Remain dedicated to overcoming terrorism
The war in Iraq is not a war on terrorism. It is a war on Iraq that we have easily won and we are now the army of occupation. Our army of occupation is now trying to force the Iraqis to become a democratic country. We say this can be done and will result in an end of terror in Iraq and Iraq will become a peace loving country. When you try to think this whole matter through, you will come up will many questions, questions that are paramount to understanding what America is about in the world and specifically in Iraq. You will have to turn to many different sources in seeking answers, but unfortunately, there is no consensus among honest thinkers and people of experience on the foreign policy of the USA. There is of course no magic in consensus, as consensus is a concept that proves most useful to the elected representatives in a democratic state, and is basic to how the citizens of a democracy think about political matters.
Foreign policy is the interactions between states, as one state tries to influence another state. Well, what state is terrorism? The Talibin was the lawful government of Afghanistan when bin Laden’s Al Qaeda attacked us on 9/11. Al Qaeda was based in Afghanistan. So the Talibin had to kick bin Laden out and join us or else. They choose or else and we conducted a half-baked proxy war on the Talibin, while bin Laden slipped away. Now we got 20,000 US troops occupying Afghanistan were they’re supposed to building a democracy. We also picked up 600 POW’s from our proxy warlords through CIA bribes that we have locked up in Guantanamo Bay. Overall, not too bad an operation; as we had to do something, and we did upset bin Laden’s training base, even if we did not get him and his primary operators. As to the 600 POW’s; I say we should indict them, put them on trail in a public court, and let the chips fall where they may.
Then President Bush invades Iraq. That’s it folks, that’s our war on terrorism. Sure, we created Homeland Security and passed the Patriot Act, had the 9/11 Commission pretty much explain how 9/11 came about which was painful, but most useful. Homeland Security fails completely to deal with our most fundamental concern in combating terrorism and the Patriot Act is nothing but an invasion of your civil liberties. Oh yes, the Congress was hand in hand with Bush on both of those measures.
So what is the answer? If there is an answer, it’s only partial and it’s far from perfect. Mine is two fold. First, know your enemy. Yes, even sit down and talk with them from time to time. No telling what you might learn, especially when you don’t know much to start with. You mean to actually have formal meetings with the evil powers of earth to find out who they are, how they think, and what might be open to negotiation. Yes, the more the better. You might find the root cause of our problem with the terrorist mindset. It may be possible to mitigate the cause. But we should know why these terrorists want to destroy us. Unfortunately, the second answer is one that we have often failed miserably at and is at odds with our basic freedoms, but not the cause for our failures. Its intelligence, the kind of intelligence that is all down and dirty; you get it by sleeping with the enemy and living with then, and praying, and drinking, and eating with them, and smelling like them. And if you slip once, you’re dead. And the few who can be bought, buy them. Let’s suppose you can do this. Now what do you do with the information? Thwart the planned attack or let it go ahead, because the risk of blowing your cover is high if you disrupt the attack, but to score big later, you can’t afford to blow the present cover. This is a dilemma for those in charge, e.g., the planned attack may produce 500 killed, but we also have some fuzzy information that a nuclear bomb might be exploded next year in some US city, so to thwart the planned attack will blow our cover, the cover we need to get more information on the dreaded nuclear bomb attack. Well, what do we do? The spy business is morally bankrupt from the get go. The people who operate these enterprises are corrupt. Like vampires, sunlight destroys them. To paraphrase Lord Acton, ‘Secrecy corrupts; absolute secrecy corrupts absolutely’. Democracy demands accountability for our actions and our money. Its citizens also demand their civil rights and sacred liberty. So there is the rub, how do we fight terror and still preserve our liberty. The possibility of loosing our liberty at home during the terror fight is very real.
I believe we can defeat the terrorists, if we can keep from becoming terrorists ourselves. To kidnap suspected terrorists, torture them, and then murder them is against the principles that made us a free country. That is what we are now doing and if we keep doing it, we will become terrorists ourselves. Besides it will not work. It will not stop them from being able to attack us. We have to know our enemy, and we have to get inside them. And we have to do this without surrendering our liberty.
