War on terrorism

[Steve]

Hi folks,

As everyone in the world knows, the US has been conducting a "War on Terrorism" for the past few years. Although acts of terrorism are certainly not only directed at the US, it seems that we are out in front of the crowd (?) in this effort. Well now, in light of the brutal murder of hundreds of school children, teachers and parents at Beslan, Russia will now join the fight.

Russia seems to have their own bin Laden. Basayev. This person takes "credit" for the mass murders at the Beslan school, the bombing of two passenger planes and a suicide bombing outside a subway station. All within the past six weeks. He states that he is not taking money from bin Ladin but would have no problem doing so.

So now Putin says he will take pre-emptive action to try and stop this insanity. Seems like the same thing that the US is trying to do.

Please read this AP report: http://apnews.myway.com/article/20040917/D855KUCG0.html

Good grief. What are we in store for? Can this kind of thing be controlled by military means? Should we negotiate with terrorists? How far do we go in the war or negotiation? Do we really talk to people who mass murder children? Do we really have any choice?

I ask these questions here because I know the varied, intellegent and (usually http://www.pcguide.com/ubb/wink.gif ) level headed folks we have here.

What do you think?

[yawningdog]

Conducting terrorist activities in Russia is a bad idea indeed. Does anybody remember when some terrorists tried to take over that theater in Russia? If not, allow me to recap. The Russian SWAT team gassed the whole theater, killing everyone inside (including the hostages) and then to ensure that the job was done thoroughly, the police then went inside and shot each unconscious terrorist in the grape...execution style.

On a personal note, this method of dealing with terrorism bears the official yawningdog stamp of approval.

Wake up. Terrorists, by definition, do not understand negotiation. Their language is nothing less than forceful action.

Good thread topic Steve. I had trouble with the link, probably on this end though.

[Donn]

Conducting terrorist activities in Russia is a bad idea indeed. Does anybody remember when some terrorists tried to take over that theater in Russia? If not, allow me to recap. The Russian SWAT team gassed the whole theater, killing everyone inside (including the hostages) and then to ensure that the job was done thoroughly, the police then went inside and shot each unconscious terrorist in the grape...execution style.

On a personal note, this method of dealing with terrorism bears the official yawningdog stamp of approval.

Wake up. Terrorists, by definition, do not understand negotiation. Their language is nothing less than forceful action.

Good thread topic Steve. I had trouble with the link, probably on this end though.

Just for the record not everyone in the theatre was killed by the narcotic gas, i believe it was something like a third, but that was only because they didn't have the right antidote for the overdoses, negligence on the part of the medicos that directed it, not negligence on the part of the users. They knew that some people were going to get a heavier doese just based on the gas diffusion laws (PV = nRT) .

[Donn]

Good grief. What are we in store for? Can this kind of thing be controlled by military means? Should we negotiate with terrorists? How far do we go in the war or negotiation? Do we really talk to people who mass murder children? Do we really have any choice?

I ask these questions here because I know the varied, intellegent and (usually http://www.pcguide.com/ubb/wink.gif ) level headed folks we have here. What do you think? [/font]

Winston Churchill once said that WWII was 'The war tht should never have happened' because the 'Allies' waited too long to fight it. Hitler should have been stopped long before Impreial Japan moved on Pearl Harbor, while the concetration camps were not yet death camps--and they were known about long before December of 1941.

The other point is that the Axis powers of WWII should have been stopped before they solidified their territorial set-up. It went from Norway to Northern Africa.

In invading Iraq and Afghanistan, the US forces have busted up a political and territorial axis running from Gaza, on the Mediterranean, to Afghanistan and Iran on the Indian Ocean. Otherwise, the fundamentalist Islamic militarists would then have had safe houses and training bases endangering everything from Israel to India--as well as north and south along the way: the Saudi oil fields, the Iranian oil fields, the Iraq oil fields, the Suez Canal and The Red Sea, The Straits of Hormuz, unfettered access to Africa, Eurasia, and Southern Russia, access to ports in the Mediterranean and all the waterways to and including Pakhistan and India and beyond--almost all totally unobserved except by satellite.

They would infact have had a 'Fortress Middle East' the way Hitler wanted a Fortress Europe. . . death camps, A-bomb factories, poison gas factories, prison camps, counterfeit currency factories, unimaginable training facilities and untold financial resources. . .no one would have stood in their way--anymnore than anyone stood in Hitler's way, as we see, AGAIN, in the Europeans, and people in the Americas that are, AGAIN, too caught up in their own immediate material comforts and traditions to consider the future implications of not stopping a transnational terroist movement that blows up restaurants, airliners, military facilities, office buildings, poisons whole villages of unwanted ethnic groups, provides safe houses and finance (investment as well as reward moneys), and weapons and training to similar thinking comrades in arms.

These people only want to negotiate long enough to resupply and reposition their assets. Anyone recall Hitler's 'Treaty' with Stalin?

