Terrorist Strategy 101

Having browsed some of McG's entries, I must say, you have created a monster, MerlinsG. Ahh well, you started out with good intentions, but you know what they say about good intentions, I'm sure.

Oh, c'mon! I did that on purpose!

Take a bow McG. Very, very funny....

Cycloptichorn:

That was an interesting article, but I disagree with most of its conclusions.

While it is undoubtedly true that Bin Laden wants to radicalize moderate Muslims, I doubt that the terrorist attacks on the U.S. were made with the primary intent of egging us to war. Muslim extremists would likely use our wealth and socially liberal ideals as their casus belli irrespective of our actions in the Middle East?-Western society provides the perfect antagonist for an advocate of Sharia. If the U.S. were totally passive, it could strengthen the case made by Muslim extremists that America's alleged moral decay has led to her weakness, thus promoting an alternative theocratic and totalitarian society (in contradistinction to our allegedly decrepit, weak, and secular society).

Yes, a war that leads to diminished living conditions and social chaos also promotes the cause of radicals, but is the answer to do nothing at all? No, and I think that Bin Laden and his compatriots would capitalize as much on passivity as they would on ill-planned aggression.

As I've said before (and I thank FreeDuck for the reminder), war is rough tool for social change, and I doubt that we can lead the Middle East to moderation by the barrel of a gun. However, I still think we need to take an aggressive and activist stance against the totalitarian brand of Islam that has given birth to groups like Al Qaeda. I simply cannot believe that a people who promote suicide bombing, beheadings, and a cruel and deadly brand of justice (on their own people no less, e.g. the Taliban) would simply live and let live in the face of weakness from their moral and religious foil.

When a nation has fallen victim to the aforementioned radical brand of Islam, and she intentionally abets our enemies, such as the case in pre-war Afghanistan, we have no rational choice but war. I would also argue that even preemptive and unilateral war is justified when military intervention is necessary to prevent the imminent use of force against us. While some have attempted to make such a case for Iraq, the conditions in that country were more complicated than those which I just described. Unfortunately, the present state of that country only attests to the truth that war is better at breaking things than creating of fixing them?-the consequences of our invasion are verging on dire, and the costs of that war were greater than any tangible benefits. Ultimately, I remain convinced that the balance of the arguments did not support Iraq. The problem was not, however, the doctrine of pre-emptive war; nor was the problem our firm stance against terrorism and her proponents. The problem was that this administration irrationally supposed, against all the evidence, that Iraqis would hail Americans as their saviors and adopt our values wholesale. This administration blindly adopted an unrealistic vision of a democratic-domino-effect from a group of individuals with no ground-level contact with actual Iraqis. Those in the administration that had any understanding of actual Iraqi society, such as the State Dept., were gagged while the rest of the administration indulged in fantasy. Furthermore, while Bush's campaign strategy in 2004 was admittedly brilliant, the scope of its genius was equally matched by the ineptitude of his war politics in 2002-03. The weak case for WMD was merely a vehicle, and even if we could swallow that tainted political pill, the vehicle ended up being thoroughly empty?-the Bush dream was a dream in the truest sense.

In the final analysis, the problem wasn't an aggressive stance, per se, but this administrations ideologically charged (and empirically void) attempt to implement that stance. I think we should be weary of assuming that a strong stance would always lead to terrorism on account of this administration's folly.

There you have it, after a ridiculously long post, the crux of my argument is: We need to base our policy on strength, not pacifism or non-intervention. However, our strength must be rooted reason and empiricism.

-Steppenwolf

It is precisely because of our actions in the Middle East that extremists have been incited to react. We've colonized the Middle East in Palestine. We've led coups and usurped democratic governments in the Middle East and replaced them with dictatorial monarchs. We support corrupt monarchies there the name of the oil business.

It's blatantly obvious that our actions have lead to these reactions, and the war in Iraq is merely the gasoline thrown onto the fire.

But for some of us, we have to learn the err of our ways the hard way.

For others, its merely a natural progression of the worldly King-Of-The-Hill game, and they're in it for the ride.

Even if that were true (and it's open for debate), that's an argument for changing our past actions. The fire has started, whatever the cause. What do we do now? That was the focus of my above argument, of which you quoted only a small fraction.

I agree; I do it myself.

I was not trying to foist McG on the Trivia & Word games crowd, nor trivialize the Trivia & Word games crowd. I was pointing out how ridiculous that particular post of McG's is.

McG,

I do not believe that you have anything to say other than trying to rile people up; if you have something constructive to contribute then do so.

Edit:

I replied to ehBeth and McG before reading the rest of the posts on this thread.

