Who is winning the terror war?

No, I think the Spanish voters are winning the war against stupidity. Around 80% of the Spanish public - like most of the civilized world - opposed the unilateral invasion of Iraq. Thier government was wrong to support the war and I am glad to see them leave.

The sad thing is that this probably will encourage further terrorism.

Wrong again George.





WASHINGTON Top Bush administration officials said Sunday that they felt confident that the devastating bomb attacks in Madrid would not shake European determination to continue fighting terrorism, and that those who favor backing away from the U.S.-led war on terror would do so at the risk of becoming future targets of terrorists.
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The secretary of state, Colin Powell, the defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, and the national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, all appeared on television Sunday in what was apparently an effort by the administration to defend the invasion of Iraq, the first anniversary of which comes Saturday. Rice said that with terrorists steadily being pushed back, Americans were now "safer, much safer" at home.
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But such assertions drew a sharp rejoinder from Howard Dean, the Vermont Democrat who recently ended his presidential campaign; his reply indicated that as a U.S. electoral issue, the terror threat may cut both ways.
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"For the president of the United States to assert that we were safer because Saddam Hussein is in jail is ludicrous, given what happened three days ago in Spain," Dean told NBC News. President George W. Bush said in January that the world was a "better and safer place" after Saddam's overthrow. Amid speculation of an Al Qaeda role in the Madrid attacks, some Spanish politicians - and thousands of angry protesters in Madrid - have suggested that the bombings were the direct price for Spanish government support of the United States in the Iraq war. Rice said, however, that she did not expect Spaniards to be deterred.
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"The Spain people understand that they've had strong and good leadership," she said. "Fighting terrorism cannot allow one to be intimidated."
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Rumsfeld rejected the idea that a pullback by Spain or others would make them safer.
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"It's kind of like feeding an alligator, hoping it eats you last," he said. And Powell said that the lesson of the Madrid attacks had to be that efforts against terrorism should be raised, not reduced.
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"There is a war on terror that must be fought," he said. "Nobody's immune. Rather than finding fault with what Spain has done, by being aggressive in the war on terror, this should redouble everyone's efforts." Prime Minister José María Aznar of Spain "did not step back or shrink from these responsibilities," Powell said, "and I hope other leaders will not shrink from our responsibility, collective responsibility, to go after terrorists."
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During the campaign for the election that was held Sunday, the opposition Socialists pledged to withdraw troops from Iraq by summer unless the United Nations provided a clear mandate for their presence. "Well," Powell told Fox News, "we think there is an opportunity to get a clear UN mandate." By July 1, when Iraqis are scheduled to regain sovereignty, he said, "there may well be another UN resolution" that would provide "more than an adequate mandate."
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The bloody images from Spain, closely covered by U.S. television, gave Americans a painful reminder of their own losses of Sept. 11, 2001. Hundreds of people in New York and Washington rallied in solidarity with the Spanish. As a result of the Madrid bombings, U.S. railroads, subways, bridges and tunnels are now under closer watch.
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Rice, speaking to NBC News, offered a pugnacious defense of the U.S.-led war against terrorists.
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"They will not win and we will not falter," she said. "Slowly but surely their world is getting smaller, not larger. They don't have Afghanistan as a base of operations. They will not have Iraq as a base of operations." She also listed Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Libya and Sudan as places they will not be able to use. Terrorists will "win skirmishes," she said, but over all, "the terrorists are losing."
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The Bush administration officials also made these points: Powell said that the United States was concerned by efforts under President Vladimir Putin to reduce participation by opposition candidates in the election Russia held Sunday, but that he did not see Russian democracy as being imperiled. Rice said a planned Jamaica trip by Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the recently deposed Haitian leader, was "a bad idea" by a man who had "forfeited" his leadership. Rumsfeld, asked whether he expected to be involved in Bush's re-election campaign, said: "There won't be a role. The president has specifically asked Colin Powell and me not to be involved in the campaign."
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Powell called "just absurd" a suggestion by John Kerry, Bush's presumed opponent in the elections Nov. 2, that the administration might have delayed announcing improved relations with Libya to gain an electoral advantage.
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Huh? Is the article you posted - which is full of vague political ramblings - supposed to be relevent to the topic at hand? Whose George?



I'd also like to point out - as I have been pointing out for years now - that invading Iraq has literally nothing to do with fighting terrorism. I thought this fact was clear to even the most misinformed and benighted people by now, what with George Bush himself admitting that Saddam had no terrorist connections.