Again, in Churchill's words--'WWII was the war that should never have been fought.' Hopefully this little fracas in Iraq and Afghanistan will have avoided an unimaginable managerie of world-wide physical and cultural dessecrations whose extrent and duration would make the after-effects of WWII look like soccer riot on a saturday afternoon.

:cool:

[pop pop]

I could write a book on this topic. I suppose most anyone could. Ask the Israelis if it can be controlled by military means. And I say that with all due respect. They've been fighting a similar war for what, 56 years? Maybe that's a clue as to how long our own will last.

Ever since 9/11, I've said that the rules have changed, and everyone's still figuring out the rules. Maybe there's only one rule now ... and that is that there are no rules. That's a scary thought and there's a word for it: anarchy.

What is now sometimes called the Bush Doctrine, meaning a policy of preemption, is not unprecedented. Israel did it in the 80's when they took out the Iraqi nuclear reactor facility. The difference is that after 9/11 a global super power claimed the "right" of preemption. I'm a veteran and that policy scares me. Not because I think it's wrong given the hand we were dealt, but rather because how do you deny any other country the same "right"?. Under that policy, any country might attack someone or something in any other country and claim, maybe justifiably maybe not, that they had to eliminate a threat BEFORE any harm could be done to them.

The precariousness of this policy lies in the perception of the justification for excercising it, as we Americans are learning. If a country excercises the premption option, the action taken must be appropriate, measured, and verifiably justified. If not, you run the risk of being perceived as being no better than the terrorists that you seek to eliminate. In such a circumstance, where you have taken action and some say it does not meet the "justifiable" litmus test, the question then becomes do you care at all what anyone else thinks as long as you have eliminated a potentially deadly threat? If you say no, then you are perceived as arrogant. Rightly or wrongly, that is how we are now perceived.

So "civilized" countries are faced with some very difficult choices in the post 9/11 and post Beslan terrorism era. Do nothing and face the consequences or do something and face the consequences. These are choices that every U.S. president will face for a very long time. And unfortunately, Vladimir Putin will not be the last Russian leader to agonize over those very same choices. Should the U.S. or Russia seek the endorsement of the U.N. or attempt to assemble a coalition of the willing in this war? I think they should try but as Margaret Thatcher once said, "Consensus is simply a lack of leadership".

I personally believe that the cost of doing nothing is unacceptably high. I also now believe that what we are dealing with is nothing less than evil incarnate. Only true evil could intentionally slaughter innocent children. I believe that only absolute evil would behead innocents and film it to have it broadcast. If their cause is so just, why are they always wearing masks?

I believe that the U.S., Russia, and any other country that is victimized by this evil has a right to fight it. They, the terrorists, have only one goal in their war. It is not territory, it is not wealth, it is not even revenge. It is simply the total and complete destruction of modern civilization, nothing less. The rest of the countries of the world had better wake up. The next calling card may have their name on it.

[Steve]

It is sometimes called "preemptive" action but what we did in Afghanistan and seemingly what Putin is preparing to do in Chechnya is a responce to being attacked. We identified the people who attacked us and went after them and those who protected them. Putin has identified the people responsible for the attacks and is going to go after them. That's all very understandable to me.

What I am having trouble with (and it's probably due to my lack of knowledge) is this. The Chechnyan struggle for freedom and independence from Russia seems to be a good thing. Everyone deserves to be free, in my book. Fighting to achieve independence is a noble cause. Good people do this. How does this noble endeavor turn into "evil incarnate" as pop pop says?

The IRA wants Irish rule in northern Ireland. The Palistinians just want (some) of their land back. The Chechnyans just want freedom and independence. Aren't these good causes?

The problem comes in the methods used. Can we identify these causes early enough and negotiate while we are still dealing with good people, or are we doomed to let things go until we are dealing with evil incarnate?

I'm glad we're hunting down bin Laden. I'm glad the Russians are going to hunt down Basayev. They must pay for what they have done. But are we intellegent enough to to solve these problems before they get to the point of terrorism?

[Donn]

Hi Steve, you wrote:

What I am having trouble with (and it's probably due to my lack of knowledge) is this. The Chechnyan struggle for freedom and independence from Russia seems to be a good thing. Everyone deserves to be free, in my book. Fighting to achieve independence is a noble cause. Good people do this. How does this noble endeavor turn into "evil incarnate" as pop pop says?

Donn wrote:

I have to ask myself what are they fighting for, this 'independence?" To align with UBL and the Taliban, their Moslem brother in arms--then thay are fighting for another terrorist base in southern Russia. If we don't consider tht then we are turning outr backs on the Lockerbie, Scotland victims, the people killed or kidnapped and tortured in the airline hijackings. Anyone Remember Terry Anderson--5 years in solitary, chained to a radiator. We're not fighting an enemy with bases so much as we are fighting a mentality with opportunities. Psychopaths and sociaopaths do not need motivations, they need excuses to enact their dramtizations.

Steve wrote:

The IRA wants Irish rule in northern Ireland. The Palistinians just want (some) of their land back. The Chechnyans just want freedom and independence. Aren't these good causes?

