Posted on 03/14/2003 9:27:42 AM PST by airedale
The October 2002 bombing of a nightclub in Indonesia's popular resort island of Bali, which killed more than 190 people—mostly tourists and many Westerners—is a grim example of the new Arab way of war. Planning and educating the agents in bomb making and holy-war doctrine took place over months in several locations. The planners of this bombing and others have been linked to the Jemaah Islamiya Southeast Asia terror network as well as Al Qaeda.
The first great struggles between the Middle East and Europe to be recorded fully were the campaigns of Salamis and Plataea in 480-479 B.C. The Greeks triumphed, and for the next several hundred years Western civilization slowly advanced east. In the 7th century A.D. this was reversed sharply when the Bedouins emerged from Arabia, defeated the Persian and eastern Roman empires, and conquered the Middle East, North Africa, and Spain. The invaders eventually were stopped in the east in 718 at the city walls of Constantinople, and in the west in 732 some 200 miles from Paris. There were to be another thousand years of see-saw wars on sea and land before the last Middle Eastern attack on a major European city, Vienna, was repulsed in 1683. It was not until the attacks by Arabians on New York in 2001 that a major Western city again came under assault from the Middle East.
While this protracted border conflict raged between the West and the Middle East, Western civilization engaged in a long series of civil wars. In 1942, the great democracies started to win and kept winning, thus determining the modern Western technique of war. The horrors of two world wars motivated the strengthening of international laws to prevent attacks on noncombatants and limit war's impact on civilians. Technology was developed that allowed highly accurate attacks that could limit destruction to military targets and minimize the number of people killed. Waging war became the business of elaborate machines operated by highly trained, long-service professionals. Western militaries became seemingly invincible on the battlefield and a tool of humanitarian assistance, not of empire. The last Western war of the 20th century was not of conquest, but waged to defend the human rights of the Muslims of Kosovo.
Middle Eastern societies have taken stock of the Western challenge and devised an innovative, strongly asymmetrical response. Middle Eastern societies demonstrably cannot win symmetrical conflict involving Western militaries. Their "better way" inherently appears barbarous, murderous, and cruel as it is diametrically opposed to the Western approach to armed conflict.
The new Arab approach to conflict is an adaptation of the revolutionary warfare of the second half of the 20th century.1 Assassins using this new way of war now swim among the populations of the world.2 With cheap, unrestricted global air travel provided by Western technology, they can deploy wherever they wish; there are no front lines or safe rear areas. The assassins make effective use of liberal immigration policies that have permitted large numbers of Middle Eastern migrants to settle in the West. Small numbers of fellow travelers and sympathizers are distributed throughout Western nations, able to be activated to provide local support, protection, and knowledge for deploying assassins. Their command-and-control system relies on commercial communications systems and business application cryptography. This makes their control system strong, redundant, secure, and global and the assassins hard to detect, track, and target. They do not rely on their own technology even for weapons, instead using in situ civilian, commercial equipment for attack. <> For rest of the article go to: http://www.usni.org/Proceedings/Articles03/prolayton03.htm
(Excerpt) Read more at usni.org ...
Proceedings is the monthly magazine for the professional naval officer in the US Navy.
Deliberately attacking civilians, noncombatants, women, and children is against the moral codes of all religions—including Islam.
This is absolutely, demonstrably false. Islam REQUIRES Muslims to seize and kill the infidel wheresoever he is to be found.
Medina Suras
The Chapter of Women
[Chapters from the Koran]
The Harvard Classics 1909–14But if there befalls you grace from God, he would say—as though there were no friendship between you and him—‘O would that I had been with thee to attain this mighty happiness!’ Let those then fight in God’s way who sell this life of the world for the next; and whoso fights in God’s way, then, be he killed or be he victorious, we will give him a mighty hire.
What ails you that ye do not fight in God’s way, and for the weak men and women and children, who say, ‘Lord, bring us out of this town 19 of oppressive folk, and make for us from Thee a patron, and make for us from Thee a help?’