The Iraq debacle was a unilateral, illegal, unjustified war, based on false pretenses, imaginary weapons of mass destruction, imaginary terrorist conections, and an imaginary imminent threat. As a result of this blunder 10,000 innoecent civilians died. Granted, those civilians were poor, brown, Islamic, and on the other side of the world, and thus, their lives are barely worth a footnote on the evening news. But, still, you must realize that invading Iraq only served to increase the resentment that leads to terrorism in the first place. It was the most short-sighted and counterproductive foriegn policy decision imaginable.

So, please, for the sake of credibility on the boards, don't try ot justify this absurd war under the umbrella of fighting terrorism. And don't have the gall to suggest that it was in Spains best interest to support our little war. Its just ridiculous.

I thought it had some relevance particularly the underlined. Only my opinion. They seemed to be sure the government would stand. The people spoke and it did not. George of course is our great and noble leader.
I agree the war in Iraq qnd terrorism are two seperate issues. In addition I posted the article not because I agreed with it but because it was just some more of the Bush administrations faulty thinking.

ILZ is right on target. The Bush administration destroyed a fifty year system of multilateral cooperation and consultation, demeaned out traditional allies and began a poorly thought out unilateral policy that other are suffering for. Al Qaeda is taking full advantage of this and there is going to be more of what we saw in Madrid as terrorist attempt to wedge open the rift this administration created between ourselves and the rest of the world. Right now we are losing and it is going to get worse.

Heh. So, what are your thoughts on the Spanish election?

IZ
I know very little about Spanish politics so I really can't comment on what effect the change in government will have. However, as for the involvement in the war in Iraq the people have spoken. Based on reports the same would happen to most governments in Europe that chose to support the US war with Iraq.

Entire article is at

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/europe/03/15/spain.election/index.html

I'm just glad the people of Spain rejected the alligator comparison. It's pretty simple what happened there. Al-Queda warned them that if they stay with Bush they'll get more bombs. Or in other words, stop invading us and we'llstop bombing you. Sounds like a sensible deal, since the invasion is flat out wrong.

Bush's team is desparate to put out the same old justifications again, but the bottom line is also very clear. The world is NOT safer. One one hand, Rice is saying their base of operations is getting smaller and smaller while Rumsfeld alludes to the Mighty Alligator of Terror going to bite you in the end...suggesting strength and determination. They contradict each other, of course.

AU1929 isn't rambling here, but collecting the many pronouncements coming out that signify pretty much nothing. If they never though Iraq was such a threat, then why are they still beating the drum about it?

The republicans are demonstrating nicely here that they really do think we are a bunch of dimmies who can't see through their posturing. They are doing Kerry's work for him.

Terror wins election

Country's ruling party was blasted out of office by fear



It took thousands of soldiers and billions of dollars to effect regime change in Afghanistan and Iraq. Terrorists did it in Spain with 10 dynamite-stuffed backpacks.
The deranged, totalitarian minds that carried out Madrid's 3/11 must be big fans of the democratic process after watching the lemming-like Spaniards do their bidding. Spain's terror-intolerant Popular Party was headed to certain victory until, with one well-planned, well-timed massacre, the Islamic nihilists were able to install a band of soft-headed Socialists in power in Madrid.

Note how incoming Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's first brave move yesterday was to pledge to pull his 1,300 troops out of Iraq and restore Spain's "magnificent" ties to France and Germany.

Don't be surprised if by tomorrow, Zapatero announces that, in a blind gesture of goodwill, he will fast-track the proposed Straits of Gibraltar Bridge project. The 9-mile span would connect Spain to Morocco, Europe to Africa, Christians to Muslims. It's a good bet such a structure would never be a target of terrorists. They'll need it as they swarm into Europe.

Every New Yorker I have spoken to since Sunday's election debacle has mouthed deep disappointment in the Spanish election. They suffered plenty after 9/11, just as the Spanish suffered after 3/11, but liberal or conservative, they believe that saying "No" to terror is paramount. From this side of the Atlantic, it looked like Spain said "Yes." They gave in.

What New Yorkers fear now is that the Spanish have opened the floodgates for Bin Ladenists worldwide.

Don't like the president of Poland? Blow up a bus in Warsaw.

Want to oust Japan's PM? Try a dirty bomb in Tokyo.

"The definition of terrorism is the use of violence to achieve a political end," said Michael Cherkasky, president of Kroll Associates and a former top Manhattan prosecutor who has been on Al Qaeda's trail for years. "And by definition, the terrorists have scored their largest success in memory by effectively turning the Spanish election. It is a terrible precedent for the world."

Cherkasky warned that "the terrorists will surely try to affect this year's American elections. Our soldiers and citizens are more likely to be at risk as we get closer to November. The terrorists will try to influence our elections with terror incidents and body bags."

