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The War on Islamism - Who is winning?

Allied victories since 9/11:

1. No mega-attacks on US, UK or Australia.
2. No WMD attack.

3. Afghanistan liberated. Taliban deposed.
4. Al-Qaida bases in Afghanistan destroyed. (The bad news is they have moved to Pakistan.)
5. Afghanistan election.

6. Iraq liberated. Saddam deposed and executed. Greatest military victory of the West since the end of World War Two in 1945.
7. After years of post-liberation fighting, Iraqi "resistance" still holds no territory and its popular support has not grown. Thousands of jihad fighters have died for nothing.
8. Iraq election.
9. Second Battle of Fallujah
10. The front in this War on Islamism has been moved from the streets of America to where it should be fought - in the streets of the Middle East.

11. Lebanon revolution.
12. Lebanon destroys Fatah al-Islam.
13. Libya abandons WMD program.
14. Israel bombs Syria's nuclear weapons program
15. Islamists defeated in Somalia.
16. Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim state, is now rated "Free".

17. Bush re-elected. Kerry defeated.
18. Blair re-elected.
19. Howard re-elected. Latham defeated. Though Howard finally loses in 2007.
20. Harper elected. Martin defeated. Canada back to normal.
21. Merkel elected. Schröder defeated. Germany back to normal.
22. Sarkozy elected. Royal defeated. Chirac out. France back to normal. "Axis of Weasels" is finished.
23. Boris Johnson elected. Ken Livingstone defeated.

24. Saddam captured, executed.
25. His sons dead.
26. Chemical Ali captured, sentenced to death.
27. Tariq Aziz captured.
28. Saddam's intelligence chief executed.
29. Saddam's chief judge executed.
30. Saddam's vice-president executed.
31. Saddam's Defence Minister captured, sentenced to death.

32. Al-Zarqawi dead (leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq).
33. Sheikh Mansour dead (religious leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq).
34. Hamad Jama al-Saedi captured (second in command of Al-Qaeda in Iraq).
35. Muntasir al-Jibouri captured (leader of Ansar al Sunnah in Iraq).
36. Muharib Abdul Latif al-Jubouri dead (Al-Qaeda in Iraq).
37. Khaled al-Mashhadani captured (Al-Qaeda in Iraq).
38. Abu Jurah dead (Al-Qaeda in Iraq).
39. Abu al-Tunisi dead (Al-Qaeda in Iraq).
40. Abu Khalaf dead (Al-Qaeda in Iraq).

41. Khalid Shaikh Mohammed captured (the Butcher of 9/11, killer of Daniel Pearl).
42. Shamil Basayev dead (the Butcher of Beslan).
43. Hambali captured (the Butcher of Bali).
44. Dulmatin dead (the Butcher of Bali).
45. Azahari bin Husin dead (the Butcher of Bali).
46. Bali bombers to be executed by firing squad.
47. Mustafa Nasar captured (the Butcher of Madrid and London).
48. Abdul Hadi al Iraqi captured (the Butcher of London).
49. Mohammed Atef dead (the Butcher of the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings).
50. Mushin Musa Matwalli Atwah dead (the Butcher of the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings).
51. Leader of Al Qaeda in Turkey captured (the Butcher of Istanbul).
52. Abu Ali al-Harithi dead (USS Cole bomber).
53. Tawfiq bin Attash captured (USS Cole bomber).
54. Imad Mughniyeh dead (Hezbollah butcher of Americans and Jews).

55. Midhat Mursi dead (Al Qaeda).
56. Abu Zubaydah captured (Al Qaeda).
57. Mohammed Jamal Khalifa dead (Al Qaeda).
58. Abu Faraj al-Libbi captured (Al Qaeda).
59. Abu Laith al-Libi dead (Al Qaeda).
60. Abu Hamza Rabia dead (Al Qaeda).
61. Adam Gadahn possibly dead (Al Qaeda).
62. Muhammad Rahim captured (Al Qaeda).