The war in Iraq is not a war on terrorism. It is a war on Iraq that we have easily won and we are now the army of occupation. Our army of occupation is now trying to force the Iraqis to become a democratic country. We say this can be done and will result in an end of terror in Iraq and Iraq will become a peace loving country. When you try to think this whole matter through, you will come up will many questions, questions that are paramount to understanding what America is about in the world and specifically in Iraq. You will have to turn to many different sources in seeking answers, but unfortunately, there is no consensus among honest thinkers and people of experience on the foreign policy of the USA. There is of course no magic in consensus, as consensus is a concept that proves most useful to the elected representatives in a democratic state, and is basic to how the citizens of a democracy think about political matters.
Foreign policy is the interactions between states, as one state tries to influence another state. Well, what state is terrorism? The Talibin was the lawful government of Afghanistan when bin Laden’s Al Qaeda attacked us on 9/11. Al Qaeda was based in Afghanistan. So the Talibin had to kick bin Laden out and join us or else. They choose or else and we conducted a half-baked proxy war on the Talibin, while bin Laden slipped away. Now we got 20,000 US troops occupying Afghanistan were they’re supposed to building a democracy. We also picked up 600 POW’s from our proxy warlords through CIA bribes that we have locked up in Guantanamo Bay. Overall, not too bad an operation; as we had to do something, and we did upset bin Laden’s training base, even if we did not get him and his primary operators. As to the 600 POW’s; I say we should indict them, put them on trail in a public court, and let the chips fall where they may.
Then President Bush invades Iraq. That’s it folks, that’s our war on terrorism. Sure, we created Homeland Security and passed the Patriot Act, had the 9/11 Commission pretty much explain how 9/11 came about which was painful, but most useful. Homeland Security fails completely to deal with our most fundamental concern in combating terrorism and the Patriot Act is nothing but an invasion of your civil liberties. Oh yes, the Congress was hand in hand with Bush on both of those measures.
So what is the answer? If there is an answer, it’s only partial and it’s far from perfect. Mine is two fold. First, know your enemy. Yes, even sit down and talk with them from time to time. No telling what you might learn, especially when you don’t know much to start with. You mean to actually have formal meetings with the evil powers of earth to find out who they are, how they think, and what might be open to negotiation. Yes, the more the better. You might find the root cause of our problem with the terrorist mindset. It may be possible to mitigate the cause. But we should know why these terrorists want to destroy us. Unfortunately, the second answer is one that we have often failed miserably at and is at odds with our basic freedoms, but not the cause for our failures. Its intelligence, the kind of intelligence that is all down and dirty; you get it by sleeping with the enemy and living with then, and praying, and drinking, and eating with them, and smelling like them. And if you slip once, you’re dead. And the few who can be bought, buy them. Let’s suppose you can do this. Now what do you do with the information? Thwart the planned attack or let it go ahead, because the risk of blowing your cover is high if you disrupt the attack, but to score big later, you can’t afford to blow the present cover. This is a dilemma for those in charge, e.g., the planned attack may produce 500 killed, but we also have some fuzzy information that a nuclear bomb might be exploded next year in some US city, so to thwart the planned attack will blow our cover, the cover we need to get more information on the dreaded nuclear bomb attack. Well, what do we do? The spy business is morally bankrupt from the get go. The people who operate these enterprises are corrupt. Like vampires, sunlight destroys them. To paraphrase Lord Acton, ‘Secrecy corrupts; absolute secrecy corrupts absolutely’. Democracy demands accountability for our actions and our money. Its citizens also demand their civil rights and sacred liberty. So there is the rub, how do we fight terror and still preserve our liberty. The possibility of loosing our liberty at home during the terror fight is very real.
I believe we can defeat the terrorists, if we can keep from becoming terrorists ourselves. To kidnap suspected terrorists, torture them, and then murder them is against the principles that made us a free country. That is what we are now doing and if we keep doing it, we will become terrorists ourselves. Besides it will not work. It will not stop them from being able to attack us. We have to know our enemy, and we have to get inside them. And we have to do this without surrendering our liberty.
posted by Pat Crotty at 8:37 PM
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