The problem comes in the methods used. Can we identify these causes early enough and negotiate while we are still dealing with good people, or are we doomed to let things go until we are dealing with evil incarnate?

Donn wrote:

I'm in favor of Ireland for the Irish. The methods of both sides are despicable, but basically: Ireland is Ireland, not 'part of England,' unless the Irish want it that way. ('Donn' is an Irish spelling that the Jewsih side of the family insists is Jewish, which the Irish side insists is Irish, "Oy Laddie! Wouldya be passin the kosher cornbeef and cabbage?" )

One has to ask, "what good people?" What 'good people' would be representing the evil ones waiting in the wings? That's a little like saying we ought to negotiate with mob lawyers...because they're. . .what? well-dressed? well-educated? well-connected? church-going? "What do they really want?" we might ask, and to get a real answer we might look at how they live in their own countries...what are their values? Sadam Hussein and his sons, Arafat and his suicide bombers, UBL and all that money he had--he could've turned Afghistan into a garden in the desert, but what did he do--trained a bunch of people to fly some airplanes into some buildings. Why would anyone want to negotiate with that kind of mentality? He could have mustered the resources to actually turn Afghinistan into a garden land--like that other Arab peoples have already done in Qatar, Baharayn, Saudi Arabia, and the UAB.

As for the Palestinians wanting some of their land back. . . they have their nerve. Whose land? Theirs, really, that's what they call it too. Theirs. The 'Palestinians' are the people that were thrown out of Jordan becaue they tried to overthrow the Hashemite dynasty--The father of the former King Hussein of Jordan (grandfather of the present King). Remember the infamous terroist unit "The Balck September Unit." That term "Black September" has nothing to do with Israel or Palestine. It is named for the month that they were thrown out of Jordan. Let's remember that the land of Judea was originally populated by . . .the predecessors of the Jewsih people, not the Arabs. And that the Jewish people were *overthrown* by the Arabs and thrown out of their home land.

So, again, you might want to think again about the network news and political definitions of whose land it is--it was originally the land of the Jewish people, who were prophecied in the Bible to be returning to their land one day. The UN made that happen in 1948, and the Palestinaians, et al, have lost every war they started in defiance of that UN edict since then. So, where do they, in the face of the teachings of the Koran, that specifies to the distribution of the spoils of war, where do the "Palestinians" come off demanding land back, and calling the Israeli's 'occupiers', when in fact they #1. lost every war they started, and #2 lost the land to the descendants of the people from whom their ancestors took it to begin with.

Why should we listen to the complaint of the Palestinians in the UN, that they should get back land they lost in a war they started, when they will not abide by any other UN mandates, like recognizing the right of the State of Israel to exist, which they have steadfastly refused to do since 1948. . .?

It has nothing to so with being pro-Israeli, but rather being able to see duplicity with which they operate, and being wise enough to see that they will use tha duplicity, and worse, to continue the Moslem fundamentalist movement--everywhere.

Steve wrote:

I'm glad we're hunting down bin Laden. I'm glad the Russians are going to hunt down Basayev. They must pay for what they have done. But are we intellegent enough to to solve these problems before they get to the point of terrorism?

Donn wrote:

Interesting question, considering we knew we were bottling up Japan with our foreign policy, and we knew about the concentration camps in Germany as soon as they started. The Jewish underground smuggled out photos to the State Dept as soon as they could get them...Churchill called it "The war that should never have been..." But that doesn't change what we have to deal with now, and, as Pop Pop stated: "It is simply the total and complete destruction of modern civilization, nothing less." It doesn't matter how nicely they started out, or how nice their negotiators talk--it's where they are inexorably going to that we have to prevent.

Like I said--does anyone recall Hitler's 'Treaty' with Stalin...before he invaded Russia.
__________________


With respect//Donn

[Mark Miller]

This is going to sound harsh but I think it's the only way for "civilized" countries to defeat terrorism, which depending on which side of the coin you are can also be called freedom fighters, as in the colonists in the war for independence.
Do not misunderstand me I am firmly on the side against the terrorists.
There is only one way. Do as the Romans did. Go up to their cities or settlements or camps, give them one chance of surrender and if not destroy the whole area.
It is not easy to defeat a group who will die for their cause. It is not easy to defeat a group who sees no hope. We are victim to our polices since world war two
IMHO
Mark

[PrntRhd]

Terrorists use all means at their disposal, including wasting the lives of hostages and innocents. Total War.
Unfortunately waging total war against them is the most effective means to stop these killers. IMHO

[Steve]

Well Donn, I do think everyone has the right to fight to regain something that has been taken away, be it land, possessions or freedom. If I'm not mistaken, even the "promised land" was occupied when the Isrealites got there.

If some army showed up on my doorstep and evicted me and gave my land, house and possessions to someone else, I'd fight too. If another country invaded us, I'd fight. I guess it's back to the methods used in the fight. When you stop fighting the army and start killing innocent people you've crossed the line.

