $30 to over $70 a barrel. Yet under American pressure it has cracked down on al Qaeda terrorists and has cleaned up (somewhat) its overseas financial offices—perhaps evidenced by a wave of reactive terrorist attacks against the Riyadh government. American efforts to urge liberalization have met a tepid response—given Saudi reliance on the oil card, and its sophistic argument that for the present an autocratic monarchy is the only alternative to a terrorist-supporting theocracy.
> 
> Syria is out of Lebanon by popular pressure. It still supports terrorists against Israel—and now Iraq too—but judging from its rhetoric it must be feeling squeezed by a democratic Turkey, Iraq, and Israel on its borders, and a new tough stance from the United States.
> 
> So where does all this leave us? In every case, I think, far messier—but far better—than before September 11. *Few argue that Afghanistan or Iraq is worse off than when under the Taliban or Saddam. Nor is Syria in a stronger position. Despite their respective nuclear and petroleum deterrence, both Pakistan and Saudi Arabia are ever more sensitive to the dangers of Islamic radicalism. Libya no longer poses the threat of using WMD against its neighbors and is less likely to fund international terror. Iran is the wild card—closer to success in obtaining the bomb, but closer as well to becoming isolated by international pressure and the events that it cannot quite control across the border in Iraq.*
> 
> Where do we go from here? The United States has its own paradoxes. These positive developments—themselves the result of a radical departure from the old appeasement that either used the cruise missile as an impotent gesture of retaliation or accepted realpolitik as a means of playing odious dictators against each other—have proved as controversial as they are costly.
> 
> A new strain of what we might call punitive isolationism is back (“more rubble, less trouble”), in which we should simply unleash bombers when evidence is produced of complicity in attacks against Americans, but under no circumstance put a single soldier on the ground to “help” such people who are “incapable” of liberal civilized society.
> 
> The hard Right is candid in its pessimistic dismissal of American idealism and worries that a new muscular Wilsonianism will lose the ascendant Republican majority and betray conservative values.
> 
> The Left buys into the neo-isolationism since it means less of an “imperial” footprint abroad and more funds released for entitlements at home—as well as a way of tarring George Bush and regaining Congress.
> 
> What is lacking has been a consistently spirited defense, both unapologetic and humble at the same time, of our efforts since September 11.
> 
> First, the United States was not cynical in its efforts: no oil was stolen; no hegemony was established; and democrats, not dictators, were promoted. We were appealing directly to the people of the Middle East, not negotiating with Mullah Omar or Saddam Hussein about their futures. No other oil-importing country in the world would have tried to pressure the Saudis to reform at a time of global petroleum shortages—not France, not China, not India.
> 
> *Second, there were never good choices after September 11.* The old appeasement had only emboldened the terrorists, from 1993 in Manhattan to the bombing in Yemen of the U.S.S. Cole. Saddam’s Iraq was unstable. It was only a matter of time before Saddam, energized with fresh petroleum profits, would renew his ambitions, once 12 years of no-fly-zones and controversial, but leaky, embargoes wore the West out. Given the premise that dictators promoted terrorists in an unholy alliance of convenience, and themselves often had oil and access to weapons, there were no good choices, whether we let them be or removed the worst.
> 
> Three, by the standard of Grenada, Panama, and the Balkans, our losses were costly. But the Middle East is a struggle of a different sort; it is an existential one in which defeat means more attacks on the United States homeland, while victory in changing the landscape of the region presages an end to the nexus of Islamic terror. In that regard, so far we have been fortunate, four-and-a-half years later, in avoiding the level of costs incurred on the first day of the war that took 3,000 American lives and resulted in a trillion dollars in economic damage.
> 
> Four, the strategy was not wholly military or political, much less characterized by preemption or unilateralism. *Iraq was not the blueprint for endless military action to come, but the high-stakes gambit that offered real hope of bringing about associated change from Pakistan to Tripolis once Saddam was gone and a constitutional government established in its place.*
> 
> Five, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. As we approach year five, there has been no subsequent attack on the United States. An entire intellectual industry has emerged to educate the West about radical Islamic fascism, something mostly lacking prior to September 11. Our enemies in al Qaeda are either dead, arrested, in hiding, or losing in Iraq, and the embrace of radical Islam through the Middle East at least now carries the consequence of fear of an unpredictable reaction on the part of the United States.
> 
> *We are still in a race of sorts, hoping that Afghanistan and Iraq will enter a period of democratic stability and the violence halts before the American public tires of the daily visuals to the point of demanding a premature end to our efforts at birthing democracy. *And while we do the unpopular work of trying to restore hope to the Middle East, the aloof Europeans pose as the moderate alternative, the Chinese make ever more trade, the Russians ever more trouble, and the Arab sheikdoms ever more money.
> 
> —Victor Davis Hanson is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. He is the author, most recently, of A War Like No Other. How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War.
> 
> 
> National Review Online - http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=Yjg5M2ExYTI5OTM4N2FkMzZkMDJkNThkZWU2Nzg2OWU=


----------



## 54/102 CEF

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Right on the money Dare.
> 
> I wonder if these people ever bother to think what having the West knocking off another Islamic government will do for us in the Middle East (besides merely giving us a third theater of war to fight an insurgency in -



Very interesting choice of words - The Soldier level may be plinking targets - and doing it very well it seems - this article http://www.jhuapl.edu/POW/library/Vlahos_Two_Enemies.pdf suggests that the whole post colonial framework of governments in the Mid East is in transition - why many call it an insurgency is that the West may have started it - but they won't control the end state. He makes the point that today's terrorists are tomorrow's government. 

Clear case studies exist in friendly states http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=King+David+Hotel+bombing+1948


----------



## 54/102 CEF

Some more background on the idea that "insurgency" is the wrong way to look at events we see in the main stream media - its all about their changes their way - which the west may not be welcome because they are not "there" as in from the East.

Terror’s Mask (from the site below) 

Written in the winter of 2001–2002. The three questions it asked
then are still relevant today—and they may be the war’s most important questions:
• If the enemy is not “terrorism”—networks of fighters and their support—but rather a
broader insurgency within Islam, how do we take its measure? Is it growing in strength
or declining? If it is growing, despite or even because of our efforts, how and when might
it coalesce into a more effective and organized movement?
• If the struggle across the Muslim World is about change and the future of Islam, how
do we assess the historical dynamic of change? How much longer can it be repressed by
an authoritarian status quo? Is there a change-alternative to radical Islam that has the
leadership strength to stand up to it?
• If the United States, in pursuing the war on terrorism, is also drawn into a struggle
over change, how should this change dynamic influence our overall strategy? If change
cannot be contained, what are the alternative risks of either embracing or denying it?
Can we achieve our goals if, at the same time, we are unable to bring about change that
we can support?
These questions have not yet been openly addressed. They certainly do not publicly
inform U.S. strategy. Can Terror’s Mask still help us understand the challenge that
America faces in this war?

Culture's Mask  (from the Website below) 

The war challenges our understanding of the world and how it is changing. Both sides
present a simple picture of two wholly opposite forces, and thus of a straightforward
struggle of good against evil. But current circumstances can also be framed in terms of two
conﬂicting views:
From the American standpoint: the avowed grand strategy of the current administration
is a vision of asserting secular Western modernity throughout the Muslim—and especially
the Arab—World.
From the Muslim standpoint: a struggle between conﬂicting visions within the world
of Islam and one that is impacted strongly by the American vision. The urgent question
central to the future of Islam is how to integrate Western modernity without losing the
integrity of Islam itself.
Even though the situation can be described simply, its resolution will be extraordinarily
complex, for we are witnessing nothing less than the creative and violent interaction of two
civilizations. This is truly a “world-historical” story whose unfolding
• Will require decades—or generations—to complete
• Is nearly worldwide in its scope and consequences
• Will be fully realized, paradoxically, through longstanding U.S. involvement
• Is highly dynamic, suggesting surprising changes along the way
the world as we know it.

-------
See by Michael Vlahos

Terror's Mask - Insurgency within Islam  http://jhuapl.edu/POW/library/Terror_Islamsm.pdf

Culture's Mask http://jhuapl.edu/POW/library/culture_mask.pdf


----------



## a_majoor

More evidence that WW IV is spreading under the radar:

http://freewillblog.com/  Friday May 12, 2006



> *I'm Cancelling My Weekend Trip To Mogadishu*
> 
> Apparently, this week was the week Somalia went back to hell:
> 
> Hundreds of terrified residents fled a barrage of rockets and mortars in Mogadishu on Friday as Islamic fighters and warlord militias fought pitched battles for control of the Somali capital.
> 
> Inhabitants of the battered city said at least 12 more people had died overnight and into Friday, pushing the death toll from six days of fighting to at least 133.
> 
> Close-quarter street battles spread beyond Mogadishu's northern shanty town of Siisii into the neighbouring district of Yaqshid, in the worst violence in the lawless capital for more than a decade.
> 
> Warlord spokesman Hussein Gutale Rage said the death toll had reached 150 but this could not be immediately verified.
> 
> Clutching a few possessions, many Mogadishu inhabitants fled to safer parts of the city and looters ransacked empty houses, undeterred by a barrage from artillery, mortars and anti-aircraft missiles.
> 
> "Around 600 civilians are trapped in storm drains with bullets and mortars flying over them, they can't get out because heavy fighting is still going on," said Ali Nur, a member of the warlords militia.
> 
> Many seriously wounded civilians, including women and children, lay in the city's Madina hospital with heavy head, chest and limb wounds.
> 
> Hundreds of people have been wounded in the clashes, with shells regularly hitting houses and killing many civilians.
> 
> "We have decided to leave because the fighting looks like it will go on for a long time," Ahmed Jimale said as he fled with his children from Siisii.
> 
> "Those who have cars have driven off with essential goods while the rest are fleeing on foot," Siyad Mohamed, a militia leader linked to the Islamic side, told Reuters by telephone.
> 
> Hundreds of militiamen roared into battle on the backs of "technicals" -- pickup trucks mounted with heavy guns which are their favourite mobile weapon.
> 
> By evening, Mohamed said the fighting had eased after the fighters paused for Muslim Friday prayers, but he expected it to be a short break.
> 
> Analysts view the fighting in the failed Horn of Africa state as a proxy battle between al Qaeda and Washington, which is widely believed to be funding the warlords.
> 
> *Foreign fighters have allegedly begun streaming into the country in recent months to help the Sharia courts impose Islamist laws. A leading Sheikh has promised that his followers will destroy any attempt at secular government, previously warning that "the fighting will continue until the evil side surrenders",* a claim tantamount to announcing that beatings will continue until morale improves. *The warlords, who have effectively been the Somalian government for years and recently began cooperating to create a makeshift government claim that the goons of the Sharia courts have been going about murdering moderate Islamic scholars, former military leaders, and secular intellectuals. Some believe that Washington is now backing the warlords.*


----------



## The_Falcon

Found this rather interesting and long albiet 1 year old article from the New Yorker about how the NYPD re-organized itself (in particular its intelligence division) after 9/11.  Found it while searching for info about NYPD "HERCULES" teams (look it up)

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/050725fa_fact2



> THE TERRORISM BEAT
> by WILLIAM FINNEGAN
> How is the N.Y.P.D. defending the city?
> Issue of 2005-07-25
> Posted 2005-07-18
> 
> 
> 
> They meet every morning: Raymond W. Kelly, New York City’s Police Commissioner; David Cohen, the Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence; and Michael Sheehan, the Deputy Commissioner for Counter Terrorism. At these sessions, held at One Police Plaza, in a room known as the executive command center, Kelly is briefed on overnight developments related to terrorism. One morning, I was allowed to sit in.
> 
> “Suicide bombing in Pakistan,” Cohen said. “Details.” He slid a sheet of paper to Kelly. “I put Hercules out on three Shiite mosques for the day.”
> 
> Hercules is a set of police antiterror teams. The team members carry heavy weapons, and they turn up without warning at sites all over the city, for reasons never shared with the public.
> 
> “New al-Zawahiri video, went up last night on Al Jazeera. Mentions the U.S.”
> 
> Kelly nodded, studying the report on the mosque deployments.
> 
> “Morty’s back from Moscow,” Cohen went on. “His report’s worth your browsing.”
> 
> Morty is Mordecai Dzikansky, a New York City homicide detective, currently stationed near Tel Aviv. (The N.Y.P.D. also has officers based, these strange days, in Singapore, Britain, Canada, and France.) He went to Russia to learn what he could from the school massacre at Beslan, in September, 2004. Dzikansky told me, when we met, that he’d been on the scene of thirteen suicide bombings in Israel, and that he learns something every time. Dzikansky is fast. He was in Istanbul within hours of the bombings of the city’s synagogues in November of 2003. Four other New York City detectives were on a 9 a.m. flight to London after the morning rush-hour blasts there earlier this month.
> 
> Cohen said, “On Chechnya, Commissioner, we got this from Boston.” He handed Kelly a document, saying something I couldn’t decipher about Russian investors. (The ground rules of my presence precluded questions.)
> 
> News broadcasts from stations around the globe, including Al Jazeera, were playing silently on monitors in the room, along with live videocasts of traffic on New York’s streets and highways. A big precinct map of the city hung on the wall next to an illuminated map of the world. The executive command center contains one long table, with a bank of serious-looking telephones—secure lines, satellite phones—built into it.
> 
> Kelly brought up Semtex, a Czech plastic explosive known as “the poor man’s C-4.” He wanted to know whether it was ever used in construction.
> 
> “It’s military grade,” Sheehan said evenly. Sheehan, who is fifty, sharp-featured, and wiry, spent twenty years in the Army, mainly in Special Forces; he later served as the State Department’s Ambassador-at-Large for Counter Terrorism in the Clinton Administration. Kelly, who is sixty-three, was a marine and, even in a dark, double-breasted suit, still carries himself like a soldier on active duty. Presumably, both men know something about explosives.
> 
> “Let’s add it to Nexus,” Kelly told Cohen, who made a note.
> 
> Nexus is another police antiterror program, run by the intelligence division. Nexus keeps tabs on terror-sensitive businesses and merchandise, among other things.
> 
> An aide called Kelly out of the room. Sheehan and Cohen relaxed perceptibly. They discussed a recent bombing in a Moscow subway station. “She knew she was a suicide bomb?” Sheehan asked.
> 
> “Oh, yeah,” Cohen, who is sixty-three, said. “She was going the route. Cops spooked her.”
> 
> Subways and their vulnerabilities have been an abiding preoccupation with these men since long before the bombing of the London Underground. Some of their other major worries include, in no particular order, trucks, planes, helicopters, ferries, vans, tunnels, bridges, underground garages, high-rise buildings, the war in Iraq, the war in Chechnya, Al Qaeda, Indonesia, the Philippines, North Africa, East Africa, anthrax, nerve gas, ammonium nitrate, chemical plants, nuclear reactors, shipping containers, railroads, all large gatherings in New York City, and propane. “Worry,” I’ve noticed, is the hardest-working word in their collective vocabulary. “Another thing we need to worry about . . .” “My biggest worry is . . .” “Should we be worried about X?” “Hell, yes.”
> 
> Cohen, especially, has the pensive cast of a professional worrier. He spent thirty-five years in the C.I.A., rising to become director of operations. Kelly hired him in 2002 to revamp the Police Department’s intelligence division. There is no other program in the country even slightly like it now.
> 
> Kelly came back in. The briefing turned to local matters. “I.D. fraud in Queens,” Cohen said. (Document fraud is permanently high on the antiterror worry list.) “Two hundred arrests so far. I think there are another two hundred to be made. We flipped some people, but it’s very labor intensive. My advice: give them some more room on this. They’re all felony arrests.”
> 
> They moved on. Sheehan said, “Our four guys are back from Sweden. They found downloaded postcard photos of the Brooklyn Bridge.” At the mention of the Brooklyn Bridge, all jaws tightened.
> 
> “Anything back on al-Hindi?” Kelly asked Sheehan.
> 
> Abu Issa al-Hindi is an Al Qaeda operative, currently in British custody. Al-Hindi and his team were discovered, through a computer seized last summer in Pakistan, to have conducted extremely thorough surveillance on two large Manhattan buildings, including the Stock Exchange, and sites in Washington, D.C., and New Jersey. Because the surveillance seemed to date from before September, 2001, the press soon lost interest in the story. The N.Y.P.D. has not lost interest.
> 
> Sheehan said, “We’ve got a detective working it every day. Everything they touched here in New York, everybody they talked to. But they were very tightly packed, very discreet, like Mohamed Atta”—the September 11th hijacker.
> 
> “Did you check out the building I told you about?”
> 
> “Yeah.”
> 
> On a notepad, Sheehan started sketching what seemed to be a warehouse in Brooklyn. He and Kelly studied the drawing, filling in details, working out surveillance angles.
> 
> Kelly asked, “Hey, did you see what they did out front of Le Cirque? Two big brick boulders.”
> 
> “Le Cirque’s a little above my pay grade,” Sheehan said. “But I don’t think that’s authorized. I’ll drive by.”
> 
> “Listen,” Kelly said. “Tomorrow, remind them that it may be bigger than a shoebox.”
> 
> “Yeah, yeah, I will.”
> 
> Kelly was referring to a big training drill in the harbor that was to take place the next day. The police, along with the Fire Department and other agencies, would simulate a jet crash in the water off the end of a runway at LaGuardia, with the cause of the crash unknown.
> 
> Cohen mentioned a request from the C.I.A. His old employer wanted to borrow some N.Y.P.D. cyberintelligence specialists to help its people learn how to navigate jihadist chat rooms.
> 
> “Wait,” Kelly said, raising his hand. “My son.” He pointed to a monitor, where Greg Kelly, a correspondent for Fox News, was doing a standup. Kelly flicked on the sound. It was the Zawahiri video story. On the scroll across the bottom of the screen, the national terror-threat level appeared: yellow, “elevated.” Kelly flicked off the sound.
> 
> “O.K.,” he said. “C.I.A. wants what?”
> 
> 
> 
> Under Ray Kelly’s command, the New York City Police Department has been profoundly reorganized since the terror attacks of 2001. Before the attacks, there were fewer than two dozen officers working the terrorism beat full time. Today, there are about a thousand. In some key areas, such as languages that are critical to counterterror work, the N.Y.P.D., drawing on a city of immigrants, has deeper resources than the federal agencies traditionally responsible for fighting international terrorism. Beyond the officers (and civilian analysts) working on terrorism exclusively, the department, which employs nearly fifty thousand people, has been comprehensively persuaded—through intensive new training, new equipment, new protocols—to think of counterterrorism as a fundamental part of what cops still call the Job.
> 
> The rationale for the N.Y.P.D.’s transformation after September 11th had two distinct facets. On the one hand, expanding its mission to include terrorism prevention made obvious sense. On the other, there was a strong feeling that federal agencies had let down New York City, and that the city should no longer count on the Feds for its protection. Some of Kelly’s initiatives were incursions into territory normally occupied by the F.B.I. and the C.I.A. And yet few objections were raised. It was as if the Feds, reeling from September 11th, silently acknowledged New York’s right to take extraordinary defensive measures. (Or, as one senior police official said to me, “Do you think anybody in Washington has the balls to tell Ray Kelly he can’t do something he decides to do?”)
> 
> Within the counterterrorism world, the department’s transformation is highly regarded. “The N.Y.P.D. is really cutting-edge,” Brian Michael Jenkins, a senior adviser at the rand corporation and a respected authority on terrorism, told me. “They’re developing best practices here that should be emulated across the country. The Feds could learn from them.” The federal government must, of course, play the leading role in stopping international terrorism at the borders. But, Jenkins said, “As this thing metastasizes, cops are it. We’re going to win this at the local level.”
> 
> This is Kelly’s second tour as Commissioner; his first was in the early nineties, under David Dinkins. In his first week back, in January, 2002, Kelly announced the creation of a counter-terrorism bureau—the first new bureau at the N.Y.P.D. in more than thirty years. He started a talent search that took him far outside traditional police-recruitment channels. Kelly wanted people with military, intelligence, and diplomatic backgrounds, with deep knowledge of international terrorist organizations—people like Cohen and Sheehan.
> 
> Kelly has been sharply critical of the Bush Administration’s failure since September 11th to help New York protect itself. When I saw him at his office, where he sits at the desk that Theodore Roosevelt used when he was Commissioner, I asked him if the Administration had begun to do more. “We’ve seen some improvement,” he said. “But it’s not nearly what it should be, in my judgment. We’re still defending the city pretty much on our dime.” He glanced out the window at downtown Manhattan. “We’re defending the nation here,” he said. “These are national assets.”
> 
> Communication, at least, is better than it was. Kelly talked about a brief but terrible scare, in October, 2001, when the White House was informed by the C.I.A. that a ten-kiloton nuclear weapon was being smuggled into New York City. The C.I.A.’s source for the story was eventually discredited. But what seemed to stick in Kelly’s mind about the episode, which electrified the White House for several weeks, was that Rudolph Giuliani, who was then the mayor, was not told of the threat. “That would never happen now,” Kelly said. “Nobody would dare sit on that kind of information today.”


----------



## The_Falcon

continued



> Ray Kelly came up the long way. He went from police cadet to Commissioner—the only officer in the history of the N.Y.P.D. to have done so. He was raised on the Upper West Side, the youngest child in a big, working-class Catholic family. His father started out as a milkman and ended up as a clerk at the Internal Revenue Service. Kelly, while working his way through Manhattan College toward a degree in business administration, took a job on the switchboard at Police Headquarters.
> 
> “It was the main number, and you had to memorize twelve hundred extensions,” he says. “You just felt, working there, like you were right at the heart of the city.” Kelly enrolled in a police-cadet program for college students. After graduation, he enlisted in the Marines and was sent to Vietnam. Before he left, he married Veronica Clarke, his high-school sweetheart. Their first child, James, was born while Kelly was overseas. (Greg was born two years later.)
> 
> Kelly rarely talks about his experience in Vietnam, and when I asked about it he used words like “frightening,” “depressing,” “debilitating.” He passed through Khe Sanh and Hue, but spent most of his time in the jungles and fields of the central highlands, serving, initially, as a forward artillery observer, one of the more dangerous combat posts.
> 
> Kelly’s early years as a police officer, in the late sixties, coincided with an epochal increase in violent crime. He became known as a “collar guy”—the type of cop who, given a choice, likes to make arrests, never mind the extra danger, paperwork, and court appearances they entail. Kelly has held twenty-five commands, and when I asked him which he liked most he talked about his days as a plainclothes officer in the old Twenty-third Precinct, in Manhattan, when it ran from East Eighty-sixth Street to East 110th Street. “Following people, jumping in cabs, keeping radios in whiskey bags,” he said. “We arrested a lot of people.”
> 
> Kelly went to law school at night, and got a master’s in public administration from the Kennedy School, at Harvard. In 1985, officers in the 106th Precinct, in Queens, were accused of torturing suspects with stun guns. “The department sent Kelly to clean it up,” Joe Calderone, who covered the story for New York Newsday, told me. “I’ll never forget when he arrived at the precinct. A couple of us were there, and here comes this guy down the block. It was, like, uh-oh—here come the Marines. He carried an attaché case, not a hair or anything even slightly out of place. He was just all business. You could tell they’d sent in the A team.”
> 
> Kelly is a strange kind of tough guy, though. His sense of urgency, his impatience with the Feds, seem balanced by a certain laconic calm. He has a blunt, nineteenth-century face, complete with crooked smile. (Or, if he’s angry, a perfect downturned circumflex of a mouth.) He wears his hair shorter than Sluggo’s. He is extremely fit, lifting weights five days a week in a regimen that his wife describes as “borderline addictive.” Still, there is no sense of gratuitous threat about him. He’s neither tall nor burly, and he moves precisely, economically. Kelly listens hard and catches jokes early, but he doesn’t have the verbal deftness of, say, a politician. He bites off sentences, or lets them trail toward the obvious point, as if to minimize the drama of what he’s saying. It’s a great affect for crisis management but not for winding up a crowd from a podium. His enthusiasms are wide-ranging: he relaxes by reading history, and by playing the drums.
> 
> Kelly became Commissioner in 1992, after Lee Brown was undone by officer corruption scandals and the Crown Heights riots. He improved morale and, more important, brought down the crime rate—finally reversing a long-term trend. But Giuliani was elected mayor the next year and decided to overhaul the police department. He replaced Kelly with William Bratton, who served as Commissioner for a little more than two years before Giuliani pushed him out. Bratton was innovative, flashy, and spectacularly successful at crime reduction. His achievement eclipsed Kelly’s in the public’s memory.
> 
> Kelly went on to serve in the Clinton Administration as an under-secretary of the Treasury, responsible for, among other agencies, the Customs Service, the Secret Service, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. He commanded the multinational police force in Haiti in 1994. In the late nineties, he was Interpol’s vice-president for the Americas. On September 11th, however, he was working, for the first time, in the private sector—as the director of global security at Bear, Stearns.
> 
> “I was out of it, out of the game,” he told me. He and Veronica live in Battery Park City, across from Ground Zero. “The World Trade Center was really our community,” he said. “Our bank was there, our drugstore. If you were going to the subway, you’d go through the World Trade Center.” Veronica was out of the city when the towers fell. Kelly was at his office, in midtown. Their building was evacuated, and they weren’t able to return for weeks. When they did, they went up on the roof. Veronica wept quietly. “This totally devastated—gone, you know—this huge hole, and it was still smoking,” Kelly said. He felt maddeningly confined to the sidelines of the city’s struggle to respond. But his chance came, unexpectedly, a few weeks later. Michael Bloomberg was elected mayor and immediately offered Kelly the Commissioner’s job.
> 
> “He had a unique combination,” Bloomberg told me. “He knew how to run a police department day in, day out—putting a cop at that corner, with this kind of backup, and that kind of training, and this kind of equipment. But he also had international and Washington experience, which are very different, and both very important. We need Washington for information, for funding. But we also need to have relations with security services and police departments around the world directly, not going through Washington. By luck of the draw, I knew somebody who had all three.”
> 
> 
> 
> The office of the department’s Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence, where I spoke with David Cohen, is in an unlikely, distinctly hip corner of southern Manhattan. Roughly a hundred plainclothes cops were busy in the loft-style space outside Cohen’s door, as they are around the clock. Cohen is ruddy-faced, with a piercing Boston accent. He said that he didn’t have time to talk, but he did anyway, and at a rapid pace. “This threat is not going to go away,” he said. “So we can’t relax. If we do, that will produce the seam they’ll go through.”
> 
> Before September 11th, the intelligence division was devoted mostly to guarding visiting dignitaries. Cohen estimates that two per cent of its work was counterterrorism. Now that figure is eighty per cent. The division runs Nexus, cyberintelligence, overseas deployments, financial investigations, and all manner of undercover operations. It also still guards dignitaries.
> 
> Cohen already knew something about setting up a counterterrorism program. In 1996, he established a special team at the C.I.A., known as “the Bin Laden unit,” that concentrated on Al Qaeda’s finances. Kelly first got to know him in the late nineties, when Cohen was the C.I.A.’s station chief in New York. When he called Cohen for the N.Y.P.D. job, Cohen had already left the agency, and was doing global risk assessment at the insurance company A.I.G. Kelly persuaded him to take a huge pay cut and return to public service.
> 
> After a career in federal government, Cohen found that he liked the speed at which things can happen in the N.Y.P.D. The first time he and Kelly talked about stationing officers overseas, Cohen thought it was an exciting idea. At a meeting the following week, he brought it up again. Kelly cut him off, saying, “Didn’t we already decide that?”
> 
> “The N.Y.P.D. is on a hair trigger,” Cohen said. “The air gap between information and action is the shortest I’ve ever experienced.” For example, he said, “Israeli border guards catch a guy who says he’s trained to do surveillance for possible assassination operations in North America. That goes to Morty, and we’re on it that day. This is about a week before we learn about it from other agencies.”
> 
> Cohen went on, “Manila ferryboat explosion, hundred dead. Reported as industrial accident. Then they picked up a guy who said it was an Abu Sayyaf job.” Abu Sayyaf is an Islamist guerrilla army in the Philippines, and an Al Qaeda ally. “We dispatched someone within the day. Any ferryboat incident anywhere, we want to know about it. It’s not the F.B.I. or the C.I.A. or the Homeland Security Department down in the subway tunnels. It’s the N.Y.P.D.
> 
> “We don’t want to learn from what’s happened here,” he said. “We’d rather learn from what’s happened somewhere else. We’re looking at how they did it, the fine-grained stuff—what kind of detonators they used, what vehicles—so that we can take the anatomy of the operation and transpose it onto New York City and figure out what we can do.”
> 
> Compared with what he did for the C.I.A., Cohen told me, “the work here is much less abstract. It’s the difference between protecting U.S. national interests and protecting lives. This is concrete. It’s the people, the city you see every day, the place where you live.” Because of his years at the C.I.A., he added, he had security clearance that gave him access to information from the interrogations of prisoners held at Guantánamo Bay and elsewhere. N.Y.P.D. officers have also been directly involved in the arrests and interrogations of terror suspects in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Malaysia, and Singapore. He didn’t seem especially interested in the debate about how to treat terror detainees, and when I asked about the Patriot Act, which has been criticized by civil-rights groups, he said brusquely, “The Patriot Act helps the F.B.I. do its job. And that’s good for us. I’m too busy to see if the F.B.I. abuses its powers.” His mandate, he said, as set forth by Kelly, is “Do everything we possibly can within the bounds of the law to make sure there is not another terrorist attack on New York City. It ain’t more complicated than that.”
> 
> Luck plays a role. “Transit cops on the 7 train caught two guys camcording infrastructure,” Cohen said. “Most of the video was tourist stuff. Two minutes was train track. Two minutes of train track? Turns out these guys worked for Iranian state intelligence. We turned them over to the F.B.I. They were deported ten days later.”
> 
> He rubbed his eyes. “I don’t know what we’ve stopped,” he said. “It’s impossible to calculate, and I don’t spend much time thinking about it. I’ve gotta be thinking about the next thing.”
> 
> Behind Cohen’s desk stood a bin of large rolled maps of New York’s neighborhoods, with handwritten tags attached: “Significant Concentrations of Pakistanis,” “Significant Concentrations of Palestinians.” A map of Iraq was pinned to the brick wall above the bin.
> 
> “Nothing from there yet,” Cohen said. But the many N.Y.P.D. officers who have been to Iraq with the National Guard or with the Reserves are debriefed upon their return. Cohen turned and stared at the map. “I have to assume it’s going to come out bad,” he said.


