The Obama Administration has largely scraped the War on Terror initiated by the Bush Administration shortly after the September 11th terrorist attacks. Many Democrats, worried about the decline in the United State's international prestige and an increasingly disillusioned war weary populace at home, don't want to pursue a global counter-terrorism campaign with the same passion as the former administration. In addition, some Democrats in the House and Senate don't even want to fight a war against terrorism at all. The lack of resolve to see the original plans for the War on Terror through to the end is combined with the fact that the Obama Administration has ceased to even use the words "War on Terror" or "Long War" and has even ordered the Department of Defense to use "Overseas Contingency Operations" to refer to the ongoing military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan instead.
What ever words the new presidential administration chooses to use to describe the current international struggle against Islamic fundamentalism, it can not change the fact that the fight between America and its enemies is still being waged, and remains a very real. This fight will continue regardless of whether or not the United States government sustains the will to maintain an armed resistance against Al-Qaeda and like-minded organizations.
Terrorist have not forgotten that they are at war with the West (American and Europe) and its cultural values (liberal democracy and modern capitalism). Reuters reports that "a bomb blasts ripped through the JW Marriott and the Ritz-Carlton hotels in Jakarta's business district last friday, killing nine people and wounding dozens in attacks that could dent investor confidence in Indonesia. In addition a car bomb also blew up along a toll road in North Jakarta, police said without giving further details. Indonesia's Metro TV said two people had been killed. An unexploded bomb was also later found at the Marriott, police said. The apparently coordinated bombings are the first in several years and follow a period in which the government had made progress in tackling security threats from militant Islamic groups, bringing a sense of political stability to Southeast Asia's biggest economy.
Suspicion is likely to fall on remnants of the Jemaah Islamiah militant group, blamed for previous attacks including a car bombing outside the Marriott in 2003 as well as bombings on the island of Bali the previous year that killed 202 people."
These attacks were similar to the Mumbai attacks were more than ten coordinated shooting and bombing attacks across Mumbai, India's financial capital and its largest city. The attacks, which drew widespread condemnation across the world, began on 26 November 2008 and lasted until 29 November, killing at least 173 people and wounding at least 308.
According to wikipedia, eight of the attacks occurred in South Mumbai: at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, the Oberoi Trident, the Taj Mahal Palace & Tower, Leopold Cafe,Cama Hospital, the Orthodox Jewish-owned Nariman House,the Metro Cinema,and a lane behind the Times of India building and St. Xavier's College.There was also an explosion at the Mazagaon docks, in Mumbai's port area, and in a taxi at Vile Parle.
Ajmal Amir Kasab,the only attacker who was captured alive, disclosed that the attackers were members of Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Pakistan-based militant organization, considered a terrorist organization by India, the United States, and the United Kingdom, among others.
The conclusions we should draw from these terrorist attacks is that Islamic-fundamentalism is alive an well. These terrorist organizations remained committed to attacking the West and its cultural manifestations in the non-Western world. The best defense against this kind of terrorism, is the offensive plan put in place by the Bush Administration after the September 11th terrorist attacks. The validity of the Bush Doctrine has been proven, by the fact that all major terrorist attacks since 911 have occurred outside of the the United States. Critics in the current administration who deplore the Bush Administration's covert plans for enhanced interrogation and rendition would be advised to reconsider their opinions in the wake of these recent events.
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Comments: 10
The Obama Administration endangers American citizens by deconstructing the policies implimented by the Bush Administration. Enhanced interrogation has produced results! Extra-ordinary rendition has taken terrorist off of the streets. An aggressive military solution to terrorism is simply more effective than the law enforcement approach of the Clinton Administration. If we are going to fight terrorism originating from the Middle East, it makes more sense to go after it source instead of letting terrorism have a medium to germinate in.
Your concepts are warped by a right wing agenda which has been proven to be impossible to achieve. Obama is wrong to continue to escalate in Afghanistan. From military history any guerrilla war is unwinnable by the invading or occupying power.
Obama is not incorrect in escalating the war in Afghanistan! I actually support his policies in this particular area. The United States needs more boots on the ground to aggressively counter the Taliban/Al-Qaeda forces in the southern region of the country. Afghanistan needs time to forge a strong government capable of crushing the Islamic fundamentalist militants in the country side. One of the mistakes our government made after the Soviet-Afghan War was not providing the needed financial support required to rebuild the infastructure of government and civil society that had been destroyed by the conflict.
The Patriot Act is not an attack on civil liberties! Unless you are calling an Afghan warlord or possibly a Colombian drug lord on your cellphone you have nouthing to worry about. The Patriot Act has only been used against citizens in a non-terrorism related event only once. The courts found that the Patriot Act could not be utilized to prosecute common criminals.
