How should America go about winning the war on terror ? Your suggestions

[Odin]

A muslim friend of mine told me that he thinks the only thing that will stop muslim fundies is a muslim Reformation.

[Heresson]

Reformation was a giant mistake

[Natalinasmpf]

If they are elected and they do not try to subvert democracy, we accept the results of the election.

But you know, the governments would still allow pro-Muslim (pro-Muslim in a negative sense, ie. like white supremacist) and anti-US hate speech.

[Natalinasmpf]

only thing that will stop muslim fundies is a muslim Reformation.

That has already happened. It was called the Sunni/Shi'ite split.

[aneeshm]

They also need a renaissance - which no western power wants , because no sensible power will want a potential rival .

It is interesting to note that Islam is now what Christianity was five hundred years ago . Does this indicate that all expansionist , evangelical religions follow a pattern ?

[Ned]

Originally posted by Natalinasmpf

If they are elected and they do not try to subvert democracy, we accept the results of the election.

But you know, the governments would still allow pro-Muslim (pro-Muslim in a negative sense, ie. like white supremacist) and anti-US hate speech.

Yeah, but there will also be people on the other side saying that the preachers of hate are medieval.

[Ned]

Originally posted by aneeshm
They also need a renaissance - which no western power wants , because no sensible power will want a potential rival .

It is interesting to note that Islam is now what Christianity was five hundred years ago . Does this indicate that all expansionist , evangelical religions follow a pattern ?

The protestant reformation was the equivalent of the extremist, hate-filled Wahabbi sect? Really?

[Heresson]

You can claim so. Certainly the wahhabis returned to Muslim original rite. Destroying the tomb of Muhammad is equivalent of protestant destruction of figures of saints and stuff...
Shia is, when it comes to some forms of cult, the catholicism of islam.
All this lashing, images of Husayn, imams, mahdis - messiahs....
Bah, Iran system is said to be the first Muslim "church".
That's why the wahhabis seem to treat Shii with disrespect.

[aneeshm]

I did not mean to imply any such thing . I merely said that the renaissance of thought , or enlightenment , has not yet happened , and its occurence would not be in the interest of the non-Islamic world .

[Drachasor]

Originally posted by The diplomat


Wrong. You are forgetting all the terrorist attacks Osama sponsored in the 90's, like the first WTC attack and the attack against the Cole. Osama was growing in the 90's and we did not stop him.

That's the problem: during the 90's we were complacent. Everybody was enjoying the booming Clinton economy and forgetting about the growing threat of Osama and Al Queda. He attacked us repeatedly but we did little to stop him because we did not want to disturb the peace and prosperity.

This is incorrect, Bush was the complacent one.

Every day Clinton met with experts to discuss the terrorist threat. He realized that it was something that had to be dealt with. The Clinton Administration also got wind that something big was on the horizon, and they tried to give word to the Bush Administration. Unfortunately the latter was too arrogant to think they needed to learn anything from the previous administration, and so they didn't pay it any head. Bush had no regular meetings to discuss terrorism until after 9/11.

Just because Clinton didn't go to war left and right doesn't mean he wasn't going after terrorists. There are other ways (though he did use the occasional military strike).

-Drachasor

[Drachasor]

How to combat terrorism:

1. Remake the US-sponsored new network in the ME area so it is actually broadcasting fair and unbiased news reports. Right now it has destroyed its credibility, and for this reason it needs a name and organization change.

2. Work with other nations to help 2nd and 3rd world Countries grow and progress. Develop charity programs and the like to work on education, health, and other issues.

3. Educate people about democracy, and help the people of non-democratic regimes become more democratic. Many in Iran, for instance, want to have a full democracy but are stifled by the religious wing of the government. However, war is not the answer here in almost every case.

4. Stop abusing 2nd and 3rd world countries for our own gain. We need to stop support brutal dictators and undemocratic regimes, even if it means the new regime will be less friendly to us.

5. Do everything possible to increase economic ties between countries. This will increase the exchange of ideas too (note China).

6. Work with Palestine and Isreal to make a peace treaty so that both of them can have their own country. Get serious and threaten Isreal with a cessation to funding. We give them 1/3 of the GDP for free every year, so they really should listen to us (we just need to be serious). Sponsor economic growth in Palestine once this is done.

7. Develop strong ties with as many countries as possible and work with them to track down known terrorists and stop them.

8. Fund R&D into new ways of tracking and locating terrorists, and into ways to help items 1-6 come to pass.

Basically, healthy, thriving communities make almost no terrorists (and really heathly ones make none). Hence we should work to alleviate forces that are stopping countries from becoming healthy, thriving areas. Yes, in many cases it is the poor governments of that region, but in some other cases it is how the U.S. or other countries have treated them.

And yes, I do understand that being poor and suffering doesn't justify (in a moral sense) going off and killing a dozen people, but it does cause (in a psychological sense) that sort of behavior to crop up when there is a tangible cause. It is merely being pragmatic to address such causes in an attempt to minimize the production of new terrorists as much as possible.

-Drachasor

[GePap]

Originally posted by Ned


Oh, come on now. Saddam harbored all sorts of terrorists, including Abu Nidal. Democrats saw no need to go to war against Saddam just because he harbored terrorists or even built training camps for him.

Oh, right, spend 200 billion to get Abu NIdal . Pakistan has training camps for terrorists against India- and did far more to spread terrorism than Iraq ever did- which of course is irrelevant- our "war" is against Islamic fundamentalists with international aims-not all terrorist (which is impossible), nor really even with islamic fundies with local aims.

Do you remembeer that right after 9/11 that most Democrats argued that we should not consider the situation a state of war?

And until we invaded Afghanistan they were right.

Kerry would have been true to form. Kerry is no Bush.

THanks heaven Kerry is no Bush.

[our_man]

The protestant reformation was the equivalent of the extremist, hate-filled Wahabbi sect? Really?

Have you never heard of the penal laws?

[Ned]

Originally posted by aneeshm
I did not mean to imply any such thing . I merely said that the renaissance of thought , or enlightenment , has not yet happened , and its occurence would not be in the interest of the non-Islamic world .

Well, the religion is undergoing a fundamentalist revival that is the antithesis of the Renaissance.

[Ned]

Originally posted by GePap


Oh, right, spend 200 billion to get Abu NIdal . Pakistan has training camps for terrorists against India- and did far more to spread terrorism than Iraq ever did- which of course is irrelevant- our "war" is against Islamic fundamentalists with international aims-not all terrorist (which is impossible), nor really even with islamic fundies with local aims.

Clinton threatened all sorts of calamities on Saddam if he didn't cooperate. Saddam just laughed. He had the measure of the man.

Kerry is no different from Clinton.