Those who believe fight in the way of God; and those who disbelieve fight in the way of Tâghût; fight ye then against the friends of Satan, verily, Satan’s tricks are weak.
Do ye not see those to whom it is said, ‘Restrain your hands, and be steadfast in prayer and give alms;’ and when it is prescribed for them to fight then a band of them fear men, as though it were the fear of God or a still stronger fear, and they say, ‘O our Lord! why hast thou prescribed for us to fight, couldst thou not let us abide till our near appointed time?’ Say, ‘The enjoyment of this world is but slight, and the next is better for him who fears;’—but they shall not be wronged a straw.
... Why are ye two parties about the hypocrites, when God hath overturned them for what they earned? Do ye wish to guide those whom God hath led astray? Whoso God hath led astray ye shall not surely find for him a path. They would fain that ye misbelieve as they misbelieve, that ye might be alike; take ye not patrons from among them until they too flee in God’s way; but if they turn their backs, then seize them and kill them wheresoever ye find them, and take from them neither patron nor help,—save those who reach a people betwixt whom and you is an alliance—or who come to you while their bosoms prevent them from fighting you or fighting their own people. But had God pleased He would have given you dominion over them, and they would surely have fought you. But if they retire from you and do not fight you, and offer you peace,—then God hath given you no way against them.
Ye will find others who seek for quarter from you, and quarter from their own people; whenever they return to sedition they shall be overturned therein: but if they retire not from you, nor offer you peace, nor restrain their hands, then seize them and kill them wheresoever ye find them;—over these we have made for you manifest power.
For example, the author claims that the West has developed an ethic against attacking civilian populations and the development of precision weapons is evidence of such. I would say that precision weapons are developed because they are a more effective means to attack a given target, not because they spare collateral civilian casualties.
In fact, the single element that differentiates Western warfare from that of other cultures is that, in general, Westerners are more inclined to escalate warfare to its ultimate level than other civilizations. Another author has pointed to this example: The plains Indians from the American West were broadly considered as warlike people with a long history of inter-tribal fighting even before the arrival of the White man. They were adept warriors who commonly exhibited bravery and daring in battle. However, if even the very bravest of this group had been exposed to even one day of the carnage at the Battle of Gettysburg, they would not have been able to comprehend it. If the Indians lost 4 or 5 braves in a single encounter, it was considered a big loss, and the remainder would invariably withdraw from the engagement and live to fight another day. What would they have thought about literally thousands upon thousands of soldiers advancing into a line of solid fire and almost certain death?
As time has passed, we have become ever more efficient in our ability in inflict massive casualties. Westerners will also endure massive casualties without quitting a fight. Would any previous civilization in history have continued supplying the fodder for month after month of the wholesale slaughter of WW I made possible by the industrial development of the Western powers?
The whole point is not that the West is more ethical when it comes to waging war. If you think Westerners will not attack civilian populations, then what about Sherman's march to the sea?--against his own countrymen, no less. Tell the people of Dresden, Nagasaki, and Hiroshima that Westerners are dead set against killing civilians. The rule governing Western warfare is best is best summarized as "Our side will do whatever is within our power if it is necessary to win." This rule always applies where survival is perceived to be at stake. On the other hand, if the foe is never considered as a threat to our very existence, then Western countries are loathe to employ maximum force. Under those circumstances, we are subject to being bled of our will to fight.
Osama Bin Laden miscalculated. He thought a sharp blow to our nose would cause us to shrink and falter. Instead, he discovered that we are "fierce when stirred to anger" as Bush stated in the week following 9/11.
I suspect the Muslims may have taken a lesson from that. They must not cause a consensus to form that western civilization is at stake. If they cause that perception to occur, I have no doubt they will face total domination. On the other hand, if they dig in for a long, low-grade struggle wherein the West is never inclined to employ massive force, then they are almost certain to prevail in the long run. The current trends in world demographics will see to that.
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