Bush says New war just like Pearl Harbor...

New war just like Pearl Harbor
Phillip Coorey
New York
04jun04

STEELING his troops yesterday for a long campaign, President George W. Bush likened the war against terror to World War II, saying it was a clash "between those who put their trust in tyrants and those who put their trust in liberty".

Addressing an air force graduation ceremony in Colorado, Mr Bush said the war on terror began on September 11, 2001 - the modern equivalent of Pearl Harbor.
"Like the Second World War, our present conflict began with a ruthless, surprise attack on the United States. Like other totalitarian movements, the terrorist seeks to impose a grim vision in which dissent is crushed and every man and woman must think and live in colourless conformity. History is once again witnessing a great clash," he said.

Mr Bush, who calls Iraq the central front in the war on terror, was criticised yesterday by his Democrat rival John Kerry for persistently linking Iraq to September 11. Senator Kerry said Iraq had nothing to do with September 11, but invading Iraq had made it a terrorist haven.

"The reason Iraq is now linked to the war on terror is because of what's happened there," he said.

But Mr Bush said: "Some say by fighting the terrorists abroad since September 11, we only stir up a hornet's nest. But the terrorists who struck us on that day were stirred up already."

Mr Bush rejected comparisons between Iraq and the Vietnam War, but yesterday pressed home the World War II theme.

He travels this weekend to Normandy, France to celebrate the 60th Anniversary of the D-Day landings that began the liberation of Europe from Hitler's tyranny.

Yesterday he quoted Supreme Allied Commander General Dwight Eisenhower, who told the troops on the eve of D-Day: "The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you."

Mr Bush told the graduates the same applied to them and said the hate-filled threats from al-Qaida were similar to Hitler's rants.

"In all these threats we hear the echoes of other enemies in other times, that same swagger and demented logic of the fanatic."