As far as torture goes, enhanced interrogation is technically not torture. Enhanced interrogation exist in a grey area of international and domestic law. Detainees are not Prisoners of War, because they are not fighting in defense of a recognized nation-state. They therefore do not fall under protection of the Geneva Convention. Furthermore, these men have never been exposed to questionable techniques of interoggation inside the legal jurisdiction of the United States.
"military history any guerrilla war is unwinnable by the invading or occupying power."
This is simply not true! The United States won a guerrilla war against rebels in the Phillipines. The British won wars against guerrilla forces in both South Africa and Malaysa. The Colombian government is currently winning a war against FARC, despite the fact that the rebels are well financed by the international drug trade. Shri Lanka has nearly crushed the Tamil Tigers.
Furthermore if you really feel so strongly that military solutions trump diplomatic I suggest you enlist. Wait with a cushy commission you would probably never have to worry about combat even. Might learn something.
As far as historical revisionism goes, how have I revised or distorted history. The U.S. military won the war in the Phillipines against rebels in the mountains. This is a historical fact, it is not an incorrect interpretation of history as you claim. The U.S. won by instituting successful COIN operations. You don't even know what that means do you? COIN operations mean Counterinsurgency Operations, the term was created by General Patraeus.
Here is a description of the conflict:
As early 1899, U.S. and Filipino forces faced off as a tense situation became worse. American forces held the capitol of Manila, while Aguinaldo's army occupied a trench-line surrounding the city. On the evening of February 4, 1899, Private William Grayson of the Nebraska Volunteers fired the first shot in what would turn out to be a very bloody war. Grayson shot at a group of Filipinos approaching his position, provoking an armed response. Shooting soon spread up and down the ten-mile U.S.-Filipino lines, causing hundreds of casualties. Upon the outbreak of hostilities, U.S. troops, supported by shelling from Admiral Dewey's fleet, quickly overwhelmed the Filipino positions while inflicting thousands of casualties. Within days, American forces spread outward from Manila, using superior firepower, mobile artillery and command of the sea to full effect.
By November of 1899, Aguinaldo and his forces had been pushed further and further into central Luzon (the main Philippine island) and he realized he could not fight the Americans with conventional military units. At this point, he ordered his followers to turn to guerilla tactics to combat the American army. From this point on, the war became a savage, no-holds-barred guerilla conflict made up of ambushes, massacres and retribution. Both sides engaged in wanton violence and slaughter. Villages were destroyed, civilians murdered, prisoners tortured and mutilated along with a host of other atrocities. Many American officers and non-coms had served in the Indian Wars, and thus applied the old belief that "the only good Indian was a dead Indian" to their relations with the Filipinos. This attitude of course was reciprocated by the native forces.
Emilio Aguinaldo was captured in March, 1902, and organized opposition from his followers soon faded. Despite the official end to hostilities proclaimed on July 4, 1902, individual tribes in Luzon and the Muslim Moros of the southern islands launched further uprisings for another decade or so.
American won the conflict, end of story! Great Britian also won the Boar War against the Afrikaners in South Africa! These are all facts, it is not revisionism, although I suspect that these are historical facts that you do not want to admit to, because like every other liberal I have met you are pacifist, a defeatist, and an un-patriotic welp! If you were a true student of history and politics you would realize that America has never fought a war that it could not win, even Vietnam was winnable if we had been willing to sacrifice enough money and enough human life to the conflict. Why don't you just come out and say what you really think, you just don't want to fight this war because you don't see the point in it and you don't grasp the importance of the struggle against Islamic-fundamentalism!
Brain W. The Patriot Act is not an affront to democracy! Has the patriot act ever inhibited your right to vote? No. By definition, "democracy" is the rule of the people. Democracy entails citizens, people like you and me electing their representatives in government. The Patriot Act never stopped anyone from going to the ballot box last November, so your silly contention that it is an affront to democracy is wrong and only serves as a crude Orwellian rhetorical devise to hide your discontent with the substance of the legislation.
Brain unless you have Osama bin Laden's cell phone number in your phone or a Colombian drug lord you have nouthing to worry about. I don't understand why this is so hard for some people to understand.
If we were willing to spend more money and human life Viet Nam was winnable? Frankly, as Nam era vet I was unwilling to lose any more friends and comrades than I already lost. Sacrifice yourself or your own for the next war. You're young enough. Or is war only for the lower classes.
"I believe we haven't had an attack on American ground in eight years because of the policies of the Bush Administration."
You don't think maybe we just have a strong defense department no matter who is in charge?
You seemto know your military strategies, but where is the diplomacy in your thinking.
Doesn't diplomacy have anything to do with international policy and cooperation among nations. Wouldn't you think that the combined efforts of a strong NATO would assist in detering future terrorist attacks and wouldn't you think it has very little to do with our military strategy and prowess?