THE CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS AND THE GREAT CALIPHATE (Must Read! -World War IV)

Corrections to “The Clash Of Civilizations And The Great Caliphate”

There are numerous errors here that misinform the reader. The most glaring is associating Wahabbism with Shi'ism. Wahabbis believe theirs is the only true way of Islam, and they are a Sunni sect. They see Shi'ism, like that of Iran, as anathema and actually WORSE than Christianity because the Shiites call themselves Muslims, and are, therefore, the close enemy. In Pakistan, for example, there are many underreported attacks on Shiites by Sunni Muslims (and some counterattacks) for this very reason, and a great fear for Iraq is a civil war between the Sunni and Shi'a, stoked by Abu Musab Zarqawi (of beheadings infamy) and other Sunni (Wahabbi) terrorists (here is a link to the text of a letter from Zarqawi to Osama bin Laden regarding starting a civil war with the Iraqi Shi’a: http://www.cpa-iraq.org/transcripts/20040212_zarqawi_full.html ).

Other problems:
- Venezuela, while having a government not too friendly with the US and having the largest oil reserves in our hemisphere, is not worthy of an "axis of evil" tag since it does not support terrorism in any sense of the term
- Iraq is much more than a footnote in this struggle - it is a rallying point for the Jihadis
- 15 of 19 9/11 hijackers were Saudi, not 18
- While a case can be made for Islamic revivalism starting with the 1979 revolution in Iran, there are few direct ties or "grand strategy" connections between the Shi'a revolution there and the Wahabbi terrorists of Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda was created through the waging of the Jihad against the Soviets in Afghanistan, which also helped create the Taliban. The Taliban were ardently opposed by the Iranian government, who supported the Shi'a minority of the Northern Alliance (who we supported to defeat the Taliban in Operation Enduring Freedom).
- The list of countries whose leaders would be replaced in this "Third Jihad" is redundant (Indonesia twice) but also very incomplete. There are 22 Arab League nations (http://www.arableagueonline.org/arableague/index_en.jsp ), and 57 countries in the Organization of Islamic Conference (http://www.oic-oci.org/) .
- Al Qaeda (AQ) not only called for the overthrow of Musharraf of Pakistan, they tried to assasinate him twice in December 2003! Also, Islamists have a political coalition in Pakistan called the MMA, but polls show the majority of Pakistanis support Musharraf.
- Jihadis have never declared an intent to nuke Israel - that territory they consider Palestine, and they want to keep it inhabitable once the eject the Israelis. Still bad intent, but not as he says. They DO, however, want to nuke the US, and have fatwas (religious edicts) to back them up (http://www.carnegieendowment.org/static/npp/fatwa.pdf )
- Islamists despise the UN, seeing it as a tool of the West.
- What we know now about cooperation between Saddam and AQ is very slim, and they did not have active cooperation ongoing, although they had met through the 1990s (see conclusions of the 9/11 commission). Saddam did support Palestinian suicide bombers, even paying their families $25K for attacks. Saddam HATES Kuwaitis and would never support terrorism from them (unless against the Kuwaiti government). Also, Saddam was an ardent secularist (who hid behind Islam when convenient) and was very wary of Islamists BECAUSE of their assassinations of Nasser and Sadat and attempts on other leaders.
- Leaders of Arab countries such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia are certainly targets of Islamists – and people have been predicting their downfall for years. Mubarak is cynically passing power to his son, and the Saudis are somewhat effectively pursuing AQ in their own country while protecting the status of the ruling family. Indonesia, which has the largest Muslim population in the world (208M by CIA Factbook estimates), recently elected a former general in peaceful elections, and he is an avowed secularist. In Malaysian elections in June, 2004, Islamist parties lost all the ground they had gained in the last decade and are now a minimal voice in that government. While AQ and Islamists (differentiated from Muslims – they are more radical) want to start a Clash of Civilizations, they have thus far failed to spark a worldwide jihad. That is not to say there is not a great terrorist threat from these groups.
- The most recent CIA Factbook estimate on Muslim population in France is 5-10%, so 20% is a vast overstatement. However, Islamic politics is becoming a factor throughout all of Europe. We receive and should expect a lot of cooperation from the Europeans on Islamist terror, especially after the Madrid bombings, cells being discovered in Germany, France, UK, Belgium, Spain, Italy and elsewhere. They are acutely aware of this problem, more so than Americans due to a history of coping with extremists throughout Europe – the IRA, the Red Brigades, the ETA, the Baader-Meinhoff gang, etc..
- Libya was not part of the axis of evil - in fact, they have renounced terrorism, openly given up their WMD programs (which led to a flood of intelligence information about other proliferation attempts regarding Pakistan, Iran, North Korea and others) and we have lifted sanctions on Libya (or we are about to). Not that I think they're all that trustworthy, but this has all happened in the last year.
- Although not as pessimistic or dire as Mr. Abraham, I do also believe that we are in for the fight of my generation, and possibly the one after. We do need to recognize and understand the adversary, but through using correct and useful assumptions and facts.

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