Why Are They at War With Us?
"We are at war. We are at war against al-Qaida, a far-reaching network of violence and hatred that attacked us on 9/11, that killed nearly 3,000 innocent people and that is plotting to strike us again."
Thus did Barack Obama clear the air as to whether we are at war, and with whom and why.
Following his remarks, during a White House briefing by National Security Council aide John Brennan, Helen Thomas asked a follow-up question to which we almost never hear an answer:
Why is al-Qaida at war with us? What is its motivation?
It was Osama bin Laden himself, in his declaration of war in 1998, published in London, who gave al-Qaida's reasons for war:
First, the U.S. military presence on the sacred soil of Saudi Arabia. Second, U.S. sanctions causing terrible suffering among the Iraqi people. Third, U.S. support for Israel's dispossession of the Palestinians. "All these crimes and sins committed by the Americans are a clear declaration of war on God, his Messenger and Muslims," said Osama.
He began his fatwa quoting the Koran: "But when the forbidden months are past, then fight and slay the pagans wherever ye find them, seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem of war."
To Osama, we started the war. Muslims, the ulema, must fight because America, with her "brutal crusade occupation of the (Arabian) Peninsula" and support for "the Jews' petty state" and "occupation of Jerusalem and murder of Muslims there" was waging war upon the Islamic world.
Terrorism, the direct killing of civilians for political ends, is al-Qaida's unconventional tactic, but its war aims are quite conventional.
Al-Qaida is fighting a religious war against apostates and pagans in their midst, a civil war against collaborators of the Crusaders and an anti-colonial war to drive us out of the Dar al-Islam. On Sept. 11, they were over here—because we are over there.
Nothing justifies the massacre of Sept. 11. But these are the political goals behind the 9/11 attack, and this is why Islamists fare well in elections in the Middle East. Tens of millions of Muslims, who may despise terrorism, identify with the causes for which Osama declared war—liberation of Muslim peoples from pro-American autocrats and Israeli occupiers.
Americans are being killed for the reasons Osama said we should be killed—not because of who we are, but because of where we are and what we do.
Consider. America lost 4,000 soldiers in six years in Iraq, with 30,000 wounded. Yet not one American of the 125,000 soldiers in Iraq was killed in December. Why not? Because we no longer conduct raids, patrol streets, kick down doors and pat down suspects. We have ended our combat operations, withdrawn to desert bases and seem anxious to go home. When we stopped fighting and killing them, they stopped fighting and killing us.
Most Americans today appear content to let Shia and Sunni, Arab and Kurd decide the future of Iraq. And if they cannot settle their quarrels without a civil-sectarian war, why should their war be our war?
According to Gen. Barry McCaffrey, we must now prepare for 300 to 500 dead and wounded every month in Afghanistan by summer.
Why are the Taliban killing our soldiers? Because we threw them out of power, took over their country and imposed the Hamid Karzai regime, and our troops, some 100,000 by fall, are the force preventing them from recapturing their country. We will bleed in Afghanistan as long as we are in Afghanistan.
But if, as Obama said, "we are at war with al-Qaida," why are we fighting Taliban when al-Qaida is in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and North Africa?
Hamas has used terrorism, but not against us. Hezbollah has used terrorism, but not against us since the bombing of the Marine barracks, a quarter-century ago. And our Marines were attacked in Lebanon because we were in Lebanon, intervening in their civil-sectarian war. Had the Marines not been sent into the midst of that war, they would not have been targeted.
When Ronald Reagan withdrew them, the attacks stopped.
Like Europe's Thirty Years' War—among Germans, French, Czechs, Dutch, Danes, Swedes, Scots and English, Catholics and Protestants, kings, princes and emperors—the Muslim world is roiled by conflicts between pro-Western autocrats and Islamic militants, Sunni and Shia, modernists and obscurantists, nationalities, tribes and clans. The outcome of these wars, the future of their lands—is that not their business, and not ours?
The Muslims stayed out of our Thirty Years' War. Perhaps we would do well to get out of theirs. But as long as we take sides in their wars, those we fight and kill over there will come to kill us over here.
This is payback for our intervention. This is the price of empire. This is the cost of the long war.
COPYRIGHT 2010 CREATORS.COM
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A brilliant and effective summary by Mr. Buchanan.
Here is a simple and eloquent statement telling us the truth. Mr Buchanan has written nothing better. I would like it to be read by everybody in the US Congress and the British Parliament, especially my own Conservative Party, which may well form a new government after the British general election which must take place by the middle of June.
But what about Israel?
Simplistically accurate, but the Nationalists and Empire builders would call this analysis naive, isolationists and unpatriotic.
