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"I will say just one word to you: Get out of my face, now!" says Abdul Rehman, an Arab Taliban fighter, from his hospital bed here. Injured last week during the air attacks on Kandahar, Afghanistan, his tone is matter-of-fact, his English near-perfect.

"I hate you; you are my enemy. There is only one conversation between me and you. This is a war conversation, a killing conversation, and you started this war."

I would not wish to fight the United States — either militarily, politically, or culturally. For every threat, our history teaches us that Americans offer not just a rejoinder, but the specter of a devastating answer of a magnitude almost inconceivable to those now chanting and threatening in the streets of the Middle East. Do they have any idea of what sort of dangerous people we really are? Do they understand the history of the names of those ships now off their coasts, like the USS Peleliu or Enterprise, or the pedigree of the 82nd or 101st Airborne?
Victor Davis Hanson

Unfortunately, they think we are weak, thanks to those in our society who have chosen retreat instead of decisive action, who have chosen "stability" at the cost of integrity and liberty.

From one of the recent al-Qaeda rants:

"O people, let not this force frighten you. Let not the power of America and its army frighten you, for by Allah we have struck them multiple times and routed them again and again. They are most cowardly of people when the armies meet." ...

"Likewise, let me remind you of the defeat of the American forces in Beirut in 1982, soon after the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, when the Lebanese resistance was personified by the truck laden with explosives that struck the main military base of the US Marines in Beirut, killing 242 soldiers - towards Hell was their destination and what an evil destination that is."

"Then after the Second Gulf War, America deployed her forces to Somalia and killed over thirteen thousand sons of the Muslims therein, before the lions of Islam from amongst the 'Arab Afghans' and their brothers from that region pounced upon her and rubbed her arrogance into the dust, killing scores of them, destroying their tanks and downing their aircraft."

"Thus, America and her allies fled in the darkness of the night without disturbing the attention of anyone so Praise and Glory be to Allah for this. During that same period, the young Mujahideen prepared for them explosives in Aden and after their detonation, the cowardly Americans ran away and fled the country in less than 24 hours."

"Then in 1995, the explosion in Riyadh took place, killing four Americans, in a clear message from the people of that region displaying their rejection and opposition to the American policy of bankrolling the Jews and occupying the Land of the Two Holy Sanctuaries. The following year, another explosion in Al-Khobar killed 19 Americans and wounded more than 400 of them, prompting them to move their bases from the cities to the desert. "

Then in 1998, the Mujahideen warned America to cease their support to the Jews and to leave the Land of the Two Holy Sanctuaries, but the enemy refused to heed this warning, so the Mujahideen, with the ability from Allah, smashed them with two mighty smashes in East Africa. Then again America was warned, but she refused to pay attention to the warnings, so the Mujahideen destroyed the American Destroyer, the USS Cole, in Aden, in a martyrdom operation, striking a solid blow to the face of the American military and at the same time, exposing the Yemeni Government as American agents, similar to all the countries in the region."

....

"They [The hijackers] destroyed the idols of America, they struck at the very heart of the Department of Defense and they hit the black heart of the US Economy, rubbing America's nose into the dust and rolling her arrogance and pride into mud. Yet with the destruction of the Twin Towers in New York, there occurred an even bigger destruction: that of the great American Dream and legend of Democracy. It has now been made clear to all that American dignity and values are at the lowest level they have ever reached. The legend of being the land of freedom, the legend of being the safest and most secure place on Earth, and the legend of the CIA, all these have been destroyed with the Help of Allah, so to Allah be Praise and Glory."

We have, regettably, been all too willing to run away, tail between our legs. And in doing so, our fleeting shapes trigger the attack response in predatory Men. It's not just human nature- it's natural for men and animals to prey on the weak. And our policy decisions, alas, have often crippled us and made us look like prime targets.