OK. Thanks. Although I still have questions, you guys have helped me see things a little clearer and get my head around the subject.

[Mark Miller]

Unfortunatly I feel this will turn into a very large and deadly "total" war
Mark

[stefanus]

Terrorist always pick soft targets. Children, Old People, Air Craft, Ambush. ad infinitum.
Unfortunately the perpetrators usually become the Government of the day and still carry on there terrorist ways. Typical example Robert Gabriel Mugabe of Zimbabwe. The western world closed their eyes when he sic`ed the Infamous 5th Brigade into Matabeleland where thousand of Women and Children where MURDERED and thrown down discarded mine shafts and buried in mass graves and the Western World said nothing. A TYPICAL DEAFENING SILENCE. It is only when these atrocities happen closer to home that the full implication is really felt. Sorry for pontificating. I fought terrorism for years in the field and really feel for the victims and their family and friends who survive. It is a very delicate debating platform.

Stefanus

[pop pop]

I'm impressed ... a very thoughtful and thought provoking discussion.

I guess I'll make these final statements/observations ...

Mark said: "Unfortunatly I feel this will turn into a very large and deadly "total" war"

The reality is that it already has and by any definition it can be called a World War. The simplest and oldest WW definition: multiple countries involved in multiple conflicts (too many to list) in multiple locations ... Afganistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia (yes, there are), Israel, Japan, The Phillipines, Russia, USA, Spain, Scotland, and tonight Egypt. I've left out some, I know. There are more and there will be others. It will get worse, much worse, before it gets even a little bit better. I believe that unless we continue to act forcefully it is inevitable that there will be an event that will make 9/11 pale in comparison. It will not be a question of if. It will only be a question of when, where, and how ... and how many more innocent people will die as a result.

There is no negotiating with evil. There is only utter defeat or absolute victory. Which it will be is a matter of how resolute we all can be. General George Patton once said something like "You don't win a war by dying for your country. You win it by making the other SOB die for his." These animals don't "have" a country but the point is the same. They must and will be destroyed.

I pray every day. There are four words among the many in my prayers that are more significant now than ever. Those words are "Deliver us from evil". I wish that could be done without people dying, but evil won't allow it.

[stefanus]

Last evenings breaking news on Egypt. That is how Terrs operate , kill and injure civilians, hide behind women and childrens skirts because they know trained troops will not or do not open up on them, if there happen to be any in the area, okay sometimes accidents happen and inoccents to get in the line of fire. Define a Terr. They do not look any different to you and I, they just act different.They could be alongside you whilst driving to work or any where. The only time you will recognise one is when he/they pitch up on your front stoep armed to the teeth and subject you to the most soul destroying things imaginable, then take every thing you own and if you are lucky leave you with your life. All in the name of FREEDOM. How do you identify and fight people like that. I am speaking from experience and not just hearsay. When they have got you you do every thing they say. I was begging for our lives and only because they where expecting some person or persons to pitch up they took of like long dogs and left my wife and I alive. Thank God. Some of my friends where not so lucky. A Terr is a Terr is a Terr and no person will make me believe any different. Here I go blowing of again. Sorry guys. I hate the Bastards, excuse my perrochial English :(
No matter what race, nationality or religion they purport to be.

Stephanus

[Mark Miller]

Again understand that I am completly against Al Quieda and all their evil allies but....
In the late 1940's when Isreal was fighting for it's independence, they bombed the Ben Guiron Hotel in I think Tel Aviv. I am a supporter of Isreal and hope that some kind of agreement can be reached.
During the "cold war" Russia was the "evil" empire.
During the Korean war China was considered the worst of the worst and with both we all though that the end of the world as we know it was close.
Al Quieda is neither and that is what makes thiis "war" so difficult. There are no borders and there are no real targets.
As i said before we are falling victim to our failed foriegn polices.
Mark :(

[stefanus]

:mad: It has just been announced on the SKY TV News that the British hostage Ken Bigley was executed yesterday. :mad: The politicians should keep hands off and allow the Security Forces to get on with their jobs to trck down and dispatch the perpitrators of Terror with extreme unction and put a ban on all news media and kick them out till the dust settles :mad:

Stefanus

[Steve]

Here I go blowing of again. Sorry guys.
That's alright Stefanus. It sounds like you had a pretty bad situation there. I'm glad you got out alive.

I really wish that my country would do a better job when things like the genocides in Rwanda, Kosovo, Sudan, etc. are happening. It bothers me when we know this is going on and do nothing of consequence to stop it. These things happen in plain site. We know who is doing it. We know where to find them, yet we do nothing.

That is state sponsored terrorism. Attacks like the World Trade Center hits, the attacks on the USS Cole, the embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, the train bombings in Spain, the murders at Beslan are perpetrated by groups not States. It may be allowed by States but the people carrying out the acts are indiviguals with a grudge to settle. One of my original questions was whether or not there is a way to talk to these people with a grudge before it degenerates into terrorism.