I am slowly shifting toward accepting that "where we are and what we do" may be as great a factor in Muslims' hatred of us as is our being wealthy, non-muslim, and in the habit of shoving our feminism and other perversions down their throats via our media. Pat Buchanan is a major mover in my changing mind and heart.
This article still leaves me with some unanswered questions, however.
While it is always good to know the enemy and to be able to think as he does, PJB seems to come closer here to accepting their views as valid than I am prepared to go.
I would welcome America's stepping away from the role (while keeping it handy in the repertoire) of "the world's sole superpower", and de-toxing from our intervention habit. And I agree with Clyde Wilson that much thinking about the geopolitical Great Game is not the best use of an Old Republic-loving American's time.
But Arabs and Muslims control substantial chunks of the earth's land and seas, and to open the door to giving them the right to select which parts of the globe shall be off limits to us, lest we open ourselves to charges of being "crusaders" or profaners of their "sacred soil", seems to be asking to be kicked from pillar to post. It may be convenient to make some concessions as to the positioning of troops, but only with the understanding that complete flexibility to protect the oil supply and trade routes is retained. And if Muslims are going to insist that we are unfit to be on the same soil as Mecca, a Christian should not be as sympathetic to the Palestinians' claims to Jerusalem as Mr. Buchanan suggests.
Furthermore, it is not enough to say that the Taliban are fighting us because we are "preventing them from recapturing their country", and leave it at that. There was, and is, a very good reason for depriving these savages of a state power base.
Kenny Smith (former NBA player, now a commentator) had what I thought was a good, common sense comment in a different context last night. It was something to the effect of, well, when a guy does something wrong, sometimes people say, 'ah, but he's a nice guy.' Then he does something else wrong and people still say, 'yeah, but he's a nice guy.' But, you know, if he keeps doing something else wrong, well, pretty soon, you know what? He's not a nice guy!
America, 2010.
Here's another answer to Miss Thomas:
Col. Allen West answers Helen Thomas - Caleb’s blog - RedStatehttp://www.redstate.com/absentee/2010/01/16/col-allen-west-answers-helen-thomas/
This is like the timeless schoolyard exchange over "who started it". Has there been a debate on this site, or a forum in the print magazine, on this? If so, can someone kindly direct me to it? If not, how about having one.
Mr. Jacobi, we haven't had an official "debate" on this question, but I don't think you'll find any other publication that has offered as compete an answer as Chronicles has—going back, in fact, over a decade before September 11.
Chronicles has consistently warned of the threat of resurgent Islam, even back when those who now throw around the word "Islamofascist" were (like Michael Ledeen) cutting deals with radical Muslims and criticizing us for warning of the dangers.
At the same time, once we acknowledge the threat of resurgent Islam, we need to figure out the best way to handle the situation. One part of that (we have consistently argued) is to avoid unnecessary confrontations with Islamic powers in their own backyards.
We need to defend ourselves, and that involves drawing lines in the sand—most obviously, at our own borders. Instead, we have the worst of both worlds—a belligerent policy toward Islam pushed by immigration enthusiasts.
Scott: At the present time I don't see how we can win. We lost when we abandoned our Christian faith and morals, and embraced a new crusade for zionism. The Faith has always been our best defense against Islam. Without it why fight? I don't want my kids to die for abortion, homosexuality, zionism, and Wall Street.
Mr. Richert,
I only came to Chronicles around the time of the Iraq invasion (to be precise, it was the reference in NR to "unpatriotic conservatives" that drew me first to The American Conservative, where a quote of Sam Francis then led me to Chronicles) so I missed the earlier discussion. I will have a look in the archives, then, to see what light is shed therein on this topic. Of course, I should have read something by Bernard Lewis by now.
In the meantime, may I ask if by your use of the word "belligerent" above you place more of the onus on America for the current (20th century and later) conflict with Islam?
Scott Richert: "We need to defend ourselves, and that involves drawing lines in the sand—most obviously, at our own borders. Instead, we have the worst of both worlds—a belligerent policy toward Islam pushed by immigration enthusiasts."
This is exactly true. The entire program of the Neo-Trotskyite "conservatives" is really quite insane with respect to Islam, the nature of Islam, its incompatibility with western societies, etc. As we send our military to secure the strategic poppy-fields and goat-pastures of Pashtunistan, the borders remain wide open, mass migration continues unabated (even in the midst of an economic depression with actual unemployment rates at near 22%). Yet the Frums, the Podheretzes, the Brooks, Ledeens, et al continue to prattle on from their plush towers of Ivory about the grave dangers of "Islamofacsism" - a term they fashioned from thin air, much in the manner the bankstas running the government create money from thin air. Why does anyone listen to what these mountebanks have to say, or read anything they write?