63. Mullah Dadullah dead (Taliban butcher).
64. Mullah Bakht Mohammed captured (Taliban).
65. Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Osmani dead (Taliban).
66. Mullah Brother dead (Taliban).
67. Taliban defense minister Mullah Obaidullah captured.
68. Abdullah Mehsud dead (Taliban).
69. Gulbuddin Hekmatyar captured (Afghan Islamofascist).
70. Aden Hashi Farah dead (Somali Islamofascist).

71. Abu Hamza jailed.
72. Omar Bakri Muhammad expelled.
73. Abdullah El-Faisal expelled.

74. Palestinian intifada defeated.
75. Palestinian civil war begins between Fatah and Hamas. As Charles Johnson says: "I'm rooting for both sides to achieve their objectives."

76. Arafat dead.
77. Abu Abbas dead (Palestine Liberation Front).
78. Mahmoud Zatme dead (Islamic Jihad).
79. Yassin dead (leader of Hamas).
80. Rantissi dead (leader of Hamas).
81. George Habash dead (founder of PFLP).
82. Imad Mugniyah dead (Hezbollah).

Islamist victories since 9/11:

1. Allies waited one and a half years after Afghanistan before Iraq, thus giving worldwide opposition / Iraq insurgency time to build.
2. Allies did not hit Iran and Syria after Iraq. Allies did not punish Iran and Syria for their support for, arming of and training of the Iraqi insurgency.
3. Allies did not kill Muqtada al-Sadr when he first emerged, thus allowing the emergence of sectarian death squads in Iraq. If Iraq is lost, not killing al-Sadr may be the main reason why.

4. British withdraw from Basra, 2007, before it is secured.
   • Britain's "softly, softly" policy in Iraq (compared to the US) was much praised, but there is evidence it amounted to ceding control of Basra to fundamentalist Shia militias.
   • British back in Basra to regain control, early 2008. Withdrawal reversed.

5. Democrats win House and Senate, Nov 2006.
6. Gates appointed. Rumsfeld sacked. John Bolton out.
7. Bush may abandon neo-conservatism for the old, failed, Saudi-friendly, Islamist-friendly realpolitik of Bush senior and dinosaurs like James Baker and Robert Gates.

8. North Korea explodes nuclear bomb, 2006. The Pakistan, North Korea and Iran nuclear weapons programs are ultimately the means by which Islamist terrorists will get nukes.
   • North Korea apparently agrees (2007-08) to shut down its nuclear facilities and close Yongbyon nuclear facility.

9. Pakistan agrees to allow terrorist state be set up in Waziristan, Sept 2006.
   • Pakistan dictator Musharraf resigns, Aug 2008. Under Musharraf, Pakistan turned into the world headquarters of Al Qaeda. Maybe the new Pakistan will now finally take action against the terrorist camps it hosts.

10. Gaza pull-out, 2005. Jews evicted for no reason. Terror state set up.
11. Lebanon ceasefire, 2006. Israel stops before destroying Hezbollah.
12. Samir Kuntar released by Israel, 2008. Big win for Hezbollah.

13. Madrid bombings, Mar 2004. [200 dead]
14. Spain elects Zapatero. Victory for the bombers of Madrid.

15. Darfur genocide. Successfully carried out by Sudan Islamist government.
16. Golden Mosque of Samarra destroyed. Successfully destroyed by Sunni Islamist supremacists. Civil war with Shia "heretics" successfully started.

17. Britain does nothing in response to Iran taking British hostages, Mar-Apr 2007
18. South Korean hostage killings, July-Aug 2007. Total victory for the Islamofascists. South Korea pays them $10 million to finance attacks against Britain and US. And South Korea promises to end Christian missions to Afghanistan (and here). Total victory for the forces of evil.
19. Holland expels Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Victory for the killers of Theo van Gogh.