I wonder what goes through a persons mind when the anger felt at a perceived injustice turns into the insanity of murdering innocent people. Targeting and murdering innocent people.

Maybe some day we will find a way to see this coming and do something to stop it before it happens. Until then we will continue to hunt and kill the people who went to far.

[Mark Miller]

Just as a side note on this.
This particular terrorism goes back to the crusades. the muslims extremists want all western influences out of the middle east first and they want to reclaim all lands where their people live [southern Russia etc..]
Of course their way of going about this is criminal and in the long run they cannot win but just sustain the bloodshed that has been going on for centuries
This goes back to my original point of "total war" as in the days of the Roman Empire.
Mark :(

[stefanus]

Steve I agree emphatically in what you say! But who is sponsoring the non State sponsored groups. eg What is Al Qaeida `s agenda? Who are their sponsors and weapon suppliers? It is endless. When one is put down another appears in its place.The two American and one Brit Guy plus many Iraqis and Security Forces who have perished in recent months, who sponsored their demise? Saddam Hussein is reportedly a finished man yet the unholy horror is still permitted to carry on. As I have previously stated. Let the Security forces do there jobs and the Politicians take a back seat and just sign the cheques. Mark I also agree fully with what you say!

Stefanus

[pop pop]

I kind of had thought that I'd made my last post on this but Mark has pushed some of my buttons. Mark, you've now said twice I believe that we are victims of our own policies. There is historical precedent where that could be said (Treaty of Versaille that ended WW1 and subsequently spawned the environment that fed the rise of Adolph Hitler and WW2). But in this case I have to absolutely disagree or at least ask, what policies? See, I absolutely do not subscribe to the premise that terrorism is OUR FAULT and therefore we bear responsibility for the deaths of 3000 people in NYC, 17 sailors on the USS Cole, hundreds of children in Beslan, over 200 innocents on a plane over Lockerbie, 35 tourists in Egypt, and so on. Our failed policies are the justification for beheading British and American CIVILIAN citizens simply working in another country? Our failed policies are justification for killling children? Rubbish.

Now, as for this thing going all the way back to the Crusades, that's interesting. UBL thinks so and had said as much. Maybe it does have its roots there but there's an awful lot of misconseptions associated with the Crusades. Primary among those misconceptions is that the Crusades were wars where the bad old Christians were hunting down and killing the peaceful benevolent Muslims who weren't bothering anyone and subsuming their culture. It was quite the reverse:

For starters, the Crusades to the East were in every way defensive wars. They were a direct response to Muslim aggression—an attempt to turn back or defend against Muslim conquests of Christian lands.

Christians in the eleventh century were not paranoid fanatics. Muslims really were gunning for them. While Muslims can be peaceful, Islam was born in war and grew the same way. From the time of Mohammed, the means of Muslim expansion was always the sword. Muslim thought divides the world into two spheres, the Abode of Islam and the Abode of War. Christianity—and for that matter any other non-Muslim religion—has no abode. Christians and Jews can be tolerated within a Muslim state under Muslim rule. But, in traditional Islam, Christian and Jewish states must be destroyed and their lands conquered. {from The Real History of the Crusades by Thomas F. Madden; emphasis mine}

While I would prefer not to have to believe that this is a religious war, non-Islam against Islam, there are irrefutable facts that make it difficult: the perpetrators of the first WTC bombing -- Islamic, the perpetrators that blew up the Pan Am over Lockerbie -- Islamic, the perpetrators of the Cole bombing -- Islamic, the perpetrators of 9/11 -- Islamic, the perpetrators of the train bombing in Spain -- Islamic, the Beslan perpetrators -- Islamic.

They made the stakes of this "us or them" not the other way around. And what really galls me is the deafening silence from the Islamic community or even outright dancing in the streets when innocents are slaughtered. Right here in the state where I live, Muslims were literally celebrating in the streets of Patterson, NJ on 9/11. They were on the evening news along with the images of people jumping out of the WTC towers. And what about their leadership? We get to watch a Muslim cleric, a religeous leader, on CNN after Beslan explain that killing children is O.K. because their cause is just and righteous. If there is a hell, they will make it burn brighter.

Sorry for ranting.

[Mark Miller]

Pop pop,
Please don't get me wrong, I am from nyc and my accountant from my old business was killed in the trade towers. I am also a huge supporter of Israel.
I think I also said that I believe the only way to "win" this war and it is a war is to fight as the Romans did which is either surrender or be totally destroyed.
As far as the Crusades I really was not saying who as right or wrong but that it was a religious war [which most of the bloodiest seem to be] and that I believed that there was where the animosity started.
Believe me if it was up to me I would turn the whole area to green glass and call it a day.
We will never "win" caring about the rest of the worlds feelings. Especially after reading that the French And Germans helped Saddam convert oil for food money into hard currency that went straight into his pocket [for oil].

[pop pop]

I understand and I'm sorry to hear about your business associate. Here where I live it seems so many people know someone who was affected personally in some way, if they weren't themselves. New Yorkers are tough, they have to be. They'll remain one of the two primary targets.