Spanish voters should have had the courage to stop terror from trumping democracy, despite their understandable grief following Thursday's attack. Instead, they sent a message to Al Qaeda: Terrorism works.

Spain is fooling itself if it believes that by voting in peace-loving Socialists, it has been inoculated against more bloodshed. Like sharks drawn to blood, terrorists are drawn to the cowardice of retreat. They can smell it even from their caves. Today, its stench hangs over Spain.

PARIS - Spain's great electoral upheaval is being called by some in Europe a victory for terrorism.
http://www.iht.com/articles/510364.htm

And for those of you suggesting Spain caved in to the terrorists, the coming blood will be on YOUR hands.

Spain stood up and exercised the vote to effect change, which is what democracy is all about. They were entirely within their rights to abolish that government that was not acting in their interests. The Spanish are acting far more American than the Americans are. They are taking the power that is rightly theirs and USING it.

They seem to understand somehow that violence only begets more violence, and they peacefully removed the warmongers from power.

What happened in Spain is by far the most significant event in this so-called war on terror so far. Far from capitulating to the terrorists, they took their country back from idiot leaders putting them in harm's way. Let's hope the world takes notice and follows suit here. War against freedom-fighters is why we have terrorists in the first place. Government doesn't rule over us, we rule over it. Anyone suggesting otherwise is part of the problem, not the solution.

If 80% of the spanish people were against the war in Iraq before the bombing, then voting for a guy who would pull them out of Iraq was logical regardless of whether they were bombed or not.

As for the question, I don't anyone is winning the war on terror. A lot of effort has been made some have been successful and obviously some not.

Today there was a massive 1000 ton bomb set off by the lebanon Hotel in Bagdad killing 28 and wounding around 40. I don't think we are winning the peace in Iraq either.

I don't think we should cut and run over there, in fact I don't see how we can leave by the date they are talking about. However, I wish they would hand over control to Nato or the UN. If Kerry gets elected, maybe that will happen. I pray that it does.

posted March 17, 2004, updated 12:00 p.m.

Growing anti-US sentiment in Europe

New poll shows that war in Iraq has undermined US credibility.

By Tom Regan | csmonitor.com

A poll conducted by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center a few days before the Madrid bombings last week shows that anti-US sentiment is growing across Europe, accompanied by widespread opposition to the war in Iraq and increasing skepticism about the war on terrorism.
Perceptions of American unilateralism remain widespread in European and Muslim nations, and the war in Iraq has undermined America’s credibility abroad. Doubts about the motives behind the US-led war on terrorism abound, and a growing percentage of Europeans want foreign policy and security arrangements independent from the United States. Across Europe, there is considerable support for the European Union to become as powerful as the United States.
In an editorial, the Guardian writes that "two full-scale wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and countless anti-terrorist operations have failed to convince most Europeans that this war [on terror], as now conceived, is winnable." The Christian Science Monitor says the Pew poll shows that the world is more in tune with Spanish Prime Minister-elect Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero than with US President George W. Bush. The Miami Herald reports that Pew's nine-country poll shows that opposition to the war has increased dramatically in the year since the invasion, especially in Britain.
"The credibility of the United States is sinking," said Madeleine Albright, who was secretary of state under President Bill Clinton. "Osama bin Laden has been able to do something that 40 years of communism was unable to do, which is to divide Europe from the United States."
This growing antiwar sentiment is reflected in the comments Mr. Zapatero, reports The Age of Melbourne, Australia. Earlier this week Zapatero blasted Britain and the US, saying that "Mr. Blair and Mr. Bush must do some reflection and self-criticism. You can't organize a war with lies." Recently both the US and British government have been accused by critics of the war in Iraq of exaggerating evidence in order to persuade their countries to go to war.
Then on Wednesday, CNN reported that Zapatero rejected a call from Bush to stand by the US, and says his threat to withdraw Spanish troops from Iraq stands. Even before he was elected last Sunday in an upset, Zapatero had also said he hopes that Bush loses the upcoming US election. For his part, the CBC reports, Bush "scolded" the people of Spain for voting out his ally, conservative Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar, a few days after the attacks in Madrid.
What happened in Spain, [Bush] said, will never happen in the United States. "They'll never shake the will of the United States. We understand the stakes and we will work with our friends to bring justice to the terrorists."
The Washington Post reports that many in Spain voted against the government of Mr. Aznar because they felt the terrorist bombings showed his error in supporting the US war in Iraq too strongly, despite the antiwar sentiments of a vast majority of the population. Spaniards strongly support the war on terrorism, but they do not see the war in Iraq as part of that effort.
"We love America – Faulkner, Hemingway, Coca-Cola and Marilyn Monroe – but we have something against your government," said Luis Gonzales, 56, a high school Spanish literature teacher, as he stopped to view the rows of candles, flowers, and makeshift signs at the central Puerta del Sol. "Aznar took us into a war that wasn't our war, but only for the benefit of the extreme right and the American companies."
While many commentators in both the US and even in the Arab world saw the Socialists' victory in a Spanish election as a "victory" for Al Qaeda, Mark Follman, writing in Salon, says there were other reasons that Aznar lost. In particular, Mr. Follman points to the feeling among Spaniards that he lied to them in the first days after the attack for his own political purposes. Aznar's government continued to blame the attack the Basque separatist organization ETA despite the growing evidence it had been carried out by an Al Qaeda cell.
Salim Lone, writing in Canada's Globe and Mail, says it's not the actions of Spain that will embolden terrorists – they've already been "given a great boost" by the war in Iraq itself.
Spain's exit has nothing to do with lack of commitment to fight terror: rather, it was at the heart of the Socialists' electoral platform, and was in tune with the 90 percent of Spaniards who opposed the war. The incoming prime minister's policy – making fighting terrorism his first priority without being embroiled in Iraq, and pushing for UN leadership for the Iraqi transition – is exactly what's needed to make the world safer.

