This has been the kind of week that pessimists love. The Cartoon Jihad rumbled on. Terrorists in Iraq came the nearest yet to igniting a genuine civil war. Disruption of oil exports from Saudi-controlled Arabia was narrowly averted. Liberals and the media, aided by knee-jerking right-wingers, ambushed the White House over approval of what should have been a routine business deal. According to at least one poll, the public now prefers to put Democrats in charge of national security. Bill Buckley declared that the American mission in Iraq has failed.
Though the tide can shift abruptly, right now it is running strongly toward a new American isolationism: washing our hands of Iraq, treating the entire Moslem world as an enemy, and hunkering down inside our own borders. After much tergiversation, that has effectively become the policy of the Democratic Party. Through a strange convergence, it also is suddenly attractive to what may be a large segment of the Right.
What would that strategy mean? The clearest lesson of the week’s events is that the fanatics in the Islamic world are full of confidence. The hope behind the isolationist impulse is that, if we leave them alone, they won’t bother us. That might make a shred of sense if they were war weary and desperate, longing to bring hostilities to an end. But when they have seen Western governments cowering at their protests, Western leaders pledging to stamp out criticism of Islam and Western commentators suggesting that the mightiest army in world history should resign itself to impotence, why should they be downhearted? Their hostility does not arise from recent events and will not be assuaged by our attempts at a unilateral cease fire.
Instead, American retreat will embolden them further. The rejection of the Dubai Ports World deal, a near certainty in light of the present state of public opinion (despite sensible arguments by the Wall Street Journal and others), will show that rulers who have cooperated with America cannot count on American support. Al-Qa’eda would be quite pleased to slink out of Iraq, where it has no hope of winning a standup war against the Shia majority, and take control of Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Qatar, after which it will be in a position to topple the faltering Saudi oligarchy and continue into Egypt.
The strongest force holding Islamofascism in check in the Middle East today is fear of the United States and Israel, compared to which the enemy commands no significant power. The most that Zarqawi and his ilk can do is terrorize civilians and pray that Allah will move the infidels to run away without have been compelled. Should that happen, the calculus changes. With America gone and Israel deterred by a nuclear-armed Iran, zealots for a new Caliphate will be the strongest horse still in the race. Their regional triumph could be astonishingly swift, and their ambitions will certainly extend far beyond Riyadh and Cairo.
America will then face an indefinite future of terrorist threats. Though of low intensity, that will be the worst species of warfare, in which we will be on a perpetual defensive, trying to guard every vulnerable point in our 3.7 million square miles of territory, penetrable through over 5,000 miles of lightly patrolled border and scores of sea and airports. Inevitably, the defense will occasionally fail, and every failure will inspire further tightening. Ultimately, we will face a stark choice between safety and freedom – or, rather, between unfree safety and unfree insecurity, for there will be no possibility of returning to the casual libertarianism that we now enjoy.
My fond desire is for a restoration of the freedom of my youth, when one could board a plane without passing through metal detectors or cross the Canadian border with only a credit card for ID. Then we were safe and free. To be so again, we shall have to defeat the legions of terrorism and tyranny, not encourage them to believe that they can defeat us.
Veal sez:
The strongest force holding Islamofascism in check in the Middle East today is fear of the United States and Israel, compared to which the enemy commands no significant power. The most that Zarqawi and his ilk can do is terrorize civilians and pray that Allah will move the infidels to run away without have been compelled.
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Agreed in part, but it could be argued that the Islamofacists don't need significant power as measured in number of tanks, divisions etc. All they need is a low to moderate level attritional conflict, exhausting the Americans. It happened in Somalia and it could easily happen gain. A change of American government into a less determined regime is a clear possibility and will help along the process nicely.
The conflict can also be escalated (to a more limited extent) as the VC/NVA successfully did against their American opponents using inflitration of foreign "volunteers." Such escalation would have to calibrated to avoid huge setbacks, yet sufficient enough to maintain pressure on the Americans, build up their body count and ensure favorable coverage and propaganda via the media and leftist sympathizers in Europe and America. Such continuous pressure has a fair chance of succeeding, and might indeed impel the infidels to withdraw, prayers to Allah notwithstanding.
Veal sez:
America will then face an indefinite future of terrorist threats. Though of low intensity, that will be the worst species of warfare, in which we will be on a perpetual defensive, trying to guard every vulnerable point in our 3.7 million square miles of territory, penetrable through over 5,000 miles of lightly patrolled border and scores of sea and airports. Inevitably, the defense will occasionally fail, and every failure will inspire further tightening. Ultimately, we will face a stark choice between safety and freedom – or, rather, between unfree safety and unfree insecurity, for there will be no possibility of returning to the casual libertarianism that we now enjoy.
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Agreed it may come to that, and that day may arrive in any case even if the Iraq insurgents are quelled. It would not be hard for al Queda and its helpers to mount suicide style attacks against a broad range of targets in the US and Europe. The Madrid and "home grown" London bombings are an example. They need not go for spectacular 9/11 style strikes. A series of truck bombs in Wall Street, or a few sucide-belt strapped jihadists at a rally in DC is all it takes to ensure broad, breathless, frantic media coverage.
Other advantages include the relatively low cost of such action (what's a truck bomb, car bomb or suicide belt with explosives cost), a flood of appeasement by assorted apologists in academia, the media and elsewhere, and bragging rights on the Arab "street" that a "new front" has been opened up agains the evil imperialists, Crusaders, infidels, take your pick.
The question arises-- is the US and Canada prepared for such a harsh struggle ahead, or is it better to retreat into the soft, quavering, appeasement mode so prevalent in many quarters? The prognosisis unclear. Under the supposedly "conservative" regime of GW Bush, the US subsidies keep flowing to terror supporting organizations like the Palestinians, most lately Hamas, and the diplomats still keep talking of "warm, undying friendship" with yet another terror supporting state, Saudi Arabia.
Meanwhile hypocritically, the same regime unleashes Predator drone missiles to knock out terrorist suspects 2000 feet below, but criticizes its ally Israel (the only democratic state in the Mideast) for unleashing Apache helicopter missiles doing the same. It is also helping to undermine that ally by pushing creation of what will likely be yet another terror sponsoring Mideast state. Can anyone say confusion? With such contradictions and weaknesses, no wonder our enemies feel emboldened.
Posted by: Enrique Cardova | Saturday, March 04, 2006 at 10:58 AM