Cav: I did not create the monster, I just shined a light under his bridge.

ehBeth: I apologize for letting McG know the forum is there. I will note, however, that he did not manage to incite a firestorm of controversy. Ultimately, McG is responsible for his own actions.

You mean like pointing out the fact that your post could be construed as nothing more than derisive? As most of your posts on this forum have been?

How about doing me a small favor... If you see the name "McGentrix" on a post, skip it. That way you will not need to worry yourself about what I write.

Can you two girls take it outside please? You're getting cat hair all over the place.

Yeah, I know what the thrust of your argument is, SW.

But you downplay the importance of our machinations in the Middle East that have led to extremist reactions. That's why I specifically quoted that small fraction of what you had written. The argument I make is not for changing our past actions (Certainly, you're being facetiously disingenuous to suggest changing the past, right?). It's an argument for restituting for our past transgressions in the Middle East, all the while not relenting on pursuing the prosecution of those terrorist leaders. This pursuit is best accomplished as a police action rather than as all out wars against nations. The vast majorities of the peoples of these nations are not terrorists, but ham-handed approaches to this pursuit only tend to incite extremist reactions within these populations.

Hell, forget about restitution - how about we just stop screwing them over.

We don't have to pay anything back, just quit supporting their regimes by buying all their damn oil.

You really wouldn't think that a region/state would have been much better off before the discovery of a precious natural resource, but Islaam sure was....

Like I've said in the past:

It is unrealistic and childish to assume that this conflict is going to somehow end once we kill all the bad guys.

BOTH sides of the table are going to have to learn to change and adapt, and yes, this includes us here in America. I know people hate to hear that, but let's be realistic - if we can't step up to the table on our side, and critically examine our own actions to see if they are, indeed, having a deletorious affect on the people of the middle east (which I can guarantee you, they are), how can we expect anyone else to do the same?

Cycloptichorn

No facetious disingenuity on my part--my apologies if I inadvertently offended you. I merely intended to shift the debate to the present by focusing on suggestions for current and future policy.

As far as restitution is concerned, that's simply too speculative and politically infeasible to be practical. But I wholly agree that the vast majority of people in these nations are not terrorists. However, pure-police action underestimates the scope of the problem. We aren't blessed with a functional international police, nor can we always trust a hostile country's domestic police to ferret out terrorists. A strong foreign policy in this area, as I suggest, doesn't contemplate war with cooperative (and competent) or innocent regimes. The fact remains that many Middle Eastern regimes have consistently failed and continue to fail at deterring or punishing terrorists. The pure-police solution is too often an empty one--great on paper, but demonstrably bad in practice. What happens when we can't count on domestic police (as is usually the case)? Do we use external police? Is this functionally any different than military action, particularly in the face of a hostile regime? Could you have seen "police action" in Afghanistan?

As far as the "stop buying oil" suggestion (Cycloptichorn's suggestion), that's not realistic. Such a solution would require a huge market intervention, and both our economy and the economy of many Middle Eastern countries would crash due to such an intervention. Would it really help our cause to make the Middle East and ourselves dirt poor?

I think that there are many 'easy' answers here, but none of them are practical when played out to their logical conclusions.

Who said we'd stop buying oil? That's not realistic in the slightest; we use so much of it that it would literally cut off the lifeline of our country.

I said we should stop buying oil from the Regimes.

Rather, we need to figure out a way to give the money we PAY for the oil to the PEOPLE of the country. Sort of a land-grant type proposal.

For example, they actually drill from a well that runs under my parents' house near Houston. They, and everyone else in the neighborhood, gets a check every year for the oil that was taken off of their property.

Do the same thing with the countries in the middle east. Tell the dictators that we won't deal with them screwing their people anymore. Empower the people to fight back against their oppressors by giving them a piece of the action.

To do otherwise is to admit that we are supporting an unfair system, where the natural resources of a country are literally being stolen from the people of said country by it's leaders. We're buying stolen goods, we know it, and we don't care. This does not bring about a lot of pro-US sentiment in the Middle East.

Cycloptichorn

No offense taken, SW.

I don't know what a police action would have resulted in in Afghanistan. I do know what has resulted there from the war we're waging there: abject failure as far as getting Osama bin Laden as one of the objectives. Also, we removed the Taliban from power, the other objective, and installed a stooge who rules all of the city of Kabul and not much more. Meanwhile, the Taliban is still around and control certain areas in Afghanistan.

Restitution isn't feasible because the US wouldn't go for it, period. We make the rules as we go along. And that is largely why we ourselves are the major cause of extremist reaction in the ME. We refuse to acknowledge our faults and transgressions there, let alone amend for them, and only add to them like the way we're waging war in Iraq. We're trying to put out the fire that we've had a big hand in starting with gasoline.