20. Benazir Bhutto assassinated.

Notes

1. Tunisian synagogue attack, Apr 2002
2. Bali bombing, Oct 2002 [200 dead]
3. Riyadh Compound Bombings, May 2003
4. Casablanca bombings, May 2003
5. Mumbai bombings, Aug 2003
6. Istanbul bombings, Nov 2003
7. Philippines ferry attack, Feb 2004 [100 dead]
8. Al-Khobar massacre, May 2004
9. Russian airplane bombings, Aug 2004
10. Beslan massacre, Sept 2004 [300 dead]
11. London bombings, July 2005
12. Sharm el-Sheikh bombings, July 2005
13. New Delhi bombings, Oct 2005
14. Dahab bombings, Apr 2006
15. Mumbai train bombings, July 2006 [200 dead]
16. Indian train bombings, Feb 2007
17. Algeria bombings, Apr 2007
18. Hyderabad bombings, Aug 2007
19. Karachi bombing, Oct 2007 [140 dead]
20. Baghlan bombing, Nov 2007
21. Algiers bombings, Dec 2007
22. Jaipur bombings, May 2008
23. Ahmedabad bombings, July 2008
24. Wah bombing, Aug 2008

The Islamist Iraqi "resistance" has killed thousands of people in Iraq, mostly Muslims, but it is hard to see anything it has achieved. Its support has not risen, and remains below 10 percent. It holds no territory. Elections went ahead anyway. So far, the resistance seems to have achieved nothing. Its vicious war against fellow Muslims, including the suicide bombing of mosques, weddings, funerals and religious processions, may even be reducing the support for Islamist terror among Muslims worldwide. See also the unprecedented protests after the Jordan bombings of Muslims.

The Islamist Palestinian intifada has also killed hundreds of infidels, bringing a rain of death, destruction and poverty onto the heads of the Palestinian people. Its main goal of destroying Israel has not progressed, and the Israeli wall is making it increasingly impossible to hit Israel at all. However, it does have the Gaza pull-out to show for it. Maybe Gaza was untenable anyway, but it looks like a victory for Islamism.

Discussion

• FBI Most Wanted Terrorists list

• U.S. State Dept
  • Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism
  • U.S. State Dept reports on global terrorism
    • 1995 to 1999
    • 2000 to date

  • Patterns of Global Terrorism 2002
    • The statistics are in, and the Afghan war reduced, not increased, Islamic fundamentalist terror. Terrorist incidents fell from 355 in 2001 to 199 in 2002, a 30 year low. This could change, but it looks promising so far.
    • After Sept 11th people agonised over the best way to end Islamofascist attacks. To address their supposed "grievances"? To "solve" the "Israel problem"? To give them money?
    • So far it seems that the best way to end Islamofascist attacks is to aggressively attack them in their home countries.

  • Patterns of Global Terrorism 2003
    • The statistics are in, and the Afghan and Iraqi wars reduced, not increased, Islamic fundamentalist terror. Nothing succeeds like success. Contrary to the claims that these wars would "inflame" the Arab world, and breed a new generation of hatred and suicide bombers, the opposite has happened. The Arab world is either: (a) afraid of the west, or: (b) silently hoping that the west wins, or: (c) the militants of course still hate the west and want to fight it, like they did before, but the difference is they are now being killed in vast numbers.
    • 307 persons were killed in terrorist attacks in 2003, a huge drop on the 725 killed in 2002.
    • The number of separate terrorist incidents also fell, to the lowest level recorded since 1969.
    • Number of terrorist incidents per year, 1982-2003

  • Country Reports on Terrorism 2004
    • Things got worse in 2004. Madrid and Beslan happened, and the Iraqi "resistance" escalated into a full-scale jihadi war. (The only bright spot is that the Palestinian intifada was defeated.)
    • The Afghanistan and Iraq wars shattered the jihad. But then, after victory in Iraq, America sat on its laurels and did not take the war to Iran and Syria (as many neo-cons had hoped). The jihad has re-grouped, and the front line is now Iraq.
    • U.S. Figures Show Sharp Global Rise In Terrorism, April 27, 2005 - over 1,000 killed in 2004.
    • Yes, it does seem that the war is protecting America - 4 years now and there has been no follow-up at all to 9/11. And no mega-attack on Britain - only the pathetic London bombings. But the cost is that the jihad war has to be fought in poor suffering Iraq. Iran and Syria are now the main terror states supporting the jihad, and the Islamist war will never end until there is a reckoning with these two states.

