You can't wage war on a concept. There is no war on Terror

[Jabbery]

You CANNOT wage war on a concept.

You CAN wage war on a country, or a specific group of individuals.

There is no "war on terrorism." There is no "war on drugs."

There is a disjointed series of poorly planned paramilitary raids against criminal gangs in Central and South America. But there is no "war on drugs."

There is a laughable military effort featuring a massive degree of cultural ignorance being undertaken in two Arab nations. But there is no "war on terrorism."

You cannot wage war upon an inanimate object or concept. The very idea is intellectually infantile at best, motivated by evil at worst.

The US population has been taken for one of the longest rides in contemporary history. Anybody who supports these bullshit cons is too stupid for words.

[mike_c]

1. and yet not one of our leaders has the courage to admit this....

They buy the WOT meme wholeheartedly. It makes me sick.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

2. The poppy fields are thriving in Afghanistan.

The warlords that we support are fighting over the crop and growing rich.

"Bring it On!", he said.

[Name removed]

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[laura888]

5. Oklahoma City Bombing

What state is Timothy McVeigh from?

Why haven't we attacked it yet?

[merh]

37. The KKK in the South, now they were (are) terrorists.

With their pipe bombs, church bombings, hangings, beatings, cross burnings, they were some hateful bad guys who used terror to spread their religious message of white supremecy that they found justification of in the bible. When is the U.S. going to invade the south to cleanse us of these terrorists?

[physioex]

6. What has happened to number of people that are...

Doing this in the past three years? What is Shrub doing about the number one funder of terrorism Saudi Arabia?

[Jabbery]

8. It's increased exponentially - continues to do so

nt

[Jabbery]

7. I got your skills right here

Who are the "people" then, Einstein?

Saddam?

Whatever you're smokin,' you could get top dollar for it.

[Nevernose]

9. Wouldn't that make it a "War on Terrorists?"

Whole 'nother concept than fighting an abstract noun. One can do anything in their justification in fighting an abstraction; fighting actual people might juse require some rules.

[immoderate]

15. People who are weak and oppressed use the tactics

of terrorism. There will be terrorists as long as there are people who feel they have no other resort against power.

In part, it's the asymmetry of power that dictates this. To make war on it, creates it.

--IMM

[laura888]

21. Bingo! We have a winner!

People who resort to using car bombs simply feel they have no other way to fight their oppression.

And an important note: Americans have also resorted to "terrorism" in the past. Timothy McVeigh is one example. But there were also instances of laborers resorting to violence against unfair management tactics.

This is why the terrorism lie is so so dangerous. It is so broad that you and I can become terrorists if we ever become so oppressed that we also feel the need to strike back.

[immoderate]

26. thanks Laura

Sometimes I feel that no one reads my posts. Appreciate the comment.

--IMM

[stavka]

43. ...so anybody who wages a "terroristic war" is our enemy?

..well if so, let's fill our gas chambers with the Klan and the Christian Identity types - and about 20% of the Central and South American military officer corps.
---

Terrorism is a tactic (and really no different from irregular warfare). Do you advocate a war on "Combined Arms"?

[2Design]

11. the bush nazi mafia has risen....and they are making money on

oil, drugs, reconstruction and wiping out the usa treasury....and we rethugs like McCain and Arnold willing to go do Bush's bidding.... I am so sick of all this....

[Nevernose]

3. I believe it was John Stewart who said:

"You can't have a war on a noun."

[Name removed]

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[physioex]

12. But...Those people werent fighting this country till we occupied them..

Plus why is Shrub ignoring the number one financeer Saudi Arabia?? What kind of business relations does Shrub family have with Saudi Arabia?

[merh]

13. please answer 3 simple questions:

Who are the terrorists?

Why are they terrorizing? and

Why are we fighting them?

[emulatorloo]

17. Read Richard Clarke's book . . .

According to him

Bin Laden Al Qaeda and loosely associated groups

They want extremist fundamentalist rule in the middle east, want to drive out moderate Muslims.

They target and kill civilians as a way to achieve these aims

Invasion of Iraq was a diversion from this. But just because GWB is a nitwit does not mean terrorists don't exist.

[merh]

24. Thanks for the info, but my post was to Klox - I want him to give me

specifics. I am so tired of being given the reason we are in Iraq is because of the terrorists. Who are the terrorist?
I want Klox to answer my 3 questions, if he can.

[Nevernose]

14. Al-Qaeda are terrorists

Those folks in Iraq are, right or wrong, partisans, not terrorists. Guerillas. What makes them blowing up a car an act or terrorism, while us shooting missiles at a wedding a legitiamte act of a "War on Terror?"