I'm an advocate of Israel too. Even so, I have one problem with them. That's the attack on the USS Liberty during the Six Day War. They've never adequately explained why they did it. Do a Google search, it's an interesting story.

Bad stuff is coming, not just more terrorism. Israel will take out the Iranian nuclear facility. It won't be as easy as when they hit the Iraq one in the 80's but they will do it. Conventional missiles with a 1200 mile range are one thing, missiles with that range and nuclear warheads are another.

You can make an arguement and probably a pretty good one whether it was right for us to hit Iraq this time. But imagine Iraq with a reconstituded military and Iran with 1200 mile nuclear tipped missiles. Did you know that Armageddon is not just a name for the end of the world? It's a plane/valley in Israel.

[Steve]

originally posted by pop pop

While I would prefer not to have to believe that this is a religious war, non-Islam against Islam, there are irrefutable facts that make it difficult: the perpetrators of the first WTC bombing -- Islamic, the perpetrators that blew up the Pan Am over Lockerbie -- Islamic, the perpetrators of the Cole bombing -- Islamic, the perpetrators of 9/11 -- Islamic, the perpetrators of the train bombing in Spain -- Islamic, the Beslan perpetrators -- Islamic.
With all due respect, I must note, if you mention only the terrorist acts perpetrated in the name of Islam, it does seem that terrorism is a religious war. But what about the terrorist acts of the Irish IRA against civilians in London? Africans against Africans? Khmer Rouge against the Cambodian people. Terrorism is a tactic that has been used by many groups down through the ages. The Islamic terrorists aren't the only ones using this tactic lately. They're just the ones we're fight right now.

On another note, I can see where some of our policies have contributed to the current situation. That's contributed, not caused. After funding the Mushahadin and bin Laden to fight the Russians in Afghanistan, we left them high and dry when the Russians pulled out, leaving the anarchy that led to the Taliban. Could Saddam Hussain have become the strong man of the middle east if we had not given him the WMDs and billions of dollars to fight Iran? The US has stuck our finger in most parts of the world and we have had an effect on the outcome of many disputes, for good and bad.

As far as what bin Laden wants, I don't really know. I've heard a couple of things, like he wants us out of what he considers sacred ground. Saudia Arabia. Well I doubt that is going to happen but that might be one of the things he wants. We don't go into the mosques in Iraq so as not to inflame the people who think we would be defileing sacred ground. It's not out of the question.

As I've mentioned a couple of times, and I guess there isn't an answer because no one seems to notice, I wish we could deal with these problems before they reach the level of insanity. I actually do think we could, if we wanted to.

[stefanus]

"The Deafening Silence" Where not my words but written by the Very Reverend John Da Costa when the second of two Viscounts was shot down over Kariba in the late 70`s and Joshua Nkomo was reputed to laugh about it on Brit TV. GUYS PLEASE DO NOT LET THESE BASTARDS GET TO US. You and I know the answers,. It is time World Governments stopped politicking and take them out. Terr`s I mean. I rest my brief. No excuse for the Perochial English to-day ;)

Stefanus

[Mark Miller]

The problem I see with our "freeing" Iraq is that we have destroyed the infrastructure of the country and it will take years and hundreds of BILLIONS of dollars to fix. I sure hope nobody "frees" the U.S.
I cannot understand how they have not caught Bin Laundin,if they know the area he is in, and I think they do, who cares what anyone says go get him.
Of course this won't stop the terrorists but I sure would feel a lot better.
Pop pop,
Just curious what lands did the muslims try and take that led to the Crusades? I would like to read about it. I think I am going to find the book that you quoted.
I agree with you about the Israels as I noted one of their "terrorist" acts during their war for Independence [1948].
guys the war is here now so no playing fair and lets just go get them.
IMHO
Mark

[pop pop]

Good points all.

Steve, your point about "terrorist tactics" being used by the IRA, Khmer Rouge, and Africans is valid. I would submit that you could include with equal strength of arguement the Amercan militia during the Revolutionary War. How dare they hide behind trees and rocks instead of fighting like civilized men! I think an important difference is the fact that the IRA, Khmer, and Africans didn't go around the globe blowing up or otherwise killing people in other countries for their causes in Ireland, Cambodia, and Africa ... nor did the American militia.

The American policies that you cite are good too. The U.S. does have a poor history of propping up bad "leaders" and then having to do something about it later. Sadaam and Noriega are two that come immediately to mind. I'm not sure that I understand the rationale but I guess it's something like we have a couple of chices of who to support, which one can maintain stability in the country/region (even if that means stability through dictatorial control). In modern times, at least, we have opted for supporting someone that can maintian stability, usually at the expense of human rights, rather than someone who might be more progressive but weaker and vulnerable to collapse (civil war). This is why, I believe, that we did not take Bagdad in the first Gulf War. If not Sadaam, then who? The vacuum that would be left, it was thought, would have worse results than leaving him in and unders some constraints.

