Defining the Enemy

[Infanteer]

Interesting quote from Imperial Hubris, which I am going through right now in light of world events:

Al Qaeda's ties to and presence in northern Iraq existed before 11 September 2001 but took on greater momentum and importance there-after.  While it was long known that Kurdistan was home to multiple, largely secular Sunni Kurdish groups opposed to Saddam Hussein's regime, the presence there of an assortment of militant Sunni Kurdish groups opposed to Daddam, secular Sunni Kurds, and the West was less clear.  What Western observers for the most part missed, however, was not overlooked by al Qaeda and the Taleban.  The New York Times has reported, for example, that documents from an al Qaeda computer captured by U.S. forces in Kabul show that bin Laden hosted the leaders of several Kurdish Islamist groups in Afghanistan in 2000 and 2001, meetings in which Taleban representatives were included.  The message delivered to the Iraqis appears to have been threefold: unite the disparate Sunni Islamist factions in northern Iraq; propagate the teachings of the Salafi sect of Islam among the Sunni population there and try to create a Taleban-style regime in Iraq; and train and prepare fighters for war against U.S. forces if Washington again invades Iraq.  In addition, the Iraqi Kurds received $350,000 in funding, weapons, Land Cruisers, and instruction in administration, logistics, and military training methods, as well as an offer - which was accepted - to provide al Qaeda cadre to assist in putting the administrative and military sides of their house in order.  Finally, it appears that the Ansar al-Islam group asked for and received from al Qaeda training in the fabrication and use of toxic weapons; manuals for producing toxins found in 2002 in Ansar camps in Iraq are identical to those taken from al Qaeda in Afghanistan.  By late summer 2002, Ansar al-Islam had built a toxin-producing facility near Khurma, Iraq, and was testing ricin and other poisons on farm animals - perhaps with the guidance of senior al Qaeda ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.  The British media have reported that the Khurma camp may have been involved in training and supplying the poison ricin to Islamists who were arrested in London in late 2002 and found to have traces of it in their possession....

The militant Sunni Kurds seem to have been eager learners and in summer 2001 the Ansar al-Islam organization - led then by Norway-based Mullah Krekar, and now by Abu Abdallah al-Shafi'i - undertook efforts to unite the large Jund al-Islam group and several other Sunni groups under Ansar's banner.  The efforts succeeded and Ansar al-Islam's manpower rose from six hundred to more than two thousand by January 2003; these numbers do not include the "scores" of Arab Afghan insurgents who entered Iraq after the fall of the Taleban.  Based in the mountains near Halabja, the newly united group began in the summer 2001 to stage guerrilla-style attacks on the U.S.-allied secular Kurdish groups - including assassination, car bombs, and ambushes.  In doing so, Ansar al-Islam showed an unexpected military competence, an inventory of modern weaponry, and an ability to conduct suicide attacks.  These operations again showed the qualitative edge given to a a Sunni militant group by a small number of al Qaeda trainers and combat veterans.  In every country where an Islamic insurgency is under way, al Qaeda trainers have improved the military skills and enhanced the religious zeal of local fighters.  Al Qaeda's trainers are proving the truth of bin Laden's late mentor Shaykh Abdullah Azzam's assertion that the Koran and the AK-47, together, yield the levels of lethality needed for Islam to triumph.

Anonymous, Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror, pp. 74-76

Now, people may be apt to blow the book off because of its title, but it is interesting to read that the author is in support of fighting, but on the right terms.  He argues that we are losing the "War on Terror" because we are approaching it wrong.

Anyways, the link between al Qaeda is strongest with the Kurds - this does nothing to implicate Saddam's regime because it was after the first invasion that he started losing his grip on the Kurdistani regions of Iraq (IIRC).  The other links also appear to be touchy; at best they represent the regime not really caring if the terrorists went through Iraq or not; what more would we expect from Saddam Hussein?

It seems that by invading, we've made it easier for these groups to work in lawless Northern Iraq.  On the flip-side, the West has a definite capability to destroy terrorist infrastructure in Iraq.  I'm sure that the subject is much more complicated then a few pundits shooting statements back and forth.

I wonder at times if it would have been best to pull out of Iraq once Saddam's regime had been shattered (or at least after they captured him).  Since Al Qaeda levels the finger at the US and the West for supporting apostate regimes like Hussein's - it could have been a public-relations victory of sorts against Al Qaeda; "Here you are pious Muslims - the United States has destroyed the apostate regime of Hussein and returned Mesopotamia to the faithful...."   ^-^

Anyways, I agree with Edward Campbell that this war isn't a "War on Terror" or against any specific group of people, rather it is an Islamic Insurgency that (IMHO) is one that is of Huntingtonian Clash of Civilization proportions.  I think the two main questions worth debating are:

1)  Was Iraq a larger player in the Islamic Insurgency under Saddam's regime or as it is now (essentially the Wild West).  It appears that the answer is the latter, so....