And as I said before, wouldn't that make it a War on Terrorists? Whole 'nother concept than fighting an abstract noun. One can do anything in their justification in fighting an abstraction; fighting actual people might juse require some rules.

[Name removed]

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[Nevernose]

25. The cars they've blown up in Iraq

Have all been aimed at cars entering and leaving the Green Zone, with the intention of killing American servicemen, members of the emerging Iraqi government, and civilians perceived as collaborators. This makes the Green Zone and people coming to and from targets of the guerilla forces, and, to the minds of those conducting the guerilla war in Iraq, legitimate targets. There is also the simple expedient of their being a war going on. Not a war on terror, but a war for control of Iraq. Almost by definition, there cannot be terrorism in a war zone, because all war is based on the concept of instilling terror into one's enemies.

I'm not certain that it even is possible to win the war in Iraq. If it is, we need to see an immediate paradigm shift, both here and abroad, from this being a war on terror to a war against armed revolutionaries.

[mike1963]

27. But "terrorists" are not members of a cohesive, let alone concentrated

entity - they're randomly scattered about (and they don't even necessarily have similar rationales or goals.)

Suppose, for argument's sake that there was a reason to fear and a desire to eliminate...say barbers. (this is a logical analogy)...how would a military offensive manage to isolate and attack them, as there's no "place" to do so?

[classof56]

18. Hey, Klox

Frist of all, welcome to DU. I don't have strong feelings about this topic, but looked up the word "terror" in my Concise Oxford Dictionary of the English Language. First definition for the word is "extreme fear". Then it talks about The Terror (as in Reign of, I'm guessing) during the French Revolution when the ruling Jacobin faction ruthlessly executed anyone considered a threat to their regime. "Terrorist" is defined as "a person who uses violence and intimidation in the pursuit of political aims".

Glad you don't smoke!

Tired Old Cynic

[I_like_chicken]

16. this is an arguement of symantics

but by calling it a war, it implies it can be won through military action. This is where the problem comes in, because we cannot defeat terrorism through military action alone. The first problem is defining exactly what terrorism is, and who is sponsoring it. Is Osama the one propagting terrorism, or is it the ideology. We can only stop terrorism by discovering the underlying problems and beliefs that cause people to turn to terrorism in order to promote their beliefs.

The same goes for the war on drugs. We cannot stop drugs from entering our country simply by stopping those who transport it because of the high demand for drugs in our country. As long as there is demand, someone new will fill the shoes of those taken down by the war on drugs, its a neverending problem. The only to stop the drug trade is to stop demand, and that I feel is impossible.

[Name removed]

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[thebigidea]

23. "a big part of the funding" - uh huh. Sure. Keep telling yourself that.

[merh]

32. Hey Knox, did it ever enter your mind that we are the terrorists?

We invaded a nation that was weaker than us because (1st to stop the terrorist - Saddam and Al Quadea link which has been debunked) and (2nd to liberate and spread democracy). Sharing/enforcing our political and religious beliefs on a people whose religious beliefs have been in existence long before ours.

To fight terrorism you must identify the terrorists and determine why they are terrorizing. We have done a half ass job of that since we can't seem to understand why they are terrorizing.

We know logically, but we refuse to accept our responsibility in their cause, so therefore, we fail to understand and work to alleviate their need to terrorize.

[AwakeAtLast]

40. I read your post this way

You wrote, "Sharing/enforcing our political and religious beliefs on a people whose religious beliefs have been in existence long before ours."

I read it from the point of view of our country's founding. We've been doing this for more than two centuries, unfortunately, and I don't see an end in sight. <Big sigh>

[merh]

41. Yes, hypocrisy reigns supreme, we, the terrorists have waged war on

terrorists, yet we refuse to accept our own responsibility in the terrorism.

[AbbeyRoad]

33. Hey you might be on to something here...

"Going after pesky individuals ins't the way to stop terrorism, its going after the people who give the pesky individuals millions of dollars and actual bombs and the such."

As a start maybe someone should have looked at these guys...

"The New York Times explained this mystery: "For ten years, as Iraq developed a vast army, chemical weapons and a long record of brutality, the Reagan and Bush administrations quietly courted Hussein as a counter-weight to Iran's revolutionary fervor." (8/13/90)

Washington feared the spread of Iran's theocratic, anti-Western ideology, which threatened imperialist interests in the region. So the US armed and financed Saddam during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war which cost over one million lives and an astronomical $1.19 trillion. The US supplied Iraq with military intelligence, $5 billion in food subsidies, $2.5 billion in export loan guarantees, and $141 million in direct export subsidies. According to Senator Robert Byrd in recent Congressional testimony, the US also sent Saddam a "witches' brew of pathogens" including anthrax, botulinum, and West Nile virus. (West Virginia Gazette, 9/27/02)

and way, way back in 1983 under Reagan...