As for supporting the Mujahadeen and UBL, I'm afraid that we took a page out of the Arab doctrine ... "The enemy of my enemy is my friend." I believe the same thing is working against us in Iraq to a large degree. It something that's not discussed alot by the talking heads on T.V. Where are all these explosives and other weapons that are being used against us coming from? Sure, some of it was left over from the destroyed Iraqi military. But I'll bet you much is coming in from other countries.

Mark ... many of the territories were in what is the middle east. The largest land grab was Constantinople (which, at the time was the largest Christian city in the world. There were more. During the CRusades, attempts were made to take cities outside the middle east like Rome and Vienna. Here's more info on the author (gotta go play golf):

Thomas F. Madden is associate professor and chair of the Department of History at Saint Louis University. He is the author of numerous works, including A Concise History of the Crusades, and co-author, with Donald Queller, of The Fourth Crusade: The Conquest of Constantinople.

[shanghaisam]

With all due respects guys, and I hope you don't mind me jumping in, but you all are tackling this from the wrong angle. We all are distraught by the thought of our kin, friends, allies, and the innocent being murdered. The stories in our own country of a child being kidnapped and raped is enough to get our hackles up. Multiply that by the images we see on TV where hundreds and thousands are being killed on a daily basis and our emotions go through the roof. It is wrong and dispicable whoever and where ever we are. However, there needs to be a rational. . .something that holds us together as civilized people. To gain this perspective one needs to seperate emotion from reason. Reasonably, the Palistinaians want a life complete with a way to make a living, housing, food. Basic items of survival are denied them (this is the people as a whole not just the militant factions). In the theocracy that is Isreal, they are denied this. In Ireland we have a religious war between (of all things) two religions who's foundations are rooted in peace. Ireland can be seperated from England but there would still be two factions fighting over dogma. The Crusades were started by Pope UrbanII in 1095 to oust the Seljuk Turks from Jerusalem. Many of the Crusaders thought they were finished after the massacre in Jerusalem and were ready to go home. Others saw the creation of a permant Christian settlement and established the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem. In other words, they set out to make their fortunes in a new land. Most of the bloodshed there was over wealth and territory. There is nothing noble about the Crusades. Theocracies are the problem be they Islamic, Jewish, or Christian, or any other sect. We are faced with a scaled down verison of that now in the States. What the world needs are non-sectarian governments! A religion is not something to from a state around. The Moslems don't need their own state/s, no more than the Christians or the Jews. If I am a Moslem in Isreal, I have a real problem in survival; if I am a Jew in Palistinian territory, I have a real problem; if I am a Christian in either of those places, I, as we have seen, have a real problem. The solution to all this, and I know this statement is simplistic and would be perceived as naieve, is to allow these people to have the basic right to survive without fighting.

I'm going to be real unpopular for this next statement but first I'd like you to look at the history of the region that Isreal is in. In 2000BC, King Saul established the Kingdom of Isreal followed by David and Solomon, the southern part became the kingdom of Judah. Both kingdoms were defeated by the 6th century BC, Isreal fell to Assyria and Judah to Babylonia, and most Jews were exiled from Palestine. Muslim armies invaded Palestine and captured Jerusalem in 638 AD. Jews and Christians in the area were allowed "autonomous control and guaranteed security and freedom of worship." The Ottoman Empire defeated Palestine in 1517 and ruled there until 1918. Under Islamic rule, Christians and Jews were allowed a large degree of autonomy. In the winter of 1917, culminating in 1918, the British with the help of the Arabs captured Palestine. "The Arabs revolted against the Ottomans because the British had promised them, in correspondence (1915-1916) wht Husein ibn Ali, the independence of their countries after the war. In the Sykes-Picot agreement with France and Russia 1916, it promised to divide and rule the region with its allies, and in the Balfour Declaration of 1917, Britain promised the Jews, whose help it neededs in the war effort, a Jewish national home. This is what prompted the League of Nations in 1922 to incorporate this in the mandate for Britain.

I suppose you wonder where all of this is heading. Well, here goes, the Jews were over run in the 6th century BC. I guess they were a little upset when the Brits broke their promise and they have seen their future prospects in pretty bleak terms since the end of WWII. They had a border, and that didn't last. The Jewish fund appropriates their lands, their orchards, their very livelyhood. The Jewish problem is that they see the Islamic population growing, soon to outnumber their population. The Palestinian's see their economics deteriorating and the whole mess is complicated by our complicity in the demise of Palestinian culture and society. The Islamic comunity is looking at the West as the enemy, and why not? If we are to gain respect in the Islamic world, resolving this thing between the Palestinians and Isreal has to be the first priority. However distasteful it may be, we have to accept whoever is in charge and establish an independent state for the Palestinians and we have to make sure that both parties abide each other and share economies with the rest of the Middle East. Then and only then do we stand a shot in this war on terrorism. If you are hoping that it will happen any other way, I'm afraid you are going to wait a very long time.