2)  Is it desirable to have Iraq become a larger player in the Islamic Insurgency and to have the United States strategically engaged there?

Big question, complex answer - oh well, that's what internet forums are for.

Infanteer

 

[CH1]

Wesley:

I had a chuckle from your rant earlier today.  In another thread I was trying to get the same point across & was put in my place!  As you said, too many ppl have their heads in the sand or other places.

Ppl have to wake up & smell the coffee, before it turns to gunpowder on our own turf.  If we turn our backs to the obvious, the obvious will come back to bite us.

I was trying to point out that even Canada, has become a target for extremists, due to our support & proximity to our neighbour.  Seems that ppl have a different (?) view of how we all fit into the big scheme of things.  They do not realise that the extremists do not view or differentiate the coalition members or any body that in any way supports them, any different.

At any rate, an excellent rant.  May be some ppl need more front line work to see if they would be treated different if captured.

Beers & Cheers

 

[I_am_John_Galt]

The argument about the number of "unnecessary" deaths caused by the war should really viewed in the context of the fact that it is made by many of the same people that claimed 4,000 - 5,000 children were being killed per month "because" of the pre-war trade sanctions: if we hold them accountable to their own estimates the war has already saved thousands of lives (without even counting the 300,000+ executed).

 

[1feral1]

Wesley:

I had a chuckle from your rant earlier today.  In another thread I was trying to get the same point across & was put in my place!  As you said, too many ppl have their heads in the sand or other places.

Ppl have to wake up & smell the coffee, before it turns to gunpowder on our own turf.  If we turn our backs to the obvious, the obvious will come back to bite us.

I was trying to point out that even Canada, has become a target for extremists, due to our support & proximity to our neighbour.  Seems that ppl have a different (?) view of how we all fit into the big scheme of things.  They do not realise that the extremists do not view or differentiate the coalition members or any body that in any way supports them, any different.

At any rate, an excellent rant.  May be some ppl need more front line work to see if they would be treated different if captured.

Beers & Cheers

Just got baack from a great lunch, two pots of XXXX Gold, and a sausage roll with sauce!

Thanks Mate, it still doesnt help the misguided and the tree hugger-granola eating-bleeding heart-dogooder-snivel libertarian leftist embarrasments out there, even though the weaker minority, seem to get all the press and attention. But wait, if we (the west, say the USA as they are the big dog on the street) did nothing, and something bad was to happen, these ratbags would be crying 'why did you not do anything about it'. So its a 'catch 22', and I rest my case.

Sorry Greywolf, but I cannot even comprehend how you think (your posts in this thread are infact to me, outragous and so bizarre), and you might be a great bloke in many other ways, but I am glad you are not in my Army. With how you feel, why are you in a defence carreer? Just keep hoping that Live 8 works.

I have ENTIRELY lost all my confidence in the way some think on here.

 

[Britney Spears]

the tree hugger-granola eating-bleeding heart-dogooder-snivel libertarian leftist embarrasments

I should point out that liberTARIANs, as distinct from liberALs  are usually considered to be on the conservative, right side of the political spectrum.

 

[1feral1]

But attacking Iraq did not destroy the threat, in fact, the threat is increased because now people from different countries are going into Iraq to attack because of the presence of a large concentration of Americans.  

If all the people killed on Sept 11, 2001 were   Canadians, I would still think attacking Iraq will not satisfy the dead's family to avenge their loved ones (if indeed that is a legitimate reason), nor would it rid the world of those responsible for the attacks or those who support them.

The attack on radical islam by the US was not revenge.

Sorry Mate, but I find this response totally piss weak, and almost un-Canadian. I reckon we can agree to disagree on this topic. You have yor way of thinking, and nothing is gonna change that.

Just remember you too, are the Great Satan, and you'd be KILLED quicksmart by many out there in that shitty part of the world, not for being mistaken as an American, but for being a westerner, and kufar as we all are.  

 

[Infanteer]

The argument about the number of "unnecessary" deaths caused by the war should really viewed in the context of the fact that it is made by many of the same people that claimed 4,000 - 5,000 children were being killed per month "because" of the pre-war trade sanctions: if we hold them accountable to their own estimates the war has already saved thousands of lives (without even counting the 300,000+ executed).

As well, I remember Matt Fisher telling me that he noticed that for every attack on US/Coalition Forces, there were one or two attacks by Iraqis on Iraqis - there is as much as a civil conflict here as there is an Islamic Insurgency against the West.  We have to consider that, due to the "Yugoslavia"-type nature of Iraq's ethno-religious makeup (Sunni Kurd, Shia Arab, Sunni Arab), that the casulties from Iraqi society disintergrating would have been inevitable, it was only a matter of waiting for Hussein to drop out of the game.

