Anti-Terrorism War: Conflicts between the Ends and the Means

Published on July 9, 2005 By Bomber From Asia In Politics

After 911, War become the only means to the end-- eliminate terrorism through war. But after nearly four years, maybe its time to think about an important question: does the means fit for the end? Can we really get rid of terrorism through a war?

The answer is not as obvious as some people, i.e. George W. Bush, may think. You can kill some terrorists in the war, in a military action, but you can not eliminiate "terrorism" through war, because one of the main reason of terrorism deeply rooted in the people who unsatisified with the world order led by US and terrorism attack is just the one of the resulte of these emotions. War can not destroy such kind of emtions, only if you kill thousands of millions of people in the war.

The explosion in London already give us enough information and we should take a good thinking of the situation now. It's still not too late.

Comments

Slanderer

on Jul 10, 2005

Step back and look at the what is happening.

You have a group of disenfranchised people who do not represent the larger muslim or national community being treated like the cold war ussr. America needs to stop attaching a flag and a face to the enemy. This draws attention to the attacker's cause. When you fight this group you are fighting individuals. Politicising an attack simply plays off the emotional trauma and answers one political statement with another. Simply put full scale war involves battling nationalities and pulls too many third parties into the problem. You catch one terrorist another rises in to take their place. The goal that each of us shares is to catch the violent people without having to wage full scale war and pull X many casualties into the fire. They need to do this without occupying foreign territory through hard power. The struggle will depend much more on the use of soft power than hard power.

Other than increased communication and cooperation on the government level I have no easy answer for you. I will say that foreign policy will change. Someday it will be written that the biggest cop out of our times has been misdirection of the public. When a crisis occurs the media focus' all the attention on the attacker. The problem is with the aggressive foreign policy. Until the left hand stop waving and distracting to what the right hand is doing - people will taking a reactive instead of proactive approach.

Island Dog

on Jul 10, 2005

I get really tired of hearing this sympathy for terrorists. And that is just what it is.

You can "make nice" with the terrorists all you want and they will still use terror. They want the entire world to be an islamic state. They have stated this many times. The only way to win this war is to destroy these people.

Bomber From Asia

on Jul 11, 2005

Of course US foreign policy will change. But the main question is the logic of US behavior. Mr. X concluded in his long article that USSR's decision makers can only understood one logic: the Might is right. I feel a little bit regret that US may have the same logic, too. Since the end of the cold war, after the collapse of the USSR, the unbalanced US become more ambitious rather than humble.

Mr. Waltz said that US should use its power in a modertate way, otherwise it would make other states scared about the abuse of US power. But unfortunately, his point of view far from be accepted

Welcome Guest! Please take the time to register with us.
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:

Richer content, access to many features that are disabled for guests like commenting on the forums.
Access to a great community, with a massive database of many, many areas of interest.
Access to contests & subscription offers like exclusive emails.
It's simple, and FREE!