I detest the terror, the suicide bombings, the beheadings, the loss of innocent life. We can search them out, kill them but others will take their places. The root of the problem is between the Isrealies and the Palestinians, not Iraq, not Iran. The Middle East is a real mess and Western Civilization is the cause of it. All of us need to solve this problem together.

Sorry for the tyrade.

[FastLearner]

Let's look at the bottom line: terrorists are, even in spite of their small numbers, changing the way in which civilized people are seeing the world. Images of planes slamming into buildings, innocent civilians having their heads literally carved off (yes, I saw the video even though I shouldn't have), and women and children having their bodily extensions blown off by home-made rockets has made me angry. Is this a religious war? You betcha. Who are the participants? Extreme Islamists against the rest of the world. BTW, we're not only dealing with a few dozen wackos any more--their numbers are multiplying every day. I'm really getting pissed off here, pardon my French (who by the way are having their own crisis with Muslims because of the banning of headscarves in public schools). What a place our world has become. I tell you, if Kerry gets elected, I may just lose my nuts and bolts. Sorry, just jabbering about nothing in particular.

[Steve]

Well, I know that we all hate terrorists. That's a given. We all agree that once they start on the path of terrorism there's no choice but to kill them. We all seem to agree that it's only going to get worse before it gets better. I'm glad Russia is in it now, full force. I wish China and the EU were in it like the US and Russia. It's a sad state of affairs.

I do agree with shanghaisam in that the Palistinians need to be treated better. They need to have their own state. They need to have a way to make a living and advance their families reguard to wealth and education. This is being denied to them. They will never stop fighting until their needs are met.

I don't really consider the American militia, during the revolution, to have used terrorist tactics. They were fighting the British ARMY. To me, terrorism is when you attack innocent CIVILIANS to try and change a governments policies. It is the tactics of the hopeless. If we give people a reason to believe that their needs will be met, the hopeless might stop turning to terrorist tactics.

[stefanus]

Steve! My sentiments exactley.

Stefanus

[Mark Miller]

Actually during the American Revolution it was the British army who terrorized the colonists civilians by burning their homes and farms so as not to give shelter to [what they believed to be] the"rebels".
Sound familiar?
Mark

[pop pop]

Wow, what a tangled web we weave.

Since I'm the one who said it I suppose I should qualify my, somewhat tongue in cheek, statement. The American militia would not qualify as terrorists for hiding behind rocks and trees and shooting at the British. They might well better fit the title "insurgents". Certainly they were the founders of modern guerilla warfare.

Now, Shanghaisam ... a really marvelous history lesson. :) The names and dates are more comprehensive than I've read before and certainly there is no doubt as to their accuracy. However, there are some premises and conclusions that might be open to discussion.

they set out to make their fortunes in a new land. Most of the bloodshed there was over wealth and territory. There is nothing noble about the Crusades.

... crusading knights were generally wealthy men with plenty of their own land in Europe. Nevertheless, they willingly gave up everything to undertake the holy mission. Crusading was not cheap. Even wealthy lords could easily impoverish themselves and their families by joining a Crusade. They did so not because they expected material wealth (which many of them had already) but because they hoped to store up treasure where rust and moth could not corrupt. They were keenly aware of their sinfulness and eager to undertake the hardships of the Crusade as a penitential act of charity and love. Europe is littered with thousands of medieval charters attesting to these sentiments, charters in which these men still speak to us today if we will listen. Of course, they were not opposed to capturing booty if it could be had. But the truth is that the Crusades were notoriously bad for plunder. A few people got rich, but the vast majority returned with nothing.

Written by Thomas F. Madden, associate professor and chair of the Department of History at Saint Louis University, emphasis mine.

And you concluded, partly, with this:

The Middle East is a real mess and Western Civilization is the cause of it. All of us need to solve this problem together.

The Middle East is a mess. But I don't think the case can be made logically or philosophically that Western Civilization is the root cause. At least, I have not seen the case made yet. Yes we all need to work to solve the problem but lets look at one example of what happened when we did. Jimmy Carter mediated the Camp David Accords in 1978 and Anwar Sadat signed a final peace treaty with Israel in 1979. For all his efforts for peace and the right to peacefully coexist with Israel he was assasinated by fundamentalists on October 6, 1981. Did Western Civilization pull the triggers on the guns that killed him???

[Mark Miller]

Again remember I am a supporter of Israel but they also had their leader killed by fundamentalists not so long ago.
Just an observation
Mark

[yawningdog]

Great work pop pop. My hat's off to you. One correction though, Guerrilla warfare goes all the way back to the pentateuch, not just the American revolution.

But the mess in the middle east goes all the way back to the death of Muhammad, when Shiites and non-Shiites fought over who was to be the leader of Islam.

[pop pop]

You know, I wasn't sure we Americans invented that. Just goes to show ya, don't use the word "certainly" unless you are. Thanks for the correction. :rolleyes: :D

BTW Yawningdog -- I was born and grew up in Va. Beach ... went to Malibu Elementary, Princess Anne High, and UVA.