Position: The Global War on Terror
In short, I believe that there IS a global conflict now going on, and that this conflict threatens the United States as well as all civilization on the planet, Western, Asian, Islamic or whatever.
I believe that the name we've given it is unfortunate. I have, for years, called it "the Jihadist war", or simply World War III.
The US has been occasionally involved in this war since its founding -- Thomas Jefferson was the first U.S. commander in chief to fight battles against Islamic terrorists.
But while the conflict predates the existence of the United States, it grew most ominous in the 20th century. There were several factors:
* The odd-but-stable partnership of the Wahhab and Saud families, formed in 1744, fed radicalism for its own political purposes.
* This partnership drove the reclamation of the "Kingdom of Nejd and Hejaz" a century ago -- renamed to Saudi Arabia in the 1930s.
* Resentments from European division of the Middle East after WWI and WWII gave a focus -- to some -- for hatred, and someone to blame for the downfall of the Ottoman Empire.
* To this mixture was added lots of money, from the discovery of oil in that country and the first successful wells 70 years ago.
* This radicalism increased and spread to Egypt and elsewhere, and fueled the Muslim Brotherhood -- which along with various spin-offs and fragments is very much a threat today.[1]
I think that al Qaeda is only one facet of this problem. Palestine is another, the Saudi and Pakistani and other radical clerics from many countries -- including the US -- are all facets of the problem. Those who tend to blame the US for the rise of Islamic radicalism have, in my opinion, an odd and incomplete view of history.
Obviously, the conflict became prevalent in American minds since 9/11 -- but even that was simply another attack among many waged in the previous few years.
We have no choice but to fight this war -- it is being fought against us. And we need to win it -- not just for the sake of the US, but also for the millions of others (including Muslims) who will be slaughtered if we fail.
Iraq is one campaign in this war. And while we've made mistakes in that campaign, those mistakes do not provide an excuse for abandoning an oil-rich country to al Qaeda and its allies as a staging area.
I watched with interest in December 2001 as the conflict almost became a nuclear exchange. That day, December 13th, nuclear war was averted -- but we were lucky, and the threat remains.
The stakes are high. We can win. We will win. We'd be happy with peaceful coexistence -- but not surrender.
===|==============/ Level Head
[1] For example, members of the Muslim Brotherhood regularly taught at Saudi universities; it was from them that Usama bin Ladin learned his current philosophy.
I believe that the name we've given it is unfortunate. I have, for years, called it "the Jihadist war", or simply World War III.
The US has been occasionally involved in this war since its founding -- Thomas Jefferson was the first U.S. commander in chief to fight battles against Islamic terrorists.
But while the conflict predates the existence of the United States, it grew most ominous in the 20th century. There were several factors:
* The odd-but-stable partnership of the Wahhab and Saud families, formed in 1744, fed radicalism for its own political purposes.
* This partnership drove the reclamation of the "Kingdom of Nejd and Hejaz" a century ago -- renamed to Saudi Arabia in the 1930s.
* Resentments from European division of the Middle East after WWI and WWII gave a focus -- to some -- for hatred, and someone to blame for the downfall of the Ottoman Empire.
* To this mixture was added lots of money, from the discovery of oil in that country and the first successful wells 70 years ago.
* This radicalism increased and spread to Egypt and elsewhere, and fueled the Muslim Brotherhood -- which along with various spin-offs and fragments is very much a threat today.[1]
I think that al Qaeda is only one facet of this problem. Palestine is another, the Saudi and Pakistani and other radical clerics from many countries -- including the US -- are all facets of the problem. Those who tend to blame the US for the rise of Islamic radicalism have, in my opinion, an odd and incomplete view of history.
Obviously, the conflict became prevalent in American minds since 9/11 -- but even that was simply another attack among many waged in the previous few years.
We have no choice but to fight this war -- it is being fought against us. And we need to win it -- not just for the sake of the US, but also for the millions of others (including Muslims) who will be slaughtered if we fail.
Iraq is one campaign in this war. And while we've made mistakes in that campaign, those mistakes do not provide an excuse for abandoning an oil-rich country to al Qaeda and its allies as a staging area.
I watched with interest in December 2001 as the conflict almost became a nuclear exchange. That day, December 13th, nuclear war was averted -- but we were lucky, and the threat remains.
The stakes are high. We can win. We will win. We'd be happy with peaceful coexistence -- but not surrender.
===|==============/ Level Head
[1] For example, members of the Muslim Brotherhood regularly taught at Saudi universities; it was from them that Usama bin Ladin learned his current philosophy.