----------



## The_Falcon

continued part 2



> One morning, I met Detective Charles Enright and his partner, Sergeant Joseph Salzone, at the Peninsula hotel, in midtown. Enright and Salzone work for Cohen on Operation Nexus, the program that tracks terror-sensitive businesses. Nexus squads visit about two hundred business concerns a week. Since the program was launched, in 2002, they’ve been to more than twenty thousand. Jimmy Chin, the Peninsula’s regional director of risk management, was meeting with Enright and Salzone. The Nexus officers wore business suits, and had the intense but deferential air of high-end sales reps. Anyone writing a parking ticket would be more intimidating. They rely, essentially, on the public-spiritedness of businesspeople, whom they practically beg to alert them to anything suspicious.
> 
> Chin, who is also the chairman of the safety-and-security committee of the Hotel Association of New York City, said, “The N.Y.P.D. is a huge police department that acts like a small one. In other places I go, nobody can imagine the kind of tight relationship we have here. But we’ve really changed our thinking since 9/11. I wouldn’t have given these guys my cell number before. Now they’ve got to be able to reach me 24/7.”
> 
> “Most of these major hotels, they have garages, and that’s what we’re actually most worried about,” Salzone said.
> 
> I asked what would be of interest to them. “People who don’t want to give the garage the keys. Any vehicle that looks overloaded,” he said.
> 
> “Salvage yards—they’re traditionally Mob-related, so they get their guard up when we show up,” Enright said. “But we tell them it’s about terrorism, their guard comes down, they’re ready to help. They know we don’t want to look at their books. Other departments are going to bust their chops on that. We just want to know about any used emergency vehicles they’ve been selling.”
> 
> “Ambulances,” Salzone said. “Ambulances can get through checkpoints. In the Middle East, they’ve been filled with explosives. Boom.”
> 
> “Pat Wagner manages the Thirty-fourth Street heliport, has a lot of Jet A fuel,” Salzone said. “We talk to her a lot.”
> 
> After a Palestinian suicide bomber in Israel disguised himself as an ultra-Orthodox Jew, the Nexus teams visited religious-garb suppliers. When, in early 2003, an alleged plot to poison the London Underground with ricin was reported, Enright and Salzone headed to Manhattan’s diamond district, because acetone, which dealers use to process their stones, is used in the production of ricin. Castor beans are also required. To learn more about those, the Nexus teams visited horticulturalists and the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. (David Cohen told me proudly, “It’s been said, ‘Cohen knows where every castor bean in the city is!’ ”)
> 
> “Thing you’ve got to remember,” Salzone said. “We got a boss who doesn’t sleep.” He meant Cohen. “That percolates down to us.”
> 
> “9/11 is never over,” Enright said.
> 
> The officers wrapped up their business with Chin and left the Peninsula. A truck-rental place in Chelsea had a new manager they wanted to meet. She turned out to be a Trinidadian, young and friendly but very busy. She took business cards, murmuring “Terrorist Incident Prevention Unit” as she read, and eying Salzone and Enright. She took a Nexus information sheet, but was obviously eager to get back to work. Enright and Salzone headed for the door. Then the new manager said, “Wait. There was one fellow. A really strange guy.”
> 
> “Did he pay cash?”
> 
> “Yes.”
> 
> Enright and Salzone turned back. And so the manager told them a long story about a secretive, erratic, abusive customer. To me, he sounded extremely suspicious. I was riveted. Enright and Salzone were not. They thanked the manager for her time, and left.
> 
> Once we were back on the street, they gently explained to me that the man was just a bad truck-rental customer. Every truck-rental place had them. Yes, this guy had paid cash, but nothing else the manager said tripped any alarms. Then I realized why he had sounded so suspicious to me. Her manner, the sequence, even the rhythm of the conversation—“Wait, there was one fellow”—followed, to the letter, every script of every cop show ever made.
> 
> Enright seemed to read my mind. “All these duped-up cop cars they’re using on these TV shows,” he said. He was pointing along the West Side Highway. “ ‘Law & Order’—they shoot right over here. Those cars are all unsecured at night, so we visit them.”
> 
> 
> 
> The intelligence division doesn’t gather information only from the street. It has specialists tracking suspicious financial movements and others working the jails and prisons; in unmarked buildings throughout the boroughs, it has officers fluent in the relevant languages poring over the foreign press or surfing the innumerable jihadist Web sites and chat rooms. The N.Y.P.D. employment application form these days asks about knowledge of some sixty languages. The department has had considerably more success in attracting immigrants who can pass its careful background checks than either the F.B.I. or the C.I.A. has had. In a nation that, in 2002, conferred a total of six undergraduate degrees in Arabic, even the Pentagon, not known for its humility, recognizes this rare resource. The Department of Defense recently borrowed seventeen computer-literate Arabic speakers from the N.Y.P.D. to assist its intelligence arm. At one counterterrorism-bureau facility, in a darkened room full of cops wearing headphones and silently watching satellite broadcasts on big flat-screen TVs, I met a tall, gaunt officer, whom I’ll call Mohamed, taking notes on news reports from Pakistan. Mohamed grew up south of Kabul, speaking Dari. He also understands Pashto, Farsi, and Arabic. He joined the N.Y.P.D. in 1994, and was issuing parking tickets when the counterterrorism bureau found him, in 2002.
> 
> On another occasion, David Cohen introduced me to some of the N.Y.P.D.’s cyberintelligence specialists: a detective and a sergeant, both born and reared in Egypt, and a detective born and reared in Iran. “When we started, in 2002, we didn’t really know what we were doing,” Reza, the Iranian-born officer, said. “It was trial and error. Viruses beyond belief. But we got the medicine now. We go into the worst chat rooms.”
> 
> “We’re always being tested,” Maged, the detective from Egypt, said. “You know you passed the test when suddenly somebody gives you a password to a chat room you didn’t know existed.” He went on, “We’re familiar with the tradition, the background, we speak the slang.”
> 
> “Also, we’re cops,” Reza said. “We hear different things than the civilians the F.B.I. hires do. We got investigative backgrounds, looking for bad guys on the street. Sometimes it’s not what they’re saying, it’s what they’re not saying. You see patterns, like news items from two months before that suddenly start recirculating.”
> 
> Sometimes, Reza said, “You’ll see an offer of a video-clip download. It might be a beheading, or training materials, or proof that someone actually did something.”
> 
> Aly, the Egyptian-born sergeant, shook his head. “This is not Islam,” he said.
> 
> The cybercops told me that each of them belonged to more than thirty separate e-mail groups, or chat rooms.
> 
> “It can take a long time to work your way up the ladder,” Maged said. “At first, it might be just some guy in Texas talking with some guy from Saudi, anti-government shit. But other people are listening, and if they see you coming back every day, and you seem serious, they might invite you somewhere else.”
> 
> “Ninety-seven per cent of the juicy stuff is done P.M.—personal message,” Reza said. “Not in chat rooms. But it takes a lot of time—months, maybe years—to get this kind of trust.”
> 
> I asked the cybercops how they communicated with other security services.
> 
> “We tell the Commissioner,” Reza said, indicating Cohen. “He tells the C.I.A.”
> 
> “Or I call Kelly, depending what it is,” Cohen said. “And he takes our calls.”
> 
> 
> 
> Detective Ira Greenberg, the N.Y.P.D.’s man in Scotland Yard, was on the Tube, on his way to work, when the London bombs went off. As soon as he could reach the street, he started phoning in reports to the intelligence division. Kelly was awakened by a call at home. He ordered the entire department’s midnight-to-eight shift to stay on duty through the day, and posted an officer in every subway train during rush hour. Four detectives—two from intel, two from counterterrorism—left for London. The N.Y.P.D.’s response was similar on the day of the Madrid train bombings, last year. Cohen told me, “I got a call”—from Washington—“saying, ‘Don’t send anybody.’ I said, ‘They’re already on the plane.’ ” He went on, “They were the first foreign law enforcement on the scene with access. They were welcomed. They weren’t over there investigating. That’s someone else’s job. We’re just trying to understand, so as to increase protection here.” After learning that the Madrid train bombers parked their van a few blocks from the station, and carried their bombs by hand to the trains, the department ordered that the security perimeter around subway and commuter-train stations in New York be expanded by two blocks. The revelation that a small businessman saw the Madrid terrorists’ preparations but figured that it was just a petty crime in progress and didn’t bother calling the cops was seen as a reason to redouble Nexus, so that no New York shop owner will ever be that blasé.
> 
> The London bombings reminded me of something Sheehan had said: “Your greatest fear is that they’re out there below the horizon.” Unlike the Madrid bombers, the young jihadists who killed more than fifty people this month were not, it seems, even on the radar of the local police. British security has disrupted a number of serious plots in recent years, but its intelligence failed utterly this time. As the I.R.A. once darkly observed, after a botched attempt to assassinate Margaret Thatcher, “We only have to be lucky once; you will have to be lucky always.” Subway systems, moreover, are hugely vulnerable. Cohen’s undercover agents spent more than a year tracking a young Pakistani immigrant named Shahwar Matin Siraj, who, according to the police, enlisted an angry teen-ager from Staten Island named James Elshafay in a plot to bomb the Thirty-fourth Street/Herald Square subway station. Investigators never found a connection between the pair and any organization, but, according to the police, Siraj and Elshafay drew up detailed attack plans. Cohen’s informant was by then wearing a wire and, last August, the men were arrested. “Lone wolves,” Cohen said. “Homegrown, but inspired globally.”
> 
> What the N.Y.P.D. learns from London’s tragedy will flow from the investigation now under way. In the subways, more closed-circuit cameras and more—not fewer—station attendants would seem to be indicated. Hasty reactions are not always helpful. On the day of the London blasts, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which operates the Brooklyn Battery and Queens Midtown tunnels, and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates the Lincoln and Holland tunnels, disconnected cell-phone service in the tunnels, calling it a counterterror measure. The measure’s logic was unclear. The Post quoted a Port Authority official as saying that the N.Y.P.D. had requested the cutoff. But an N.Y.P.D. spokesman told me, with some frustration, that the department had made no such request. Michael Sheehan, Kelly’s counterterrorism deputy, was closely monitoring events in London—his and Cohen’s officers are embedded in the investigation there—but he had not yet seen anything that would, he told me, “change how I deploy here.” Public fears of a possible follow-up attack rose and fell—“fiends poised to strike again,” the Post opined—but Sheehan seemed calm. “We’re on high alert,” he said. “They’re not going to attack you when you’re on high alert.”


----------



## The_Falcon

continued part 3



> “Our backbone is hard-nosed detective work, investigations,” Sheehan told me. And yet there is not much about his job that resembles traditional police work. He worries about infrastructure protection—roadways, financial systems, the water supply. He works on grim, multi-agency protocols for identifying and responding to chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear (C.B.R.N.) attacks. He supervises constant, intensive training—his bureau trains city, state, federal, and regional instructors, and also key corporate security divisions. “We train the trainers,” Sheehan says.
> 
> Sheehan, like Cohen, has been thinking hard about Al Qaeda for a long time. He was in Somalia in the early nineties, when Al Qaeda trained and supplied local militiamen who attacked American peacekeepers. By the time he retired from Special Forces, as a lieutenant colonel, in 1997—having completed two tours with the National Security Council, at the White House—Sheehan had developed what “The 9/11 Commission Report” describes as an “obsession with terrorism.” He became the State Department’s coördinator for counterterrorism in 1998, but was frustrated by the cautiousness of American efforts to oppose Al Qaeda. Sheehan told the 9/11 Commission that he felt he was regarded as “a one-note Johnny nutcase.”
> 
> Richard Clarke, the N.S.C.’s coördinator for counterterrrorism, in his book “Against All Enemies,” describes Sheehan’s fury after one White House meeting, in 2000: “ ‘What’s it going to take, Dick?’ Sheehan demanded. . . . ‘Does Al Qaeda have to attack the Pentagon to get their attention?’ ”
> 
> Sheehan says that, even when he was at the State Department, he was often in New York. “Most of the real Al Qaeda expertise in this country was always here in New York,” he told me. John O’Neill, of the F.B.I., was the head of the local Joint Terrorism Task Force then. O’Neill was as prescient about Al Qaeda as Sheehan and Clarke were, and at least as frustrated. O’Neill quit the F.B.I. in 2001, became security director of the World Trade Center, and a few weeks later was killed in the terror attacks.
> 
> So Sheehan took the counterterrorism job at the N.Y.P.D. with a full appreciation of the federal government’s failings. Kelly knew Sheehan from his stint in Haiti, where Sheehan was the American liaison to the international forces. When Kelly approached him about the New York job, Sheehan was serving as the U.N.’s Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping. “He didn’t have to talk me into it,” Sheehan said. “I wanted to get back into counterterrorism.”
> 
> What’s striking about Sheehan is how casually he connects his unusual breadth of experience to his present job. He directs close studies of far-flung terrorist episodes and groups, on the theory that, as he put it, “We have to know what’s going on. When things went to hell in Egypt in 1990, it showed up here.” Among other things, he was referring to the fact that Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, the leader of the foiled 1993 “landmarks” bomb plot against major New York buildings and tunnels, came to the United States in 1990, having escaped a brutal crackdown on Islamists.
> 
> As closely as Sheehan watches developments in Yemen and the Philippines, most of his work is profoundly local. It is basically civil defense, retooled for the age of terror. His conversation is full of “bomb curtains” (an Israeli invention, made of Kevlar—all vulnerable commercial windows should have them) and “clamshell” road barriers (also known as Delta barriers, a design refined by the N.Y.P.D.) and “standoff” (an area around targets, particularly buildings, not accessible to vehicles).
> 
> It was Sheehan who, in a letter to the Port Authority last year, raised the N.Y.P.D.’s concerns about the design of the Freedom Tower, at Ground Zero. The standoff was inadequate, Sheehan said, and there was too much glass near the ground. Kelly backed Sheehan, Mayor Bloomberg backed Kelly, and the plans for the site were eventually redrawn.
> 
> Sheehan stared ruefully at the papers on his desk, and pushed away the remains of a takeout lunch. He has a restless, loose-limbed energy; in a dark suit, carelessly worn, with his caustic asides and wide knowledge, he seems more like a professor than like a career soldier, or a top police official. “You’ve got to find a level of intensity you can sustain,” he said quietly. “If we let ourselves get all spun up by every bullshit threat we get from Washington—and not sleep for three nights, then sleep for two days—something real will happen during those two days.”
> 
> The threat reports from Washington were incessant, he said. “A lot of stuff originates overseas, probably from some jerkoff teen-ager. We get it from C.I.A., F.B.I., and I’m glad they pass it to us, but the first thing we ask is ‘What’s the source?’ Our hot line, which gets a lot of calls, somebody answers and asks for a name and address. So we get very little b.s.” (The hot-line number is 888-NYC-SAFE. It can also be reached through 311. All the signs in the subways and at bus stops—“If You See Something, Say Something”—point to the hot line.)
> 
> Sheehan, as an outsider to local institutions, seems to have a relatively easy time forming unheard-of alliances with other city agencies. He even claims to welcome the N.Y.P.D.’s traditional rivalry with the Fire Department. “They’re both aggressive organizations, and that’s fine,” he said. In April, the Mayor signed a formal order designating the Police Department the lead agency in hazardous-materials incidents, which had previously been handled by the Fire Department with the police in a subordinate role—and the F.D.N.Y., naturally, objected. In other American cities, fire departments still have the command role in hazmat incidents. But New York City is at an exceptionally high risk for a C.B.R.N. attack, and that has caused the city to revise the traditional approach.
> 
> Assistant Chief Phil T. Pulaski, a commanding officer in the counterterrorism bureau, gave me an example: “A tanker-truck collision, a spill, it’s an accident anywhere in the country, but not here in New York City. Our intel shows that Al Qaeda’s instructions to its people are ‘Get your hazmat license, get your tanker-truck license, and we will use them as weapons.’ So any tanker spill here is presumed to be criminal in nature, and it’s investigated as such until proved otherwise. Why? Because if the scene is just cleaned up as fast as possible, we may miss the evidence of a terror crime in progress. The driver may get away. Even if he’s killed, we want to go through his pocket litter, find out who he’s meeting. We want to prevent the next incident.”
> 
> 
> 
> Much of the counterterrorism bureau’s work is done at a facility in an obscure warehouse district in Coney Island. Like other nodes on the N.Y.P.D.’s antiterror grid, it has a slightly “X-Files” feel. There’s no sign on the building; if you don’t know where to look, you probably won’t find it. Pass through the solidly built, monitored, and remote-controlled door, however, and you’re in a bustling, gleaming, windowless, oddly cosmopolitan world. There are classrooms, meeting rooms, lots of cops (uniformed and plainclothes), a little cafeteria, a library. On one wall is a big framed black-and-white photograph—an aerial shot, taken at night—of the twin towers, looking intensely romantic.
> 
> “We collect information on the strategic threat, including from overseas, and analyze it,” Captain Hugh O’Rourke told me. “Then we take it out and put it to work: target hardening.”
> 
> We were joined by Lieutenant John Rowland, the director of regional training for the bureau. “We’ve been doing instruction on Islam for the N.Y.P.D.,” Rowland said. “It’s needed. We’ve got a lot of Catholics in this department.” (I had already noted, in a restroom at the facility, a well-thumbed copy of “The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Understanding Islam.”)
> 
> O’Rourke said, “We’re trying to get our analysis influenced with the proper cultural perspective, because we’re a long way from southwest Asia. Some of our officers were born there, though.”
> 
> “Pashtun tribesmen, Pakistanis, Egyptians, Farsi-speakers, Filipinos, Chinese—you name it,” Rowland said. “They’ve been tremendously helpful. One guy here just made his hajj.”
> 
> The N.Y.P.D.’s contingency planning now includes the devolution of decision-making, in an emergency, from One Police Plaza to eight borough command posts around the city. This system got an unplanned tryout during the big summer power failure in 2003. It passed that test. I visited a facility known as the “shadow command center,” which will replace N.Y.P.D. headquarters if One Police Plaza becomes disabled. It’s in an even more obscure spot than the Coney Island center, and it sees very little telltale traffic in and out. Vast rooms full of desks, phones, and silent monitors stretched around us, inside a huge windowless warehouse. It’s designed to be up and running in an hour.
> 
> I went out to Floyd Bennett Field, the old airbase on Jamaica Bay, to watch some N.Y.P.D. training exercises. There were “fast rope” helicopter maneuvers: officers zipped down ropes from choppers hovering thirty or forty feet above the ground; they hit the dirt, rolled, and sprinted to positions, under the beady eyes of trainers with stopwatches. Charles Kammerdener, the commanding officer of the special-operations division, met me in his office. He was white-haired, almost naval-looking. “In the old days, it was basically a perp in a building in a tactical situation,” he said. “ ‘Thank you. Do it over.’ That was then. Nowadays, we train for people who may be military-trained, booby-trapped, automatic-armed, working multiply.”
> 
> Sheehan talks about “adding a counterterrorism element to event management.” Kammerdener gave me an example. “The marathon,” he said. “While those runners are warming up and stretching on Staten Island, I have people moving through the crowd doing air monitoring. I have a helicopter up with a video downlink and snipers.”
> 
> Outside the old airbase headquarters, there were subway cars parked in the scrub, swarming with guys in huge blue hooded suits—a simulated chemical attack. A mannequin representing a victim was rushed past me to a portable outdoor shower, where it was scrubbed with long-handled brushes while an instructor barked suggestions: “More water!” More blue suits were going through the train cars with monitors.
> 
> Dr. Dani-Margot Zavasky, an infectious-disease specialist with an interest, previously only academic, in unconventional weapons, is the medical director of the counterterrorism bureau. “Not only are bioagents hard to detect, they’re hard to put yellow tape around,” she said. “They’re not like other crime scenes.” Recently, she told me, “a number of us have been studying the issue of quarantine—what can be done, legally, in the United States. The N.Y.P.D. cannot order a quarantine, of course, but we can help enforce one. So we must prepare.”
> 
> Phil Pulaski, from the counterterrorism bureau, told me that all officers had at least basic training in C.B.R.N. response, and some “have all the equipment—they can enter the hot zone.” He added, “We’ll work with the chief medical examiner, going through the bodies, in case they’re suicide perps.”
> 
> John Colgan, a deputy chief in the counterterrorism bureau, said, “We’ve got a seventeen-page protocol on C.B.R.N. / hazmat incidents. Officer Jones may need to know just one page, but he trains on the whole thing, so he knows where he fits in. He’s seen the whole movie, that’s good. But you really gotta know your lines.”


----------



## The_Falcon

last one



> Before September 11th, the N.Y.P.D. had a small unit that, on request, reviewed the security arrangements of important businesses and facilities. “That was really just lights and locks,” a counterterrorism officer told me. Now the unit offers much more comprehensive, terror-risk assessments, free of charge. The N.Y.P.D. sends the officers who carry out the assessments to labs around the country for radiological, biological, chemical, and bomb training.
> 
> Sheehan and one of his detectives took me through an assessment they had produced for a prominent Manhattan institution. The detective, flipping slowly through a volume of photographs of walls, doors, driveways, fences, chimneys, air vents, and columns, told me, “We look at both the facility and its potential adversaries. This particular institution might be targeted by computer hackers, or animal-rights activists.”
> 
> The detective went on, “You see these columns here? No bomb-blast mitigation measures in place. Very easy for a truck to pull up right here, with this whole big structure up above. That’s bad. They’re hardening these columns as we speak.”
> 
> Not all businesses are thrilled to receive a detailed, official tally of their “risk exposures,” however. The alterations suggested are often expensive, and not all insurers agree that the liability implications of having such a list would be good for their clients if an attack occurred.
> 
> The No. 1 private-sector target in New York—perhaps the No. 1 target, period—is, according to many experts, Wall Street. I went to talk to James Esposito, the New York Stock Exchange’s senior vice-president for security. Esposito is big, imposing, in his sixties. He was the top F.B.I. agent in New Jersey at the time of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. “These guys are just like smugglers,” Esposito said. “They’re always going to be trying to come up with something different. It’s like a bad dream, and it won’t go away.”
> 
> “ ‘Groundhog Day,’ ” said his deputy, Sam Cocozza, who is ex-N.Y.P.D.
> 
> Wall Street has been closed to traffic at Broadway since the mid-nineties, and Broad Street and other blocks have been closed since September 11th. The result is an eerie, very un-Manhattan stillness. There are cops everywhere you look, including a full N.Y.P.D. Hercules team, with automatic weapons, armored trucks, and a K-9 unit. The cobbled streets are laced with iron fencing, heavy concrete planters, and huge steel bollards, anchored deep in the ground—a fixed defense against truck bombs. There are still plenty of tourists milling around, although the top attraction in the area, the Stock Exchange tour, has been shut down since September 11th. Indeed, it is believed that Issa al-Hindi’s reconnaissance team used the tour to case its target.
> 
> “They had counted the chairs in the Big Board room,” Esposito said sourly.
> 
> “We had sharpshooters, bomb dogs, drug dogs years ago,” Esposito went on. “But, suddenly, it’s so sophisticated. The N.Y.P.D. has created a body of experts that is just unbelievable. Without frightening the public, they’ve just been quietly going about their business. Our people have trained with the Police Department, the Fire Department, on C.B.R.N. We’re really customers of their expertise.”
> 
> 
> 
> I was walking through a crowded shopping district downtown with a senior police official. We were on our way to one of the “undisclosed locations” of the metropolitan antiterror effort. The official said, “Now, guess who the Feds are.” I saw two young white men in dark suits standing stiffly against a wall, failing utterly to blend into the scene.
> 
> A former federal prosecutor told me, “New York has never been a sought-after post among F.B.I. agents. That’s partly the cost of living, and partly the ferocious competition with the N.Y.P.D. Detectives are just so much more experienced than young federal agents at interviewing suspects and sources. It’s intimidating. F.B.I. agents parachute in. They don’t know the city. They look like aliens to us, let alone to an immigrant community.”
> 
> The N.Y.P.D. works closely with the F.B.I. on counterterrorism, mainly through the local Joint Terrorism Task Force. (The task force worked on the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and apprehended the main perpetrators.) Tim Herlocker, the agent in charge of the local branch of the Bureau’s new Office of Intelligence, told me that the N.Y.P.D. had “soldiers to invest in this at a level that we never will have.” The N.Y.P.D., which is nearly twice the size of the F.B.I., “really stepped up,” Herlocker said, after September 11th.
> 
> Still, the tensions persist. The F.B.I. reportedly opposed the deployment of Morty Dzikansky to Israel, for example. John Colgan, the deputy chief for counterterrorism, says, “We reach through the F.B.I. to get federal assets. But the Bureau’s got to let us know what it’s doing in our city. You can’t have some guy you don’t know coming into your house to cook hamburgers on your stove. You might blow him away. We’ve got to be kept informed, or there may be trouble.”
> 
> Local police departments tend to resent the F.B.I.—if nothing else, for its tendency to condescend to them. Its agents actually have a better working relationship with the N.Y.P.D. than most, partly, no doubt, because the condescension runs both ways. The deep identity crises and public exposures of incompetence that have distracted and consumed the F.B.I. and the C.I.A. since September 11th may, paradoxically, have strengthened New York’s counterterror efforts by allowing it to move into the vacuum and build an aggressive municipal self-defense.
> 
> Cohen told me, “We’ve got the Feds working for us now, in a good way; it’s not the usual feeding of raw material to the experts.” It’s doubtful that anyone at the F.B.I. would put it quite the same way. When I mentioned Commissioner Kelly to Pasquale D’Amuro, then the F.B.I.’s lead agent in New York, he grew testy. “I don’t tell Ray Kelly what to do,” he said. “He doesn’t tell me what to do.” (D’Amuro recently left the F.B.I. and joined Giuliani Partners.)
> 
> Since the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, in 2002, there has been one large, inert, misshapen bureaucracy that, for New York, at least, symbolizes the extent of the Bush Administration’s neglect. When Kelly says that New York is having to defend itself “pretty much on our dime,” he is referring, primarily, to the budgeting formula under which homeland-security funds are disbursed. In fiscal year 2004, Wyoming received $37.74 per capita, and North Dakota $30.82, while New York got $5.41. Among the fifty states, New York’s per-capita allotment was forty-eighth. This bizarre formula is, from New York’s point of view, only slowly improving.
> 
> The bill for New York City’s antiterror budget, which is roughly two hundred million dollars a year, is footed, for the most part, by the city itself. Bloomberg’s view has been, from the beginning, that Kelly should do whatever he considers necessary, and that a way to pay for it will be found later.
> 
> Kelly, in return, has given Bloomberg a rare political gift: crime rates that have continued to fall without an over-reliance on the kind of tactics that alienated minorities during the Giuliani administration. The fact that crime is so low has also made the department’s ferocious new focus on terrorism possible. Kelly has sometimes infuriated the police unions by refusing to defend officers in controversial incidents. However, within the department, his dramatic restructuring of the Job has encountered surprisingly little resistance. He told me that was because police officers identified with the counterterrorism effort: “They see themselves on a mission to protect the city.”
> 
> 
> 
> “Salaam alaikum.” Mayor Bloomberg was greeting an auditorium full of Muslim community leaders last fall at One Police Plaza. Ramadan was about to begin, and Bloomberg and Kelly had invited them for an annual pre-holiday conference. The gathering had been blessed by a diminutive imam from Indonesia, who sang a verse from the Koran.
> 
> Bloomberg extolled New York as “a city based on religious tolerance,” and deplored bias crimes against Muslims (which have increased many-fold throughout the United States since September 11th). “The N.Y.P.D. is our first line of defense against hate and bias,” he said. He wished his esteemed constituents a good Ramadan. “Ma’assalama.”
> 
> Kelly was crisp and specific. He said that he would be increasing patrols around mosques for the holiday, and would put out extra plainclothes officers. “We want recent immigrants in particular to know that the Police Department is not an immigration agency,” he said. He added that he hoped that more Muslims would become police officers, and gave specifics—dates, phone numbers, Web sites—for applying to take the next police exam. He said he had no new threat information to report. “Still, we ask all New Yorkers to look at events through the prism of 9/11. If you see or hear anything suspicious, we urge you to call 311 and ask for the terrorism hot line.” Then he, too, wished the crowd a good Ramadan.
> 
> The Mayor left, but Kelly stayed and took questions. Some conferees looked as though they’d just arrived from a Saudi village, others from the Afghan mountains. There were turbans, djellabahs, tall black embroidered caps, red checked kaffiyehs, and Western suits, and many languages were spoken. Kelly listened closely to all questions and speeches, and gave respectful answers.
> 
> An African-American chaplain from the Department of Corrections was concerned about the treatment of Muslim women taken into custody. People were unhappy about being made to change their clothes, she said. Kelly said he would check out the protocol.
> 
> A Turk in a red kufi wanted to thank the police for twelve years of untroubled Ramadan parking at his mosque. This speech brought general applause.
> 
> Later, I told a senior police official about this pre-Ramadan lovefest. “Well, some of those guys in there don’t talk quite so nice about us when they’re back at the mosque,” he said.
> 
> One of the men he may have had in mind was Amin Awad, a co-founder and the president of the Al-Farooq mosque, in Boerum Hill, Brooklyn. Awad was at the pre-Ramadan conference at One Police Plaza—indeed, he goes every year. Sheikh Rahman preached at Al-Farooq in the early nineteen-nineties, and until 1994, according to the Times, the mosque openly raised money for Osama bin Laden. In 2003, Al-Farooq was implicated in a case in which the Justice Department accused a Yemeni sheikh of funnelling twenty million dollars to Al Qaeda. The Daily News called for the mosque to be shut down. In the end, the sheikh was convicted of providing material support to Hamas, not Al Qaeda, and no mosque officials were charged.
> 
> When I spoke with Awad in his tiny, third-floor office at Al-Farooq recently, he was circumspect about the N.Y.P.D. He has been a chaplain at a jail on Rikers Island for fifteen years, and he said that his advice to younger Muslims concerning the police is “Don’t ever take the officer as your enemy.” He also said that AlFarooq’s relations with the local precinct—the Eighty-fourth—were “very sweet.” But then he made the disconcerting observation that he himself was still not sure who the September 11th hijackers were, or even if they were Muslim.
> 
> Zein Rimawi, a Palestinian who helps run the Islamic Society of Bay Ridge, in Brooklyn, and who was also at the pre-Ramadan conference, is loudly critical of some police operations, including the Herald Square subway bombing plot, which he considers entrapment. But he is far more critical of the F.B.I., which he believes targets for harassment Muslim community leaders who decline to become informants. “We are like the African-Americans used to be. What they used to suffer, we are suffering now,” he told me. He also said, however, that relations between local Muslims and the police vary from precinct to precinct, and that in his precinct, the Sixty-eighth, things could not be better. “We have a problem, we talk with the captain, he’s very kind and gentle.” He laughed. “I’m even going to be a police captain for a couple of hours later this month, just to see how the precinct works.” On the other hand, in Sunset Park, where Rimawi is on the board of an Islamic school, relations with the precinct are not so warm.
> 
> Donna Lieberman, of the New York Civil Liberties Union, told me that she sees “lots of room for improvement” in the N.Y.P.D.’s treatment of the city’s Muslims. For example, she said, the department often contradicts itself about not being an immigration agency. Suspects under arrest are routinely asked whether they are citizens, and their answers are sometimes turned over to federal authorities.
> 
> I asked Kelly if the N.Y.P.D.’s relations with the city’s Muslim communities today are a challenge comparable to its dealings with the black community in the past. He looked a bit surprised. No, he said. The relationship with black New Yorkers went back, he said, “many, many years.” The Police Department’s relations with Muslims, Kelly said, weren’t even an issue before September 11th. “There was no history of real or perceived abuse,” he said. “We, institutionally, had not much contact with them. After 9/11, we have more.”
> 
> 
> 
> Hardening the target: that’s the term of art for the overarching goal of local counterterror work. It can help to know what’s happening thousands of miles away, but a densely layered system of municipal defense is a terrorism deterrent of a special type. It says, basically, Try another town.
> 
> There are obvious limits to what local cops can prevent. As Sheehan told a symposium of terrorism experts at One Police Plaza last year, “I don’t know what I can do about somebody bringing a nuclear bomb through the Port of Newark. That’s the federal government’s problem. You can drive yourself crazy thinking about that.” The attack plans for September 11th did not originate or mature locally, and nothing about them would necessarily have appeared on the radar of even today’s extended, hypersensitive, metropolitan terror-detection system. The attacks came, literally, out of the air. Other law-enforcement or national-security agencies might have caught and stopped them, but that was the point—that is exactly why New York has stepped up its defenses.
> 
> No counterterrorism program, no amount of homeland-security spending, can eliminate the threat. For politicians, there is a temptation to hype it, to practice the politics of fear. Some, like Bloomberg, have resisted the temptation; the Bush Administration has not. But spreading alarm is one of the aims of terrorism, and fearmongering subverts the counterterrorism effort, which essentially seeks to manage the threat. Cohen, talking to the same symposium as Sheehan, brought the N.Y.P.D.’s position into sharp focus when he said, “New York City sees more than a thousand arrests a day, and we have to watch them all—watch for the one that means something to us.” That is a description of serious counterterrorism work. It is done quietly, incessantly, with no gratuitous public alarms.
> 
> Endless vigilance, no victory; success means nothing happens. Such anti-drama is the essence of prevention. Meanwhile, there is an element of theatre to a lot of counterterror work. The American “sleeper cells” that we have heard so much about—but whose existence has yet to be convincingly demonstrated—may prove to be as elusive as Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction. Believing that jihadist fighters may be inside the United States waiting to strike feels, some days, like a paranoid leap of faith (other days, like after London, it may not). Sleeper cells, or something very like them, have been uncovered in Europe certainly, though there is nothing here comparable to the millions of angry young Muslims living there. The “enemy” here is still in large measure a phantom. It may be necessary to presume he exists, but when will that cease to be true?
> 
> 
> 
> The N.Y.P.D.’s Hercules teams are the city’s street-level deterrent. Their deployment can be startling. A Chevrolet Suburban with blacked-out windows pulls up to the curb, doors fly open, and officers in Kevlar combat helmets and body armor, carrying M-4 assault rifles, rush to positions. Pedestrians freeze; some recoil. Motorcycle patrols often accompany the teams, and a bomb-sniffing dog is always there. The site may be a bank or a bus station or a concert hall—or an ordinary block with no self-evident potential target. The team knows why it is there; bystanders are left to guess. I watched a Hercules team in action one afternoon on Broadway, north of Columbus Circle. Some passersby ignored the commotion, many hurried away, but a few stopped to ask the officers what they were doing.
> 
> “We’re here for you,” they were told.
> 
> “It’s for the Bible college,” a woman said knowingly, pointing at the American Bible Society offices down the block. (Wrong.)
> 
> “It’s the Israeli film festival,” an older man said, pointing at a movie house in the other direction. (Right.)
> 
> “We’re here to protect you.”
> 
> An immaculately dressed sergeant from intelligence who was observing explained the scripted answers: “They don’t want to find themselves in a debate about the intifada or Ariel Sharon.”
> 
> Hercules deployments are “asymmetric,” unpredictable—they deliberately follow no pattern. They are self-conscious displays of force, presuming the existence of enemy reconnaissance. “The goal is to create a hostile environment for terrorist operatives in the city,” Detective Abad Nieves, a Hercules officer, told me.
> 
> Hercules commanders like to point to Iyman Faris, an Al Qaeda operative with designs on the Brooklyn Bridge. He was here, in 2002. We know what hotel he stayed in. We know what Pakistani restaurant near City Hall he ate in. He admitted, after his capture, in Ohio, in 2003, that he was plotting to destroy the bridge. After months of casing the target, he sent a message to his Al Qaeda handlers that “the weather is too hot,” which investigators took as a reference to intensified police activity around the bridge. Hercules teams, acting on tips, provided much of that activity.
> 
> Most New Yorkers are happy to see the Hercules teams, according to the cops I asked. One of them said, “It’s only tourists from the Midwest who don’t like us, because Americans aren’t used to seeing automatic weapons on the street. Foreigners are.”
> 
> The people who did not seem intimidated at all, I noticed, were older women. Several of them marched right up to the warrior cops and asked if there was something they should be worried about. But it occurred to me that people who were not happy to see machine guns and military gear on Broadway might not feel comfortable saying so.
> 
> I asked Lieutenant Cory Cuneo, one of the Hercules officers posted outside the Israeli film festival, about the worst hostility he had encountered in this role. He said it had come from a woman outside the Winter Garden, across from Ground Zero.
> 
> “Why are you out here?” she said.
> 
> “There used to be two buildings right over there,” Cuneo told her.
> 
> “That was just one event,” she said. “It’s being used to justify all kinds of horrible things.”
> 
> “Just one event? Where are you from?”
> 
> “New York.”
> 
> “No. Originally.”
> 
> “New York.”
> 
> “No way. Nobody who was born and raised here would ever say what you just said.”
> 
> I thought the woman sounded like a New Yorker, all right. But, of course, Cuneo sounded like one, too


