Posted on 09/14/2005 7:26:38 AM PDT by LurkedLongEnough
AS THE WAR between the United States and Al Qaeda enters its fifth year, the nature of the armed, transnational Islamist group's campaign remains misunderstood. With the conflict viewed largely as an open-and-shut matter of good versus evil, nonmilitary engagement with Al Qaeda is depicted as improper and unnecessary.
Yet developing a strategy for the next phase of the global response to Al Qaeda requires understanding the enemy -- something Western analysts have systematically failed to do. Sept. 11 was not an unprovoked, gratuitous act. It was a military operation researched and planned since at least 1996 and conducted by a trained commando in the context of a war that had twice been declared officially and publicly. The operation targeted two military locations and a civilian facility regarded as the symbol of US economic and financial power. The assault was the culmination of a larger campaign, which forecast impact, planned for the enemy's reaction, and was designed to gain the tactical upper hand.
Overwhelmingly centered on the martial aspects of the conflict, scholars and policymakers have been too focused on Al Qaeda's ''irrationality," ''fundamentalism," and ''hatred" -- and these conceptions continue to color key analyses. The sway of such explanations is particularly surprising in the face of nonambiguous statements made by Al Qaeda as to the main reasons for its war on the United States. These have been offered consistently since 1996, notably in the August 1996 and February 1998 declarations of war and the November 2002 and October 2004 justifications for its continuation.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
The Boston Globe ... Did John Kerry write this?
(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
Let MOAB do the speaking! We can clean up the ashes afterwards and dump them in the trash.
John Kerry was in Vietnam?
This does not surprise me one whit.
Liberals fail to realize there are some people you just cannot talk to. They think that if we talk about "root causes" and "what your issues are" then all problems can be solved.
Liberals just do not understand that our very existence as a free, secular, non-Islamic society is their problem, and their solution is not open to discussion.
Man, sometimes I just HATE living up here in Massachusetts.
I guarantee that the author has NEVER been stopped at the airport and searched.
Sign language works... I can sign "F*** OFF AND DIE"!
..and apparently an Al Qaeda spokesman as well. The fact that he's at Harvard speaks volumes about that institution.
Or Dukakis. Or the Bulger brothers. Or Bill Weld. Or Peter Gammons.
"Sept. 11 was not an unprovoked, gratuitous act. It was a military operation . . . ."
What a complete crock. This is from a culture that is so backward that it can't meet western military head-on, and can't even prevail using guerilla tactics against the military.
So they take sucker punches at unarmed civilians. They slit the throats of stewardesses, and run planes full of men, women and children into office buildings. They are vicious animals.
This is not "military." This is not "assymetrical warfare."
Anyone who would dignify the cold-blooded murder committed on 9/11 by calling it a "military" action is an enemy to civilized society.
Dr. Mohamedou is the Associate Director of Harvard’s program on Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Resolution (HPCR). Prior to joining HPCR, Dr. Mohamedou served as Research Director with the International Council on Human Rights Policy, based in Geneva, where he helped found and direct the research and policy program. Previously, he was a post-doctoral Scholar-in-Residence at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University, and served as Research Associate at the Ralph Bunche Institute on the United Nations in New York. Dr. Mohamedou holds a degree in law from the Université Panthéon-Sorbonne in Paris, as well as a Master's degree and a Ph.D. in Political Science from the City University of New York Graduate School. He is the author of books and essays on human rights, civil society, and conflict, including Iraq and the Second Gulf War, State-Building and Regime Security (1998, second edition 2001), Contre-Croisade—Origines et Conséquences du 11 Septembre (2004), and Societal Transition to Democracy in Mauritania (1995), and the editor of Journalism, Media, and the Challenge of Human Rights Reporting (2002). Dr. Mohamedou is a frequent lecturer in his fields of interest.
I hate to use the comparison, but many diplomats "worked" with Hitler and Nazi Germany in the pre-WWII days. England and Russia walked away with "sweetheart" deals guaranteeing "peace in our time" and a cut of the pie in the event of hostilities. And we all know how that ended up.
I guess those stewardesses whose throats they slit were considered to be in the military because they were wearing uniforms.
of course AQ has really stood the test of time...I mean they are a worthy opponent who will stand knuckle-to-knuckle and fight...I mean they've held their own and made gains since 9-11...right??
Nothing more then rat rhetoric to try and make people believe we are less safe today then four years ago...pathetic.
I'll give you 5 chances to guess which finger I'm holding up, Mohammad.
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