The Scotsman writes that several things are now certain in Europe after last week's attacks. "Firstly, the Iraq war is a red herring. The real war now being fought is against Al Qaeda." The Spanish edition of Expatica points out that for all his anti-US statements, the new prime minister, Zapatero, will have to be especially tough on Al Qaeda and terrorism within his own border, and in that way, could become even more cooperative with the US.
But the action that has larger implications for the US foreign policy, reports The Australian, is Zapatero's statement that he will move away from a close relationship with the US and improve relations with Germany and France. He is also expected to endorse the acceptance of the European constitution, which Aznar, with the help of Poland, had blocked in the past.
Annie Applebaum of The Washington Post writes that Western unity (as in the US-led war on terror) has taken a hit. Spain's decision to court the Germans and French is a blow to "the notion of a unified West, and a victory for countries that want to create a Europe that is a rival politically and economically to the US. The vote in Spain, Ms. Applebaum writes, and the growing anti-US sentiment in Europe, can be also seen as "payback" not for the war in Iraq but "for the way it was launched and sold, or not sold, to Europeans."
Before the war, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell did not travel the continent, explaining why it should be fought, despite the fact that this was not blindingly obvious, either here or there. In the run-up to the war, we launched a UN process that – because of a quite separate military schedule, one that allegedly required a springtime invasion – we clearly had no intention of taking seriously. In the aftermath of the war, we lost interest in the allies who sent troops, sometimes at great political risk. Military aid has not been forthcoming; contracts have gone exclusively to American companies; budgets for public diplomacy in Europe have been cut.
Martin Jacques writes in the Guardian that the Spanish vote is part of the world-wide reaction to the war in Iraq, and also, in its own way, a delayed reaction to the end of the cold war.
The affinity between the US and western Europe was, not least, a product of the cold war. Once, after 9/11, the US decided to pursue a unilateralist policy in support of its own interests as the world's sole superpower, Europe found itself out in the cold. We are only at the beginning of this period, and many surprises lie in wait – Spain is but one example.
While the US and Europe may be at odds about the events of the war, a new opinion poll taken in Iraq by the BBC and other broadcasters shows that shows that most Iraqis think their lives have improved in the last year. Seventy percent of people said that things were going well or quite well in their lives, while only 29 percent felt things were bad.
The poll had some cautions for the US-led coalition. Almost 85 percent of Iraqis believe that restoring security is the number one priority for the coming year. And there was almost no support for the people the coalition would like to see lead Iraq. Ahmed Chalabi, the head of the Iraq National Congress and a favorite in the Pentagon, had no support at all, while Saddam Hussein remains one of the six most popular politicians in the country. There were also deep differences on other key issues according to region or religious belief.
Still, the BBC reports, Dan Plesch, a security expert at Birkbeck college in London said that the poll was good news for the leaders of countries who began the invasion a year ago this week.
"This poll indicates that Iraqis strongly support a unified country with strong leadership. They don't want to see the country divided up and they don't want to see an Islamic government."
Meanwhile, the French newspaper Le Parisien and other news outlets received a fax from an Islamic group threatening terrorist attacks in retaliation over French plans to ban Islamic headscarves and other religious apparel in schools. The group identified itself as The Servants of Allah, the Powerful and Wise. French President Jacques Chirac said his government was taking the threat seriously, but that people should not panic as it was not known how serious the threat really was.

Funny how Al-Queda and Bush's "you're either with us or against us" have so much in common.