----------



## a_majoor

An interesting take on the Victor Davis Hanson argument that the West has the "cultural" ability to defeat its enemies:

http://article.nationalreview.com/



> *Victory Record*
> Can we do it again?
> 
> An NRO Q&A
> 
> This just in: We’re going to win the war on terror. Or so University of Dayton history professor Larry Schweikart says. He is author of the new book, America’s Victories: Why the U.S. Wins Wars and Will Win the War on Terror and thinks the case is made in American military and political history. Schweikart went through some of it in an interview with National Review Online editor Kathryn Lopez.
> 
> Kathryn Jean Lopez: So why does the U.S. win wars?
> 
> Larry Schweikart: The glib answer is (cue Bill Murray from Stripes), “We’re Americans, dammit!” *In fact, there are several characteristics of American fighting forces — some of them unique to us, some common to most Western nations — that make it difficult for us to lose. * Our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines, all free individuals in a volunteer force, come from a remarkably typical cross-section of American society, and always have. Whether it was the free men of color, Indians, and Baratarian pirates who fought under Andy Jackson or the special-ops forces riding horses to rain down precision-guided munitions on the Taliban, our military has generally represented our society almost perfectly. “It ain’t me, I ain’t no senator’s son,” sang Creedence Clearwater Revival, but in fact the modern military has a higher proportion of sons and daughters of our elected officials than from the population as a whole; and zip-code studies have shown that virtually every zip code is represented pretty proportionally, including the infamous 90210. (Note to John Kerry: The Northeast has, except for the Civil War and the Revolution, been notoriously underrepresented in our wars).
> 
> Americans win wars because we learn from loss — this is a no brainer, but there have been, and are today, cultures that find shame and dishonor in admitting a mistake, and thus can’t fix it. We win wars because our fighting men and women are the best trained in the world, then we give them unprecedented levels of autonomy, so that, as one American officer put it, a U.S. sergeant has the operational autonomy of most Middle Eastern colonels. Americans are successful in wars because we embrace technology, which itself comes from a society that tolerates failure and the ability to adjust to a bad hypothesis; we are successful because our protesters actually have caused the military, through their constant focus on American casualties, to relentlessly push down the level of casualties we take and push up the levels we inflict on others; and we are successful because above all we subscribe to concepts of sanctity of life that lead us to “leave no man behind.” In fact, I can find no other military in human history that has attempted so many times to rescue its own prisoners of war.
> 
> Lopez: Even so, isn’t your declaration that we will win the war on terror ridiculously optimistic? How do you know?
> 
> Schweikart: If it was based on mere political punditry, it might be optimistic. I base my views on the historical record. If you ask any historian, “When did we win the war in the Pacific?” the answer would almost always be, “Midway.” After that, Japan couldn’t win — the only issue was the final, often gruesome, death toll. Think of that! That’s years before Iwo Jima or Okinawa, and yet historically the war was over after June 1942. Likewise, *if you look at the Filipino Insurrection (1899-1902, followed by the “Moro Wars”) — which mirrors Iraq very closely, the war was over when William McKinley was reelected. It took two more years for Emilio Aguinaldo to admit defeat, but his stated goal of forcing a political solution by “un-electing” McKinley was finished. I think we hit the “tipping point” in Fallujah in November 2004. After that, the terrorists could no longer hold up in any town for long, nor could they organize effectively.* Zarqawi’s recent death closely resembles our Pacific model as well when American P-38s ambushed Isoroku Yamamoto and killed him. Historically, of the 11 “insurgencies” and “guerilla wars” of the 20th century (including Vietnam), the government (in this case, that would be us) won eight. However, most of these took between five and eight years to win. That places us right on our timetable, which is to expect the death throes of the terrorists in Iraq in another year or two.
> 
> Lopez: Besides possibly thinking you’re delusional for reasons already discussed, someone skimming your book is going to think you’re an unfair partisan. You have a subhead that reads “Why Does the Left Hate America’s Citizen Soldiers?” This is a book for right-wingers, right?
> 
> Schweikart: My editors forced me to exercise restraint, as my original subtitle was, “Why the U.S. Wins Wars and the Left Hates It That We Do!” Actually, this is a book for anyone who honestly wants to understand why our military is so damn good. Far from “broken,” as Jack Murtha claims, our military is kicking tail and taking names, and it has done this for 200 years. What I’m struck by, though, Kathryn, is how often in the past — and even now — our enemies have underestimated us. The Mexican generals boldly predicted they’d march into New Orleans in six weeks; Europeans all expected the Spanish to destroy us; Eric Luddendorf brushed off the involvement of the U.S. into World War I as insignificant; and recently the infamous Osama bin Laden letter to the late Zarqawi urging a “Mogadishu Strategy” has proven remarkably consistent and consistently wrong.
> 
> Now, how does this tie in with the Left hating America’s citizen soldiers? Well, we have always had antiwar protesters, from Emerson to Bryan, and one effect that their loud voices has had is to fool our enemies into thinking that the majority of Americans are soft and without commitment.
> 
> As for today’s Left, I still await any — and I repeat, any — news of a military victory to which they do not attach a “but.” They are, in Laura Ingraham’s words, the “but monkeys.” Every Fallujah dismantling, every successful election, every dead Zarqawi is adjoined to a “but,” to the point that a headline out this weekend from Reuters — supposedly a news agency, mind you, reported the news that the Army’s recruiting was considerably above its goals, followed with a but “Challenges in the Future Remain.” So our news agencies are now reduced to hoping for future events to temper news of current military successes. It’s sad.
> 
> Lopez: How did “we” rewrite Custer’s Last Stand in Fallujah?
> 
> Schweikart: *The latest research on the Custer massacre is fascinating, indicating that rather than a “last stand,” in which all of Custer’s forces were quickly under assault from a huge body of Sioux, the boy general spread his men out rather thinly while he attempted to cut off the escaping women and children. Meanwhile, the Indians slowly infiltrated the perimeters of the remaining troops and, when they had a critical mass, overwhelmed them. At Fallujah, while there was a final massed assault, it was preceded by months of “battlefield shaping” in which our forces, nightly infiltrated Fallujah — often with the assistance of locals, who pointed out the locations of the baddies — and winnowed down their numbers.* One sniper had 100 recorded kills alone! When the final attack came, al Qaeda and the Saddamist resistance were a hollow shell, and collapsed accordingly.
> 
> Lopez: Name a military mistake we haven’t learn from and how we can.
> 
> Schweikart: I would say that despite the fact that we, better than anyone, embrace new technology, we still have a habit of ignoring some cutting-edge weapons. Hiram Maxim was an American, who, due to lack of interest from the War Department, took his famous machine gun to Britain. Thompson’s submachine gun did not catch on for some time, in part due to the doctrinal emphasis on each soldier being a “sharpshooter.” Likewise, more recently, I think we became absorbed with the Soviet-style battle, with its “front” and its “support units,” and therefore when a guerilla war came, lacking any “front line,” our support units paid a high price in lack of training. But this, ultimately, was addressed. The fate of Jessica Lynch’s 507th Maintenance unit was reviewed and studied, and within months, the Army concluded that all personnel, including “support troops,” were combat soldiers first — something the Marines always understood. As a result, casualties among those units has fallen substantially.
> 
> Schweikart: Outside of Vietnam, American pols have a pretty good track record of keeping the U.S. military from losing situations?
> 
> Schweikart: Yes, I think that’s true. This goes back to “sanctity of life.” Americans see peace as the norm, and don’t want to fight unless absolutely necessary — quite a contrast from some societies in which warfare is an extension of religion or a means to establish honor. However, this can get us into trouble. Ronald Reagan, looking at Vietnam, established the “Reagan Doctrine” that said that the U.S. should not commit troops without a “clear exit strategy” and a high likelihood of winning. Normally, that’s good advice. But as Gandalf noted in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, sometimes you have to fight because it’s the right thing to do, whether or not there is a high likelihood of winning. That was the case after 9/11. We will win, but it would be the right fight even if we were not sure we would.
> 
> Lopez: Then why does Iraq look so bad right now?
> 
> Schweikart: This is the value of history. If you look at Iraq through a “current events” mode, it doesn’t look great. But imagine where we were after Midway in 1942: The Germans still occupied a large chunk of Russia, and the Red Army had not yet shown it could beat the Nazis in open combat; the Japanese still held more territory than any empire in history, and still had nearly a dozen carriers to our four or five; and there was no indication that the Brits could hold Burma. Indeed, with a few minor twists and turns, we could have lost Midway, the Russians could have lost Kursk, and the Second World War would have developed much, much differently.
> 
> Or consider, from the Union’s point of view, where we were in the spring of 1863. The Army of the Potomac had been soundly thrashed at all but a few battles — Antietam a significant exception — and commanders were being changed faster than Sandy Berger could shove documents down his pants. It looked bad. Yet below the surface, the South had lost a higher percentage of men-per-total forces committed than the North in every single battle except Fredricksburg. Lincoln knew that, and that’s why he was so frustrated with both the Radical Republicans and the Copperhead Democrats for trying to undercut him at every turn. Despite some battlefield defeats, the North was winning — yet only Lincoln could see it.
> 
> Lopez: How is the American military underestimated?
> 
> Schweikart: We are constantly underestimated because our natural tendency is to abhor war. We are not — contrary to the hysterical shrieks of the Cindy Sheehans and the madcap inanities of Michael Moore — a “militaristic” society. It takes a lot to make us “throw down.” What foreign powers don’t understand is that because our military is so representative of society as a whole, because it is not a group of elites who have purchased commissions, or slaves who are forced into service, our armed forces fight with a tenacity that never ceases to surprise our foes. The Germans were stunned after their first battles with us in World War I, battles in which they dealt us severe casualties due to our inadequate training. But the Germans also knew that we would not relent until we achieved victory. This stems from a fundamental misunderstanding of who Americans are, and how our military works. Yamamoto was one of the few enemies who “got it,” but he could not exert much influence over the Japanese warlords who deceived themselves into thinking along the lines of bin Laden: “a little bloodshed and the Americans will withdraw.”
> 
> Lopez: I did not know that Art Carney of Honeymooners fame was wounded by shrapnel while invading Normandy. Not to pick on Hollywood — especially given we’re talking draft vs. non-draft days — but it’s a bit of a different scene there in Tinseltown now?
> 
> Schweikart: The Hollywood stories in the book are amazing — I learned so much about that heroic generation. Many of those I discuss, of course, became stars after the war, but many were big names before Pearl Harbor and volunteered. Humphrey Bogart, who fought in World War I, attempted to join up even though he was way too old. Henry Fonda, already a star for his role in Of Mice and Men, and later an antiwar voice, nevertheless fought, as did Jimmy Stewart. Clark Gable, technically too old to serve, also joined up but his publicist requested special placement for him, to which General “Hap” Arnold uncategorically said “no.” Gable began as an enlisted man and became a general officer. One of the more ironic stories involved Werner Klemperer, who gained fame as “Col. Klink” on the TV show, Hogan’s Heroes. He was a prison-camp commandant — a policeman of sorts. Klemperer served in the U.S. Army, in Hawaii as . . . an MP!
> 
> So why, or when, did it change? I don’t know why, but the change came, as it did with the news media, in the 1960s, and my hunch is it started well before Vietnam. Some of it was self-selecting: As Hollywood got more left, it repelled patriots and engaged in some of its own “blacklisting.” There are abundant stories out there today of conservatives in Hollywood who cannot fly their colors. Moreover, I think there is a malignant elitism associated with the motion-picture industry today that, rather than entertaining, it is “making art” and therefore is engaged in political discourse. So they tend to think that they are not only too good to serve, but are above all that anyway.
> 
> Lopez: And writers, too — Ray Bradbury was a military propagandist?
> 
> Schweikart: One of the most stunning things I found was that Dr. Seuss, Theodor Geisel, was a war art propagandist. His wartime art is “in your face,” to say the least, featuring one “cartoon” in which Hitler and his fellow Nazis jokes in front of several Jews hanging from trees behind him, or another in which a buck-toothed Japanese Emperor is being attacked by American planes and bombs. Walt Disney, although a little more restrained than Dr. Seuss, produced numerous wartime propaganda films and training films using Donald Duck. His “Victory Through Air Power” unabashedly advocated bombing civilian populations in Germany and Japan until those nations surrendered. Japan was portrayed as a black octopus, ultimately killed by a “sword” of air power. When survival was on the line, it’s interesting how the artists and writers suddenly see the value of an American military.
> 
> Lopez: What about training? Are our guys and gals getting enough of it — character training included?
> 
> Schweikart: Ours is the finest-trained force in human history. Everyone I’ve spoken to agrees that if there is one key difference-maker on the battlefield, it is our men and women are trained, and our enemies — no matter how devious or unorthodox — are not. But this has been true going back to pre-World War II, when the U.S. Army concluded that the single best way to reduce American casualties was through better training, not necessarily better weapons. The Prussians showed in the 1870s that a well-trained army could annihilate an opposing force of equal size and even, perhaps, higher morale, for once the casualties start, morale fades without training.
> 
> As for character training, not long ago and exasperated Bill O’Reilly wondered why “we train soldiers in six weeks” and we still haven’t been able to train Iraqi soldiers. *The answer is that we aren’t training the Iraqis to be soldiers — many of them already were soldiers. We are, essentially, training them to be “Americans,” to have American values of sanctity of life, to learn from loss, to submit to civilian audit, and so on.* We’ve had 200 years to do that. Give the Iraqis a couple of years, Bill.
> 
> Lopez: How do protesters make soldiers better?
> 
> Schweikart: Conservatives hate to hear this one, but the fact is that since 1920 at least, the U.S. Army (and other service branches since) has been exceptionally sensitive to casualties. The military was shocked at how many ground combat deaths it had in World War I. Typically, antiwar protesters in America have had little success getting Americans worked up about either “collateral damage” to civilians or even brutality to enemy combatants if this occurred in the heat of battle. For example, there were instances of GIs sending home Japanese skulls from the Pacific in the Second World War — it was exceptionally rare, but even then, few people here at home got too concerned about it. Rather, since Korea, the only tactic that the antiwar Left has had any success with has been to play on American losses — the flag-draped caskets, the body bags, the scenes of carnage to “our boys.” The military figured that out some time ago, and has relentlessly addressed what it called after World War I “The Casualty Issue.” Simply put, the protesters’ focus on American losses has led our military to take fewer and fewer battle deaths. This wasn’t the primary factor — winning wars was — but it was an indirect and unintended consequence of the protesters. Santa Anna, in contrast, referred to his soldiers as so many “chickens,” and Zulu kings routinely tested the range of British rifles with the bodies of their warriors. Protesters have paradoxically made our soldiers more lethal than ever, in Patton’s words, making the other guy die for his country . . . or cause.
> 
> Lopez: Even Cindy Sheehan?
> 
> Schweikart: Every war has its whacko. In the Civil War it was Clement Valladigham — who, as it happens, is buried just across the street from where I teach. This war, it’s ”Mother Sheehan.” As long as she was in the “let’s save our sons and daughters” mode, she had some appeal to the mainstream of society. To the extent that she calls President Bush a “terrorist,” she has no impact on anything and no credibility, and, fortunately, she has drifted more to this extreme in the last year.
> 
> Lopez: So a prediction based on your historical survey: What we gonna do about Iran?
> 
> Schweikart: You hit the nail on the head: *Iran is likely next. Any serious presidential candidate for 2008 with a shred of credibility would already be taking this on (along with illegal immigration). My guess is that they will all ignore it, and allow the Iranians to a) get a bomb and b) do something horrible. The question then is: Will Bush leave office without addressing this? I suspect from what I know of Bush that he does not care what history thinks of him or what Reuters thinks of him*. He cares if he has left this country safer. Therefore, my not-so-bold prediction is if we have started to witness an obvious suppression of hostile activity in Iraq by late 2007, you might see a last-ditch diplomatic offensive followed by military action. It is necessary, but it won’t be pretty.
> 
> Lopez: How long does it take to write a book like yours?
> 
> Schweikart: Some books are in the works for years. I’ve taught a class that students call “Stirrups to Star Wars” for more than a decade, and have amassed much of the research while teaching this class. After completing A Patriot’s History of the United States with Mike Allen, I looked at all this stuff and concluded it could pretty much write itself. So the specific answer to your question is, less than a year to write, a decade to research.
> 
> Lopez: Why did you write it? Was there one catalyst?
> 
> Schweikart: I’ve loved Victor Hanson’s analysis in NRO, and use his Carnage and Culture for my classes. But I always wanted a brief, one-volume explanation of why we are so successful militarily, and the invasion of Afghanistan — which we completed in a matter of weeks, when the Soviets, with 80,000 men, could do it in years — convinced me that this was the time.
> 
> Lopez: Besides, say: We win! Hooraah! What’s the most important lesson from your book?
> 
> Schweikart: Military success does not come merely from great generals or high-falutin’ technology: *It comes from an ongoing, widespread set of values that make it phenomenally easy to turn civilians into well-trained, disciplined fighting troops*. Americans need to know that their fighting men and women reflect them — their sacrifices, their core beliefs, and their unrestrained optimism.
> 
> National Review Online - http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MGQwYmYzNDY2ZjdkYzliYWY3MjdmNThlODJlNmUxYmU


----------



## a_majoor

From Small Dead Animals: a report that the Al Qaeda was considering a poison gas attack in the New York subway system. One question left open is why the attack would be called off, given the nature of the AQ and their previous actions.

http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/archives/004149.html



> *Terror Aborted*
> 
> Exerpts of a new book by Ron Suskind reveal that;
> 
> Al-Qaeda terrorists came within 45 days of attacking the New York subway system with a lethal gas similar to that used in Nazi death camps. They were stopped not by any intelligence breakthrough, *but by an order from Osama bin Laden's deputy, Ayman Zawahiri*. And the U.S. learned of the plot from a CIA mole inside al-Qaeda.
> 
> [...]
> 
> U.S. intelligence got its first inkling of the plot from the contents of a laptop computer belonging to a Bahraini jihadist captured in Saudi Arabia early in 2003. It contained plans for a gas-dispersal system dubbed "the mubtakkar" (Arabic for inventive). Fearing that al-Qaeda's engineers had achieved the holy grail of terror R&D — a device to effectively distribute hydrogen-cyanide gas, which is deadly when inhaled — the CIA immediately set about building a prototype based on the captured design, which comprised two separate chambers for sodium cyanide and a stable source of hydrogen, such as hydrochloric acid. A seal between the two could be broken by a remote trigger, producing the gas for dispersal. The prototype confirmed their worst fears: "In the world of terrorist weaponry," writes Suskind, "this was the equivalent of splitting the atom. Obtain a few widely available chemicals, and you could construct it with a trip to Home Depot – and then kill everyone in the store."
> 
> The device was shown to President Bush and Vice President Cheney the following morning, prompting the President to order that alerts be sent through all levels of the U.S. government. Easily constructed and concealed, mass casualties were inevitable if it could be triggered in any enclosed public space.
> 
> Via Drudge. Posted by Kate at June 17, 2006 06:41 PM


----------



## a_majoor

Sometimes, a bit of humor is called for:


----------



## couchcommander

Turns out, as suspected, the US is manufacturing yet another crisis to further their interests.

http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewPrint&articleId=11539 (long read, give yourself 15 min)

Some important quotes:



> ....As the United States was beginning its military occupation of Iraq in April, the Iranians were at work on a bold and concrete proposal to negotiate with the United States on the full range of issues in the U.S.-Iran conflict.....
> 
> ...The proposal, a copy of which is in the author’s possession, offered a dramatic set of specific policy concessions Tehran was prepared to make in the framework of an overall bargain on its nuclear program, its policy toward Israel, and al-Qaeda.....
> 
> ....The proposal offered “decisive action against any terrorists (above all, al-Qaeda) in Iranian territory” and “full cooperation and exchange of all relevant information.”....
> 
> ....To meet the U.S. concern about an Iranian nuclear weapons program, the document offered to accept much tighter controls by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in exchange for “full access to peaceful nuclear technology.” It proposed “full transparency for security [assurance] that there are no Iranian endeavors to develop or possess WMD” and “full cooperation with IAEA based on Iranian adoption of all relevant instruments (93+2 and all further IAEA protocols).” That was a reference to new IAEA protocols that would guarantee the IAEA access to any facility, whether declared or undeclared, on short notice -- something Iran had been urged to adopt but was resisting in the hope of getting something in return.....
> 
> ....The Iranian proposal also offered a sweeping reorientation of Iranian policy toward Israel. In the past, Iran had attacked those Arab governments that had supported the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, and Tehran had supported armed groups that opposed it. But the document offered “acceptance of the Arab League Beirut declaration (Saudi initiative, two-states approach).” The March 2002 declaration had embraced the land-for-peace principle and a comprehensive peace with Israel in return for Israel’s withdrawal to 1967 lines. That position would have aligned Iran’s policy with that of the moderate Arab regimes.....
> 
> ....Nevertheless, within a few days, Rumsfeld and Cheney had persuaded Bush to cancel the May 21 meeting with Iranian officials. In a masterstroke, Rumsfeld and Cheney had shut down the only diplomatic avenue available for communicating with Iran and convinced Bush that Iran was on the same side as al-Qaeda.....
> 
> ....By the second half of 2003, American Iran policy had already begun to shift toward the issue of nuclear weapons, on which the neoconservative John Bolton, then the undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, played the lead role. The policy was to put pressure on Iran to force it to completely give up its nuclear fuel cycle by getting the IAEA to vote to take Iran’s case to the U.N. Security Council.....
> 
> ....Iran began negotiating on the nuclear issue with the United Kingdom, France, and Germany in September 2003 to avoid the Security Council and the prospect of sanctions, and possibly even U.S. warplanes. But Mohammed El Baradei, the chief of the IAEA, who had been meeting with Iranian officials about their nuclear program for months, knew that the essence of the problem was Iran’s unfulfilled need to negotiate a settlement with the United States. According to an account in Newsday earlier this year, El Baradei met with Powell in January 2004 to appeal to him for serious U.S. involvement in the negotiations, warning that negotiations were the only way the issue could be resolved. But Powell wouldn’t respond.....
> 
> ...When the IAEA voted in February to refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council due to concerns over its nuclear program, Iran responded by resuming uranium enrichment and, in April, announced progress in enrichment -- all in defiance of U.S. military threats. But analysts familiar with Iranian thinking believe that the enrichment is not for the purpose of acquiring nuclear weapons but to force the United States to negotiate a settlement with Iran. Najmeh Bozorgmehr, an Iranian journalist who has covered Iran policy for several years, says Iranian leaders are now convinced that they had to show the United States “we can give you a hard time” to induce the administration to negotiate. Bozorgmehr says the enrichment is “producing facts on the ground” that Iran hopes will lead to negotiations. *Trita Parsi says senior national security officials he interviewed in 2004 indicated that the rejection of Iran’s 2003 proposals had tilted the internal debate toward that view. “If the United States had engaged Iran in 2003,” Parsi says, “Iran would not be enriching now.*”.....


----------



## tomahawk6

Classic couchcommander. Its all the fault of the US ! Had the government just done what the Iranian's wanted we wouldnt be in this mess. You forget that the US policy under Clinton toward North Korea was to give the North Korean's nuclear reactors in exchange for a promise to use them for peaceful means.Today the NK's have nuclear weapons. Below are some of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's untterances.

"Israel must be wiped off the map."

“if we were permitted to hang two or three persons, the problems with the stock exchange would be solved for ever”

"To take Islam throughout the world and save its oppressed populations is a duty for all Muslims, but right now it is the Iranian polity that must do this, 
This movement must originate in Qom, Shiite and Iranian Islam's chief cultural centre. Qom forms our cultural calling card and credentials to revolutionise the current world order,"

“From the beginning of time, humanity has longed for the day when justice, peace, equality and compassion envelop the world. All of us can contribute to the establishment of such a world. When that day comes, the ultimate promise of all Divine religions will be fulfilled with the emergence of a perfect human being [12th Imam] who is heir to all prophets and pious men. He will lead the world to justice and absolute peace. O mighty Lord, I pray to you to hasten the emergence of your last repository, the promised one, that perfect and pure human being, the one that will fill this world with justice and peace.”

“Our revolution’s main mission is to pave the way for the reappearance of the 12th Imam, the Mahdi,” Ahmadinejad said in the speech to Friday Prayers leaders from across the country.


----------



## couchcommander

No, not all. But frequently.  ;D

More seriously, Clinton's foreign policies were almost as dysfunctional as Bush's - I'm not going to be an apologist for previous governments.

The point of the article still stands though - the US administration is trying to railroad the issue rather than exploring options. 

And I wouldn't automatically assume that Bush would win a "strange leader quote" fight with Ahmadinejad...  In the end, I trust neither.


----------



## tomahawk6

There are only two options when faced by a regime that is hell bent on acquiring nuclear weapons.
The choices ? Do nothing or strike them. Ahmadinejad truely believes in the coming of the 12th Imam. We may in fact see a clash between religious fundamentalists. I will put my money on Bush.
The alternative is the world making travel plans to visit a black rock in Mecca.


----------



## paracowboy

couchcommander said:
			
		

> The point of the article still stands though - the US administration is trying to railroad the issue rather than exploring options.


you prefer appeasement then, do you, Mr Chamberlain?


----------



## couchcommander

No. 

Clear and open demands, followed by negotiations, conducted in good faith and with a desire to resolve the issue (however in which we also ensure our fundamental requirements are not fettered away) If these are unable to resolve the issue, and we have sufficient evidence to justify killing lots of people, the direct application of force to specific targets to acheive specific limited objectives. i.e. not "take over Iran", but more along the lines of "destroy their capability to construct, support, and deliver nuclear arms". As I have advocated before in regards to NK, this should be followed by a policy of strict containment until they decide to come around - however I don't think the US would survive not having Iranian oil. 

