Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dayuhan who wrote (28888)	2/11/2004 6:10:46 AM
From: unclewest	Respond to of 793840

One of the great fallacies of this fight, often seen here, is that we are fighting a bunch of cowards who will give up if we stand up to them. Nice dream, but not true. Ask the Russians about that idea. Good thought...One could ask the Israelis too. The terrorist's continued willingness to fight to the death under the most adverse circumstances for them is worrisome. True, but we have to watch our definitions carefully. This is not “us vs. terrorism”. Terrorism is a tactic, not a player. It’s not even us against terrorists. You don’t see SF teams fighting ETA or the Tamil Tigers, and you don’t see the FBI chasing down IRA sympathizers. We are fighting a particular strain of Islamic militancy that has targeted the US. I agree that terrorism can be a small-unit tactic, but terrorism can also be and presently is much more than that. There are certainly connections between the states that have been sponsoring terrorism: Libya, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Iraq, Cuba, N Korea. And There are certainly connections between the formal terrorist groups of Hizballah, Hamas and the Islamic Group...as well as the affiliated extremist groups of Al-Qaida, Ramzi Yousef, and the Abu Nidal Organization. There are at least six known active extremist sub-groups for Hizbollah and nine for Hamas. All are tied together with mutually supporting threads. BTW that decentralization of combat command is right out of our own tactics manuals. The terrorist org "Islamic Group" has conducted extensive OPS in Egypt and also participated in the 93 WTC bombing , and the Luxor Temple bombing of Japanese tourists in 97, and several others. They have cells in a dozen western countries including the US. They signed osama's February 1998 fatwa. This one group is believed to have up to 50,000 active members and over 200,000 active supporters some of whom are very wealthy. Imo all of the above are tied together in a, not so loose, mutually supporting way. There have been reports of members of some of these orgs meeting with folks from and in countries on your side of the globe. At the very least, that indicates a world-wide coordination capability. I can more easily take your viewpoint when thinking about domestic terrorist groups i.e. the Murrah Building in OK City; Or when considering the 14 right-wing groups; or the left-wing terrorist threat which according to the FBI represented the predominant terrorist threat against the US for the past three decades; or the Puerto Rican terrorist org. I do not believe these orgs are well-connected, nor do they have the personnel strength nor the asset base of the state sponsored groups. My primary beef with clinton and his staff was based on the fact that, while he was being serviced by his young girlfriends, in 1998 there were 273 terrorist attacks world-wide. 166 were bombings and 86 of them were against American targets. In 1999 there were 392 terrorist attacks, 186 were bombings and 111 were directed against US targets. Some of these were coordinated simultaneous attacks against US targets in different countries. Nairobi and Dar es Salaam being perhaps the two most widely known. In 1998 there four terrorist kidnappings of US citizens, in 1999 there were 20. The picture was and remains clear. The terrorists were rapidly gaining strength and expanding operations. The great American response of blowing up empty tents in a desert with cruise missiles was laughable even to the terrorists. So the attacks continued with increasing lethality. Steven, I agree with your premise that terrorism is a tactic. I don't agree with the inference that it is presently being conducted against America by small groups of widely scattered men. Sure we do have some of those small groups both here and abroad such as the FARC in Columbia...but we also have large, well-organized, well-funded, well-equipped, and highly motivated terrorist groups each with hundreds of thousands to millions of active participants and supporters. Some/most of these groups are interactive and mutually supporting. They are all dedicated to taking down America. I maintain that this war is very complicated, and much bigger than most think. After hundreds of unanswered terrorist attacks against America, GWB initiated the counter-attack. If clinton had done that to fulfill his constitutional duty to protect and defend America, 3,000 men, women and children in NYC and Wash DC may still be alive today. The war is on. Attacks against Americans continue, though not against the homeland. Our opponents show little sign of significant weakness. They have certainly not thrown in the towel. There are 150 million Muslim militants, 15 million Muslim extremists and 1.5 million trained fanatics capable of a suicide attack. We have miles to go before we sleep. uw