A Multi-front War
This has been said many times by many people better at this than I am but I felt a need to say it again. Most people will be in agreement that we are in a war against terrorists and their groups who have proclaimed a Jihad against the United States and the entire western non-muslim world. I submit that they are also engaged in Jihad with the non-western world including Muslims that do not walk in lockstep with their idea of radical Islam. Bin Laden and his Al Qaeda 'The Base' is the focus by many of this war but I find this to be a bit too narrow a focus and we need to widen our understanding about who and what we are having to fight. AQ is a blanket name under which many different organizations in many different countries identify themselves, for strategic reasons and for a sense of legitimacy in the terrorist fraternity. So much for stating the obvious.
One front that has also been talked about is the tacit approval of these murderers and terrorists as evidenced by the deafening silence from the "moderate Muslims". Many give lip service to the subject by such profound memes as "We condemn these acts" and "They do not reflect the mainstream of the Muslim people". Saudi Arabia, "our ally in the war on terror" continues to fund and back the Madrassa hate factories, the most recent noted is the 4,500 new ones being planned for Southeast Asia.
We note with some trepidation the Islamization of Europe and the effect it is having on some of their political decisions.In our smugness about Europe and what is taking place there we need to take note of the beam in our own eye as well. CAIR, the Council of American Islamic Relations. compares itself to the NAACP for Muslims. In reality, CAIR is something quite different. For starters, it's on the wrong side in the war on terrorism. One indication came in October 1998, when the group demanded the removal of a Los Angeles billboard describing Osama bin Laden as "the sworn enemy," finding this depiction "offensive to Muslims." CAIR consistently defends other militant Islamic terrorists too. The conviction of the perpetrators of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing it deemed "a travesty of justice." The conviction of Omar Abdel Rahman, the blind sheikh who planned to blow up New York City landmarks, it called a "hate crime." The extradition order for suspected Hamas terrorist Mousa Abu Marook it labeled "anti-Islamic" and "anti-American.". Another group that could be called a fifth column is tha Muslim Brotherhood. These men are part of an underground U.S. chapter of the international Muslim Brotherhood, the world's most influential Islamic fundamentalist group and an organization with a violent past in the Middle East. But fearing persecution, they rarely identify themselves as Brotherhood members and have operated largely behind the scenes, unbeknown even to many Muslims. This Chicago Tribune article is an excellent look at this organization and its ultimate goals.
These are just two of the various groups operating in our country.
Our neighbor to the north has even allowed Sharia law to overide their own laws and constitution, thereby allowing the first step toward an Islamic Republic on our border.
Also on the home front is the witting accomplices of much of the main stream media and wire services. Reuters and the AP have apparently been joined by the New York Times in refusing to use the word terrorist.
Headline: Top Rebel in Iraq Says War With U.S. May Last for Years
The most wanted insurgent in Iraq acknowledged... that a top guerrilla leader had died in fighting in Falluja... the militant, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi... The audio message, posted on a guerrilla Web site... In the message, Mr. Zarqawi said Omar Hadid, a leader of the Falluja resistance and one of the most wanted guerrillas in Iraq...
The article goes on to describe other actions in Iraq:
Guerrillas in Mosul, the embattled northern city, tried to overrun Al Salam Hospital... Guerrillas also set off an explosion outside a British military base six miles southwest of Basra, wounding several Iraqi civilians … The Army of Ansar al-Sunna, one of the most militant groups in Iraq... The abductions are often organized by criminal gangs that try to get payments for the victims from their home countries or employers, or from politically motivated rebel groups... The Chinese government said it was negotiating to free eight Chinese workers who were abducted recently and turned up Tuesday in a videotape released by insurgents. Their captors are demanding that the Chinese government clarify its position on the war... insurgents were likely to try to take hostages... insurgents would consider a prominent kidnapping to be "'the perfect backdrop" to the elections …
From Bill Roggio...Examples of the media's negative portrayal of the fight against tyranny and terror can be seen in the media's reactions to President Bush's inauguration speech. Note this headline from The Scotsman: "A shiver runs round the world as Bush bangs the drum for 'fire of freedom'". A shiver? From who? Iran? Syria? Europe? Shouldn't the call for liberation from oppression and brutal regimes and ideologies be trumpeted by the very organizations that thrive on freedom? What do they fear?
The media and their mantra of "if it bleeds, it leads" and "good news is no news" feed into the thinking and the underlying hope of some of the left wanting to see failure and the belief that America is to blame for whatever is wrong with the world, it's our fault and if we were a third world impoverished country then at least the rest of the world would love us again.
Other forces at work are the anarchists/pacifist demonstrators that seem to garner all the news. Many of these are the same ones who made up the drug fogged protestors of the 60's and 70's and are trying to relive their heydays while the new generation of this group are trying to make their own memories of being from their hip generation. Many of these newbies have no idea what they are protesting and why, they are just protesting.
I apologize for the longer than usual rambling but I would also like to say that part of the problems we are having on our home front in this war is our fixation on immediate gratification. We tend to think of wars and goals achievable within months, not years. Anything longer becomes a "quagmire."
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