IMHO at least.


----------



## Kirkhill

couchcommander, your bombard and besiege strategy results in the following:

A) a population that will suffer because of their leaders' actions, leaders' with questionable popularity now
B) a population that is likely to become more disgruntled because of the suffering imposed by your strategy
C) a population that is just a likely to rally round unpopular leaders and act out against you as overthrow the current leadership (an act likely to cause more suffering for which you will receive "credit")
D) a population that is likely to look askance at you when you finally realize that invasion was the only option 10 years ago - 

"Where were you when we needed you?" and "What took you so long?"

3 options - Bombard, Besiege, Invade.  The first two don't count because you can't bring matters to a conclusion - they just delay the inevitable and increase the suffering of the "average citizen".


----------



## GAP

Kirkhill said:
			
		

> 3 options - Bombard, Besiege, Invade.  The first to don't count because you can't bring matters to a conclusion - they just delay the inevitable and increase the suffering of the "average citizen".



There is a fourth, though I doubt the US can institute it....bring down the regime from within. The people may do that themselves, the west just has to subtly assist

my 2 cents


----------



## couchcommander

Kirkhill, 

Does the US have the capacity to invade to Iran? In my limited analysis I would say they may have the capability to overthrow the government, but to actually occupy and hold the place? no. Goals, IMO, especially ones dealing with so many lives (not just Iranian, but possibly those of our own armed forces), need to be set so that they are acheivable. 

Thus we're back to Bombard and Besiege. Yes, you are absolutely right the population will at first learn to hate us. This isn't a short term policy though. It is something that must be undertaken over the long term.

Over the long term, even the most radical leaders will be unable to get anything done and will fall from favour. In the end, like it has happened several times before, the country will eventually come around. Either the leaders will undertake it for their own survival, or the people will force their leaders to do it. 

GAP is right with the "bring down the regime from within" - if possible that's not a bad option. It has gone horribly wrong on several occasions though, and even when it does "work" the end state regime is not necessarily better than the one it replaced. Remember the tendancy for things to go more radical before they moderate.


----------



## Kirkhill

Regardless of the means used to "overthrow" the government there is no guarantee of the outcome.  I have no guarantee that I am not going to wake up in 9 months and discover that "Smilin' Jack" is the PM and that he has withdrawn us from NATO and NORAD.

All anybody can ever do is change the status quo.  What happens after that is anybody's guess.  

The only real questions to be asked are:

Is the status quo tolerable?
Is the risk manageable?
Are there any capabilities extant to change the status quo?

Beyond that it becomes a question of doing whatever is going to be done with the minimum of suffering to all parties concerned.


----------



## Kirkhill

Actually there is a better option:

Build Las Vegas across the border with the target state.  Create a no-tax zone.  Stock well with materials unavailable in target country.  Bombard daily with TV and Radio ads.  Send over Cruise Missiles with deep discount vouchers.  Accept target currency at par.  Maybe even add some Dollars to the loads of vouchers.

Let nature take its course. ;D


----------



## SeaKingTacco

> Build Las Vegas across the border with the target state.  Create a no-tax zone.  Stock well with materials unavailable in target country.  Bombard daily with TV and Radio ads.  Send over Cruise Missiles with deep discount vouchers.  Accept target currency at par.  Maybe even add some Dollars to the loads of vouchers



errr- you mean something like....Dubai?


----------



## Kirkhill

Popular location, Dubai?

How's the taxi service across the Gulf?

Perhaps something in Kurdistan would be more centrally located.


----------



## a_majoor

Options on Iran have been discussed ad nausium on several threads, and the general consensus (if any) is that we allow the "purple finger" strategy to undermine Iran from within (the long term solution), or if sufficient provocation exists, do a decapitating strike on the regime and Republican Guard, and let the people sort out the rest.

Iraq as a constitutional democracy with a consensual government and free market economy represents the main effort of the "purple finger" strategy (with Afghanistan being number two), and is thus a huge threat to the Theocracy of Iran. Their support of the insurgency in southern Iraq is evidence of how badly they need the Iraqis to fail.

Maybe Dubai can help out with some cash and casino staffs on six month rotations.


----------



## SeaKingTacco

> Popular location, Dubai?
> 
> How's the taxi service across the Gulf?
> 
> Perhaps something in Kurdistan would be more centrally located.



Kirkhill, 

It is unbelievable how much small boat traffic goes in and out of Dubai daily for every part of Southwest Asia, most especially Iran.  I've watched it on my radar and seen it with my own eyes.

Taxis?  There might as well be a bridge.  It's getting me wondering...just how much "moderate", capitalistic "trickle" is getting into Iran via Dubai?  Have we all been missing something fundamental happening?


----------



## Kirkhill

The thing that fascinates me most is how even in the most "dirigiste" or "communist" societies "capitalism" drives the economy.  Back in the days of the old Soviet Union, where the planned economy failed people lined up to get excess amounts of toilet paper to trade for toothpaste to trade for shoes.  

Capitalism, like some other stuff, happens - no matter what governments decree.  Even here in Canada we have the grey market the government tries to ignore/come to grips with.  And I am pretty sure that you must of found one or two "horse-traders" in Bosnia and Afghanistan.  They even have them in France I am told.

If there is a way to make money people will find it.  And you sparking up Dubai there, frankly I didn't put 2 and 2 together the way that you did.....  I have to believe that people visiting Dubai from Iran are taking back a different view.  After all the Iranian kids around Tehran are apparently heading for the hills on the weekends to get away from the Mullahs and do what boys and girls do.

Ultimately something similar contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union.  The only people the USSR could send abroad as spies and provocateurs were people close to the top.  They were the only ones that could be trusted.  However once they got to the West it was hard to convince themselves that the USSR was a workers' paradise.  

Unfortunately that strategy takes time - on the other hand it may be less costly in military hardware (cheaper to keep them parked than to run them) and someone is likely to be able to turn a profit at the same time. ;D


----------



## a_majoor

Market forces and the "Invisible Hand" will always find means of manifesting themselves. Just looking around here in Canada you can see such stunning examples as the "perverse incentives" in health care which make the desired outcome a patient dieing, preferably before they actually get expensive treatments, rather than actually doing something to make the person better.

What we consider the black or grey markets and corruption are just other expressions of market forces working around (or sometimes through) the system in order to satisfy supply and demand.

Sadly, despite five thousand years of recorded history and examples in almost every place you care to look, there are still (and apparently always will be) people who believe "up" is "down" and will attempt to upset the applecart of free expression, free choice and free markets in the name of Socialism, the "Revolution", "Social Justice", God, Allah, Zeus or whatever other term is the fancy of the day. Alas, the outcome of these fantasies are also always the same:



> If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - forever.



And this, more than anything else, is the reason we must fight and win at home and abroad.


----------



## Kirkhill

Arthur:

On the sunny side of your dismal image - stamping is a transitory act - if you want to do it forever you keep having to repeat yourself - for some reason the face just will not stay stamped, even according to your own examples.

So, if you want a vision of the future, imagine a human face - forever.  And no doubt somebody, somewhere will take up the task of stamping on it.  He'll go away though, maybe with a bit of help - just like all the others.


----------



## Sapper Bloggins

The story of today's conflict between al Qaeda and the west could be a palimpsest unwittingly obscuring the half-obliterated memory of a similar struggle from more than a thousand years ago: injured and humiliated common folk who prove susceptible to the call of a militant and avenging form of their religion; the manipulative radical ideology that promises its recruits an otherworldly reward in exchange for their making the ultimate sacrifice; the arrogant, self-satisfied occupying power whose chief goal is finding ways of extracting new profits from its possession.

There appears to be no political solution and no window on the future, other than the clarity of vision that a careful and empathetic rendering of history can provide.
There is, admittedly, much to learn, and better late than never: a rudimentary education in the historical complexities and continuities of Iraq and Iran.


----------



## a_majoor

Historical complexities? Just the age old impulse to gain and maintain power at all costs (the "Root Cause"tm of Terrorism)

How else can you explain behavior like this:http://www.backseatblogger.com/2006/07/02/children-used-as-human-shields/


----------



## a_majoor

Somalia looks like another front opening up, deja vu all over again.....

http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/archives/004228.html



> *Somalia Churning Out Terrorists*
> Bill Roggio ;
> 
> 
> As the situation in Somalia deteriorates and the al-Qaeda backed Islamic Courts Union (or al-Ittihad Mahakem al-Islamiya) consolidates power in the capital city of Mogadishu, the Ethiopian military has crossed the border into Somalia. Approximately 200-300 Ethiopian troops, about two companies including two armored platoons, have pushed upwards to 100 miles into Somali territory. It is unclear if their goal is to secure the lawless border, make a land grab or engage the militias of the Islamic Courts. The Ethiopian government denies reports its military has crossed the Somali border.
> 
> [...]
> 
> In 2002, a confidential report indicated Somalia contained 17 known operational terrorist training camps (see attached map). The environment in Somalia is said to compare to that of Afghanistan during the heyday of the Taliban. Terrorists from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Chechnya, Iraq and the Arabian peninsula are said to be flocking into Somalia to staff the camps or enter training. Camps are said to be training recruits to employ improvised explosive devices (roadside bombs or IEDs) to counter the expected Ethiopian armor. The Islamic Courts are also scouring the Communist-era weapons caches for anti-aircraft weapons, small arms, and explosives.
> 
> 
> It's looking more like pre-911 Afghanistan every day. I'm sure it's Bush's fault.


----------



## Scoobie Newbie

Send in the French Foreign Legion.


----------



## a_majoor

Back to Iran, perhaps with the application of a bit more effort by the Anglosphere West, we could bring the democratic movement to the tipping point:

http://thespiritofman.blogspot.com/2006/07/9th-of-july.html



> 9th of July is not just another day of year in history for majority of Iranians.
> 
> Today is the anniversary of the Iranian student uprising of 1999. It is being commemorated by numerous blog posts and demonstrations around the globe. Other anti-regime events also took place on this date and a few people may know about it.
> 
> In 1980, hundreds of pro-Shah elements of the Iranian armed forces, mainly air force, took part in a coup, led by the late prime minister Bakhtiar, against the ayatollahs. The coup, unfortunately, failed and thousands of brave servicemen executed by the regime in few weeks after the coup failed and many others purged from service. The plan was to bomb Khomeini's residence, seize the Radio & TV run by the revolutionary guards, and invite the royal family back to Iran. According to the regime's officials, Soviets had a hand in helping discover the whole plot against the government.
> 
> In 1999, thousands of pro-freedom students of different universities across Iran rised against the Islamic regime and the protests lasted more than 10 days. 17 students killed, hundreds wounded and thousands detained. I completely remember those days as I was preparing for school exams and had to move across the city of Tehran to get to school. Streets were full of angry people and students but the presence of anti-riot police, islamic militants known as Basij told us that regime was ready to crush the protests at any cost.
> 
> the 18th of Tir (9th of July) protests have become a symbol of violent struggle against the clerical establishment of Iran.
> 
> Watch this excellent clip (h/t Chester)
> 
> In 2003, similar protests erupted and lasted for more than 10 days in June resulting in arrests of 4000 thousand students.
> 
> Today Iranian people are demanding civil liberties and political freedoms, separation of religion and state, equality and justice (especially for women), the immediate release of all political prisoners and most importantly a Free Referendum to determine the future government of Iran through a democratic process.
> 
> It's important to remind the free world about the freedom movement of the Iranian people and spread the word to get international community support for the freedom Iranians are fighting for.
> 
> All we ask for, is to help us get rid of tyranny and be free.


----------



## xenobard

I don't know if the following article has been posted on this forum before, but I just came across it and found it quite interesting.  I'd be further interested to find out people's thoughts on it:



> Subject: Muslims, terrorists and  the USA....A different spin on Iraq war.
> This WAR is for REAL!
> Dr. Vernon Chong, Major  General, USAF, Retired
> Tuesday, July 12, 2005
> To get out of a  difficulty, one usually must go through it. Our country is
> now facing the most  serious threat to its existence, as we know it, that we
> have faced in your lifetime and mine (which includes WWII).
> The deadly seriousness is greatly compounded by the fact that there are very
> few of us who think we can possibly lose this war and even fewer who realize
> what losing really  means.
> First, let's examine a few basics:
> 1. When did the threat  to us start?
> Many will say September 11, 2001. The answer as far as the  United State is
> concerned is 1979, 22 years prior to September 2001, with the  following attacks
> on us:
> * Iran Embassy Hostages, 1979;
> * Beirut,  Lebanon Embassy 1983;
> * Beirut, Lebanon Marine Barracks 1983;
> * Lockerbie, Scotland Pan-Am flight to New York 1988;
> * First New York World  Trade Center attack 1993;
> * Dhahran, Saudi Arabia Khobar Towers Military  complex 1996;
> * Nairobi, Kenya US Embassy 1998;
> * Dares Salaam, Tanzania  US Embassy 1998;
> * Aden, Yemen USS Cole 2000;
> * New York World Trade  Center 2001;
> * Pentagon 2001.
> (Note that during the period from 1981 to 2001 there were 7,581 terrorist
> attacks worldwide).
> 2. Why were we  attacked?
> Envy of our position, our success, and our freedoms. The  attacks happened
> during the administrations of Presidents Carter, Reagan, Bush 1, Clinton and
> Bush 2. We cannot fault either the Republicans or Democrats as  there were no
> provocations by any of the presidents or their immediate  predecessors,
> Presidents Ford or Carter.
> 3. Who were the  attackers?
> In each case, the attacks on the US were carried out by Muslims.
> 4. What is the Muslim population of the World? 25%.
> 5. Isn't the Muslim Religion peaceful?
> Hopefully, but that is really not material. There is no doubt that the
> predominately Christian population of  Germany was peaceful, but under the
> dictatorial leadership of Hitler (who was also Christian), that made no
> difference. You either went along with the  administration or you were
> eliminated. There were 5 to 6 million Christians  killed by the Nazis for
> political reasons (including 7,000 Polish priests).  (see
> http://www.nazis.testimony.co.uk/7-a.htm
> <http://www.nazis.testimony.co.uk/7-a.htm> )
> Thus, almost the same number of Christians were killed by the Nazis, as the
> six million holocaust Jews who were killed by them, and we seldom heard of
> anything other than the Jewish atrocities. Although Hitler kept the world
> focused on the Jews, he had no hesitancy about killing anyone who got in his
> way of exterminating the Jews or of taking over the world - German, Christian or
> any others.
> Same with the Muslim terrorists. They focus the world on the US, but kill all
> in the way -- their own people or the Spanish, French or  anyone else. The point
> here is that just like the peaceful Germans were of no protection to anyone from
> the Nazis, no matter how many peaceful Muslims there may be, they are no
> protection for us from the terrorist Muslim leaders and  what they are
> fanatically bent on doing -- by their own pronouncements --  killing all of us
> "infidels." I don't blame the peaceful Muslims. What would  you do if the choice
> was shut up or die?
> 6. So who are we at war with?
> There is no way we can honestly respond that it is anyone other than the
> Muslim terrorists. Trying to be politically correct and avoid verbalizing this
> conclusion can well be fatal. There is no way to win if you  don't clearly
> recognize and articulate who you are fighting.
> So with  that background, now to the two major questions:
> 1. Can we lose this  war?
> 2. What does losing really mean?
> If we are to win, we must clearly answer these two pivotal questions
> We can definitely lose this war, and as anomalous as it may sound, the major
> reason we can lose is that so  many of us simply do not fathom the answer to the
> second question - What does  losing mean?
> It would appear that a great many of us think that losing  the war means
> hanging our heads, bringing the troops home and going on about our business,
> like post Vietnam. This is as far from the truth as one can  get.
> What losing really means is:
> We would no longer be the  premier country in the world. The attacks will not
> subside, but rather will  steadily increase. Remember, they want us dead, not
> just quiet. If they had  just wanted us quiet, they would not have produced an
> increasing series of  attacks against us, over the past 18 years. The plan was
> clearly, for terrorist to attack us, until we were neutered and submissive to
> them.
> We would of course have no future support from other nations, for fear of
> reprisals and for the reason that they would see, we are impotent and cannot
> help them.
> They will pick off the other non-Muslim nations, one  at a time. It will be
> increasingly easier for them. They already hold Spain  hostage. It doesn't
> matter whether it was right or wrong for Spain to withdraw  its troops from
> Iraq. Spain did it because the Muslim terrorists bombed their train and told
> them to withdraw the troops. Anything else they want Spain to do will be done.
> Spain is finished.
> The next will probably be France.  Our one hope on France is that they might
> see the light and realize that if we don't win, they are finished too, in that
> they can't resist the Muslim  terrorists without us. However, it may already be
> too late for France. France  is already 20% Muslim and fading fast!
> If we lose the war, our production, income, exports and way of life will all
> vanish as we know it.  After losing, who would trade or deal with us, if they
> were threatened by the  Muslims. If we can't stop the Muslims, how could anyone
> else?
> The  Muslims fully know what is riding on this war, and therefore are
> completely  committed to winning, at any cost. We better know it too and be
> likewise committed to winning at any cost.
> Why do I go on at such lengths about  the results of losing? Simple. Until we
> recognize the costs of losing, we  cannot unite and really put 100% of our
> thoughts and efforts into winning. And  it is going to take that 100% effort to
> win.
> So, how can we lose the  war?
> Again, the answer is simple. We can lose the war by "imploding."  That is,
> defeating ourselves by refusing to recognize the enemy and their  purpose, and
> really digging in and lending full support to the war effort if we are united,
> there is no way that we can lose. If we continue to be divided,  there is no way
> that we can win!
> Let me give you a few examples of how we simply don't comprehend the life and
> death seriousness of this  situation.
> President Bush selects Norman Mineta as Secretary of  Transportation. Although
> all of the terrorist attacks were committed by Muslim  men between 17 and 40
> years of age, Secretary Mineta refuses to allow profiling. Does that sound like
> we are taking this thing seriously? This is war! For the duration, we are going
> to have to give up some of the civil  rights we have become accustomed to. We
> had better be prepared to lose some of our civil rights temporarily or we will
> most certainly lose all of them  permanently.
> And don't worry that it is a slippery slope. We gave up  plenty of civil
> rights during WWII, and immediately restored them after the victory and in fact
> added many more since then.
> Do I blame President  Bush or President Clinton before him?
> No, I blame us for blithely assuming we can maintain all of our Political
> Correctness, and all of our civil rights during this conflict and have a clean,
> lawful, honorable war.  None of those words apply to war. Get them out of your
> head.
> Some have gone so far in their criticism of the war and/or the Administration
> that it  almost seems they would literally like to see us lose. I hasten to add
> that  this isn't because they are disloyal. It is because they just don't
> recognize  what losing means. Nevertheless, that conduct gives the impression to
> the  enemy that we are divided and weakening. It concerns our friends, and it
> does  great damage to our cause.
> Of more recent vintage, the uproar fueled by  the politicians and media
> regarding the treatment of some prisoners of war,  perhaps exemplifies best what
> I am saying. We have recently had an issue,  involving the treatment of a few
> Muslim prisoners of war, by a small group of  our military police. These are the
> type prisoners who just a few months ago were throwing their own people off
> buildings, cutting off their hands, cutting out their tongues and otherwise
> murdering their own people just for  disagreeing with Saddam Hussein.
> And just a few years ago these same  type prisoners chemically killed 400,000
> of their own people for the same  reason. They are also the same type of enemy
> fighters, who recently were  burning Americans, and dragging their charred
> corpses through the streets of Iraq.
> And still more recently, the same type of enemy that was and is providing
> videos to all news sources internationally, of the beheading of  American
> prisoners they held.
> Compare this with some of our press and  politicians, who for several days
> have thought and talked about nothing else  but the "humiliating" of some Muslim
> prisoners -- not burning them, not  dragging their charred corpses through the
> streets, not beheading them, but  "humiliating" them.
> Can this be for real?
> The politicians and  pundits have even talked of impeachment of the Secretary
> of Defense. If this  doesn't show the complete lack of comprehension and
> understanding of the seriousness of the enemy we are fighting, the life and
> death struggle we are in and the disastrous results of losing this war, nothing
> can.
> To bring  our country to a virtual political standstill over this prisoner
> issue makes us look like Nero playing his fiddle as Rome burned -- totally
> oblivious to what is going on in the real world. Neither we, nor any other
> country, can  survive this internal strife. Again I say, this does not mean that
> some of our  politicians or media people are disloyal. It simply means that they
> are  absolutely oblivious to the magnitude, of the situation we are in and into
> which the Muslim terrorists have been pushing us, for many  years.
> Remember, the Muslim terrorists stated goal is to kill all  infidels! That
> translates into ALL non-Muslims -- not just in the United States, but throughout
> the world.
> We are the last bastion of defense.
> We have been criticized for many years as being 'arrogant.'  That charge is
> valid in at least one respect. We are arrogant in that we  believe that we are
> so good, powerful and smart, that we can win the hearts and minds of all those
> who attack us, and that with both hands tied behind our back, we can defeat
> anything bad in the world!
> We can't!
> If we don't recognize this, our nation as we know it will not survive, and no
> other free country in the world will survive if we are defeated.
> And finally, name any Muslim countries throughout the world that allow freedom
> of speech,  freedom of thought, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, equal
> rights  for anyone -- let alone everyone, equal status or any status for women,
> or that have been productive in one single way that contributes to the good of
> the world.
> This has been a long way of saying that we must be united on this war or we
> will be equated in the history books to the self-inflicted fall of the Roman
> Empire . If, that is, the Muslim leaders will allow history books  to be written
> or read.
> If we don't win this war right now, keep a closeeye on how the Muslims take
> over France in the next 5 years or less They will  continue to increase the
> Muslim population of France and continue to encroach  little by little, on the
> established French traditions. The French will be  fighting among themselves,
> over what should or should not be done, which will  continue to weaken them and
> keep them from any united resolve. Doesn't that sound eerily familiar?
> Democracies don't have their freedoms taken away  from them by some external
> military force. Instead, they give their freedoms  away, politically correct
> piece by politically correct piece.
> And they  are giving those freedoms away to those who have shown, worldwide
> that they abhor freedom and will not apply it to you or even to themselves, once
> they are in power.
> They have universally shown that when they have taken over, they then start
> brutally killing each other over who will be the few who  control the masses.
> Will we ever stop hearing from the politically correct,  about the "peaceful
> Muslims"?
> I close on a hopeful note, by repeating  what I said above. If we are united,
> there is no way that we can lose. I hope now after the election, the factions in
> our country will begin to focus on the critical situation we are in, and will
> unite to save our country. It is your future we are talking about! Do whatever
> you can to preserve it.
> After  reading the above, we all must do this not only for ourselves, but our
> children, our grandchildren, our country and the world
> Whether Democrat  or Republican, conservative or liberal and that include the
> Politicians and media of our country and the free world!
> Please forward this to any you  feel may want, or NEED to read it. Our
> "leaders" in Congress ought to read it,  too. There are those that find fault
> with our country, but it is obvious to anyone who truly thinks through this,
> that we must UNITE!


----------



## bilton090

Hit the nail on the head on that one ! +100 , good read !


----------



## bilton090

couchcommander said:
			
		

> No.
> 
> Clear and open demands, followed by negotiations, conducted in good faith and with a desire to resolve the issue (however in which we also ensure our fundamental requirements are not fettered away) If these are unable to resolve the issue, and we have sufficient evidence to justify killing lots of people, the direct application of force to specific targets to acheive specific limited objectives. i.e. not "take over Iran", but more along the lines of "destroy their capability to construct, support, and deliver nuclear arms". As I have advocated before in regards to NK, this should be followed by a policy of strict containment until they decide to come around - however I don't think the US would survive not having Iranian oil.
> 
> The U.S. imports more oil from Canada than any other country in the world !


----------



## Scoobie Newbie

http://www.eia.doe.gov/neic/rankings/crudebycountry.htm

Rank Country of Origin Thousand Barrels/day 
1 Canada   1,616 
2 Mexico   1,598 
3 Saudi Arabia   1,495 
4 Venezuela   1,297 
5 Nigeria   1,078 
6 Iraq   655 
7 Angola   306 
8 Kuwait   241 
9 United Kingdom   238 
10 Ecuador   232 
11 Algeria   215 
12 Russia   158 
13 Norway   143 
14 Colombia   142 
15 Gabon   142 
16 Argentina   59 
17 Brazil   51 
18 Trinidad and Tobago   49 
19 Indonesia   34 
20 Australia   21 
21 Libya   18 
22 Cameroon   18 
23 Guatemala   18 
24 Malaysia   18 
25 Brunei   15 
26 China, People’s Republic of   14 
27 Congo (Kinshasa) *    14 
28 Oman   10 
29 Congo (Brazzaville)   8 
30 United Arab Emirates   5 
31 Ivory Coast   5 
32 Qatar   4 
33 Yemen   4 
34 Denmark   2 
35 Peru   1 
36 Syria   1 
37 Thailand   1 
  Other   158 
  Total   10,088 
  Persian Gulf **    2,400 

Includes crude oil imported for storage in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

* Formerly Zaire 
**Includes Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates.


----------



## couchcommander

I should clarify - it seems to me that the impact of removing Iranian oil from the market would have quite an impact on the cost of oil, posing a problem, especially for the US. 

.02 anywho, anyone who is truely informed can confirm/deny this?


----------



## a_majoor

Well couch, the post just above yours breaks down who produces what, and Iran isn't even broken out separately, but simply included in the "Persian Gulf".

While oil is fungible (i.e. a barrel of oil is pretty much the same wherever it comes from), in practical terms most of the oil imported into the United States comes from South America,the Carribean, and Canada. The Middle East exports most of its oil to Europe, China and India, which goes some way to explaining the attitude of appeasement that many European nations have. Removing Iranian oil will cause some shock, but the other producers will scramble to make up the shortfall, to cash in on the potential profits.

I suspect that the cumulative outcome of escalating oil prices will be the introduction of inexpensive (in relative terms) petroleum substitutes such as bio diesel, liquefied coal and synthetic fuels made from natural gas, which will have the paradoxical effect of dropping oil prices to the great benefit of nations like India and China. Pulling the price rug from under the feet of Saudi Arabia and Iran would destabilize their current regimes and dry up a lot of funding for terrorism, on the other hand, it will also have a negative effect on Iraq, which is establishing a consensual government and free market but will see its major export lose much of its value.


----------



## a_majoor

Michael Lendeen sums up the situation is the Middle East (SW Asia), but there are further currents running deeper; the Caucus, East Africa (particularly the takeover of part of Somalia by a Taliban like Islamic extremest faction), continuing fighting in Afghanistan, reservoirs of enemy in India and the Phillipines, and the continuing menace of home grown terrorists.

We can certainly subdivide the theaters according to geography, major players etc, but it should be long past apparent that this is a global conflict, and we should start preparing to accept the only way to protect the Western, democratic and free market civilization we live in is to start moving to a war footing. Once the Aglosphere mobilizes, there is no nation or coalition that can stand against us, and once the cancerous regimes which cause so much misery are crushed, then no nation or group of nations can rebuild these parts of the world with the speed and lasting results that we can (see Germany, Japan and South Korea for a few examples).

http://article.nationalreview.com/print/?q=NDE4MDA3NDUyYjA0ZGY1MzQ4NjM5NjM1MWY4NDVkZGM=



> *The Same War*
> Hezbollah, natch.
> 
> By Michael Ledeen
> 
> No one should have any lingering doubts about what’s going on in the Middle East. It’s war, and it now runs from Gaza into Israel, through Lebanon and thence to Iraq via Syria. There are different instruments, ranging from Hamas in Gaza to Hezbollah in Syria and Lebanon and on to the multifaceted “insurgency” in Iraq. But there is a common prime mover, and that is the Iranian mullahcracy, the revolutionary Islamic fascist state that declared war on us 27 years ago and has yet to be held accountable.
> 
> It is very good news that the White House immediately denounced Iran and Syria, just as Ambassador Khalilzad had yesterday tagged the terrorist Siamese twins as sponsors of terrorism in Iraq. For those who doubt the Iranian hand, remind yourself that Hezbollah is a wholly owned subsidiary of the mullahcracy (with Syria providing some supplies, and free run of the territory), and then read what Iraq the Model had to say yesterday, Wednesday:
> 
> Hizbollah is Iran's and Syria's partner in feeding instability in Iraq as there were evidence that this terror group has a role in equipping and training insurgents in Iraq and Hizbollah had more than once openly showed support for the “resistance” in Iraq and sponsored the meetings of Baathist and radical Islamist militants who are responsible for most of the violence in Iraq.
> 
> Notice, please, that he says Iran “sponsored the meetings of Baathist and radical Islamist militants...” He is talking Sunnis here, the same Sunnis who, according to CIA deep thinkers and scads of academic experts, cannot possibly work closely with Shiites like, ahem, the mullahs of Tehran. Iraq the Model isn’t burdened by this wisdom, and so he just reports what he sees on the ground in his own country.
> 
> Notice also that over the weekend there was a “security summit” in Tehran, involving all of Iraq’s neighbors, at which Iran’s moonbat President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made one of his trademark understatements about Israel. “The existence of this regime will bring nothing but suffering and misery for people in the region,” he mildly commented, and then said that the anger of the people might soon “lead to a vast explosion that will know no boundaries.”
> 
> Sounds to me like he knew something before the rest of us. As well he should, because Iran has been quite busy in Lebanon of late. The Lebanese Tourism Ministry’s Research Center announced an amazing statistic in early July: in the first six months of the year, 60,888 Iranian tourists visited Lebanon. No other Asian country came close (the Philippines ranked second, with a bit over 12,000). I don’t think that there’s enough disposable income in mullahland to cover the expenses of more than ten thousand people a month headed for the Beirut beaches. Do you think, as I do, that a goodly number of those “tourists” were up to no good? Maybe some of them were working for the Revolutionary Guards Corps? Or were Hezbollah operations people? I’ll bet you your favorite farm that one of them was the world’s most wanted man, Imad Mughniyah, the operations chieftain of Hizbollah, the world’s most lethal terrorist organization.
> 
> Actually I won’t bet; it would be unethical. We know that Mughniyah flew to Damascus a while back with Ahmadinejad, and went to Lebanon to work with his buddies.
> 
> In this war, there is no meaningful distinction between Iran and Syria, they work in tandem. It’s just that Iran gives the orders and Syria obeys.
> 
> There’s a lot of fanciful analysis of the recent expansion of the war, revolving around a general “why?” and a more specific “why now?” Someone said that Iran was trying to distract world attention from the upcoming U.N. showdown over the mullahs’ atomic program, which seems silly to me. A U.N. debate serves Iran’s interest. It deflects attention from our growing awareness of Iran’s centrality in Iraq, and the urgency of going after the regimes in Tehran and Damascus. That is where Iran’s doom lies, not in the endless charade about the nukes.
> 
> I don’t think it is worth our time and energy to try to answer the “why now?” except to agree with Allahpundit who remarked that there does seem to be something special about dates numbered “11.” The important thing to keep in mind is that both the Gaza and northern Israel attacks were planned for quite a while, which means that Iran wanted this war, this way. It isn’t just a target of opportunity or a sudden impulse; it’s part of a strategic decision to expand the war.
> 
> Iran has been at war with us all along, because that’s what the world’s leading terror state does. The scariest thing about this moment is that the Iranians have convinced themselves that they are winning, and we are powerless to reverse the tide. As I reported here several months ago, Khamenei told his top people late last year that the Americans and Israelis are both politically paralyzed. Neither can take decisive action against Iran, neither can sustain prolonged conflict and significant casualties. Meanwhile, the Supreme Leader said, the terrorists are all working for Iran, and we will expand the terror war.
> 
> Don’t think for a moment that they worry about victims in Gaza or Lebanon. They are delighted to see Israel fighting on two fronts, because they will use the pictures from the battlefield to consolidate their hold over the fascist forces in the region. After a few days of fighting, I would not be surprised to see some new kind of terrorist attack against Israel, or against an American facility in the region. An escalation to chemical weapons, for example, or even the fulfillment of the longstanding Iranian promise to launch something nuclear at Israel. They meant it when they said it, don’t you know?
> 
> The only way we are going to win this war is to bring down those regimes in Tehran and Damascus, and they are not going to fall as a result of fighting between their terrorist proxies in Gaza and Lebanon on the one hand, and Israel on the other. Only the United States can accomplish it.
> 
> Last week, President Mikheil Shaakashvili of free Georgia came to Washington and reminded us–not that it was much noticed — of America’s revolutionary mission. But President Bush heard it. “I just sent over to President Bush the letter that Georgian freedom fighters sent...seven years ago, and it never made it to the White House. It was intercepted by KGB and all the people who wrote it were shot,” Mr. Saakashvili said during a visit with the president in the Oval Office. “I'm sure lots of people out there in Korea (and he might well have added, Syria and Iran) are writing similar letters today. And I'm sure that those letters will, eventually, (arrive)...because that's a part of the freedom agenda that President Bush has and we strongly believe in.”
> 
> As do millions of Syrians and Iranians. And you know what? Millions of Arabs all over the Middle East do too. Give them a chance to fight for their freedom, as we did with the Georgians. The longer we dither, the more likely it becomes that we will sadly and unnecessarily find ourselves in a military confrontation of some sort, with all the terrible consequences that entails.
> 
> Faster, please. Your options are narrowing. You cannot escape the mullahs. You must either defeat them or submit to their terrible vision. There is no other way.
> 
> — Michael Ledeen, an NRO contributing editor, is most recently the author of The War Against the Terror Masters. He is resident scholar in the Freedom Chair at the American Enterprise Institute.