  • Country Reports on Terrorism 2005

• MIPT Terrorism Knowledge Base
  • analytical tools
    • charts

• Does attacking your enemy just make him stronger? Does killing terrorists just create more terrorists? Israel's experience shows otherwise.

• Appeasement

• Offence, not defence

• Status as at 2008: There were no major Islamist terror attacks in the West in either 2006 or 2007.

The West loses momentum, after 2004

• In 2003, Bush was on a roll. After conquering Baghdad, Iran and Syria were afraid they were next. They are not afraid now. Instead of toppling Iran and Syria in 2003, Bush tried to defend the ground he had taken, while Iran and Syria tried to destabilise it and destroy its infant democracy from outside. They may well succeed.
• Bush has been weak in other ways. He has tolerated the existence of the Shia thug al-Sadr. His reward for tolerating al-Sadr has been the emergence of sectarian death squads and religious civil war in Iraq. Killing al-Sadr could have stopped all this, and maybe still could.
• Bush has also done nothing about Islamic terror supporting Saudi Arabia, which has paid no real price for 9/11. The religious fascist state of Saudi Arabia is not an ally, and never will be, until its medieval culture is broken and transformed.
• Bush has been a somewhat half-hearted fighter. He looks good compared to defeatists and appeasers like Kerry. But one could imagine a lot better than Bush.

• The fact is that regime change in Iran, Syria and Saudi Arabia is still essential if there is ever to be victory in this war. Leaving those regimes in place just kicks the problem down the road, guaranteeing decades more of Islamist terror.

• Time for Democratization 2.0, February 27, 2006 - Since re-election, Bush has done very little. We've got to go on the offensive again. But maybe this won't happen until there is another 9/11. "Victory is only possible through a de-nazification that we have not had the nerve to implement. Must we wait to be nuked first? Probably." We've got to launch "the next phase of the war". "As far as I see it, this counter-Islamism program is not a matter of whether, but of when. OK, the whether is whether we will still have the capability after the next 9/11."

• Five Years On, Mark Steyn, August 21, 2006 - "After the Taliban fell, the region's autocrats and dictators wondered: Who's next? Now they figure it's a pretty safe bet that nobody is. What's the difference between September 2001 and now? It's not that anyone "liked" America or that, as the Democrats like to suggest, the country had the world's "sympathy". Pakistani generals and the Kremlin don't cave to your demands because they "sympathize". They go along because you've succeeded in impressing upon them that they've no choice. Musharraf and Co. weren't scared by America's power but by the fact that America, in the rubble of 9/11, had belatedly found the will to use that power. It is notionally at least as powerful today, but in terms of will we're back to Sept. 10: Nobody thinks America is prepared to use its power. And so Nasrallah and Ahmadinejad and wannabe "strong horses" like Baby Assad cock their snooks with impunity."
• Iraq: Quit Or Commit, Rick Moran, 20 Aug 2006. "Iran and Syria. .. have judged that we will do nothing to stop them from continuing their support for the terrorists and the insurgency. We interdict what supplies and men that we can but it isn’t enough. And Iran and Syria have apparently decided that since there is no downside to their support for our enemies in Iraq, that they can bleed us white while engineering a humiliating defeat for American prestige in the process. ... And why we have done so little in the past three years to stop them is, to my mind, one of the biggest mysteries of the war."

