War on Terror - Winnable?
POSTED BY: Arawaen
UPDATED: Monday, August 10, 2026 14:56
VIEWED: 8893
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For a brief and fleeting moment I thought a political figure was going to tell us the truth about the war on terror. It can't be won! The war against Al-Qaeda, that might be possible to win. Terrorism is a concept, the war against it is like the war on poverty, the war on drugs or the war on crime. As long as a person, any person (not just an Islamic radical) is willing to pick up a gun or build a bomb in an effort to effect political change or even to simply lash out against political opposition you are going to have terror. Making it so nobody is willing or able to do this will be as successful as making it so nobody is willing to grow, sell or use drugs.
Just as with crime, drugs and poverty the impossibility of victory does not mean we shouldn't work against terrorism, but I fail to see the need to spread false hope about the future.
Arawaen
Um, I'm lost. Uh, I'm Angry. And I'm Armed.
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You took the words out of my mouth. I've used the same points when talking about this with people. Nice to know I'm not alone.
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Human nature is what it is, people well make war for many resons most not very good ones or they may look good from were they are standing and if there is war for a good reson by the end who remembers what that was?there may be hope. where their is change their is hope. just not in my life time.Human nature needs lots of time to change. Lets hope in the long run we wake up befor the time runs out.
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Well said!
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Quote:
there may be hope. where their is change their is hope. just not in my life time.Human nature needs lots of time to change. Lets hope in the long run we wake up befor the time runs out.
I have been reading Aristotle lately (Nichomachean Ethics and Politics), it seems to me the same human nature problems he talks about at 325 B.C. (approx.) are the same ones we have today. Can't say I see a lot of progress in almost 2500 years which is a little depressing.
I am starting Plutarch next, who is some 350 years later, initial observation seems to have similar problems and solutions (though I haven't looked at enough to really say).
Arawaen
Um, I'm lost. Uh, I'm Angry. And I'm Armed.
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Just like the 'War on Drugs', the 'War on Poverty', the 'War on AIDS', the 'War on Illiteracy', or the 'War on Obesity', the 'War on Terror' has too much money value for the people that make our policy. Besides it gives the Government an excuse to enact new laws, like the Patriot Act, that will eat away at our freedoms. The Patriot act, like many other laws passed during a state of crisis, was sold to us with the guise that it will protect us, and that it is temporary.
That is just ONE of the reasons that I will be voting Libertarian again this election.
www.lp.org
www.badnarik.org
Vote Libertarian.
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like i said a LLLLong time. 2500 years is just a drop in the bucket of time.So it seams I wasn't to far off by saying not in my life time.Maybe not in my Kids kids kids kids lifetime.I still have hope. The best we can do is see the eivl and know its here with us every day be awear of it,then inbrace the good in all we do. that is were the hope for change is. just my opinnon.
Not from book learnen just life.
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Wow. What a topic for political rhetoric.
On the one hand, you could make an argument that this is a winnable war: albeit you have to change your view on 'winnable'. It can no longer mean to completely crush your enemy, to see your enemy driven before you and hear the lamentation of their women. The new definition would be along the lines of "beating the crap out of your oppenent until he is no longer able to preform acts of terror on you or your country."
This stance would mean that we continue along the lines we have been going for the past 3 years: stepped up security at home and on bases abroad, pre-emptive strikes on training facilities, and continued hunting of terrorist organizations.
On the other hand, you can posit that no war is winnable, no matter how much fighting is done. That this is a political ruse of an administration that needs a diversion from precieved domestic, as well as forgein, policy that is failing.
This position requires us to have more knowledge than is known to the common person. While the media is well informed, it cannot be as informed as those behind the scenes. It is not that hard to glean more information from government sources than is readily given by the media. This is only because Doom and Gloom sells. (The GOA offers a nice supply of info). So, with the fore knowledge that is not given to most everyone via the internet or news media, we can then make educated guesses as to why the government is doing what it is and to see through the normal politcal rhetoric.
Now, seeing as how I was once 'in the trenches', so to speak, in the War on Drugs, I can only speak from that perspective.
When you find yourself standing in the middle of a cocoa field, buring a plantation down that was burned down just 45 days before, you begin to ask yourself questions that have no answers. You have to change your point of view and look at things from askew. You need to see the overall picture instead of a daily nit-picking.
It was all too easy for me to look around at the wet, green landscape (with wet feet, wet BDUs, wet everything) and complain that there has to be a better way. But from a Big Picture stand, my war on drugs worked. Sure, there were probably hundreds of more fields like that one. But when you stop and think that 35,000 acres of cocain bearing fruit plants were stopped in 90 days, it pleases you to know that that much coke wont be killing anyone on my watch.
So, to all those who are fighting terror on G.W.'s watch: Go get them, and tell them that I said hello.
That's my view. I am sure that most others will disagree. That is the beauty of this and other free countries around the world. We can speak our minds and not have the secret militia burst into our homes and shoot us in the head in front of our families.
Next?
I call her "Vera"
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In addition to what's already been correctly stated... when al qaeda is gone (or in deep hiding) there will be palestinian terrorists. When they're gone there will be IRA terrorists, and when they're gone there will be anarchist terrorists, then eco-terrorists, anti-business terrorists, and so on. And if all of those have been quiet for a while, there will always be the common criminal "terrorists" like the belt-way snipers to keep the government on some sort of high-alert-freedoms-restricted status.
Once the people in charge see how much power they've gained thanks to the terrorists, they're not going to give it up. Especially if all it takes to keep it is to propagate fear and xenophobia.
I happen to be rereading "1984" right now. Anyone who hasn't read it should. Still apropos for our time.
And I second SGTGUMP.
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Megness, I gather from your statement,
Quote:that you mean ethics should be learned and developed from personal experience and not taught. Why not do away with all schooling and learn everything (science, medicine, architecture, etc.) from personal experience? Why should ethics be different?
Not from book learnen just life
Not all science is correct, when we find something to be wrong we change it, but we don't discard all of science. The same should be true of ethics, we should build upon the experiences of the people that came before us.
I suppose the aversion to ethics as a discipline is that too often it has been reduced to a mere list of prohibitions rather than as a system of thinking that allows a person to arrive at their own conclusion. I don't know if this came about because of people's dislike of thinking or the establishment's desire to control (without knowing the question it is hard to refute an answer).
Regardless of how much we disagree on the means of obtaining the knowledge, I agree with you that that knowledge must be actualized by the individual to be of any real use,
Quote:
The best we can do is see the eivl and know its here with us every day be awear of it,then inbrace the good in all we do.
I am also envious of your hope. I believe it to be a good thing to have hope.
Arawaen
Um, I'm lost. Uh, I'm Angry. And I'm Armed.
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