----------



## couchcommander

Hey Mr. Majoor,

I'm all for the development of alternative fuel sources (in fact my leftist world would perferr the development of alternative energy sources period), and you are of course right on in that increasing the price will drive the development of these alternatives.

A quick google turns up both sides of the argument:

There is a view that it would be horrible:

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/embargo-on-oil-too-costly-industry-chief-says/2006/01/15/1137259944361.html

And your view that there would be a temporary shock followed by an declination:

http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0327/p17s01-cogn.html


----------



## a_majoor

Lots of potential rotos coming up:

http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/archives/004317.html



> *The Wider War*
> Bill Whittle, in Strength (an essay from May 2004, you should read or read again); http://www.ejectejecteject.com/archives/000099.html
> 
> Finally, consider this: Muslims are angrily at war with Buddhists in East Asia. Muslims are enraged with Animists in Africa. Of course, none of this approaches the sheer hatred that Muslims bear towards Hindus in the South Asia peninsula. And this foaming hatred blanches compared to the white-hot fury Muslims feel for the Christian American Crusaders. And this fury is but a candle to the incandescent, boiling, supernova of murder they feel toward the Jews.
> 
> Does anyone beside me detect a pattern here? You know, my Dad told me once, “Bill, if more than three people in your life are utter, total assholes, then maybe it’s you.”
> 
> Developments in the under-reported situation in Somalia; http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2006/07/20/africa/AF_GEN_Somalia.php
> 
> Ethiopian troops in armored vehicles rolled into Somali Thursday and set up a camp near the home of the interim president, residents said, less than a day after Islamic militants reached the outskirts of the base of a U.N.-backed, but largely powerless government.
> 
> A leader of the Islamic group controlling large parts of southern Somalia demanded that Ethiopian troops withdraw. "We will declare Jihad if the Ethiopian government refuses to withdraw their troops from Somalia. They must withdraw as soon as possible ... We will wait for some time to see if they respect our demands," Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed told The Associated Press.
> 
> A spokesman for the Ethiopian government had said that his country would protect Somalia's transitional government from attack by the Somali Islamic militias. Numerous witnesses told The AP that Ethiopian soldiers arrived Thursday afternoon in Baidoa, the only town held by the government, 240 kilometers (150 miles) northwest of Mogadishu and about 150 kilometers (100 miles) east of the Ethiopian border.
> 
> [...]
> 
> Militia loyal to Supreme Islamic Courts Union reached within 35 kilometers (20 miles) of Baidoa on Wednesday, prompting the government to go on high alert in anticipation of an attack. The militia was expected to pull back on Thursday, court officials said.
> 
> The Supreme Islamic Courts Council militia seized Mogadishu and most of the rest of southern Somalia last month and has shown signs of planning to install strict religious rule, sparking fears it was a Taliban-style regime. The U.S. has accused the militia of links to al-Qaida that include sheltering suspects in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.


----------



## Edward Campbell

I think that Jeffrey Simpson is suggesting that Islam may be on the verge of the sort of _reformative_ ‘clash within a civilization’ which I believe is a necessary precursor to an _enlightenment_ which, I believe again, is necessary if Islam is to exist at all, in the 22nd century, much less co-exist with anyone else.  (I say ‘I think’ because Simpson is, _comme d’habitude_, convoluted and obscure.)

Here is what he says in today’s _Globe and Mail_ – reproduced here under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20060722.wcosimp0722/BNStory/Front/home


> Can Islam co-exist with itself?
> 
> JEFFREY SIMPSON
> 
> The much-discussed clash of civilizations assists less in understanding the world than the clash within a civilization. Islam and other religions can co-exist; more troubling is whether Islam can co-exist with itself.
> 
> Just now, world attention focuses on another spasm of intense violence in the almost six-decade-long quarrel between Israel and some or all of its neighbours.
> 
> That quarrel, central to which is the apparently irreconcilable requirement of Israel's right to exist and the Palestinians' need for their own state, is but one manifestation of a worldwide debate/division within Islamic civilization. And that debate is about how Islam relates to other faiths and civilizations.
> 
> Conventionally, but wrongly, this debate is described as one between “moderates” and “terrorists” or “extremists” or “militants.” A multitude of shadings colours each word, not to mention the many strands of Islam from purist, astringent ones to sensuous Sufism. The greatest cleavage, between Sunnis and Shiites, is becoming even more intense.
> 
> Tensions almost everywhere in the Islamic world, often accompanied by violence, reveal the cross-cutting strands of Islam, at a minimum between those who wish to co-exist with other civilizations and those who do not. Some of these tensions, to be fair, are more about ethnicity and language than religious interpretation, as with the Kurds in Turkey. Other clashes within Islam are between civilizations, as between Persian Iran and Arab Iraq under Saddam Hussein.
> 
> In Southeast Asia, Islamic terrorist violence has marked Indonesia and the Philippines, while a militant form of Islam has infected northern Malaysia. In Thailand, Islamic groups have committed terrorist acts in the southernmost provinces, even though most Muslims there want no part of violence. Pakistan, a state created so the Muslims of British India could have their own country, remains internally riven by cleavages, many of them ethnic but some over how to marry Islam to the state. In Algeria, a purist Muslim group actually won an election, but the military annulled it. The fear of what a free election might produce is among the reasons why various Arab regimes won't organize elections, except sham ones.
> 
> In Afghanistan, the Taliban and its sympathizers continue to provoke instability, desiring to replace the government with one based on a ferociously intolerant interpretation of Islam. In the West Bank and Gaza, Hamas rejectionists (of Israel as a “Western” intrusion into an Islamic part of the world) battle with Fatah, a group that begrudgingly and belatedly became wedded to a “two state” solution. Lebanon is split not just between Christians and Muslims, but among Muslim communities, the splits having produced a confusing civil war and ongoing strife.
> 
> In sub-Saharan Africa, this same conflict appears between those Muslims who want to accommodate others and those who want to dictate to them, often violently. In Sudan, Muslim raiders kill black Africans, the “others,” in Darfur. In Somalia, Muslim warlords have just been replaced by a gang of Muslim purists.
> 
> No amount of political correctness can obscure the fact that, although not all terrorists are Muslims, many of them are. They organize themselves differently depending on circumstance, aim at different targets, pop up in different parts of the world. Like all fanatics, they purport to speak for the future and represent the people, especially those oppressed not only by colonial outsiders from another civilization but those within Islam who co-operate with the outsiders. Osama bin Laden typifies this dual rage.
> 
> In some (but not all) Western societies, this rage has inspired terrorist cells. Scattered mosques, imams and websites preach the purity of the faith and the threats to it from decadent Western civilization. Of course, these cells represent a tiny fragment of Islamic communities in Canada, the United States, Europe and Australia. But that police have broken up what they insist are terrorist cells in such peaceful countries as Canada and Australia illustrates that no nation can remain immune from this fight within Islamic civilization. It threatens us, as well as other Muslims.
> 
> Christendom featured ferocious doctrinal fights that shaped whole countries, inspired rebellions and revolutions, ignited wars that lasted decades — and also provoked a clash of civilization with the Ottomans, aboriginals, Africans, Hindus, Confucians and just about every other non-Christian group in the world. Think of the Christian countries of Europe racing to discover new lands, planting the cross of Christ, battling “others” in the name of one variation within the faith.
> 
> History suggests the battle within Islam — about interpreting the faith, applying it to government, directing how Muslim communities should relate to “others,” projecting hope for those without much of it, explaining the sorrows of the present by reference to a golden past, rationalizing lying and violence — will define our world for a very long time indeed.
> 
> jsimpson@globeandmail.com



His opening sentence is nonsense.  Huntington’s _Clash of Civilizations_ is a highly successful and useful model precisely because it does explain what we see around us.  Simpson is correct that the _clash_ with Islam deserves our attention.

I see several competing factions:

•	The East Asians – probably already _enlightened_ but under intense pressure to abandon their modern, tolerant, highly successful secular version of Islam and adopt the medieval _Arab_ or equally medieval _Persian_ versions;

•	The Central and West Asians who have already abandoned secularism and modernity;

•	Ditto the Persians;

•	The Arabs – who never gave modernity a chance in any meaningful way, except, perhaps, in Egypt and Palestine in the ‘20s and ‘30s;

•	The North-East Africans who are under the influence of the Arabs; and

•	The North-West Africans who were, also, briefly, modern but are slipping/have slipped backwards.

I agree with Dr. Wafa Sultan – see: http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/47695/post-414487.html#msg414487 – who says that the _clash_ is between modernity and barbarism.  While I suspect that an overwhelming majority of individual Muslims in the Far East, Central and West Asia, Persia, Arabia and Africa want to be modern and to live modern, secular, albeit _socially conservative_ lives – just like many, many North Americans – I believe that the _intelligentsia_ throughout all those regions is equally or more committed to moving everyone back, waaaay back to an 8th century Middle Eastern _paradise_ where people like them rule over everyone else.  I think Dr. Sultan’s provocative choice of the word barbarism is apt because the 8th century was a barbarous time throughout Europe, the Near East and West Asia – only South and East Asia were anything like _civilized_ by any sensible definition of that word.

I agree with Simpson that it is only a tiny minority within Islam which is virulently anti-Western and advocates/uses terrorism to advance its cause - the problem is that the entire Muslim world is starved for information and opinion is easily swayed by the barbarous intelligentsia which controls most of the information flow; thus the terrorists are painted as heroes and martyrs and the people most Muslims want to emulate (that would be us) are made out to be monsters.  Propaganda works – even, maybe especially, the crude kind.

We need to turn Muslims, especially that tiny minority which is our declared enemy, inwards – we need to remind them that the battle is for the soul of Islam.

Then we need to arm and equip those who are not part of the barbarous intelligentsia and terrorist fellow travellers.  We need not be too careful about who we support and it should be practical, physical – *never moral* – support: arms and money.  These revolutionaries will not be our friends, much less our allies – they will not thank us and we should not act in any manner which deserves thanks.  Our aim is to turn the entire _Islamic Crescent_ into a charnel house – for decades – in the hope that some faction which supports religious *reformation* will emerge powerful enough to start that process.  This is, as Simpson says, the work of generations.  I see it, as a start, as a new _Thirty Years War_ (just as ferocious, too) followed, sometime later, by an _enlightenment_ (which took us a century to accomplish).

I repeat: we are not at war against terror or even all terrorists.  After all we have used terror ourselves (what do you think Churchill meant when he said _”Set Europe ablaze”_ – was he going to invite the Germans to a fall festival complete with bonfires?) and we have decorated our own Canadian terrorists who served in SOE.  We are at war with some movements which, generally, share a few Characteristics: they are _Islamic_, they crave the barbarous medieval and reject the modern, they are intolerant – they are fundamentalists who *believe*, firmly, that they and only they are ‘right’ and, by and large, they are Arabic or Persian by ‘culture’.

The way to defang them, in the short term, is to turn them against the rest of the Islamic world.  The only way to defeat them is to force them to defeat one another until the horrors of internecine war requires them to reform and enlighten themselves.

It is a pity but I am convinced t is the only rational long term plan.


----------



## Kirkhill

If government is about governing, limiting - a governor is not only a person it is an inanimate object that prevents an engine from being operated at its maximum, unsustainable limit and instead limits the engine to operations in a sustainable, comfortable zone - then government's primary function is not to defend its subjects but to control its subjects.

It controls its subjects to their benefit otherwise it doesn't long keep their support.

It also controls its subjects to the benefit of their neighbours.  By keeping the neighbours happy then it leaves the subjects free to continue their daily life unhindered.  I have heard and used the analogy of:  bear on a chain, bear in a cage, bear in a zoo, bear in a park or bear at large - which one is free?  None is completely free because their ability to act is always constrained or governed.  Even if the bear is unaware of it actions have consequences.  A bear at large, a free bear, killing a person is likely to end up dead at the hand of a government in which it has no active participation.

The role of the government then becomes that of agent to negotiate the greatest degree of freedom for its subjects in consultation with their neighbours's governing agent.

An acceptable and successful government is one that negotiates that goal and maintains that state of affairs.

However, people being who they are, no government can be sure that every person within the boundaries they claim will support their decisions - even if the majority does.  Equally they can't be sure that every person within their boundaries will accept the limits that have been negotiated with the neighbours and accepted by the subjects of the government.  At that point, for a government to maintain credibility both with its neighbours and its own subjects which have, perhaps reluctanctly, accepted the need for limits and restrictions, it must be able to act against those that oppose it.

When persuasion and bribery don't work then coercion is left.  The government needs coercive power and needs to be willing to use it against its own subjects.  

In the english speaking world we have become used to splitting soldiers from police.  Soldiers face external enemies and are allowed a freer hand with deadly force.  Once upon a time it was virtually an ungoverned use.  Police face internal enemies and are tightly controlled as to how they can conduct there activities.  This is necessary because if the government gives its agents a free hand with deadly force is not likely to maintain the support of the subjects for long.

And yet, at the same time, that deadly force must be deployed within borders.  The government and its agents will not be popular with the people being subjected.  Ultimately though it must prevail otherwise its credibility with the neighbours and its supportive subjects, hopefully the majority, will be damaged or destroyed.  At that point either chaos prevails or the neighbours take a hand in matters and try to sort things out themselves.  Thus Lebanon and Afghanistan, part of the old USSR, not to mention most of Africa and now Iraq.

It seems that there are already ample destabilizing forces at play that we don't need or want to create more.  

What we do need, IMHO, is to create more stabiliizing forces capable of exerting control, but, that are also capable of garnering the support of their subjects and also the acquiescence if not support, of their neighbours.  Afghanistan is a great model in this regard and frankly Iraq is having to fight its way down the same path.  My Scottish Ancestors of which you have all heard too much, did not come easily or willingly to the Enlightenment that lead them to help create the modern institutions that govern Canada, the US, Britain, Australia, India and many more.  They were beaten over the head for many centuries before they saw the light.  Some will no doubt say that that is typically Scottish tendency.  Anybody else would only have taken decades to come to the same conclusion.

Governing is never going to be popular.  Policing still less so.  When police are confronted by subjects that won't be subjects then Soldiering is required.  

The only question that remains is who is going to do the Governing, Policing and Soldiering.  Is it going to be done by the community or by the neighbours?  If it is done by the neighbours against the wishes of the community history suggests that that solution won't last for long.  If it is done by the community, acting against itself, there is the risk of the policing not being accepted.  They and the government can stand accused of toadying to the neighbours.  Ultimately Civil War is a possibility.  Again we can look at Lebanon,  Afghanistan and Iraq.  However, once those battles have been fought, once a level of acceptance and acquiescence is achieved then those communities, like Britain and the US become relatively stable. At least until generations pass and history is forgotten.

We don't need to foment more instability.  What we would be better doing is doing more of what is being done in Afghanistan and frankly what has been done successfully in the Gulf States.  I am thinking particularly of Oman.  As well you might consider Jordan.

Oman in the 60's and 70's was as backward as Afghanistan.  It was ripe for destabilisation to the possible advantage of Russia just as happened in Aden and Yemen. Destabilisation doesn't guarantee control of the outcome.  The solution to Oman was to have the modern son overthrow the mediaeval father, thereby keeping bloodlines and belief-systems intact but setting the stage for a different approach to governance that ultimately allowed the new Sultan to gather and maintain enough support from his own population that he found people willing to tackle their fellow subjects and bring them into line with the will of the majority.  The Sultan's Army and Police were trained, and supported and often accompanied by foreigners (Brits) but ultimately they created their own free-standing institutions.  Jordan was a similar situation.  

Those that might argue that Jordan, Oman and Malaysia are unsuccessful solutions because there is continuing unrest and continuing use of coercion, not to mention bribery and persuasion, to maintain stability might give a thought to the fact that even in Canada, the US and my homeland of Scotland unrest continues.  Strikes happen.  Blockades happen.  Insurrection happens (how else to describe Caledonia, Gustafsen Lake, Ipperwash and Oka or riots in Montreal, Seattle, Detroit, Los Angeles, Chicago, or those of the Thatcher era).  Governing constantly requires active policing and occasionally soldiering.

And once in a while the neighbours have to be reminded by soldiers to keep their noses out of the affairs of others.

I don't think that the willy-nilly fomentation of chaos is going to get where we need to be.  I think that we are going to have to do something much harder.  Forego the notion of allowing people to pick their own governments unhindered by the wishes of the neighbours.  We have to make people understand that the government is as much a creature of the neighbours as it is the domestic population.

That means that we actively get involved in selecting governors and saying that these governors of yours and these policies of yours are acceptable to us.  These ones aren't.  Pick who you like but if your pick presents a threat to us and ours, either by commission or by negligent omission, then be aware that we will take matters into our own hands.

If your lawn isn't being maintained to the standards of the neighbourhood and is devaluing our property the we will require you to cut the lawn, or we will cut it for you.

The solution is not in creating chaos.  It is in creating order with the lightest possible hand.


----------



## a_majoor

Wether you agree with Edward or not, the conditions for a "Thirty Years War" already exists inside South West Asia. there are three major competing visions for regional hegemony in the area, Shia Theocracy, Wahhabi theocracy and secular Ba'athist rule. The Ba'athists have received a severe body blow from OIF but are still active and in control of Syria, the Shia theocrats are working towards nuclear weapons and a regional "strike force" in the Hezbollah, while the Wahhabi's have spread their venom across East Africa, inside Pakistan and Afghanistan, and are making inroads in Indonesia and yes, the West as well. 

In crude terms, the Shia theocrats (Persians) are in the lead, with a powerful State apparatus and concentration of forces. The Ba'athists still have potential, given their control of a Syria and all the advantages of having access to the power of the State, but are currently handmaidens to Iran in a marriage of convenience. The Saudi Wahhabists have the advantage of global dispersion, so will have to be rooted out through a wide arc of the world, a daunting task for the West, much less the Iranians.

Although a "vulture" strategy of allowing South West Asia to implode and picking up the pieces seems superficially advantageous, historical analogies suggest otherwise. We already know the nations of "Old Europe" were double dealing with Ba'athist Iraq in terms of nuclear technology in the 1970's, The United States played off Iraq and Iran in an attempt to reach equilibrium, and Old Europe and Russia were into "Oil for Food" in the 1990's. We also know China is seeking ties with Iran as a way of securing access to oil. Like it or not, these nation's entanglements have the potential of intensifying the wars as they support their favorites, as well as creating potential expansions of the conflict(s) as the Imperial sponsors are tempted to intervene directly to shore up their positions or take advantage of their opponent's weakness.

The other disadvantage of the "vulture" strategy is Darwinian selection. The eventual victors will be the most adaptable, vicious and intelligent group left, and there is no grantee they will be the harbingers of the "Enlightenment". It is far more probable they will carry out the "Counter reformation" instead, with even worse consequences for Islam, that region of the world and Western Civilization.


----------



## GAP

So what's the ultimate outcome? One of the three win out, with or without the "wests'" help and that leaves a radical Islamic force (for want of a better word) and the "west" . Do they then go toe to toe or is it going to be like the cold war where each side used proxies?


----------



## Kirkhill

> Wether you agree with Edward or not, the conditions for a "Thirty Years War" already exists inside South West Asia.



Agreed entirely although given that the recalcitrants have been exchanging bullets with the modernists since before colonial days ended (would Kemal Ataturk's revolution in Turkey in the 1920's be a useful starting point?) perhaps we should be thinking longer term than that.  The Dutch had their 80 years war with Spain and the French had their Hundred (115 actually but at some point it probably seems futile to continue counting) with the English.  By that standard we are already past the Dutch Wars which included the 30 years war.

The game's still to play for.  I am betting the Bank of England will win this one.  Not necessarily it directly but the secret to British Hegemony was the Bank of England.   The Spanish played the Dutch by the old rules of cash on hand.  When they ran out of gold the Dutch won.  The Brits beat all comers since 1698 with the power of the Bank of England and debt financing. They paid other people to do their fighting on land in the 18th century while they seized the seas. Ever since Britain has fought wars, gone into debt, struggled with bankruptcy, especially during World War 2 but ultimately it has been able to prosecute the wars it chose.  They have just paid off World War 2 and are in fairly good shape to support another.

The American's using the same system have even deeper pockets.

I am betting that ultimately this will come done to whoever America backs - answer in the next decade or so.


----------



## a_majoor

Rather than take on all comers (a mugs game if there ever was one), we can slip in and upset the applecart in Aikido or Judo fashion by supporting selected players (even if they are not notionally on our side, self preservation goes a long way in those parts ofg the world):

http://article.nationalreview.com/



> *Let’s Be Friends with Syria*
> It would drive the Iranians crazy.
> 
> By James S. Robbins
> 
> Let’s begin with a quote: “The operations of Israel in Gaza and Lebanon are in the interest of people of Arab countries and the international community.” If someone in the U.S. wrote that it would be dismissed as some kind of far-out pro-Israel propaganda.* But since it was written by Ahmed Al-Jarallah, editor-in-chief of the Arab Times, it is a bit harder to disregard.* Mr. al-Jarallah is know for being a bit sensationalistic at times, but his editorial, entitled “No to Syria, Iran Agents,” is noteworthy for stating a usually unspoken truth — that there are limits to what can be justified under the banner of “resistance to Israeli aggression.” Hamas and Hezbollah may wave the bloody short, but they are simply tools in the hands of Damascus and Tehran, both working other agendas.
> 
> If Hamas and Hezbollah (not to mention their sponsors) believed they could count on the unquestioned and reflexive support of the Arab world in their recent clashes with Israel, they were clearly mistaken. The divisions began to emerge at the Cairo conference of Arab foreign ministers shortly after the start of the Israeli offensive. Arab unity — a difficult proposition at any time — began turning into open division. The countries siding against Hezbollah included Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Iraq, and the Fatah wing of the Palestinian Authority. On the other side, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, and Algeria. Hamas, not present, could also be put in this group, as could Iran, naturally.
> 
> What we see are the outlines of a new international alignment in the Middle East. *The states critical of Hezbollah see the group as at best an uncontrollable menace to regional stability, and at worst the leading agent of Iranian influence*. The opposition to what in the past would have been a pro-forma blanket condemnation of Israel took some countries by surprise, and a motion to hold another meeting to discuss the crisis was defeated by its original supporters for fear of exacerbating this disunity.
> 
> Concern over the potential of Iranian regional hegemony is partly inspired by realist politics — would you want your crazy neighbor to get his hands on a nuclear weapon? But it is also a function of fear of the spread of Shiite influence into traditionally Sunni-dominated areas. This was the point that King Abdallah II of Jordan made in December 2004 when he noted the emergence of a “Shiite crescent” ranging from Iran to Lebanon. The antipathy between the two major Muslim sects should not be underestimated. In some ways it is a deeper division than between Muslims and Jews, because someone of another faith is simply deluded while a Muslim who is part of a rival sect is an apostate, someone who has no excuse and who should know better. Unbelievers should be converted, but apostates must be killed.
> 
> Thus while the Jewish state rains air strikes down on “the Party of God,” Saudi establishment cleric Shaykh Abdallah Bin-Jibrin has issued a fatwa addressing the question, "Is It Permissible to Support the So-Called Rafidi [Shiite] Hizballah?" His answer: a resounding no. One cannot join Hezbollah, lend support to Hezbollah, or even pray to God for Hezbollah’s success. “Our advice to Sunnis,” he writes, “is to disown [the Shiites] and disown anyone who might join them… Anyone who might support them is nothing but one of them. God has said 'They are but friends and protectors to each other. And he amongst you who turns to them (for friendship) is of them'."
> 
> *Syria is the lynchpin of the equation*. It is the main transit route for Hezbollah’s materiel support, and it serves the same role for insurgents and supplies headed for Iraq. Since February 2005 Syria and Iran have been openly allied. Though three-fourths Sunni and a Baathist dictatorship, the common interests and common enemies of these two countries more than make up for their religious and ideological differences.
> 
> I have long thought that the time was ripe for a diplomatic opening to Syria. Bashar Assad should be offered the same deal as Muamar Khadaffi — basically, stop doing things that annoy us, get rid of your WMD and missile programs, and you can be our friend. And it is good to be our friend, particularly if you are a dictator seeking to avoid regime change. This deal should have been pursued long ago, coincident with the same move by Libya. Alas, we went another way, and since Syria had few allies in the region, Damascus was forced towards Tehran. But it is never too late to sell out an ally, and unless the dictator gene skips a generation, Assad the younger will eventually realize that aligning with Iran only further isolates and weakens his regime.
> 
> The current crisis presents the United States with a great opportunity. This conflict is only partly about disarming Hezbollah according to the dictates of UNSCR 1559 or 1583. It is also only partly about Iran using the crisis to divert attention from their nuclear program. *It is most significant for exposing the emerging order, the new lineup of states united in opposing Iranian regional hegemony. Splitting off Iran’s most important regional ally and rendering impotent its most dangerous terrorist surrogate group would constitute a major defeat for the Iranians in their drive to extend their influence across the Middle East.* Hopefully our diplomats will be clever enough to see the contest in those geopolitical terms and not enter the fray believing that they will have achieved final success if they broker some kind of ceasefire. For Hezbollah, “ceasefire” is just another word for “reload,” and Iran has plenty of ammunition.
> 
> — James S. Robbins is senior fellow in national-security affairs at the American Foreign Policy Council, a trustee for the Leaders for Liberty Foundation, and author of Last in Their Class: Custer, Picket and the Goats of West Point. Robbins is also an NRO contributor.


