Ruminating on all that's happened since 9/11
13/09/2006
That much used and abused term "The War on Terror" is the best demonstration of the misguided and self destructive foreign policy of the US and the UK since 9/11. Our governments have taken this term literally and are attempting to propagate a conventional war against terrorism.
What poor students of history they are...
Attempting to subdue terrorist and guerrilla forces with conventional forces does not work. If there is one lesson to be learned from the 20th century it is this: the barefoot guys with AK47's/bomb belts always win against standing armies. One only has to look at Vietnam, Rhodesia, Afghanistan and innumerable small conflicts around the world to see this.
The recent dust off in the Lebanon is a classic example. The Israeli army used overwhelming armed might to attack a smaller guerrilla force embedded within a civilian population and the results for the Israelis were very poor. They succeeded in doing great harm to the civilians of Lebanon but when the dust cleared Hezbollah was largely intact.
In addition to the ineffectiveness of tanks etc against non-conventional forces the collateral damage done to the civilian population in such actions is the single most effective recruiting sergeant for the terrorists/insurgents etc. I bet Hezbollah has no problem recruiting now and neither does Al Qaeda have problems finding young lemmings in Iraq where once they had no presence at all (hold on what's this? There was no Al Qaeda in Iraq pre-invasion and no WMD's... so why did we go in again?)
Our other great mistake is that our deportment in this war has been deplorable. We tell the world we are the bastions of democracy and freedom and then we set up questionable interment camps? What the hell is that? Rendition and secret CIA prisons (and don't try to tell me the Brit Govt had no part of this)? If you use the tactics of the bad guys, guess what? YOU ARE THE BAD GUYS!
I am unsure how we should have prosecuted the campaign against Islamic extremism but I do know that our govts chose the worst path possible. Watch now as Iran flexes its muscles and attempts to fill the power vacuum left in Saddam's wake. Rather than chase the terrorists around the world with bombs maybe all we needed to do was to continue to import our corrosive culture and values to the Middle East; that is after all why the extremists hate us. They hate to see their young ones seduced by coca-cola, Reeboks, easy sexuality, open relationships, free choice etc. It was the Russian people's desire for these things that finally brought low the Soviet State. Rather than offer the Islamo-fascists the M16 we should offer their kids sticks of gum, hedonism and moral decay…
Mad

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