Posted on 06/17/2002 7:07:16 AM PDT by IronJack
Like an advertiser trying desperately to sell a mediocre product, the Hate America First crowd keeps changing its message on the war against terrorism. The latest essay is “We can’t win against evil.” The war on terrorism is a lost cause, they claim, a fool’s errand, a quest for an unholy grail. Since we can’t eradicate it, or only at such a terrible cost, we should abandon the struggle.
It’s the mating call of the moral coward, or the sonorous belch of the comfortable burgher who doesn’t want to risk getting wrinkles in his Dockers.
This is not a war between nations and armies. It is a collision between ideas. This is a war by a handful of malcontents against a civilization, and by a civilization against madmen. Wars used to be about destroying infrastructure; bomb enough buildings and tanks and factories and the enemy cannot sustain his aggression. We need to maintain that strategy – crush the will and ability of the enemy to make war – but this enemy has no infrastructure to destroy. Our targets can’t be buildings and machinery; they have to be people. And our tactics must be directed not against armies but against individuals, where ideas lodge.
I’m inclined to believe that Osama bin Laden is dead, mashed under countless tons of rubble in a dank cave or blasted into unidentifiable pieces of subhuman ugh. (It is altogether fitting and proper to think that the madman suffered the same fate as so many of his victims.) There are still noisemakers in al-Qaida who must be silenced, however. And there are still bomb-throwers and spore-mailers who deserve no place at humanity’s table. Mullah Omar still breathes. Yasser Arafat still inspires fulminating treachery among his rabble ilk. Saddam still plots nuclear and biological aggression. Saudi princes still launder terrorist money. Yemen, Somalia, Sudan, all still seethe with hatred against us, a bitter vitriol that can be tapped by tomorrow’s bin Laden and used to slake a thirst for blood.
And for every general, there are a dozen lieutenants. Our job must be to eliminate this infernal cadre down to the foot soldier level.
We can’t win against evil? Yes, we can. We can’t eradicate it entirely; God has seen to it that Man will always have a choice. But we can contain evil. We can round it up, chase it into dark corners, subdue it, whip it, force it into a mayonnaise jar and screw the lid on tight. We can crush its practitioners and bury its disciples. Not only can we, not only must we, we owe it to Mankind to exercise the great power we’ve developed to eradicate this blight from our planet.
This is not simply a clash of ideologies, but a collision between light and darkness, civilization and savagery. Throughout history, Man has struggled to constrain the forces of chaos, to put stones atop each other, to assert order where randomness has prevailed. The forces arrayed against us are those armies of chaos, those narrow men who would tumble the stones we’ve carefully placed, who would erase eons worth of advancement on the strength of a grudge.
They are intolerable, these fulminating Luddites. They are throwbacks to days of club and fang, to a primitive mindset where destruction was a master to be served in its own right and for its own ends. They are unevolved, unenlightened, and unsuited to a world of peace and prosperity. Hate hangs on them like moss on a damp log. Poison drips from their polluted spirits and they seek no higher glory than to undo what their superiors have done.
They are not protected by rules of civility or laws of humanity. Something critical is missing in their psyche, some neural circuitry that understands fairness and equity, that suppresses depravity even if it serves their purpose. That fatal flaw allows them to belt on a satchel charge and blow up a shopping mall with the same nervous glee we would feel going to a football game. It blinds them to the insanity of labeling “holy” the wholesale destruction of innocent strangers.
In that ethical desert, appeals to reason and compassion have no more substance than a mirage. Right and Wrong are malleable terms, and have been reduced to weapons of justification rather than modes of critical analysis. The terrorists are propelled toward havoc like a bullet fired from a rifle; there is no guidance after their initial momentum is imparted. At that point, the only way they stop is by expending their energy against something.
And just as you can’t argue a bullet back into the barrel, there is no stopping these savages except with extreme prejudice. Their blind zealotry fulfills them in a way no logic can, and they can't give it up without suffering a spiritual collapse that is a suicide of the soul. Better a suicide of the body, especially when promised the rewards of Heaven for wreaking mayhem in the camp of an imagined enemy.
All of which is why discussions of “profiling” and negotiated settlement are absurd on their face. Only an enemy who subscribes to at least some minimal compact with humanity can be trusted to negotiate in good faith. To a people to whom no lie is too great, no violence beyond consideration, no treachery impeachable in the pursuit of their amorphous and protean ends, the spoken word is simply a magician’s cloak, a clever device for hiding tactical legerdemain.
So our answer to terrorism must be violent, abrupt, and unapologetic. We don’t need coalition buy-in or universal approbation. We can expect vicious condemnation from our so-called allies as well as the inevitable argle-bargle from our foes. Within this country, the sniveling element will not be appeased, even as they hide their world-weary cowardice under the rhetoric of “civil liberties” and “tolerance.”
None of that can be allowed to matter. Our prosecution of this conflict must be decisive and visionary. Quibbling over niceties makes for absorbing conversation in between hors d’oeuvres at a Georgetown cocktail party. But chasing down mass murderers means dirt under your fingernails and bloodstains on your shirt. Let’s get on with this terrible business, and elevate our defense beyond mere propriety to the realm of victory. Those with no taste for the battle can wait in the rear.
Too bad we didn't just simply keep the cockpit doors closed.
Correct,we need to find a way to instill fear and an understanding that extended families will suffer for acts of terrorism by a family member. Among other objectives for security. Good Post.
I want them to hide in dark caves and holes in the earth, shivering with terror whenever they hear the roar of diesel engines because the tales of their ancestors talk about metal monsters crawling over the earth, spitting death and destruction.
I want their mothers to be able to admonish them with "If you don't behave, the Pale Destroyers will come for you", and that will be enough to reduce them to quivering obesience.
I want the annihilation to be so complete that their mythology will tell them of the day of judgment when the stern gods from across the sea .. the powerful 'Mericans .. destroyed their forefathers' wickedness.
Kill them all ... nits make lice.
(COL Chivington, Sand Creek)
I suspect they did. The terrorists likely broke them down.
On the other hand, if Islam cannot co-exist peaceably with the rest of the world, what other choice do we have?
And let the time be known as Dies Irae, the Days of Wrath.
Seems to point to unprecedented genocide. Since you can't you trust any Muslim, no matter what they say or do, only extermination of every Muslim remains.
We can muse about the psychology behind the thoughts and actions of the useful idiots, but behind it all is the selfish personal lust for power over all others, a lust felt deeply by a few clever mad men. We should destroy them first and then the fervor of the followers will wither away.
Moral relativism is what empowered these butchers to slip into our country and murder us. All cultures are equal, ya know. We don't dare discriminate. Everybody should have the same rights, right?
Good post.
but I must admonish you with humble heart & say "Be careful what you wish for"
Appearances are deceptive. Extremism accords this fringe more magnitude than it deserves.
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