Democrats - How Would You Deal with Militant Islam?

Al Qaeda alone is known to operate in more than 60 countries. We need the cooperation of intelligence and law enforcement agencies around the world to cast a global net for terrorists, infiltrate their cells, learn their plans, cut off their funds, and stop them before they can attack. We will strengthen the effectiveness of intelligence and law enforcement efforts around the world by forging stronger international coalitions and enhancing cooperative relationships.
Source: [X-ref Kerry] Our Plan For America , p.225 Aug 10, 2004

Improve intelligence capabilities to counter terrorism
We can more effectively prevent another terrorist attack by: restoring the credibility of our intelligence community by ensuring the basic integrity of the intelligence process. We will make certain that our intelligence agencies are protected from political pressures and operate in a culture of diversity of thought, dissent, and forceful challenging of assumptions; strengthening accountability & leadership by creating a true Director of National Intelligence with the authority to manage & direct all of the components of the intelligence community; maximizing coordination and integration by structuring around key threats like terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, and hostile countries; transforming our intelligence services to ensure that they have sufficient personnel with the skills, languages, training, & orientation needed to meet today's threats. We will make sure that the FBI is fully prepared to perform counter-terrorism intelligence operations and strengthen our capabilities overseas.
Source: [X-ref Kerry] Our Plan For America , p. 13 Aug 10, 2004

Cut off terrorists funds
Terrorists need money to operate. We will: impose tough financial sanctions against nations or banks that engage in money laundering or fail to act against it; launch a "name and shame" campaign against those financing terror, and shut out of the US financial system those nations that fail to respond, end Bush's kid-glove approach to the supply & laundering of terrorist money in Saudi Arabia, and demand Riyadh shut down Saudi-based "charities" that help finance al Qaeda and other terrorist networks.
Source: [X-ref Kerry] Our Plan For America , p. 14 Aug 10, 2004

Prevent Afghanistan & others from becoming terrorist havens
Our drive to topple the Taliban regime convincingly demonstrated the courage and skill of our troops, the value of powerful new technologies, and the particular importance of Special Forces units in defeating unconventional enemies. Unfortunately, we have not followed with a plan or the commitment to win the peace. Bush has all but turned away from Afghanistan, allowing it to become a forgotten front in the war on terror and once again a potential breeding ground for terrorists.
Source: [X-ref Kerry] Our Plan For America , p. 15 Aug 10, 2004

woiyo wrote:

We know how the Democrats would have handled it as John Kerry, who was their candidate for President stated many times.

Go to the UN.

In other words, let someone else decide the policies of the US.

That message was rejected then, and I hope will be rejected the next time a democrat or ANYONE brings it up.

Yea, it would have been a horrible thing to finish the inspections to know ahead of invading Iraq that there was no WMD. <Sarcasm>

We criticized before the Iraq invasion. Now that your man has made a complete mess of things, you come and ask for a solution.

Your side should have listened before jumping. Now it is almost beyond repair.

revel wrote:

woiyo wrote:

We know how the Democrats would have handled it as John Kerry, who was their candidate for President stated many times.

Go to the UN.

In other words, let someone else decide the policies of the US.

That message was rejected then, and I hope will be rejected the next time a democrat or ANYONE brings it up.

Yea, it would have been a horrible thing to finish the inspections to know ahead of invading Iraq that there was no WMD. <Sarcasm>

This had been going on for twelve years, and Hussein had hidden things, refused the inspectors entry to sites until they could be sanitized, and been caught lying. How much more time should we have given him to abide by the terms of his Gulf War 1 surrender agreement? It seems to me like a dozen years is a long time, considering that he had promised to destroy the weapons and stop the programs in such a way that it would be apparent that he had done so. It wouldn't have been hard for him to destroy them and have clear proof of it within the first year after he agreed to. It was actually foolish for us to have given him so many years to keep his word.

We criticized before the Iraq invasion. Now that your man has made a complete mess of things, you come and ask for a solution.

Your side should have listened before jumping. Now it is almost beyond repair.

Since all the token conservatives are demanding an answer from "Democrats" (as if it's only up to them to ddecide) on how to deal with militant Islam....perhaps I'll take a stab at it.
(So-called "militant Islam" in 2001 was of a different kind and quality than the militant Islam of 2006, so we must frame our discussion around how we should have dealt with it then.)

I would have begun first by publicly acknowledging that the United States has had a history of supporting radical/extremist mujahideen fighters in Afghanistan, and that this is potentially a monster that the US created. Perhaps I'm naive in thinking that honesty would have been beneficial in rallying support for a this malignant group. The US militarily funded and ideologically supported the voilent mujahideen in hopes of combatting Russian influence in the middle east. The Taliban was an eventual sconsequence.
The United States created the Taliban, and that needed to be publicly announced.

From there, the administration should have acknowledged the origin of the threat, and perhaps introspected not only the what and the where, but also the why behind the attacks....and not asking "why do they hate us when we're so good." Denial in this respect has proven costly.
Bush predictably decided that making terrorist-like non-negotiable demands of Afghanistan was more effective than diplomacy.

If escalating the level of violence was the only solution, then a mission to seek and destroy al Qaeda would have been appropriate, as the Taliban had fallen into disfavor throughout the region, support would have been almost universal both locally and internationally. The false connection with Iraq was transparent from the beginning, and only proved to be more so later on. Liberating the Iraqi people was not even the original war aim.

**I'll leave this and come back and finish this later, if there are any comments, I'll respond then. I have to get off to work**

Do you think it is a problem, Brandon, that the US and Israel are both in violation of treaty agreements?

SHouldn't we be cleaning our own house, as well?

Cycloptichorn

a partiuclarly dangerous dictator

I didn't know there were so many Democrats in Canada.

Brandon9000 wrote:

a partiuclarly dangerous dictator

What are your reasons for calling Hussein a "particularly dangerous dictator"? Just curious, as that seems to be at the core of what you are (continously) stating...