----------



## a_majoor

Further to the above post:

http://www.nysun.com/pf.php?id=36587



> *They Are All Jews Now*
> BY MARK STEYN
> July 24, 2006
> URL: http://www.nysun.com/article/36587
> 
> Afew years back, when folks talked airily about "the Middle East peace process" and "a two-state solution," I used to say that the trouble was the Palestinians saw a two-state solution as an interim stage en route to a one-state solution. I underestimated Islamist depravity. As we now see in Gaza and southern Lebanon, any two-state solution would be an interim stage en route to a no-state solution.
> 
> In one of the most admirably straightforward of Islamist declarations, Hussein Massawi, the Hezbollah leader behind the slaughter of U.S. and French forces 20 years ago, put it this way:
> 
> "We are not fighting so that you will offer us something. We are fighting to eliminate you."
> 
> Swell. But, suppose he got his way, what then? Suppose every last Jew in Israel were dead or fled, what would rise in place of the Zionist Entity? It would be something like the Hamas-Hezbollah terror squats in Gaza and Lebanon writ large. Hamas won a landslide in the Palestinian elections, and Hezbollah similarly won formal control of key Lebanese cabinet ministries. But they're not Mussolini: they have no interest in making the trains run on time. And to be honest who can blame them? If you're a big-time terrorist mastermind it's frankly a bit of a bore to find yourself Deputy Under-Secretary at the Ministry of Pensions, particularly when you're no good at it and no matter how lavishly the European Union throws money at you there never seems to be any in the kitty when it comes to making payroll. So, like a business that's over-diversified, both Hamas and Hezbollah retreated to their core activity: Jew-killing.
> 
> In Causeries du lundi, Charles-Augustin Sainte-Beuve recalls a Parisian dramatist watching the revolutionary mob rampaging through the street below and beaming: "See my pageant passing!" That's how opportunist Arabs and indulgent Europeans looked on the intifada and the terrorists and the schoolgirl suicide bombers: as a kind of uber-authentic piece of performance art with which to torment the Jews and the Americans. They never paused to ask themselves: Hey, what if it doesn't stop there?
> 
> Well, about 30 years too late, they're asking it now. For the first quarter-century of Israel's existence, the Arab states fought more or less conventional wars against the Zionists, and kept losing. So then they figured it was easier to anoint a terrorist movement and in 1974 declared Yasser Arafat's PLO to be the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people," which is quite a claim for an organization then barely half-a-decade old. Amazingly, the Arab League persuaded the U.N. and the EU and Bill Clinton and everyone else to go along with it and to treat the old monster as a head of state who lacked only a state to head. It's true that many nationalist movements have found it convenient to adopt the guise of terrorists. But, as the Palestinian "nationalist" movement descended from airline hijackings to the intifada to self-detonating in pizza parlors, it never occurred to their glamorous patrons to wonder if maybe this was, in fact, a terrorist movement conveniently adopting the guise of nationalism.
> 
> In 1971, in the lobby of the Cairo Sheraton, Palestinian terrorists shot Wasfi al-Tal, the Prime Minister of Jordan at point-blank range. As he fell to the floor dying, one of his killers began drinking the blood gushing from his wounds. Doesn't that strike you as a little, um, overwrought? Three decades later, when bombs went off in Bali killing hundreds of tourists plus local waiters and barmen, Bruce Haigh, a former Aussie diplomat in Indonesia, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, had no doubt where to put the blame. As he told Australia's Nine Network, "The root cause of this issue has been America's backing of Israel on Palestine."
> 
> Suppose this were true — that terrorists blew up Oz honeymooners and Scandinavian stoners in Balinese nightclubs because of "the Palestinian question." Doesn't this suggest that these people are, at a certain level, nuts? After all, there are plenty of IRA sympathizers around the world (try making the Ulster Unionist case in a Boston bar) and yet they never thought to protest British rule in Northern Ireland by blowing up, say, German tourists in Thailand. Yet the more the thin skein of Palestinian grievance was stretched to justify atrocities half way around the world the more the Arab League bigshot emirs and European Union foreign ministers looked down from their windows and cooed, "See my parade passing!"
> 
> They've now belatedly realized they're at that stage in the creature feature where the monster has mutated into something bigger and crazier. Until the remarkably kinda-robust statement by the G8 and the unprecedented denunciation of Hezbollah by the Arab League, the rule in any conflict in which Israel is involved — Israel vs PLO, Israel vs Lebanon, Israel vs [Your Team Here] is that the Jews are to blame. *But Saudi-Egyptian-Jordanian opportunism on Palestine has caught up with them: it's finally dawned on them that a strategy of consciously avoiding resolution of the "Palestinian question" has helped deliver Gaza, and Lebanon, and Syria, into the hands of a regime that's a far bigger threat to the Arab world than the Zionist Entity. Cairo and co grew so accustomed to whining about the Palestinian pseudocrisis decade in decade out that it never occurred to them that they might face a real crisis one day: a Middle East dominated by an apocalyptic Iran and its local enforcers, in which Arab self-rule turns out to have been a mere interlude between the Ottoman sultans and the eternal eclipse of a Persian nuclear umbrella.* The Zionists got out of Gaza and it's now Talibanistan redux.The Zionists got out of Lebanon and the most powerful force in the country (with an ever growing demographic advantage) are Iran's Shia enforcers. There haven't been any Zionists anywhere near Damascus in 60 years and Syria is in effect Iran's first Sunni Arab prison bitch. For the other regimes in the region, Gaza, Lebanon and Syria are dead states that have risen as vampires.
> 
> Meanwhile, Kofi Annan in a remarkable display of urgency (at least when compared with Sudan, Rwanda, Congo et al) is proposing apropos Israel and Hezbollah that U.N. peacekeepers go in, not to keep the "peace" between two sovereign states but rather between a sovereign state and a usurper terrorist gang. Contemptible as he is, the Secretary-General shows a shrewd understanding of the way the world is heading: already "non-state actors" have more sophisticated rocketry than many EU nations; if Iran has its ways, its proxies will be implied nuclear powers. Maybe we should put them on the U.N. Security Council.
> 
> So what is in reality Israel's first non-Arab war is a glimpse of the world the day after tomorrow: the EU and Arab League won't quite spell it out, but, to modify that Le Monde headline, they are all Jews now.
> 
> © 2006 Mark Steyn


----------



## a_majoor

Looking longer term (WW V?)

http://cdnjohngalt.blogspot.com/



> *Barbarians behind the walls*
> 
> I found this article on The Corner from the Times regarding the follies of multi-culturalism:
> 
> 
> ONE of Britain’s most senior military strategists has warned that western civilisation faces a threat on a par with the barbarian invasions that destroyed the Roman empire.
> 
> 
> In an apocalyptic vision of security dangers, Rear Admiral Chris Parry said future migrations would be comparable to the Goths and Vandals while north African "barbary" pirates could be attacking yachts and beaches in the Mediterranean within 10 years.
> 
> Europe, including Britain, could be undermined by large immigrant groups with little allegiance to their host countries — a "reverse colonisation" as Parry described it. These groups would stay connected to their homelands by the internet and cheap flights. The idea of assimilation was becoming redundant, he said.
> 
> The warnings by Parry of what could threaten Britain over the next 30 years were delivered to senior officers and industry experts at a conference last week. Parry, head of the development, concepts and doctrine centre at the Ministry of Defence, is charged with identifying the greatest challenges that will frame national security policy in the future.
> 
> If a security breakdown occurred, he said, it was likely to be brought on by environmental destruction and a population boom, coupled with technology and radical Islam. The result for Britain and Europe, Parry warned, could be "like the 5th century Roman empire facing the Goths and the Vandals".
> 
> Parry pointed to the mass migration which disaster in the Third World could unleash. "The diaspora issue is one of my biggest current concerns," he said. "Globalisation makes assimilation seem redundant and old-fashioned . . . [the process] acts as a sort of reverse colonisation, where groups of people are self-contained, going back and forth between their countries, exploiting sophisticated networks and using instant communication on phones and the internet."
> 
> Third World instability would lick at the edges of the West as pirates attacked holidaymakers from fast boats. "At some time in the next 10 years it may not be safe to sail a yacht between Gibraltar and Malta," said the admiral.
> 
> Parry, 52, an Oxford graduate who was mentioned in dispatches in the Falklands war, is not claiming all the threats will come to fruition. He is warning, however, of what is likely to happen if dangers are not addressed by politicians.
> 
> Parry — who used the slogan "old dog, new tricks" when he commanded the assault ship HMS Fearless — *foresees wholesale moves by the armed forces to robots, drones, nanotechnology, lasers, microwave weapons, space-based systems and even "customised" nuclear and neutron bombs.* (_interpolation by me: this is very much the "RMA" vision, but as we see in Southern Lbanon, sophisticated weapons need sophisticated and real time information to use. This is best done through contact and personal interaction...)_
> 
> Lord Boyce, the former chief of the defence staff, welcomed Parry’s analysis. "Bringing it together in this way shows we have some very serious challenges ahead," he said. "The real problem is getting them taken seriously at the top of the government."
> 
> Ancient Rome has been a subject of serious public discussion this year. Boris Johnson, the Conservative MP and journalist, produced a book and television series drawing parallels between the European Union and the Roman empire. Terry Jones, the former Monty Python star, meanwhile, has spoken up for the barbarians’ technological and social achievements in a television series and has written:
> 
> "We actually owe far more to the so-called ‘barbarians’ than we do to the men in togas."
> 
> Parry, based in Shrivenham, Wiltshire, presented his vision at the Royal United Services Institute in central London. He identified the most dangerous flashpoints by overlaying maps showing the regions most threatened by factors such as agricultural decline, booming youth populations, water shortages, rising sea levels and radical Islam.
> 
> Parry predicts that as flood or starvation strikes, the most dangerous zones will be Africa, particularly the northern half; most of the Middle East and central Asia as far as northern China; a strip from Nepal to Indonesia; and perhaps eastern China.
> 
> He pinpoints 2012 to 2018 as the time when the current global power structure is likely to crumble. Rising nations such as China, India, Brazil and Iran will challenge America’s sole superpower status.
> 
> This will come as "irregular activity" such as terrorism, organised crime and "white companies" of mercenaries burgeon in lawless areas.
> 
> The effects will be magnified as borders become more porous and some areas sink beyond effective government control.
> 
> Parry expects the world population to grow to about 8.4 billion in 2035, compared with 6.4 billion today. By then some 68% of the population will be urban, with some giant metropolises becoming ungovernable. He warns that Mexico City could be an example.
> 
> In an effort to control population growth, some countries may be tempted to copy China’s "one child" policy. This, with the widespread preference for male children, could lead to a ratio of boys to girls of as much as 150 to 100 in some countries. This will produce dangerous surpluses of young men with few economic prospects and no female company.
> 
> "When you combine the lower prospects for communal life with macho youth and economic deprivation you tend to get trouble, typified by gangs and organised criminal activity," said Parry. "When one thinks of 20,000 so-called jihadists currently fly-papered in Iraq, one shudders to think where they might go next."
> 
> The competition for resources, Parry argues, may lead to a return to "industrial warfare" as countries with large and growing male populations mobilise armies, even including cavalry, while acquiring high-technology weaponry from the West.
> 
> The subsequent mass population movements, Parry argues, could lead to the "Rome scenario". The western Roman empire collapsed in the 4th and 5th centuries as groups such as Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Suevi, Huns and Vandals surged over its borders. The process culminated in the sack of Rome in 455 by Geiseric the Lame, king of the Alans and Vandals, in an invasion from north Africa.
> 
> Parry estimated at the conference there were already more than 70 diasporas in Britain.
> 
> In the future, he believes, large groups that become established in Britain and Europe after mass migration may develop "communities of interest" with unstable or anti-western regions.
> 
> Any technological advantage developed to deal with the threats was unlikely to last. "I don’t think we can win in cyberspace — it’s like the weather — but we need to have a raincoat and an umbrella to deal with the effects," said Parry.
> 
> Some of the consequences would be beyond human imagination to tackle. The examples he gave, tongue-in-cheek, include: "No wind on land and sea; third of population dies instantly; perpetual darkness; sores; Euphrates dries up ‘to clear way for kings from the east’; earth’s core opens."
> 
> TOP STRATEGIST
> 
> Rear Admiral Chris Parry is the armed forces’ chief “blue skies” thinker.
> 
> Parry, 52, was educated at the independent Portsmouth grammar school and at Jesus College, Oxford. During the Falklands war in 1982, he was mentioned in dispatches while serving with the Fleet Air Arm on the destroyer HMS Antrim.
> 
> Parry is one of Britain’s leading specialists on amphibious warfare. He once commanded the assault ship HMS Fearless, was in charge of amphibious warfare training at Portsmouth naval base and headed a joint British-Dutch taskforce before moving to his post at the Ministry of Defence.
> 
> The admiral heads the development, concepts and doctrine centre, set up in 1998 and based at Shrivenham, Wiltshire. It has more than 50 staff and is being expanded to include extra analysts.


----------



## aluc

http://www.torontosun.ca/News/Columnists/Worthington_Peter/2006/07/31/1710913.html


Diplomacy is futile

Military solutions to conflict are generally quicker and last longer than endless dialogue

By Peter Worthington


It was Mr. Spock, the always logical, incisive "alien" on the Star Trek series, who came up with the phrase that defines our world today: "The purpose of diplomacy is to prolong a crisis."

Think about it. Isn't that what "diplomacy" does best? Procrastinates, confuses, extends.

I don't know if Spock (or his writers) is the original author of that observation, but it's so painfully true that it should give pause to those who advocate diplomacy over action -- which is just about every world "leader."

A case can be made that military solutions are more likely to be lasting than negotiated settlements, especially when dealing with those who have no code or constitution that they honour.

Yet the myth persists that negotiated settlements are preferable. They are, but only among democracies -- which, it should be noted, have never gone to war against one another.

We (meaning the western, civilized world) are involved in seeking diplomatic solutions in several crises today which, it can be predicted with some certainty, won't work but will succeed admirably in prolonging the crisis.

North Korea is one. If Spock were around, his logical mind would be dazzled by the idea that anyone, much less a superpower, would take North Korea seriously. Former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright does, but she negotiated a deal with North Korea that fizzled, and now seeks to be an international consultant like Henry Kissinger and make lots of money. So ignore her.

As strategic advisor Edward Luttwak has pointed out, international sanctions against Pyongyang over its missiles and nuclear fantasies are pointless because it's "a regime that exports almost nothing and imports even less."

International isolation is no threat to a regime that depends on isolation for survival. It seeks to blackmail the world to send food to feed its army, but not its people. Still, diplomacy ensures the crisis with North Korea will continue.

Iran has been in a crisis ever since the Shah was deposed -- betrayed by America. Negotiations ever since, first attempted by Jimmy Carter with predictable results, have solved nothing.

Iran's intent to develop nuclear weapons has enhanced diplomatic hysteria, which guarantees the crisis will continue -- until Israel loses patience and bombs a nuclear plant.

As for the Israeli/Palestinian crisis which is perpetual motion diplomacy, Israel understands better than most that military action is more likely to resolve a crisis than endless talk. That seems its thinking in the present "war" with Hezbollah.

Looking back at history, one can clearly see that a military solution rather than diplomacy resolved the crisis with Hitler, Nazis, fascism and Japanese militarism.

Hanoi's solution to a divided Vietnam was a military one; diplomacy only prolonged the crisis.

This won't be palatable to many, but throughout history, revolutionary movements or violent uprisings have mostly been defeated when those battling them are even more violent.

If Alexander Kerensky had chosen to be more violent than the Bolsheviks in 1917, Communism might have been defeated.

America in Iraq is a different story. Who knows where we'd be today if the U.S. hadflattened Fallujah when the militant brain trust had gathered there, or if the U.S. hadn't tried to save civilian lives instead of crushing whatever was in their way?

And would Palestinian militancy be what it is today if the Israeli army hadn't used rubber bullets to quell demonstrations?

The U.S. was born in 1776 via action over diplomacy, starting with the relatively minor issue of taxes (cooler heads had urged negotiations).

Spock would likely point out that the purpose of the UN today is not to solve crises, but to prolong them through diplomacy. That way, the status quo of instability never fades.


----------



## a_majoor

Defining the battle lines:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,6-2295231,00.html



> *This is just the start of a showdown between the West and The Rest*
> Amir Taheri
> 
> MANY IN THE WEST see the mini-war between Israel and Hezbollah, now in its fourth week, as another episode in a tedious saga of an Arab-Jewish conflict that began with the creation of the state of Israel in 1948, a political version of the “original sin”. The conventional wisdom in the West is that the whole tale would end if Israel were to return the occupied territories to the Palestinians, allowing them to create a state of their own.
> 
> But that analysis does not reflect the Middle East’s new realities. All the wars in that region of the past century, including the one between Iran and Iraq in the 1980s, revolved around secular issues — border disputes, the control of territory and water resources, security and diplomatic relations. Although fought in the name of nationalism or pan-Arab aspirations, none had a messianic dimension.
> 
> *The first two wars of the new century in the Middle East, however, were ideological ones. The United States toppled the Taleban in Afghanistan and the Saddamites in Iraq not in pursuit of territory but in the name of an idea: democracy. *
> 
> Since 2001 the region has been turned into an ideological battleground between two rival camps with global ambitions. One camp, led by the United States, claims to represent the modern global system of open markets, free elections, religious freedoms and sexual equality. The other camp is represented by radical Islam, which regards the Western model as not only decadent but dangerous for the future of mankind. It hopes to unite the world under the banner of Islam, which it holds to be “ The Only True Faith”.
> 
> In the Lebanese conflict, Israel and Hezbollah are the junior proxies for the rival camps. Israel is not fighting to hold or win more land; nor is Hezbollah. But both realise that they cannot live in security and prosper as long as the other is in a position to threaten their existence. *A Middle East dominated by Islamism could, in time, spell the death of Israel as a nation-state. A westernised, democratic Lebanon, on the other hand, could become the graveyard of Hezbollah and its messianic ideology. And if the US succeeds in fulfilling George W. Bush’s promise of a “new Middle East” there will be no place for regimes such as the Islamic Republic in Iran and Syria’s Baathist dictatorship. *
> 
> The present rupture in Lebanon has much to do with who will lead the fightback against the West. For almost a quarter of a century there has been intense competition within the Islamist camp over who could claim leadership. For much of that period Sunni Salafist movements, backed by oil money, were in the ascendancy. They began to decline after the 9/11 attacks that deprived them of much of the support they received from Arab governments and charities. In the past five years Tehran has tried to seize the opportunity to advance its own leadership claims. The problem, however, is that Iran is a Shia power and thus regarded by Sunni Salafists as “heretical”. To compensate for that weakness, Iran’s President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has made the destruction of Israel a priority for his regime. The war triggered by Hezbollah is in part designed to show that President Ahmadinejad is not bluffing when he promises to wipe Israel off the map as the first step towards defeating the “infidel” West.
> 
> The broader aspects of the Lebanon crisis are better understood in the Middle East than in the West. For the first time, Israel is under attack from Islamist and Arab secular radicals as “an American proxy”. Writing in Asharq Alawsat, a pan-Arab daily, a Syrian Cabinet minister, makes it clear that the war in Lebanon today is between “the forces of Islam and America, with Israel acting as an American proxy”.
> 
> Iran’s “supreme guide”, Ali Khamenei, expressed a similar view this week during an audience he granted in Tehran to Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan President. “What we see in Lebanon today represents the revolt of Muslim nations against America,” he said. “Hezbollah is backed (by Iran and others) because it is fighting America.” President Chávez endorsed that analysis by calling on Muslims and non-Muslim revolutionaries to unite to “save the human race by finishing the US Empire”. Iran’s state-controlled media has said that Lebanon would become “the graveyard of the Bush plan for a new Middle East”.
> 
> Tehran believes that a victory for Hezbollah in Lebanon will strengthen President Ahmadinejad’s bid for the leadership of radical Islam. A number of recent events have made his attempt to wrest control more likely. This week several leading Sunni theologians at the Al-Azhar seminary in Cairo issued fatwas that allow Sunnis to fight alongside and under the command of Shia Muslims. The fatwas came in response to a Saudi fatwa that had declared any association with and support for Hezbollah to be haram (forbidden).
> 
> More significant was a message from Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda’s number two. The Salafist radical tried to get hold of Hezbollah’s tailcoats in the hope of winning a share of the expected spoils of victory. He endorsed the idea of a global campaign against the “infidel”, thus abandoning his previous strategy of focusing the jihad on countries such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Iraq. More significantly, he dropped the al-Qaeda claim of fighting a defensive war against the infidel by designating a vast area of jihad from Spain to India.
> 
> All that is good news for President Ahmadinejad, who claims that Sunni radicalism has reached the limits of its capabilities in the fight against the global system led by the US and that it is now the turn of the Shia, led by Iran, to be in the driving seat.
> 
> “Hezbollah has fought Israel longer than all the major Arab armies combined ever did,” President Ahmadinejad told a crowd in Tehran this week. He also promised that Muslims would soon hear “very good news” about the jihad against the United States.
> 
> The idea of Shia leadership for the jihad was further boosted this year when Iran took Hamas under its wings. As a branch of the global Muslim Brotherhood movement, a Sunni outfit, Hamas has exerted its influence to win wider support for Iranian leadership at least as a tactical choice.
> 
> *Many in the Middle East are alarmed by these shifts of power and dread the prospect of the region entering a new dark age under radical Islamist regimes*. For this reason, there seems to be much less hostility towards Israel in the wider Arab world than we might expect in the West. There may be no sympathy for Israel as such but many Arabs realise that the current war is over something bigger than a Jewish state with a tiny territory of 10,000 square miles, less than 1 per cent of Saudi Arabia’s land mass.
> 
> This war is one of many battles to be fought between those who wish to join the modern world, warts and all, and those who think they have an alternative. This is a war between the West and what one might describe as “The Rest”, this time represented by radical Islamism. *All the talk of a ceasefire, all the diplomatic gesticulations may ultimately mean little in what is an existential conflict*.


----------



## a_majoor

Newt Gingrich on WW IV:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/10/AR2006081001311_pf.html



> *The Only Option Is to Win*
> 
> By Newt Gingrich
> Friday, August 11, 2006; A19
> 
> Yesterday on this page, in a serious and thoughtful survey of a world in crisis, Richard Holbrooke listed 13 countries that could be involved in violence in the near future: Lebanon, Israel, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Uzbekistan, Somalia. And in addition, of course, the United States.
> 
> With those 14 nations Holbrooke could make the case for what I describe as "an emerging third world war" -- a long-running conflict whose latest manifestation was brought home to Americans yesterday with the disclosure in London of yet another ghastly terrorist plot -- this one intended to destroy a number of airliners en route to America.
> 
> But while Holbrooke lists the geography accurately, he then asserts an analysis and a goal that do not fit the current threats.
> 
> First, he asserts that the Iranian nuclear threat is far less dangerous than violence in southern Lebanon. Speaking of the Iranian-American negotiations, Holbrooke asks, "And why has that dialogue been restricted to the nuclear issue -- vitally important to be sure, but not as urgent at this moment as Iran's sponsorship and arming of Hezbollah and its support of actions against U.S. forces in Iraq?"
> 
> In fact an Iran armed with nuclear weapons is a mortal threat to American, Israeli and European cities. If a nonnuclear Iran is prepared to finance, arm and train Hezbollah, sustain a war against Israel from southern Lebanon and, in Holbrooke's own words, "support actions against U.S. forces in Iraq," then what would a nuclear Iran be likely to do? Remember, Iranian officials were present at North Korea's missile launches on our Fourth of July, and it is noteworthy that Venezuela's anti-American dictator, Hugo Chávez, has visited Iran five times.
> 
> It is because the Bush administration has failed to win this argument over the direct threat of Iranian and North Korean nuclear and biological weapons that Americans are divided and uncertain about our national security interests.
> 
> Nevertheless, Holbrooke has set the stage for an important national debate that goes well beyond such awful possibilities as Sept. 11-style airliner plots. It's a debate about whether we are in danger of losing one or more U.S. cities, whether the world faces the possibility of a second Holocaust should Iran use nuclear or biological weapons against Israel, and whether a nuclear Iran would dominate the Persian Gulf and the world's energy supplies. *This is the most important debate of our time. It rivals both Winston Churchill's argument in the 1930s over the nature of Hitler and the Nazis and Harry Truman's argument in the 1940s about the emerging Soviet empire*.
> 
> Yet Holbrooke indicates that he would take the wrong path on American national security. He asserts that "containing the violence must be Washington's first priority."
> 
> As a goal this is precisely wrong. *Defeating the terrorists and thwarting efforts by Iran and North Korea to gain nuclear and biological weapons must be the first goal of American policy*. To paraphrase Abraham Lincoln, if violence is necessary to defeat the terrorists, the Iranians and the North Koreans, then it is regrettably necessary. If they can be disarmed with less violence, then that is desirable. But a nonviolent solution that allows the terrorists to become better trained, better organized, more numerous and better armed is a defeat. A nonviolent solution that leads to North Korean and Iranian nuclear weapons threatening us across the planet is a defeat.
> 
> This failure to understand the nature of the threat is captured in Holbrooke's assertion that diplomacy can lead to "finding a stable and secure solution that protects Israel." If Iran gets nuclear weapons, there will be no diplomacy capable of protecting Israel. If Iran continues to fund and equip Hezbollah, there will be no stability or security for Israel. Diplomacy cannot substitute for victory against an opponent who openly states that he wants to eliminate you from the face of the earth.
> 
> Our enemies are quite public and repetitive in saying what they want. Not since Adolf Hitler has any group been as bloodthirsty and as open. If Holbrooke really wants a "stable and secure" Israel he will not find it by trying to appease Iran, Syria, Hezbollah and Hamas.
> 
> This issue of national security goals will be at the heart of the American dialogue for some time. If *our enemies are truly our enemies (and their words and deeds are certainly those of enemies) then victory should be our goal. If nuclear and biological threats are real, then aggressive strategies to disarm them if possible and defeat them if necessary will be required.*
> 
> Holbrooke represents the diplomacy first-diplomacy always school. We saw its workings throughout the 1990s, as Syria was visited again and again by secretaries of state who achieved absolutely nothing. Even a secretary of state dancing with Kim Jong Il (arguably a low point in American diplomatic efforts) produced no results; such niceties never do in dealing with vicious dictators.
> 
> The democracies have been talking while the dictators and the terrorists gain strength and move closer to having the weapons necessary for a terrifying assault on America and its allies. The arrests yesterday of British citizens allegedly plotting to blow up American airliners over the Atlantic Ocean are only the latest example of the determination of our enemies. This makes the dialogue on our national security even more important.
> 
> Richard Holbrooke has established a framework for a clear debate. The Bush administration should take up his challenge.
> 
> The writer, a former speaker of the House, is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and author of "Winning the Future: A 21st Century Contract with America."


----------



## a_majoor

A very long essay (in fact only part one is published so far), but an astounding read. Follow the link and read all of it:

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/observer/story.html?id=dbf1dd8d-0182-4b4c-9c1a-66d7e2be105d



> *Age of terror, age of illusions*
> Part One: I remember the anger I felt watching the endlessly repeated images of the towers collapsing. But there's another kind of anger -- a more cerebral one toward the intellectuals of our time who contributed to all that destruction through their hostility toward the mores and traditions of western civilization.
> 
> Robert Sibley
> The Ottawa Citizen
> 
> Saturday, September 09, 2006
> 
> NEW YORK - I still see bodies falling. Standing at my hotel window, overlooking Ground Zero, it's not hard to visualize the flaming towers and the bird-like figures of human bodies plummeting through the air. I especially remember a couple leaping hand in hand into emptiness. In their flapping clothes they looked like big clumsy birds, desperate to fly.
> 
> There were others, of course. Dozens. According to one estimate, some 200 people jumped from the North and South Towers in the hour-and-a-half the buildings remained standing after the planes hit the World Trade Center on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. Clerks and executives, cooks and waiters, patrons and clients; they leaped in a continuous stream from the four sides of the buildings, from the office windows of Cantor Fitzgerald, the bond-trading firm, from the Windows on the World restaurant that occupied the 106th and 107th floors, from the offices of the insurance company Marsh & McLennan. Writer Tom Junod, in a recent article in Esquire magazine, described the jumpers in heartbreaking imagery: "They jumped through windows already broken and then, later, through windows they broke themselves. They jumped to escape the smoke and the fire; they jumped when ceilings fell and the floors collapse; they jumped just to breathe once more before they died."
> 
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> I step back from the window, rolling my shoulders to ease the sudden tension in my neck. It's as though my body remembers the anger I felt watching those endlessly repeated images of the towers' collapse; the roiling storm of smoke and the ashen humanity emerging from the clouds of pulverized concrete and flesh; the shell-shocked relatives stalking the streets with photographs of missing loved ones; the firefighters and police officers crawling over the smoldering mountain of rubble, the mobs dancing on the streets of Damascus and Tehran and Gaza, celebrating mass murder.
> 
> But there's another kind of anger, too; a colder, more cerebral anger toward the intellectuals of our time, the cosmopolitans and sophists who, unwittingly or not, contributed to all that destruction through their sophisticated hostility towards the mores and traditions of western civilization.
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> The question is, why are so many unwilling to acknowledge the threat Islamism poses to western civilization? More to the point, perhaps, why are so many so quick to blame the West itself, particularly the United States, for the attacks, as though the 3,000 who perished in the collapse of those 110-storey towers, including many Canadians, deserved their fate?
> 
> Sept. 11 was what the German philosopher G.W.F. Hegel would undoubtedly call a "world-historical moment"; which is to say, the terrorist attacks forced a fundamental shift in the way we think (or should think) about the world. Simply stated: On Sept. 11, 2001, a half-hidden war against western civilization and all that it represents was finally made explicit for all to see. Only the most naive or ideologically purblind deny this. "Is there a war on?" asks Italian philosopher Marcello Pera. "My answer is: from Afghanistan to Kashmir, to Chechnya, to the Philippines, to Saudia Arabia, Sudan, Bosnia, Kosovo, Palestine, Turkey, Egypt, Algeria, and Morocco, and elsewhere, in a great part of the Islamic and Arabic world, groups consisting of fundamentalists, radicals, and extremists -- the Taliban, al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood, Islamic Jihad, the Armed Islamic Group, and many others -- have declared war, jihad, against the West. They have said it, written it, diffused it in plain speech. Why should we not take action?"



Read the rest.


----------



## muskrat89

Here are the people Jack Layton and his ilk want to "negotiate" with..

http://www.youtube.com/v/-HlaVpqUXF0


----------



## a_majoor

Four years later, another large group comes on board with the Iraqi government. I suspect that if we use this timeline as a template, by 2010 we should have a large local force fighting alongside our team in Kandahar and the southern provinces:

http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htterr/articles/20060922.aspx



> *Iraqi Tribes Turn on al Qaeda *
> 
> September 22, 2006: Coalition forces in Iraq have suddenly received the manpower equivalent of three light infantry divisions. They did not suffer any repercussions in domestic politics as a result, and now have a huge edge over al-Qaeda in al-Anbar province. How did this happen? Tribal leaders in the largely Sunni province on the Syrian border got together and signed an agreement to raise a tribal force of 30,000 fighters to take on foreign fighters and terrorists.
> 
> These leaders have thrown in with the central government in Baghdad. This is a decisive blow to al Qaeda, which has been desperately trying to fight off an Iraqi government that is getting stronger by the week. Not only are the 30,000 fighters going to provide more manpower, but these tribal fighters know the province much better than American troops – or the foreign fighters fighting for al Qaeda. Also, this represents just over 80 percent of the tribes in al-Anbar province now backing the government.
> 
> The biggest gain for the coalition is that they will now have forces on their side that know the terrain in al Anbar province. This is a very big deal in a campaign against the terrorists. When a force knows the terrain, it can make life miserable for its enemies. Just ask any Army unit that has gone through the National Training Center at Fort Irwin. The OPFOR (Opposing Force) has fought there for so long that they know all the good ambush sites. Units coming there for a training session don't have that knowledge – and they pay the price in the exercises held there.
> 
> This is just one sign that the tide is turning in favor of the coalition in Iraq. Many of the Sunni leaders have decided that the Shia-dominated Iraqi government is not going away any time soon, nor is the democratic process. As such, the tribal leaders have now decided that it is better to be on their good side rather than to be seen as uncooperative. Constant Arab casualties in al Qaeda attacks – and al Qaeda's desire for a caliphate – have not helped matters any, either.
> 
> On the other hand, by signing up with the government, these tribal leaders will hasten the construction of government services, and gain something else just as valuable – the government's gratitude. In essence, the tribal leaders have slowly been won over by a combination of coalition perseverance and al Qaeda strategic ineptness.
> 
> This agreement, if it holds, is a win for the United States, which is looking for measurable progress. It is a win for the Shia-dominated Iraqi government, which will now have an easier time in that province. It is a win for the tribal leaders, who will get a few markers they can call in down the road from the government for their assistance. For al Qaeda, now facing the equivalent of three additional light infantry divisions composed of people who will have knowledge of al Anbar province, it is a huge loss. The major downside is that many of the tribesmen still support al Qaeda, and will defy their tribal leaders by continuing to work with the terrorists, or by not being very enthusiastic in fighting the terrorists. – Harold C. Hutchison (haroldc.hutchison@gmail.com)


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## tomahawk6

There is some skepticism concerning how sincere the Sunni tribes are about this deal. If they go after the foreign fighters hard then we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. If they just go through the motions then we may have to turn the heat up. This is encouraging but proof is in the pudding.


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## a_majoor

Wait and see is the best policy, but even if 10% of the tribal fighters are effective, that is three traditional Infantry battalions in the field. More probably, they will be an effective home defence force, denying the AQ fighters the ability to use the tribal homes and villages. Cut off from local supplies and intelligence, the AQ will have a much harder time operating, a worthwhile result in of itself.


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## karl28

Officials can't confirm bin Laden death report
23/09/2006 11:15:28 AM  

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  Printer-friendly page 



Neither the U.S. nor French officials can confirm a French newspaper report claiming al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden died last month in Pakistan.


CTV.ca News Staff 

A videotape posted on the Internet early this month, purportedly by al Qaeda, showed previously unseen footage of a smiling Osama bin Laden.  

