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Barney.

One question that bugs me though is we are all itching to do the terrorists in but how do you spot a terrorist? Do we just presume that everyone with olive skin who attends mosques in Iraq is 'with them' and fair game targets for our superb weaponary? Makes our taking retributions a hell of a lot easier if we do. Not sure it wins us the war though.

Conventional troops always face a nightmare in unconventional guerilla wars. The temptation when we were on patrol in Northern Ireland was simply to presume that everyone in a catholic area was 'one of them' and would kill you as soon as look at you. If we treated them as such, they obviously acted as 'one of them'. There was no political appetite to go and wipe 'them' out. So we got in a circle without end.

Intelligence is the key to all this. Its a tough job up front and will need cool heads. We need to find the ring leaders, the opinion formers, the paymasters and the weapon weilders. And we need to be very, very calculated in targeting just them. When we take them out - the mob will see reason. If we radomly hit the mob the mob will grow.

I respect your opinion, but disagree totally. In any war, even one in which the odds appear to be overwhelmingly against you, you can defeat your enemy by making him lose his will to fight.

In this war, there is only one way to do that - we must treat the terrorists to a vision of horror that exceeds anything they can omagine or perpetrate. If we start worrying about our western more's any taking innocent lives, we might as well pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan now, and start getting on our knees 5 times a day to sing about "Allah akhbar".

Our beliefs in compassion, civility and humanity are the very weapons that the terrorists are employing against us. They know that we will get wrapped up in hand wringing over whether this Muslim is good and that Muslim is bad. Let's look at the bigger picture - how many in the "arab street" are expressing their outrage over these acts of savagery and barbarism in the name of Islam?

That's the same number of "moderate" Muslims there are in the world. I don't like climbing into the gutter with these vermin any more than the next person, but that is what they understand. They are rooted in 13th Century barbarism and lack the ability to comprehend our compassion and desire to spare innocent lives. As long as we are unable or unwilling to truly shock and awe these barbarians into abandoning their "religion" of murder, slavery, oppression, hate and barbarism, all we are doing is, literally, throwing Christians to the lions. It's time to take off the gloves and stop pretending.

Intelligence is the key to all this. Its a tough job up front and will need cool heads. We need to find the ring leaders, the opinion formers, the paymasters and the weapon weilders. And we need to be very, very calculated in targeting just them. When we take them out - the mob will see reason. If we radomly hit the mob the mob will grow.

Intel is key, but holding back does not get respect here. And Intel comes with respect. The Iraqis who would help us have to believe we will utterly destroy their enemies lest they come back for them. The population will ride the strongest horse (usama bin ladin quote) we must be that horse.

Every time we have used strength, contraty to what you say we have made progress. When we stop, show kindness, be willing to negotiate to save innocent lives, we are perceived as being weak. (Also our targets vanish in the night during such negotiations.) Perhaps it is because we don't randomly target, but the enemy hides behind the women and children. (Take these pictures, and release them.)

While I understand the need to wrap ourselves in the "high road" mantel, this war will be fought and won at the level of the side willing to go lowest. We unfortunatly should match their brutality. Leave bodies in the street, (dying with their guns and bombs in their hands.) Kill anyone who carries a weapon or walks after curfew in battle ground cities. Kill anyone tampering with the road side or oil lines or refineries. And finally, show photos of the insurgents firing from mosques etc to get the moderate religious leaders with us.