The U.S., which followed developments in the Iran-Iraq war with extraordinary intensity, had intelligence confirming Iran's accusations, and describing Iraq's "almost daily" use of chemical weapons, concurrent with its policy review and decision to support Iraq in the war . The intelligence indicated that Iraq used chemical weapons against Iranian forces, and, according to a November 1983 memo, against "Kurdish insurgents" as well .

What was the Reagan administration's response? A State Department account indicates that the administration had decided to limit its "efforts against the Iraqi CW program to close monitoring because of our strict neutrality in the Gulf war, the sensitivity of sources, and the low probability of achieving desired results."

[I_like_chicken]

38. Its true that there are individuals who support terrorism

and they need to be stopped with military action, which is something we are doing. But to call the war on terrorism a war just on indiviuals is being naive. People like Osama would not be able to attract followers if they didn't believe him. Arabs see the way America is acting, our support of the Saudi royal family, the pressence of US troops on saudi soil, our support of Isreal, and as a result feel their soverignty is being threatened by America, and the best way to fight back, and in some cases the only way to fight back, is threw terrorism. When dynamic leaders like Osama arise, people flock to them. If we only focus on indiviuals, then when we knock out one leader, another one will arise. In order to complete stop terrorism, we have to go to the core root of the problem, namely the percieved or real threat Arabs feel from America. America must change its foreign policy in the Middleeast. This won't end terrorism, but its a start. What should america change its foreign policy to, I don't know since im not a foreign policy expert, but I do know that Bush's plan is not working at all, and in fact is creating more terrorist, the exact opposite of what we're trying to do.

As for the war on drugs, what your suggesting is exactly what were doing now, and what have the results been, basically very little change in the drug trade. We spend billions every year on the war on drugs, and it has gotten us no where. I believe what we should do is legalize all drugs, regulate their trade to insure as much safety as possible. After legalization there should be a large push to inform the public on the dangers of drugs, and a push to upgrade an increase rehablitation clinics to help those who want to be rehablitated. I don't think legalization of drugs will increase drug use, since basically anyone who wants to use drugs now can get their hands on them. Instead I think it will stop us from wasting billions of dollars a year on a war thats not working, and instead focus that money on where it its needed, into education and rehabilitation.

[emulatorloo]

20. While you have some good points, this is like a "Grammar post"

I mean, would you feel any better if GWB corrected his grammar and said "War on Terrorists?"

I think the real problem is w GWB, not his grammar.

[alejandrofromcuba]

29. Grammar

I think it is just a question of grammar.

Similar to FDR and Johnson's "War on Poverty"
and Nixon's "War on Cancer"

(Both of which did make progress--but neither solved the problems.

I don't let semantics of grammar bother me. It is obvious this war is against those who practice "terror" against US or US interests--in other words whoever our RW leaders think is against THEM is a practitioner of terror.

[TacticalPeek]

28. Since the War on Terror doesn't seem to be going so well,

let's switch to a War on the Flanking Maneuver.

Or, we could skip ahead to the War on Strategic Bombing, but that may require raising taxes. No one ever said national insanity was cheap.

[laura888]

31. LOL! And next let's declare war on the Blitzkrieg n/t

[I_like_chicken]

39. Even better lets declare war on war.

We need to stop war, and the best way to do that is to have a war on war!!!

[Oddman]

30. That's right . . .

No matter what bush says you can't hunt down and kill an ideology.

The war on terror is like the war on drugs. Let's see, the war on drugs has been going on for over 30 years and drug use is more prevalent now than when they started. Very successful!

These morans don't know how to fight terrorism - you can't fight it with bombs and guns and death and fear.


“Cripes . . .I can’t even spell Preserdent . . .”

[FlemingsGhost]

34. According to that criteria, how does one combat "evil"

Your word, not mine:

"You cannot wage war upon an inanimate object or concept. The very
idea is intellectually infantile at best, motivated by evil at worst."

What's logically askew regarding this passge?

[laura888]

36. I think what is meant by "evil" in the original post is...

...causing harm to others that will further one's own self-interest.

Personally, I think the original post was absolutely dead-on.

I see nothing "logically askew" here at all.

[JHBowden]

35. How about a "war on amphibious assault?"

or a war on tactical retreating? :silly:

[Jim Warren]

42. The answer is quite simple then,

Preznit Bush should ask Congress to immediately pass an emergency foreign aid package worth billions so the evil-doers can form a nation that we can attack.

(btw, klox go back to your klan, your brain is still wet.)