Citing a leaked French secret service report, regional daily newspaper L'Est Republicain reported Saturday that Saudi Arabia was convinced bin Laden died of typhoid in Pakistan in late August. 

The French government said it could not confirm the report and would investigate the intelligence leak. 

"The information diffused this morning by the l'Est Republicain newspaper concerning the possible death of Osama bin Laden cannot be confirmed," said a Defence Ministry statement. 

French President Jacques Chirac said the report "is in no way whatsoever confirmed" 

He said he was "a bit surprised" by the leak, and has asked Defence Minister Michele Alliot-Marie to investigate how a document from France's DGSE intelligence agency was published in the press. 

L'Est Republicain printed what it described as a copy of a confidential document from the DGSE (Direction Generale des Services Exterieurs). 

It cited an uncorroborated report from Saudi secret services that the leader of the al Qaeda terror network had died. 

The DGSE transmitted the document, dated Sept. 21, to Chirac and other top French officials, the newspaper said. 

The report added that Saudi security services were pursuing further details, notably the place of bin Laden's burial. 

"The chief of al Qaeda was a victim of a severe typhoid crisis while in Pakistan on August 23, 2006," the document says according to the report, adding that the leader's geographic isolation meant that medical assistance was impossible and that his lower limbs were allegedly paralyzed. 

The report further said Saudi security services had their first information on bin Laden's alleged death on Sept. 4. 

Meanwhile in Washington, CIA duty officer Paul Gimigliano said he could not confirm the DGSE report. 

The Washington-based IntelCenter, which monitors terrorism communications, said it was not aware of any similar reports on the Internet. 

"We've seen nothing from any al Qaeda messaging or other indicators that would point to the death of Osama bin Laden," IntelCenter director Ben N. Venzke told The Associated Press. 

If it were true, al Qaeda would likely release information of his death fairly quickly, said Venzke, whose organization also provides counterterrorism intelligence services for the American government. 

"They would want to release that to sort of control the way that it unfolds. If they wait too long, they could lose the initiative on it." 

Reports suggesting that bin Laden was dead, wounded or seriously ill have surfaced over the years, more often during periods when no taped messages from the al Qaeda leader surfaced in the media. But none have proven to be accurate. 

However, Saudi sources told CNN's Nic Robertson that they learned bin Laden has been ill with a water-borne disease for the past several weeks. 

The IntelCenter said the last time it could be sure bin Laden was alive was June 29, when al Qaeda released an audiotape. In that recording, he eulogized the death of al Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed in a U.S. airstrike in Iraq earlier that month. 

In Pakistan, a senior official of that country's top spy agency told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity that he could not confirm the French newspaper report. 

The ISI, or Directorate of Inter-Service Intelligence, official said he believed the report could be fabricated. 

U.S. Embassy officials in Pakistan and Afghanistan also said they could not confirm the report. 

Gen. Henri Bentegeat, the French army chief of staff, said in a radio debate last Sunday that bin Laden's fate remained a mystery. 

"Today, bin Laden is certainly not in Afghanistan," Bentegeat said. 

"No one is completely certain that he is even alive."

With files from The Associated Press

 I thought this would be the best place for this article . Its probably a pile of horse crap but thought that I would still post it the actual article  was posted on 23/09/2006 11:15:28 AM   at the sympatico web site


----------



## tomahawk6

If he is dead it will be a measure of satisfaction, but it wont end the war. I would much rather see a JDAM drop into Ayman al-Zawahiri's living room. Taking him out will really disrupt AQ.


----------



## Scoobie Newbie

T6 I'd rather him be taken alive.  More INT value


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## tomahawk6

If we get him some ACLU lawyer will be representing him.


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## Scoobie Newbie

Hey I'm not saying he might not fall out the plane once he is done giving info


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## a_majoor

It is a bit difficult to imagine how you can win "hearts and minds" which are so twisted

http://www.macleans.ca/culture/books/article.jsp?content=20060925_133309_133309



> *The church dance that snowballed*
> 
> A masterful new work on al-Qaeda and 9/11 explains how a loser cult has metastasized
> 
> MARK STEYN
> 
> On the fifth anniversary of 9/11, U.S. and Afghan troops in "eastern Afghanistan" -- a vague delineated land that doesn't necessarily stop at the Pakistani border -- captured a man called Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.
> 
> Who?
> 
> Well, he was the head of Hezb-i-Islami -- or, latterly, one faction of it. And for a while he was prime minister of Afghanistan, and an opponent of the Taliban, and then an ally of the Taliban. And in recent years he's been Iran's Mister Big in the Hindu Kush. He's believed to be the guy who smuggled Osama's son, Saad bin Laden, and various al-Qaeda A-listers out of Afghanistan and to the safety of the ayatollahs' bosom. He's an evil man who knows a lot of high-value information, if you can prise it out of him.
> 
> He made his name in the eighties, when there were so many Afghan refugees in Peshawar that the Pakistani intelligence service, the ISI, decided to streamline operations and make the human tide sign up with one of six designated émigré groups in order to be eligible for aid. Hekmatyar headed one of the two biggest, with some 800,000 people under his banner. He also has the distinction of being the commander of Osama's first foray into the field. In 1985, bin Laden and 60 other Arabs were holed up in Peshawar doing nothing terribly useful until they got the call to head across the Afghan border and join up with Hekmatyar's men to battle the Soviets near Jihad Wal. So off they rode, with a single local guide. They arrived at Hekmatyar's camp at 10 in the evening only to find the Soviets had retreated and there was no battle to fight.
> 
> "Your presence is no longer needed," Hekmatyar told Osama's boys. "So go back." So the neophyte warriors shot a few tin cans off fence posts, handed in their weapons and caught the bus back to Peshawar: mujahedeen tourists who'd missed the show.
> 
> This poignant vignette occurs in Lawrence Wright's masterful work *The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road To 9/11*. I picked the book up a couple of weeks ago without much enthusiasm, mainly because of a growing suspicion these last five years that a "human interest" view of current events is bound to be misleading. Osama himself seems merely an extreme embodiment of larger globalized trends he's barely aware of. The praise the New York Times heaped on Wright for his portrayal of John O'Neill, the "driven, demon-ridden FBI agent who worked so frantically to stop Osama bin Laden, only to perish in the attack on the World Trade Center," suggested one of those artificially novelistic accounts too obviously aimed at getting a sale to Miramax. And most of the Wahhabist fellows over on the other side are too irrational for the psychological demands of fiction: it would surely be as unsatisfying as reading a detective novel where every character's insane.
> 
> But I was wrong. The human comedy in The Looming Tower is very illuminating. Bin Laden, for example, emerges not as the fearless jihadist and scourge of the Soviets but as a laggard and faint-heart with a tendency to call in sick before battle and, if pressed into service, to pass out during it due to his blood pressure. The "nap" he took during the battle of the Lion's Den in 1987 is spoken of by awed al-Qaeda types as evidence of his cool under fire, but it seems more likely he just fainted. In Afghanistan, the local lads were hard and brave, the Arab volunteers they dismissed as "useless." Had the Americans funded the mujahedeen directly, the Afghan resistance of the 1980s might have remained a conventional war of liberation against the Soviet invaders. But Zbigniew Brzezinski, facing the Congressional oversight of post-Watergate Washington, chose instead to run the operation through third parties and plumped for the Saudis' Prince Turki and the ISI. And next thing you know, a more or less straightforward nationalist resistance has become jihad central. The deeply sinister Prince Turki (full disclosure: he's not big on me, either -- "The arrogance of Mark Steyn knows no bounds") used bin Laden's money to attract to Afghanistan a bunch of freaks and misfits from the Arab world and beyond, and their natural tendency to self-glorification did the rest: from the Soviet point of view, the Lion's Den was an inconsequential tactical retreat; to Osama's boys, living in the heightened pseudo-religiosity of jihadism, it was an exhilarating victory, a moment when (as Wright puts it) "reality knelt before faith." When the Soviet empire fell apart a few years later, the bin Laden crowd genuinely believed it was they who had inflicted the fatal blow with their famous triumph at this rinky-dink no-account nickel 'n' dime skirmish the Commies had barely noticed. So their thoughts naturally turned to what they might do for an encore. And, having taken down one superpower, they figured the next move was pretty obvious.
> 
> Wright's book is a marvellously vivid recreation of a kind of sustained unreality. My talk-radio pal Hugh Hewitt calls it a "genealogy," and I think that's a very good way of putting it: The Looming Tower is a family tree of jihad, the chain connecting some weirdsmobile in Cairo with another in Riyadh and then Islamabad and then Hamburg and London and pretty much everywhere. *One thing it demolishes is the lazy leftist trope that the "root cause" is poverty. The penniless yak herds aren't the problem. The very first words of the very first chapter are "In a first-class stateroom on a cruise ship bound for New York . . ." It's 1948 and inside the first-class stateroom is Sayyid Qutb, the first of a grand parade of privileged middle-class Westernized Muslims for whom a mis-wired encounter with the modern world is enough to make them hot for jihad.* There's a sad inevitability when al-Qaeda's head honchos are ready to give up on 9/11 because they haven't any Muslim Westerners who can pull it off, and just at that moment a Hamburg engineering student called Mohammed Atta shows up. In the jihad, somebody always shows up, somebody middle-class and prosperous and educated and perfectly assimilated except for an urge to self-detonate on the London Underground.
> 
> It's tempting to think history might have turned out a little differently had that drunken floozy on the ship not come on to Sayyid late one night or the nurse in George Washington University Hospital not been showing quite so much cleavage. But reading of Qutb's sojourn in America in the late 1940s you begin to wonder whether the girl really did come on to him or if the nurse truly disclosed to him the particulars of what she sought in a lover. *His disgust at the lasciviousness of America is vaguely reminiscent of the old joke about the spinster who complains that the young man across the street strips naked in full view every night: when the cop says he can't see anything, she explains you have to climb up on the wardrobe and crane your neck up over the skylight. If you're looking for it as assiduously as Qutb was, you'll find it everywhere.*
> 
> The title of Wright's book comes from the Koran's fourth sura, the one Osama quoted in a speech on the eve of 9/11:
> 
> "Wherever you are, death will find you,
> 
> Even in the looming tower."
> 
> In an Islamist grievance culture, the tower doesn't have to be that tall to loom. *The tragedy in Wright's book is that across little more than half a century a loser cult has metastasized, eventually to swallow almost all the moderate, syncretic forms of Islam*. What was so awful about Sayyid Qutb's experience in America that led him to regard modernity as an abomination? Well, he went to a dance in Greeley, Colo.: "The room convulsed with the feverish music from the gramophone. Dancing naked legs filled the hall, arms draped around the waists, chests met chests, lips met lips . . ."
> 
> In 1949, Greeley, Colo., was dry. The dance was a church social. The feverish music was Frank Loesser's charm song Baby, It's Cold Outside. But it was enough to start a chain that led from Qutb to Zawahiri in Egypt to bin Laden in Saudi Arabia to the mullahs in Iran to the man arrested in Afghanistan on Sept. 11. And it's a useful reminder of how much we could give up and still be found decadent and disgusting by the Islamists. A world without Baby, It's Cold Outside will be very cold indeed.



If there is a solution, it will have to be in finding a way to energize and mobilize the "moderate, syncretic forms of Islam". If not, then the only other solution might lie in "Lighting up the sky", a horrible end state to contemplate.


----------



## a_majoor

This war, like most others, is a battle of wills.

http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/archives/004739.html



> *Recruiting Goals Fall Short*
> 
> ...for Al Qaeda. John Hinderaker at Powerline quotes from a document written by high-ranking al Qaeda officer, discovered in Zarqawi's "safe house" and released recently by CENTCOM;
> 
> You have to plow through a lot of palaver to get to the substance of the letter. What I think is most interesting is the picture that it paints of al Qaeda's prospects, especially in light of the recently-leaked fragments of the National Intelligence Estimate purportedly saying that the Iraq war has been a recruiting bonanza for al Qaeda, and that al Qaeda's numbers and support are ever-increasing. Al Qaeda itself seems to see its position quite differently.
> 
> _Know that we, like all the mujahidin, are still weak. We are in the stage of weakness and a state of paucity. We have not yet reached a level of stability. We have no alternative but to not squander any element of the foundations of strength, or any helper or supporter._
> 
> [...]
> 
> _The most important thing is that you continue in your jihad in Iraq, and that you be patient and forbearing, even in weakness, and even with fewer operations; even if each day had half of the number of current daily operations, that is not a problem, or even less than that. So, do not be hasty. The most important thing is that the jihad continues with steadfastness and firm rooting, and that it grows in terms of supporters, strength, clarity of justification, and visible proof each day. Indeed, prolonging the war is in our interest, with God’s permission_.
> 
> Though, all things considered, things could be worse for Al Qaeda. Imagine what trouble they'd be in if they also had to contend with a relentless negative media barrage brought about by mid-term elections.
> 
> Posted by Kate at October 3, 2006 09:56 PM


----------



## Edward Campbell

Here, reproduced from today’s (6 Oct 06) _Globe and Mail_ under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act is an opinion piece by Timothy Garton Ash (Oxford) with which I wholeheartedly agree:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20061006.wcoash06/BNStory/specialComment/home 


> The struggle of our time
> *Fanatiques sans frontières are on the march, says TIMOTHY GARTON ASH. And we must stand up to them*
> 
> TIMOTHY GARTON ASH
> 
> From Friday's Globe and Mail
> 
> Almost every day brings a new threat to free expression. A French philosopher is in hiding, running for his life from death threats on Islamist websites, because he published an article in a French newspaper saying that Mohammed is revealed in the Koran as a "master of hate." A production of Mozart's _Idomeneo_, which at one point displays the severed (plastic? papier mâché?) head of Mohammed, alongside those of Jesus, Buddha and Poseidon, is pulled off the stage of the Deutsche Oper in Berlin, after a telephoned threat of violence was reported to management by local police. And that's just the past week.
> 
> Going slightly further back, there's the murder of the Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh and the murderous hounding of Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Salman Rushdie. A British anti-fascist activist is beaten up following the publication of his photograph and address on a far-right website called Redwatch. Animal rights activists make death threats to medical researchers and their families. Christian extremists threaten BBC executives because they broadcast _Jerry Springer: The Opera_. Need I go on?
> 
> _Fanatiques sans frontiers_ are on the march. It's wrong to describe this as a single "war on terror"; our adversaries and their ideologies are so diverse. But if you think we are not engaged in a struggle against manifold enemies of freedom, as potentially deadly as those we faced in the 1930s, you are living in a fool's paradise. In the first decade of the 21st century the spaces of free expression, even in old-established liberal democracies, have been eroded, are being eroded and -- if we don't summon ourselves to the fight -- will continue to be eroded. Free expression is not just the particular preserve of writers and artists. It's a first-order freedom, the oxygen on which other liberties depend. Not for nothing did John Stuart Mill devote a whole chapter in his _On Liberty_ to "the liberty of thought and discussion."
> 
> The erosion of free expression comes in many different ways. Most obviously, there is violence or the threat of violence: "If you say that, we will kill you." This is dramatically facilitated in our time by the Internet, e-mail and cellphones. French philosophy teacher, Robert Redeker, went into hiding after an Islamist website called for him -- "the pig" -- to be "punished by the lions of France" as "the lion of Holland, Mohammed Bouyeri did," and then gave Mr. Redeker's home address, photograph and phone number. Mohammed Bouyeri was the slayer of Theo van Gogh.
> 
> 
> Down the scale, there is peaceful public protest, sometimes with an implicit threat of violence. There are also other forms of less visible pressure, including the use of economic weapons -- the boycott of Danish goods in some Islamic countries following the Danish cartoons scandal, for example, or the Chinese state's covert pressure on satellite providers, for whom China is a major customer.
> 
> Then there's self-censorship in the face of such threats. German Chancellor Angela Merkel aptly described the Deutsche Oper's decision to pull _Idomeneo_ as "self-censorship out of fear." But self-censorship can also flow from a well-intentioned notion of multicultural harmony, on the lines of "you respect my taboo and I'll respect yours" -- what I've described before as the tyranny of the group veto. And there are misguided attempts by democratic governments and parliaments to ensure domestic peace and inter-communal harmony by legislating to curb free expression. The British government's original proposal for a law on incitement to religious hatred was a case in point.
> 
> The threats also come from the most diverse quarters. It would be absurd to pretend that Islamist extremists are not among the current leaders in intimidation, at least in relation to Europe and North America. After all, Christians, Buddhists and, indeed, Poseidonites did not -- so far as we know -- threaten violent retaliation because the severed (plastic?) heads of their all-holiest were displayed on a Berlin opera stage. But my opening case-list shows that it's not just _jihadists_ who want to squeeze the oxygen pipe of free expression. Even as I write, news reaches me of a good friend, Tony Judt, a historian of modern Europe and outspoken critic of recent Israeli policy, finding a venue in New York suddenly withdrawn after telephone calls to the host institution, which happened to be the Polish Consulate. (He proposed to talk about "the Israel lobby and U.S. foreign policy.")
> 
> According to the Polish consul, those telephone calls came from "a couple of Jewish groups," including the Anti-Defamation League, and "representatives of American diplomacy and intelligentsia." Such phone calls are, of course, not comparable with death threats. But this is all part of a many-fronted, incremental erosion of free expression, even in the classic lands of the free, such as the United States, France and Britain.
> 
> What is to be done? First, we need to wake up to the seriousness of the danger. I repeat: this is one of the greatest challenges to freedom in our time. We need a debate about what the law should and should not allow to be said or written. Even Mill did not suggest that everyone should be allowed to say anything, any time and anywhere. We also need a debate about what it's prudent and wise to say in a globalized world where people of different cultures live so close together, like roommates separated only by thin curtains. There is a frontier of prudence and wisdom that lies beyond the one that should be enforced by law. I believe, for example, that Mr. Redeker's article in Le Figaro was an intemperate and unwise one, with its claim that Islam (not just Islamism, or _jihadism_, but Islam _tout court_ is today's equivalent of Soviet-style world communism -- yesterday Moscow, today Mecca -- and his denunciation of Mohammed as a "pitiless warlord, pillager, massacrer of Jews and polygamist." But once the _fanatiques sans frontiers_ respond by proposing to kill him, then we must stand in total solidarity with the threatened writer -- in the spirit of Voltaire.
> 
> Never mind that Voltaire probably never said exactly what is so often attributed to him: "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." That famous quotation seems to have originated in an early 20th-century paraphrase. But that was indeed the spirit of Voltaire. The order of phrases is vital. Too many recent responses in such cases, from the Rushdie affair onward, have had this backhanded syntax: "Of course I defend his/her freedom of expression, but . . ." The Voltaire principle gets it the right way round: first the dissent, but then the unconditional solidarity. Now we are all called upon to play our part. The future of freedom depends on words prevailing over knives.
> 
> _British political writer Timothy Garton Ash is a professor of European studies at Oxford._



Now, anyone who takes us back to _On Liberty_ is on the right track.  (Anyone who has not read _On Liberty_ more than once is unread and should not be allowed to vote.)

Our liberty is threatened by all _collectivists_ – including Christians, Jews and Muslims – who *believe* that they are possessed of the _revealed truth_ and that they have some sort of obligation to impose that ‘truth’ upon unbelievers, like me.

We need to have a new _enlightenment_ – based upon 19th century English liberalism – to bring liberty back to the West and then spread it to other societies.  English liberalism may not triumph over e.g. Asian conservatism and conservatism is, in my view, quite an acceptable socio-political philosophy.  What is unacceptable – what we must *defeat*, in military battle, if necessary but certainly in the _marketplace of ideas_ is *barbarism*.  There are barbaric Muslims and Barbaric Christians, too; all must be defeated.

Let's forget about the foolishly named 'war on terror' and get on with the *War on Barbarism*.


----------



## Kirkhill

> Let's forget about the foolishly named 'war on terror' and get on with the War on Barbarism.



Now there's one to get behind.  Well done Edward.  +1.


----------



## a_majoor

An interesting discussion about WW IV framed as a question of momentum:

http://www.snappingturtle.net/jmc/tmblog/archives/005946.html



> October 06, 2006
> *The Losing Momentum Fallacy*
> 
> I've been writing about how the US and Al Queda are fighting on a meta-battlefield of serialization and parallelization since at least 2003. The US is fundamentally trying to slow things down, occasionally biting where it chooses, chewing, and swallowing chunks of Al Queda and company at its convenience. Al Queda tries to make it politically impossible to maintain a sustainable pace so that the US is forced by political realities into burnout, leading to an opportunity where Al Queda can actually claim a durable military victory.
> 
> Given that well established dynamic, Glenn Reynold's post on losing momentum is so badly framed that it's better to toss it out and start over again. The US Army is now taking 42 year olds. This is a sign of force stretching that is currently manageable but it's a warning sign that Al Queda's efforts are not without effect. Al Queda wants us to speed up, overextending ourselves. We're not there yet but we could get there. Additional force commitments will get us to Al Queda's preffered scenario. So count me as having a different opinion than both Glenn Reynolds and Mohammed of Iraq the Model who would like the US to move much faster. Unfortunately, Mohammed is engaged in magical thinking. We aren't going further and faster because we can't sustain that sort of effort.



Glenn Reynolds (Instapundit) posts here: http://instapundit.com/archives/033024.php
Mohammed posts here: http://iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/2006/10/americas-sinhesitation.html

Since the United States and the Anglosphere West (much less NATO) are not mobilized on a war footing, it is difficult to see just what more could be done. "Bite and hold" on a global scale is painful but manageable given the political will to do more is lacking, and of course the United States cannot ignore other potential threats on the horizon, such as the possible disintegration of the DPRK, or Hugo Chavez attempting to destabilize South America and the Carribean basin.

Clever out of the box thinking is needed. In another post, it was pointed out the Sultan of Oman has access to a reservoir of goodwill and receptive people on both sides of Iran, and runs a relatively modern and moderate state, perhaps he could be persuaded to supply the Diplomacy and Development "D's" of the Three D strategy in his areas of influence. http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/51227/post-458441.html#msg458441

Getting some of that horsepower, or fully engaging India will provide a vast new reservoir of resources which can be deployed to combat, contain or influence (as appropriate) the various States and actors who are working against us.


----------



## a_majoor

The political battle back home: forward this to all your American friends

http://www.winface.com/?p=21



> *North Korea, the Democrats, and 40 dead Canadian Soldiers*
> 
> October 10, 2006 on 9:04 am | In International politics |
> If you’re a Canadian who wants to reduce the death rate among soldiers and civilians in countries like Afghanistan and Iraq here’s what you have to do: get Americans to vote Republican.The reason for that is simple: the people behind these conflicts, not the grunts dying on the ground, but the terror masters in Iran and Beijing, watch our public opinion polls and know perfectly well that each death swings more voters to the Democrats and thus makes the world safer for them.
> 
> An appeasenik: a Kerry, a Clinton, or a Gore, in power would be a dream come true for these people - enabling them to defeat the growth of American democratic ideas in the two thirds of the world they control, speeding the ground rot happening in Europe, and greatly weakening America at home. Crippling the Bush administration during its last two years isn’t quite as good, but a step in the direction they want to go - so they’re throwing everything they’ve got at killing Americans, at killing Canadians, and Iraqis, and Afghanis because it all plays in the media, and every death swings votes their way.
> 
> It has to stop - but only American democrats voting Republican can stop it.
> 
> A landslide victory for Republican candidates in November will bring a quick end to the murderous attacks going on now - the people using the Taliban and infesting Iraq won’t throw away their resources for nothing. That will give peace a chance, foster rebuilding, and bring hope to millions. (_interpolation: this is a debatable proposition. They may also choose the Sampson option and go down in flames the way Hitler attempted to bring Germany down at the end of the Third Reich_)
> 
> There’s another side to this too - and if you get a chance to talk to Americans, especially democrats, it’s important to bring this up.
> 
> The democratic party has been taken over by extremists, but most democrats are not driven by the hatreds people like Dean exploit. Look at Joe Liebermann, a lifelong democrat driven from the party by a fringe group waving the anti-war banner. Joe, and millions of democrats just like him, is the hope of the party - but those are voices that aren’t being heard. Right now, the Democratic party, the party of dissent, stiffles dissent - and acts to support tyranny and oppression abroad.
> 
> To take their party back, democrats have to vote Republican - a landslide victory for Liebermann in Connecticut and Republicans everywhere will create the opportunity for the democratic party to face its demons and throw them out. A re-invigorated American democracy could lead to American elections in 2008 in which neither side promises the terrorists safe haven, in which no appeaseniks take center stage, in which the election becomes a battle of ideas, values, and personalities, not a battle for the future of American democracy in a world at war.
> 
> That’s the outcome we need, that’s what the world needs, that what the thousands of real people whose lives will be lost, and the millions whose hopes will be crushed and lives diminished, need. So talk to an American, one on one: get the people you know to understand what’s at stake - and how to stop the killing.


----------



## a_majoor

Some more about the motivations of the Jihadis. This is the long term centre of gravity, and needs to be addressed somehow.

http://www.libertyfilmfestival.com/libertas/?p=2903



> *Pierre Rehov’s Suicide Killers*
> 
> “Those who blow themselves up get a good bonus from God. They marry 72 virgins.”
> 
> Pierre Rehov’s Suicide Killers is without question one of the most extraordinary films ever submitted to The Liberty Film Festival, and we’re extremely proud to be showing it this year. [Ticket information is here.] I’ve never seen a filmmaker put himself in the kind of life-threatening situations Pierre put himself into in order to make this film - finding his way into terrorist training camps, speaking with terrorists preparing for martyrdom missions, interviewing their families … Suicide Killers is quite simply the most revealing film available about the phenomenon of suicidal Islamic terror. Not only do you get to look into the eyes of suicide killers and hear them explain their behavior (in the most chilling terms imaginable), but you begin to understand the repressive world that creates these men - and now, tragically, women as well. [Several female suicide terrorists are interviewed in the film.]
> 
> Suicide Killers is an absolute must-see for anyone who wishes to understand the threat we face in the War on Terror *- a threat caused not by American foreign policy, or by Israeli occupation, but by repression in Islamic societies, a great deal of which is sexual repression*. This is probably the most intriguing phenomenon uncovered by Pierre’s film. The San Francisco Chronicle recently ran a feature on the film and interviewed Pierre. Here’s some of what Pierre says about his film:
> 
> Q: Why did you make this film?
> 
> A: I had originally wanted to make a film about the psychology of (Israeli) victims of suicide attacks. I started interviewing victims, but I realized it was going to be a film (of a story that had been told before) — that the victims’ lives were completely torn apart. But something struck me: Everyone told me about the last second before the suicide bomber blew himself up — the look and the smile on his face. I was intrigued about how someone can do something so extreme and have a nice smile on his face. I wanted to discover on the individual level what was hiding behind the smile. This is when I shifted.
> 
> In the midst of all this, I talked to one of the girls who survived an attack in Haifa. She was a waitress. She was 17. She saw the taxi stop by the cafe where she was working, she saw a guy come in, going straight to her, and opening his shirt and showing dynamite around his belt. He pointed with his finger toward the dynamite and said, to her, “Do you know what this is?”
> 
> I’ve studied psychology, and there are a lot of things connected to flashers — they want to destroy innocence. I realized that these guys in the last minute of their lives have this same behavior. This is when I understood there is something really sexual about this extreme act they want to commit. I knew (about the Islamic religious belief) of 72 virgins, and I also knew about how sexual frustration can lead to people becoming serial killers.
> 
> Click on over for the rest of the interview.
> 
> This is brave, groundbreaking filmmaking. If the Academy is as ‘courageous’ as it’s always claiming to be, it will nominate Suicide Killers for an Oscar this year.


----------



## Bigmac

Is Pakistan seeing the light??  ???