Sound plausible to you folks?

 

[Infanteer]

I should point out that liberTARIANs, as distinct from liberALs   are usually considered to be on the conservative, right side of the political spectrum.

Thanks, I consider myself a Libertarian, but I hope I'm not a "tree hugger-granola eating-bleeding heart-dogooder embarrasment".... ;D

 

[I_am_John_Galt]

I should point out that liberTARIANs, as distinct from liberALs  are usually considered to be on the conservative, right side of the political spectrum.

By "libertarian leftists" I took him to mean the left side (aka "socialist libertarians," like Chomsky, anarcho-communists, etc.) ... was that not obvious?

 

[Britney Spears]

By "libertarian leftists" I took him to mean the left side (aka "socialist libertarians," like Chomsky, anarcho-communists, etc.) ... was that not obvious?

Not really, no. In common usage the word is taken to mean "Right Libertarian" around here.  If Wes was referring to anarcho-comunists, then so be it, although I'm not sure how much sense that would make in our context. I suppose at the end of the day we can call ourselves whatever we want.

I just didn't want to get confused with those dirty right wing libertarians that's all.

 

[Infanteer]

I just didn't want to get confused with those dirty right wing libertarians that's all.

Hey, slot off granola-head! 

 

[1feral1]

I think ya guys know what I mean  ;D

Cold beers,

Wes

 

[Infanteer]

I'm not sure Wes - I think ya may be softening up with the good life on Bribie Island....planning any protest marches lately?

:dontpanic:

 

[1feral1]

Lately my only protest is the pool is too cold to swim, and the bay accross the road is full of bull sharks! Nancy is too chicken to go canoeing.

Regards,

Wes

 

[Infanteer]

Another bit from Michael Sheuer that is worth the read.  I think Britney will like it as it points out the same idea: who cares about Iraq, think about strategy and dealing with Al Qaeda and its growing Islamic Insurgency:

Time for a question in the field of  cross-cultural analysis: Why is today's Iraq like a Christmas present you long for but never expected to receive?  Give up?  Well, there is nothing bin Laden could have hoped for more than the American invasion and occupation of Iraq.  The U.S. invasion of Iraq is Osama bin Laden's gift from America, one he has long and ardently desired, but never realistically expected.  Think of it:  Iraq is the second holiest land in Islam; a place where the Sunni minority long dominated and brutalized the Shia majority; where order was kept only by the Baathist barbarity that prevented a long overdue civil war; and where, in the wake of Saddam's fall, the regional powers Iran and Saudi Arabia would intervene, at least clandestinely, to stop the creation of, respectively, a Sunni or Shia successor state.  In short, Iraq without Saddam would obviously become what political scientists call a "failed state," a place bedeviled by its neighbors and - as is Afghanistan - a land where al Qaeda or al Qaeda-like organizations would thrive.  Surely, thought bin Laden, the Americans would not want to create this kind of situation.  It would be, if you will, like deliberately shooting yourself in the foot.

While still hoping against hope, bin Laden would then have thought that the United States must know that it is hated by many millions of Muslims for enforcing sanctions that reportedly starved to death a million and more Iraqis.  In this context, an invasion would sharply deepen anti-American sentiment in the Muslim world, a hatred that would only worsen as Muslims watched the U.S. military's televised and inevitable thrashing of Saddam's badly led and hopelessly decrepit armed forces.  And then, dreamed bin Laden wildly, things would get bad for the Americans.  They would stay too long in Iraq, insist on installing a democracy that would subordinate the long-dominant Sunnis, vigorously limit Islam's role in government, and act in ways that spotlighted their interest in Iraq's massive oil reserves.  All Muslims would see each day on television that the Unites States was occupying a Muslim country, insisting that man-made laws replace God's revealed word, stealing Iraqi oil, and paving the way for the creation of a "Greater Israel."  The clerics and scholars would call for a defensive jihad against the United States, young Muslim males would rush from across the Islamic world to fight U.S. troops, and there - in Islam's second holiest land - would erupt a second Afghanistan, a self-perpetuating holy war that would endure whether or not al Qaeda survived.  Then bin Laden awoke and knew it was only a dream.  It was, even for one of Allah's most devout, too much to hope for.