> Army: Pakistani raid killed up to 80 militants at al-Qaida training centre
> HABIBULLAH KHAN
> 
> 
> 
> CHINGAI, Pakistan (AP) - Pakistani troops backed by missile-firing helicopters on Monday struck a religious school purportedly being used as an al-Qaida training centre, killing dozens of people in what appeared to be the country's deadliest-ever attack against suspected militants.
> 
> The country's top Islamic political leader said American planes were used in the pre-dawn strike against the school - known as a madrassa - and called for nationwide protests Tuesday, claiming all those killed were innocent students and teachers. A U.S. military official denied any involvement in the attack in northwestern Pakistan, near the Afghan border.
> 
> An al-Qaida-linked militant who apparently was a primary target of the strike had left the building a half hour beforehand, a Pakistani official said.
> 
> Anger over the missile strike scuppered the signing of a peace accord, expected Monday, between tribal elders linked to militants. The United States has urged Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf to do more to stop militants from crossing from tribal regions into Afghanistan, where Taliban-fanned violence has reached its deadliest proportions since the American-led invasion in 2001.
> 
> Musharraf, along with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, met with President George W. Bush last month in Washington to address the issue.
> 
> Helicopter gunships fired four or five missiles into the madrassa in Chingai, said army spokesman Maj.-Gen. Shaukat Sultan. The blasts tore apart the building and all inside, spraying body parts, blood and debris across a wide area.
> 
> Sultan said initial estimates indicate the attack killed about 80 suspected militants from Pakistan and other countries. Only three people - all seriously wounded - were believed to have survived, a hospital official said.
> 
> "These militants were involved in actions inside Pakistan and probably in Afghanistan," Sultan told The Associated Press.
> 
> Sultan said the attack was launched after those in charge of the building refused warnings to close it down.
> 
> Among those killed was Liaquat Hussain, a Pakistani cleric and associate of al-Qaida No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri, locals and an intelligence official said. Another al-Zawahri deputy, Faqir Mohammed, was believed to have been in the madrassa and left 30 minutes before the strike, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
> 
> In Islamabad, Qazi Hussain Ahmed - an opposition political leader - blamed the U.S. for the attack and said claims that the madrassa was a terrorist training centre were "rubbish." Thirty children were among the dead, he said.
> 
> In Afghanistan, U.S. military spokesman Maj. Matt Hackathorn denied the U.S. was involved in the strike.
> 
> "It was completely done by the Pakistani military," he told AP.
> 
> Mohammed - the al-Qaida deputy who escaped the raid - addressed a crowd of 10,000 mourners at a mass funeral for the victims, criticizing Musharraf's government and promising widescale protests.
> 
> 
> "We were peaceful, but the government attacked and killed our innocent people on orders from America," Mohammed told the rally as dozens of militants surrounded him, brandishing semi-automatic weapons.
> 
> On Saturday, Mohammed denounced the Pakistani and U.S. governments and praised Osama bin Laden during a rally in the area attended by 5,000 pro-Taliban and al-Qaida tribesmen.
> 
> Before burial, the remains of at least 50 people were laid on traditional wooden beds placed side by side in rows and covered with coloured blankets. Locals walked among the beds and offered prayers.
> 
> "The government has launched an attack during the night, which is against Islam and the traditions of the area," Siraj ul-Haq, a cabinet minister from the North West Frontier Province, told AP. Ul-Haq said he would resign in protest.
> 
> The blast levelled the building, tearing mattresses and scattering Islamic books, including copies of the Qur'an.
> 
> In the nearby town of Khar, some 2,000 tribesmen and shopkeepers marched through the main street, chanting "death to Musharraf, death to Bush."
> 
> The attack happened about three kilometres from Damadola, another Bajur village where in January a U.S. Predator drone fired a missile that purportedly targeted - and missed - al-Zawahri, killing instead several al-Qaida members and civilians.
> 
> Pakistan became a key U.S. ally in its war on terror after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and has deployed about 80,000 soldiers in the tribal region to flush out Taliban and al-Qaida militants hiding there.
> 
> 
> 
> © The Canadian Press, 2006


----------



## Edward Campbell

Here is another perspective, from one of the _charter members_ of my version of the _Anglosphere_ or, more properly according to Ruxted, the new coalition of capable democracies – see: http://ruxted.ca/index.php?/archives/33-About-Turn!-Time-to-Revise-Canadas-Foreign-Policy-Part-2.html

This is by former Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew; it is published in the Jan/Feb 2007 issue of _Foreign Affairs_ and is reproduced here under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act.

http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20070101facomment86101/lee-kuan-yew/the-united-states-iraq-and-the-war-on-terror.html 


> The United States, Iraq, and the War on Terror
> *By Lee Kuan Yew*
> From Foreign Affairs, January/February 2007
> 
> Summary: In spite of its diffculties in Iraq, the United States was not wrong to have removed Saddam Hussein. The outcome of the Iraqi enterprise will be crucial to the course of the "war on terror." And success is still possible -- if Washington takes a page out of its Cold War playbook.
> 
> _Lee Kuan Yew is Minister Mentor of Singapore. He was Prime Minister of Singapore from 1959 to 1990. This piece was adapted from a speech he delivered when accepting the Woodrow Wilson Award for Public Service in October 2006._
> 
> *A Singaporean Perspective*
> 
> The basic feature of U.S. foreign policy during the Cold War was inclusiveness -- a willingness to embrace any country that opposed communism, whatever its type of government. The United States contested the Soviet system and held the line militarily, and its consistent and comprehensive approach eventually led to the Soviet Union's implosion.
> 
> After the Cold War came the "war on terror." Islamist terrorists tried to bring down the World Trade Center in 1993 and bombed the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. Then came the attacks of September 11, 2001. In response, the United States attacked Afghanistan and routed the Taliban. Then, in 2003, the United States invaded Iraq to remove Saddam Hussein and establish democracy there.
> 
> During the war on terror, however, the United States has not been as inclusive as it was in its war against communism. Aside from those in the "coalition of the willing," even most European countries have distanced themselves from Washington.
> 
> The United States did not realize, moreover, the depth of the fault lines in Iraqi society -- between Kurds and Arabs, Sunnis and Shiites, and the members of different tribes and local religious groups. These tensions were contained during four centuries of Ottoman rule, and the British, who took over from the Ottomans in 1920, put Iraq under strong Sunni control, centered on Baghdad. Now, because of the destruction of the old Iraqi society, for the first time in centuries, power is in the hands of the Iraqi Shiites.
> 
> With Sunni control of Iraq removed, Shiite Iran is no longer checked from extending its influence westward. And by allowing the emergence of the first Shiite-dominated Arab state, the United States has stirred the political aspirations of the 150 million or so Shiites living in Sunni countries elsewhere in the region.
> 
> The United States has long relied on its traditional Sunni Arab allies, such as Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia, to keep the Arab-Israeli conflict in check. Now the power of the Sunni bloc may no longer be able to counter an Iran that supports militias such as Hezbollah and Hamas against Israel. The new Iraqi prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, found it necessary to publicly support the Shiite Hezbollah in Lebanon during the fighting this past summer.
> 
> I am not among those who say that it was wrong to have gone into Iraq to remove Saddam and who now advocate that the United States cut its losses and pull out. This will not solve the problem. If the United States leaves Iraq prematurely, jihadists everywhere will be emboldened to take the battle to Washington and its friends and allies. Having defeated the Russians in Afghanistan and the United States in Iraq, they will believe that they can change the world. Even worse, if civil war breaks out in Iraq, the conflict will destabilize the whole Middle East, as it will draw in Egypt, Iran, Jordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Turkey.
> 
> On Iraq, the Singaporean government has been and is in firm support of President George W. Bush and his team. We have helped to train Iraqi police and have thrice deployed a tank landing ship to the Gulf, each time with about 170 personnel, a C-130 detachment, and three separate KC-135 detachments for air-to-air refueling missions. President Bush was right to invade Iraq to depose Saddam and try to remove the weapons of mass destruction that intelligence agencies in Europe and the United States assessed Iraq to have had.
> 
> But I became nervous when the United States disbanded the Iraqi army and police and dismissed all Baathists from the Iraqi government. I feared this would create a vacuum.
> 
> I recalled how when the Japanese captured Singapore in February 1942 and took 90,000 British, Indian, and Australian troops prisoner, they left the police and the civil administration intact and functioning -- under the control of Japanese military officers but with British personnel still in charge of the essential services, such as gas and electricity. Except for a small garrison, most of the 30,000 Japanese invasion forces had left Singapore and headed to Java within a fortnight. Had the Japanese disbanded the police and the civil administration when they interned the British forces, there would have been chaos.
> 
> Perceptions of U.S. unilateralism have triggered an informal countercoalition of necessity among those countries that oppose the coalition of the willing. Many in this countercoalition are not on the side of the jihadists. Russia and China, along with some European countries, have come together simply to protect their interests against what they perceive as U.S. encroachment on their respective domains. They have no fundamental conflict of interest with the United States.
> 
> To isolate the jihadist groups, therefore, the United States must be more multilateral in its approach and rally Europe, Russia, China, India, and all non-Muslim governments to its cause, along with many moderate Muslims. A worldwide coalition is necessary to fight the fires of hatred that the Islamist fanatics are fanning. When moderate Muslim governments, such as those in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Persian Gulf states, Egypt, and Jordan, feel comfortable associating themselves openly with a multilateral coalition against Islamist terrorism, the tide of battle will turn against the extremists.
> 
> *REMAKING THE MIDDLE EAST*
> 
> The Bush administration has set out to spread democracy in Iraq and the Middle East more generally. In the long run, democracy can prevail, but the process will not be easy.
> 
> A free and fair election, moreover, is not the best first step toward democracy in a country that has no history or tradition of self-government. Without adequate preparations, elections simply allow people to vent their frustrations against the corruption and inadequacies of the incumbents and vote in the opposition, regardless of its characteristics. This is what led to Hamas' gaining power in the Palestinian territories.
> 
> A better start would be to concentrate on education, the emancipation of women, and the creation of economic opportunity. Next should come a focus on implementing the rule of law, strengthening the independence of the courts, and building up the civil-society institutions necessary for democracy. Only then will free elections lead to a more democratic order.
> 
> To think that Iraq can go from dictatorship to democracy via two elections in three years is to expect too much. Such a transformation is an effort for the long haul, well beyond the two- and four-year U.S. electoral cycles.
> 
> In its struggles today, the United States should remember the principles and policies that guided its responses to Cold War threats and accept that no single power, religion, or ideology can conquer the world or remake it in its own image. The world is too diverse. Different races, cultures, religions, languages, and histories require different paths to democracy and the free market. Societies in a globalized world will influence and affect one another. And what social system best meets the needs of a people at a particular stage in their development will be settled internally.
> 
> Regarding the rest of the Middle East, Singapore is much indebted to Israel. When we became independent in 1965, Israel was the only country that helped us build a citizen army. The Israeli colonel who led a team of ten officers from 1966 to 1968 revisited Singapore as a brigadier general a decade later and was surprised at our economic progress. He lamented the slower economic progress in Israel. I told him we had been at peace with our neighbors and that Singapore's armed forces were a deterrent, a weapon of last resort against adventurism by any country. Israel, on the other hand, had been engaged in successive wars.
> 
> To solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, there must be two states, one for Israel and another for the Palestinians. But the latter must be viable, one for which peace is worth making. The United States should urge Israel to encourage such a Palestinian state to emerge and help it prosper -- for the Palestinians will have reason to avoid war if war will destroy the future they are building for themselves.
> 
> Progress on the Israeli-Palestinian issue would not just be beneficial in its own right but would also relieve Sunni Arab discontent that arises from the perception that their countries acquiesce in U.S. support for Israel against Palestinian interests. If the United States were seen to actively support the peace process with the goal of a two-state solution, Sunni governments would be more likely to openly support U.S. policies for peace in the greater Middle East.
> 
> As for Iran, it is publicly committed to the destruction of Israel and will try to sabotage any peace settlement, because the continuation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is necessary for its fight against the Sunni Arab states for leadership of the Muslim world. Encouraged by North Korea's recent nuclear test, Iran will press ahead with its own nuclear program. If and when Tehran gets sufficient fissile material, the balance of power in the Gulf will be fundamentally changed. The Iranian problem will eclipse the Iraqi problem and be at the top of the international agenda. And if Iran's theocracy succeeds, it, not democracy, will be seen as the way of the future for many in Muslim countries.
> 
> *COLLATERAL BENEFITS*
> 
> The reason I am so focused on the Middle East is that my first close interaction with the United States grew out of the country's involvement in a previous painful struggle, that in Vietnam. Between 1966 and 1971, American leaders used to stop by Singapore after visiting South Vietnam to discuss the regional situation with me. Washington had sent in some 500,000 troops without sufficient knowledge of the history of the Vietnamese people and paid a huge price in blood, treasure, prestige, and confidence as a result.
> 
> Conventional wisdom in the 1970s saw the war in Vietnam as an unmitigated disaster. But that has been proved wrong. The war had collateral benefits, buying the time and creating the conditions that enabled noncommunist East Asia to follow Japan's path and develop into the four dragons (Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan) and, later, the four tigers (Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand). Time brought about the split between Moscow and Beijing and then a split between Beijing and Hanoi. The influence of the four dragons and the four tigers, in turn, changed both communist China and communist Vietnam into open, free-market economies and made their societies freer.
> 
> The conventional wisdom now is that the war in Iraq is also an unmitigated disaster. But if the troubles in Iraq are addressed in a resolute, rather than a defeatist, manner, today's conventional wisdom can be proved wrong as well. A stabilized, less repressive Iraq, with its different ethnic and religious communities accepting one another in some devolved framework, can be a liberating influence in the Middle East.
> 
> The challenge now, as in the 1970s, is for the United States to find an honorable exit from a conflict that developed in an unexpected way. Once begun, however, the problem has to be seen through to the finish so that irreparable damage is not done to the United States and the world at large. An Iraq that coheres as one state; includes Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds, Turkmen, and others; and is not manipulated by any of its neighbors represents an outcome that would accord with the interests of the United States, Iraq's neighbors, and the wider world. Washington should therefore bring all of Iraq's neighbors into the process of achieving this objective.
> 
> The next president will face a new world. There will be not just Iraq but also Iran to contend with, and the long-term fight against Islamist militants will still only be in its early rounds. But the United States overcame the setbacks of the war in Vietnam, checkmated Soviet expansion, and became the indispensable superpower. With a wide coalition and a proper attitude, the United States can prevail now as well.



This might have gone in any number of Army.ca fora but I put it here, in the ill-named _‘War on terror’_ thread (I mean the *war* is misnamed, not the thread) because he touches on several aspects of the broader clash between the modern, secular, democratic, capitalist West and those _movements_ which wish to drag their own peoples and, eventually, the whole world back into a barbaric theocracy.

I have three comments.

*First*: Like the Iraq Commission, Lee recognizes that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is closely bound amongst the tangled roots of the larger medieval Islam _vs_ Civilization conflict.

I am  not persuaded that there is any _acceptable_ solution to the Arab/Israeli conflict.  The state-to-state problems can, almost certainly, be solved but the real problem is not Arab states; the real problem is *non-state movements* which are armed, powerful, aggressive and, in the main, unwilling to accept the existence of Israel … or Jews.  These movements have no need to adopt any other position: _Death to Israel! and Kill all the Jews!_ are popular sentiments amongst a solid majority of Muslims in the Middle east, North Africa and Central Asia – if the data I think I saw (Pew polls, etc) is correct.

*Second*: I wish President Bush, Prime Minister Harper and other Western leaders would read, think about and actually understand these few words:

_” … In the long run, democracy can prevail, but the process will not be easy.

A free and fair election, moreover, is not the best first step toward democracy in a country that has no history or tradition of self-government. Without adequate preparations, elections simply allow people to vent their frustrations against the corruption and inadequacies of the incumbents and vote in the opposition, regardless of its characteristics. This is what led to Hamas' gaining power in the Palestinian territories.

A better start would be to concentrate on education, the emancipation of women, and the creation of economic opportunity. Next should come a focus on implementing the rule of law, strengthening the independence of the courts, and building up the civil-society institutions necessary for democracy. Only then will free elections lead to a more democratic order.

To think that Iraq can go from dictatorship to democracy via two elections in three years is to expect too much. Such a transformation is an effort for the long haul, well beyond the two- and four-year U.S. electoral cycles. 

In its struggles today, the United States should remember the principles and policies that guided its responses to Cold War threats and accept that no single power, religion, or ideology can conquer the world or remake it in its own image. The world is too diverse. Different races, cultures, religions, languages, and histories require different paths to democracy and the free market. Societies in a globalized world will influence and affect one another. And what social system best meets the needs of a people at a particular stage in their development will be settled internally.”_

We, Canadians, must understand that Lee Kwan Yew’s words apply to Afghanistan, too.  We will not, because we cannot, install democracy – not even a conservative democracy – in Afghanistan in our lifetimes or even in the lifetimes of our children and grand children.  Democracy, liberal or conservative, as we understand that term, is not _natural_ for most societies.  It required, in the West and in East Asia, much struggle between people and medieval barons and mandarins and monarchs followed by a renaissance or two and religious reformations and counter-reformations and still ongoing liberal and conservative enlightenments.  Afghanistan is ill prepared to even think about democracy as anything other than a means to *’… vent their frustrations against the corruption and inadequacies of the incumbents …’* as we have seen, again and again in Algeria, Egypt, Pakistan and Indonesia.

*Third*: We must also understand that a *liberal* democracy is not the only acceptable model.

As an aside: There are, now, a few *conservative* democracies – Singapore itself being the best example and several *illiberal* democracies.*  The former are, in my opinion _natural_ and expected expressions of East Asian (Confucian) values in the 21st century; the latter are consistently weak and, I think doomed to fail.  Several EU members, including France, ar, at heart, *illiberal* democracies. 

That aside, Afghanistan, like much of Central and West Asia and the Middle East and North Africa is both socially conservative and resolutely _un__enlightened_.  Even after a couple or three generations it is unlikely that whatever democracy develops in that poor, tradition bound land will be *liberal*.  We must assume that Canadian soldiers will be home, and mostly in the old folks home, when Afghanistan becomes a democracy.  Our soldiers will have done their job when a lawfully elected government in Kabul can manage the affairs the country in reasonable security.  We may not like how they mange their own affairs but they key words are _”their own”_.  It is not ‘our’ country, we are there to help make the system secure and stable enough for them decide, for themselves and in their own ways, how to manage their own affairs.  That’s it: make the place secure and provide a stable foundation, for the Afghans to run Afghanistan as they see fit – only running it in such a way as not to endanger Canada and its interests and those of friends and neighbours.

Lee Kwan yew has lived a long and eventful life.  His insights merit consideration – especially by George W Bush and his successors in the White House.


----------
* See Fareed Zachariah: _Illiberal Democracy_ (Foreign Affairs, Nov/Dec 1997) and _The Future of Freedom_ (the book is an expansion of the 1997Article) -  http://www.fareedzakaria.com/about.html


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## Kirkhill

Edward Campbell said:
			
		

> _” … In the long run, democracy can prevail, but the process will not be easy.
> 
> A free and fair election, moreover, is not the best first step toward democracy in a country that has no history or tradition of self-government. Without adequate preparations, elections simply allow people to vent their frustrations against the corruption and inadequacies of the incumbents and vote in the opposition, regardless of its characteristics. This is what led to Hamas' gaining power in the Palestinian territories.
> 
> A better start would be to concentrate on education, the emancipation of women, and the creation of economic opportunity. Next should come a focus on implementing the rule of law, strengthening the independence of the courts, and building up the civil-society institutions necessary for democracy. Only then will free elections lead to a more democratic order.
> 
> To think that Iraq can go from dictatorship to democracy via two elections in three years is to expect too much. Such a transformation is an effort for the long haul, well beyond the two- and four-year U.S. electoral cycles.
> 
> In its struggles today, the United States should remember the principles and policies that guided its responses to Cold War threats and accept that no single power, religion, or ideology can conquer the world or remake it in its own image. The world is too diverse. Different races, cultures, religions, languages, and histories require different paths to democracy and the free market. Societies in a globalized world will influence and affect one another. And what social system best meets the needs of a people at a particular stage in their development will be settled internally.”_
> 
> We, Canadians, must understand that Lee Kwan Yew’s words apply to Afghanistan, too.  We will not, because we cannot, install democracy – not even a conservative democracy – in Afghanistan in our lifetimes or even in the lifetimes of our children and grand children.  Democracy, liberal or conservative, as we understand that term, is not _natural_ for most societies.  It required, in the West and in East Asia, much struggle between people and medieval barons and mandarins and monarchs followed by a renaissance or two and religious reformations and counter-reformations and still ongoing liberal and conservative enlightenments.  Afghanistan is ill prepared to even think about democracy as anything other than a means to *’… vent their frustrations against the corruption and inadequacies of the incumbents …’* as we have seen, again and again in Algeria, Egypt, Pakistan and Indonesia.
> 
> *Third*: We must also understand that a *liberal* democracy is not the only acceptable model.
> 
> As an aside: There are, now, a few *conservative* democracies – Singapore itself being the best example and several *illiberal* democracies.*  The former are, in my opinion _natural_ and expected expressions of East Asian (Confucian) values in the 21st century; the latter are consistently weak and, I think doomed to fail.  Several EU members, including France, ar, at heart, *illiberal* democracies.
> 
> That aside, Afghanistan, like much of Central and West Asia and the Middle East and North Africa is both socially conservative and resolutely _un__enlightened_.  Even after a couple or three generations it is unlikely that whatever democracy develops in that poor, tradition bound land will be *liberal*.  We must assume that Canadian soldiers will be home, and mostly in the old folks home, when Afghanistan becomes a democracy.  Our soldiers will have done their job when a lawfully elected government in Kabul can manage the affairs the country in reasonable security.  We may not like how they mange their own affairs but they key words are _”their own”_.  It is not ‘our’ country, we are there to help make the system secure and stable enough for them decide, for themselves and in their own ways, how to manage their own affairs.  That’s it: make the place secure and provide a stable foundation, for the Afghans to run Afghanistan as they see fit – only running it in such a way as not to endanger Canada and its interests and those of friends and neighbours.
> 
> Lee Kwan yew has lived a long and eventful life.  His insights merit consideration – especially by George W Bush and his successors in the White House.



One of the more fascinating aspects of the Afghan situations, as far as I am concerned, is why more use has not been made of the Loya Jirga.  That seems to have been a well developed consultative process with a great deal of credibility from historical use.  It is beyond me why it couldn't have been the basis for at least one "House" in a bicameral legislature.  The Lords/Senate would seem to be a natural fit although given the current power of the Barons perhaps it would be a better "Commons" (except for the lack of women).  Maybe it can be employed as something like the Privy Council.


----------



## Edward Campbell

Edward Campbell said:
			
		

> ...
> *Second*: ...
> We, Canadians, must understand that Lee Kwan Yew’s words apply to Afghanistan, too.  We will not, because we cannot, install democracy – not even a conservative democracy – in Afghanistan in our lifetimes or even in the lifetimes of our children and grand children.  Democracy, liberal or conservative, as we understand that term, is not _natural_ for most societies.  It required, in the West and in East Asia, much struggle between people and medieval barons and mandarins and monarchs followed by a renaissance or two and religious reformations and counter-reformations and still ongoing liberal and conservative enlightenments.  Afghanistan is ill prepared to even think about democracy as anything other than a means to *’… vent their frustrations against the corruption and inadequacies of the incumbents …’* as we have seen, again and again in Algeria, Egypt, Pakistan and Indonesia.
> 
> *Third*: We must also understand that a *liberal* democracy is not the only acceptable model.
> 
> As an aside: There are, now, a few *conservative* democracies – Singapore itself being the best example and several *illiberal* democracies.*  The former are, in my opinion _natural_ and expected expressions of East Asian (Confucian) values in the 21st century; the latter are consistently weak and, I think doomed to fail.  Several EU members, including France, ar, at heart, *illiberal* democracies.
> 
> That aside, Afghanistan, like much of Central and West Asia and the Middle East and North Africa is both socially conservative and resolutely _un__enlightened_.  Even after a couple or three generations it is unlikely that whatever democracy develops in that poor, tradition bound land will be *liberal*.  We must assume that Canadian soldiers will be home, and mostly in the old folks home, when Afghanistan becomes a democracy.  Our soldiers will have done their job when a lawfully elected government in Kabul can manage the affairs the country in reasonable security.  We may not like how they mange their own affairs but they key words are _”their own”_.  It is not ‘our’ country, we are there to help make the system secure and stable enough for them decide, for themselves and in their own ways, how to manage their own affairs.  That’s it: make the place secure and provide a stable foundation, for the Afghans to run Afghanistan as they see fit – only running it in such a way as not to endanger Canada and its interests and those of friends and neighbours ...
> ----------
> •	See Fareed Zachariah: _Illiberal Democracy_ (Foreign Affairs, Nov/Dec 1997) and _The Future of Freedom_ (the book is an expansion of the 1997Article) -  http://www.fareedzakaria.com/about.html



To pick up on my own points (where is the pats self on back icon?), here is an opinion piece by Sen. Colin Kenney from today’s (28 Dec 06) _Ottawa Citizen_, reproduced under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act.

My *emphasis* added.

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=82fbe8cd-e183-45aa-a94c-66fa1578a2dd 


> Help them to help themselves
> 
> *Colin Kenny, Citizen Special*
> Published: Thursday, December 28, 2006
> 
> All the NATO troops in the world won't suffice to secure Afghanistan. Eventually the Afghans are going to have to do their own fighting
> 
> Can Canada's involvement in the current NATO incursion in Afghanistan save that country from failing? Not a chance.
> 
> Can Canada's contribution give the Afghans a chance to save themselves from failing? Following months of listening closely to all kinds of analysis, then spending four days there this month, I'd say there's a fair chance.
> 
> Certainly the more than 300 young men and women that I and four other senators from the Committee on National Security and Defence talked to this month think there's a chance. I was encouraged by both their optimism and their lack of naivete about the enormousness of what needs to be done beyond firing bullets.
> 
> This is the essence of what we were hearing from a lot of them: As long as Canadians have no illusions about a quick fix, *we may well be able to help the Afghans nudge themselves out of the Middle Ages in whichever ways they want to do that. Afghans may not want to do that in every way that westerners would recommend. But if we want to be realistic about what is doable, Canadians will have to accept that.*
> 
> Our committee is going to issue a statement on our Afghanistan visit early in the New Year. But two days after our return, here are some personal thoughts:
> 
> After a long history of bloodshed, and foreign and homemade oppression, helping to give Afghans a sense of security is critical to getting the nudging process underway. So far, all the brave efforts of all the Canadians and their allies haven't produced that kind of security. In fact, at this stage the NATO presence in Kandahar has given southern Afghans more to worry about in terms of sheer survival, not less.
> 
> Quite bluntly, there is a war going on that wouldn't be happening if we weren't there. If you couple that with the Afghans' long-standing hatred of uninvited foreigners occupying their lands, it doesn't take long to figure out that at this point we're not exactly seen as the best thing to come along since either sliced bread or the local variety.
> 
> The problem is that we haven't been able to accomplish any of *the three ends that Canada defines as essential to forays into troubled states: defeat would-be oppressors militarily; facilitate the creation of the kind of infrastructure and institutions that noble concepts like freedom and justice depend upon for survival; and do basic development projects that improve the lives of ordinary people.*
> 
> Some critics in Canada complain that our military should spend less time chasing the Taliban and more time on development. That's a very romantic concept, and in the long run, a worthy one. Everyone over there knows that Canada's mission to Afghanistan will have been meaningless if we don't get involved in development. They also know that *it will have to be development largely defined by the Afghans -- not Western textbook definitions of what constitutes emancipation and progress.*
> 
> But nobody can get started down that road unless we can provide the security that development workers need to do their jobs. We kept being told that Canada is already involved in development projects, even in the Kandahar region. But the descriptions we got were hazy, and if these projects are taking place, the military said it was too dangerous to take us to any of them.
> 
> Nope, military progress has to be the first imperative, or nothing else is going to fall into place.
> 
> There are problems here. First, we only have 2,500 Canadians on the ground, and it takes 2,000 of them to support the 500 doing the fighting. NATO does not have enough fighters, and we will be hard pressed to offer any more.
> 
> But all the NATO troops in the world won't suffice. Eventually the Afghans are going to have to do their own fighting.
> 
> Foreign armies will always have a problem in Afghanistan. A strong national army would have far more popular support. But such an army needs training, and trainers who are willing to go to the battlefield with a national army until Afghan officers and senior non-commissioned members have developed the expertise to lead their troops.
> 
> Who will provide the extra troops NATO needs now, and who will step in and provide the extra NATO personnel needed to train an effective Afghan military and police force? Currently, the Dutch are there with us. The Americans are there. The British are there. But *there are a lot of NATO members that simply won't go into this kind of dangerous territory.*
> 
> If these countries end up sticking to their (lack of) guns, and don't buy into the NATO common approach to defence in the Afghanistan context, then there's not much Canada can do. We are trying to redefine and rebuild our whole military, and we can't do that if we continue to over-commit troops that are scarce after more than two decades of military neglect.
> 
> If these other NATO countries don't come through, there is little hope for sustainable military success. There are reports that the Taliban is regrouping in Pakistan in preparation for a massive offensive that would far outstrip anything our Canadian kids have seen to date -- and they've seen plenty.
> 
> Does that mean that Canada should pull out? No. We've committed ourselves until at least 2009. Unlike Iraq, the end is worthy here, and some degree of progress is attainable.
> 
> Other than our obvious interest in international peace and stability, Canada doesn't have an overriding interest in Afghanistan. We're there because it's right to be there, the way it would be right to be in Darfur (if we had the additional resources) and the way it was right to be there to help free Europe more than 60 years ago.
> 
> There are some European countries that need to remember how important it is to stand up for what is right. *NATO is currently trying to figure out how best it can play a relevant role in the modern world. If NATO doesn't hurry up, the word relevant is going to pass it by.
> 
> And while that is happening, Afghanistan will probably slip away. Pity, because the soldiers we talked to know what many Canadians and Europeans are so doubtful about: If we team up and give these people some help, they still have a fighting chance.* After what the outside world has done to Afghanistan over the years, we owe them that.
> 
> _Senator Colin Kenny is chair of the Senate Committee on National Security and Defence. E-mail: kennyco@sen.parl.gc.ca _
> 
> © The Ottawa Citizen 2006​



The key points is this: the *best* we can do is to help the Afghans to help themselves and the hope (maybe _nudge_ a bit, too) they will help themselves in ways which are not inimical to our, Canadian, vital interests.

I rather like Sen. Kenney’s broad, general reformulation of Canada’s 3D process in Afghanistan as:

1.	Defeat would-be oppressors militarily;

2.	Facilitate the creation of the kind of infrastructure and institutions that noble concepts like freedom and justice depend upon for survival; and

3.	Do basic development projects that improve the lives of ordinary people.

I do *not agree* with this statement:

_”Everyone over there knows that Canada's mission to Afghanistan will have been meaningless if we don't get involved in development.”_

I think that’s a misstatement of the position which ought to be:

_Everyone knows that Development, financed and aided by the West, is one of the three keys to allowing the Afghans to avoid falling back into the _failed state_ mode.  That Development can be done best by various non-governmental organizations but it can be done only after NATO/ISAF has secured an area, as is the case in the North and West of Afghanistan._
   
With regard to Sen. Kenney’s last point, see: http://ruxted.ca/index.php?/archives/32-About-Turn!-Time-to-Revise-Canadas-Foreign-Policy.html where Ruxted says: _”NATO is less and less a useful 'cornerstone' for Canada and, more and more, a stumbling block.”_ and _”… it may be aiding and abetting the Taliban. NATO may be part of the problem.”_

I do not agree with Sen. Kenney when he says that, _”… Canada doesn't have an overriding interest in Afghanistan. We're there because it's right to be there …”_  Our overarching goal to be anywhere in the world must be to protect and promote our own vital interests.  In the case of Afghanistan Canadians need to recognize that:

•	The Taliban and al Qaeda and many other similar _movements_ are part of a larger _thrust_ which aims to reshape the Islamic Crescent* into a unified, barbaric and powerful theocracy which will, then, be able to attack and defeat the secular, democratic West and impose its medieval social/cultural norms on the entire world;

•	Canada is firmly in the sights of these _movements_ – Osama bin Laden, for example, has, publicly, declared us to be a target.  We are his sworn enemy; and

•	We need to protect ourselves and our way of life by _ defeating would-be oppressors militarily and create the kind of infrastructure and institutions that noble concepts like freedom and justice depend upon for survival_ so that failed states like Afghanistan cannot be used as firm bases by *enemies* like al Qaeda.

That’s a lot more than just ‘doing the right thing’ in the world.


---------
* Morocco through North Africa and the Middle East to West and Central Asia and down through Malaysia to Indonesia.


Edit: Typo - "I do not agree with Se*n*. Kenney when he ..."


----------



## GAP

With Edwards' exceptions, I really enjoyed reading Kenny's read on Afghanistan. It is refreshing to have a politician basically say it like it is, not mouth words to score political points for the upcoming election.

This should also help take the wind out Jack's sails ( and a little out of Dion's if he was considering changing the Liberal position).


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## GAP

Kenya closes border with Somalia
Associated Press
Article Link

Nairobi — Kenya said Thursday it has closed its border with Somalia in an apparent effort to keep Islamic militants and refugees from entering the country.

“The Kenyan border is officially closed,” Foreign Affairs Minister Raphael Tuju told The Associated Press, but he did not say when the decision was made or how long the border would remain closed.

Kenya has sent extra troops to its northern frontier with Somalia.

The UN's humanitarian agency said Wednesday that about 4,000 Somali refugees were reported to be near the Somali border town of Dhobley, unable to cross into Kenya.

That same day, a Kenyan security helicopter and a Kenyan air force plane were fired at by unidentified gunmen on either side of the border. Mr. Tuju said he had no information on the incidents.

The minister told journalists Wednesday that Kenya will not allow Somali refugees into the country following the routing of Somalia's Islamic movement, because Kenya did not know of any threat facing the refugees.
More on link


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## MarkOttawa

Very good, wide-ranging CGAI podcast with Andrea Charron, Eugene Lang, Dick Fadden:



> "Defence Deconstructed: 9/11 and Lessons Learned" (Canada)
> 
> __
> https://soundcloud.com/user-609485369%2Fdefence-deconstructed-911-and-lessons-learned



Mark
Ottawa


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