But in March 2003 bin Laden - to his astonishment - got his longed-for gift, complements of America, when the United States invaded Iraq.  The fatwas that greeted the invasion essentially validated all bin Laden has said in arguing for a defensive jihad against the United States.  Even leaving aside the fatwas issued by pro-bin Laden clerics, the virulence of the remaining fatwas is clear in those published by such notable scholars as Shaykh Sayyid Tantawi, Shaykh Yusuf Qaradawi, and Shaykh Salman al-Awdah, all of whom "are not voices in the wilderness, but [are] rather the core of the Sunni Muslim establishment," according to Professor Daniel Byman.  "Once an enemy lands in Muslim territory," Shaykh Tantawi, head of al-Azhar University, declared in March 2003, "jihad becomes the individual duty of every Muslim man and woman.  Because our Arab and Muslim nation will be faced with a new crusade that targets land, honor, creed, and homeland, scholars ruled that jihad against U.S. forces has become the duty of every Muslim man and woman."  In the end, something much like Christmas had come for bin Laden, and the gift he received from Washington will haunt, hurt and hound Americans for years to come."

Michael Sheuer, Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror: pp 212-214

 

[a_majoor]

The fatwas that greeted the invasion essentially validated all bin Laden has said in arguing for a defensive jihad against the United States.

Bin Laden's 1998 Fatwa called for Muslims to kill ALL Americans, including women and children, WHEREVER they could be found. This does not sound like a "defensive" jihad in any sense of the word.

The more I read this book, the less I like it. Although it correctly points out many things the Western Alliance overlooked and could have done better, the final argument still seems to be we should roll over and appease the Islamofascists. History tells us that appeasement never works (when you pay the Danegeld, you never loose the Dane), and the behavior of the West since 1973 and especially 1979 has been to look the other way so long as the oil keeps coming.

We need a multi prong approach; slotting the Jihadis is only one step, reducing our reliance on Middle Eastern oil is another, supporting democracy wherever it is found in the Middle East (Israel, soon Iraq, possibly Lebanon) and finishing the nation building exercise that has been started in Afghanistan and Iraq is yet another. The Jihadis have a 25 year head start in terms of "preparing the ground", a vigorous counteroffensive in the military, political, economic and cultural spheres is needed to roll up the Islamofascist threat.

 

[Britney Spears]

Bin Laden's 1998 Fatwa called for Muslims to kill ALL Americans, including women and children, WHEREVER they could be found. This does not sound like a "defensive" jihad in any sense of the word.

The guy's a bloody lunatic and so are most of his lieutenants, I don't think we have to spend too much time analyzing his pronouncements for rationality or consistency.

 

[Infanteer]

Bin Laden's 1998 Fatwa called for Muslims to kill ALL Americans, including women and children, WHEREVER they could be found. This does not sound like a "defensive" jihad in any sense of the word.

Yes, but for defensive purposes - just as we bombed Dresden and Hamburg to stop the German Offensive, his Fatwa's go on the same logic.  I'm not trying to shoehorn bin Laden's statements into a particular viewpoint, only going off his 15 years of consistent proclamations.

The more I read this book, the less I like it. Although it correctly points out many things the Western Alliance overlooked and could have done better, the final argument still seems to be we should roll over and appease the Islamofascists. History tells us that appeasement never works (when you pay the Danegeld, you never loose the Dane), and the behavior of the West since 1973 and especially 1979 has been to look the other way so long as the oil keeps coming.

I'm curious if you read it yet.  I just finished it today and was quite enthralled by the ending.  Sheuer takes off from Ralph Peters lead and argues that ultimately we must adapt the measures taken by Sherman and Grant and ruthlessly destroy the Islamic Insurgency and everything that supports it.  He argues that, like the early part of the US Civil War, we in the West have failed to understand the conflict for what it is, and our strategy reflects this as we are dithering on half-measures, the silly notion that we can project democracy on a bayonet, and dangerous misconceptions about our foe.

Anyways, I got to head to work - more on this later.

 

[Infanteer]

The guy's a bloody lunatic and so are most of his lieutenants, I don't think we have to spend too much time analyzing his pronouncements for rationality or consistency.

I just spent a couple days reading a pretty decent deconstruction of that line of thought - I see a plausible argument in stating that we underestimate bin Laden by pigeon-holing him as a lunatic, a gangster, or some sort of simpleton under the spell of Zawahiri.

 

[I_am_John_Galt]

We need a multi prong approach; slotting the Jihadis is only one step, reducing our reliance on Middle Eastern oil is another,

I think the notion of "reducing our reliance on Middle Eastern oil" is not as difficult as some make it out to be: the oil patch reserves are already somewhere close to all of North America's needs for the next 50 years (achieveable by 2010, I think) ... if it weren't for the (seemingly) single-minded obsession to destroy the western canadian economy, the Queen Charlottes (estimated at 3 times the size of Hibernia, but alas not located in a region of federal voting interest) could/would supply that much more ...