• Election 2006 - Cox and Forkum, like me, are disappointed in Bush since his re-election in 2004. He has done little to win the war since 2003. He is trying to stay the course, and hold the ground. But he is not fighting to win. - "Two years later, as this week's mid-term Congressional elections approach, I have lost almost all confidence in Bush's and the Republicans' abilities to wage the necessary war against Islamists. Bush has certainly had his good moments, ... But even these have been exposed as mostly words not principles. ... the list of Bush's compromises since 9/11 is appalling: ... Bush is not waging the kind of war necessary for a lasting victory, and we are losing as a result. He is willing to fight and, unlike most Democrats, appears to recognize that the threat from Islamists requires us to fight. But, hamstrung by an apparent moral uncertainty or confusion, he is not willing to fight to win."
• What should Bush do? Kill al-Sadr and the other Iraqi militia leaders, and bring down the regimes of Iran and Syria.

• How to win in Iraq
  • How to win in Iraq I - "Go long" (stay the course)
  • How to win in Iraq II - "Go wide" (destroy the militias, hurt Iran and Syria)

Pessimism - Democrats win mid-term election, Nov 2006

• Democrats win House and Senate, Nov 2006
  • The Democrats will do their best to take us back to the failed appeasement foreign policy of the Clinton years.
  • At worst, we could see a repeat of the 1970s abandonment of Vietnam by a Democrat Congress.
  • And Bush's response looks like making things worse. By turning to dinosaurs like James Baker and Robert Gates, he looks like returning to the failed, Saudi-friendly realpolitik foreign policy of Bush senior.
  • Maybe all the American people wanted was two-party rule (it is absolutely the norm for the president to lose Congress in his second mid-terms), and maybe they were motivated by many different issues, including many local issues, but the effect on the war effort could be serious. This could prolong the war by decades, and allow Iran become a nuclear power. Time will tell how bad this is. But it doesn't look good.

• The media said the 2006 election was allegedly about the war, but the 2004 election allegedly was not:
  • Here's an interesting thing: The media claims this election was all about the war. And yet when Bush won in 2004, the media denied it was all about the war, and claimed it was about religion, or something. But surely when Bush is running himself, the election is far more likely to be about the war than when he is not running at all, and voters are choosing local representatives based on a vast range of local issues?
  • I'm sure the war was part of it, but I suspect the media are exaggerating. Many people are unhappy with the war. But I do not think the American people want to withdraw in failure, as Islamist fundamentalists and left-wingers everywhere in the world hope. Many conservatives are unhappy with Bush because they want to win, and Bush has been drifting.
  • Be that as it may, the effect of electing Democrats - and panicking Bush into abandoning neo-conservatism for old realpolitik - may be to lose the war.
  • European appeasers and defeatists celebrate. As Denis Boyles says, American voters might be amazed to see some of the reactions: "American voters .. may have been impatient but might not have realized they were voting to legitimize the humiliation of the US military."

• America's enemies celebrate:
  • Islamists in the Middle East celebrate.
  • Syria celebrates.
  • Hamas celebrates.
  • Iranian enemy leader Ayatollah Khamenei celebrates: "This issue (the elections) is not a purely domestic issue for America, but it is the defeat of Bush’s hawkish policies in the world. ... Since Washington’s hostile and hawkish policies have always been against the Iranian nation, this defeat is actually an obvious victory for the Iranian nation."
  • Iran thinks it is safe from attack now.
  • Al Qaeda celebrate. They clearly view the election as a victory for them: "you aren’t the ones who won the midterm elections, nor are the Republicans the ones who lost. Rather, the Mujahideen — the Muslim Ummah’s vanguard in Afghanistan and Iraq — are the ones who won, and the American forces and their Crusader allies are the ones who lost"

  • Al Qaeda in Iraq celebrate (and here): "Now the American nation has put their foot on the beginning of the right path to save them from their crisis, so they voted for something reasonable in the latest elections ... Will the politicians keep their promises by bringing back their boys from Iraq from the lion's hand ... They are getting ready to leave, because they are no longer capable of staying"
  • Al Qaeda in Iraq celebrate Rumsfeld's sacking, which the enemy clearly sees as a victory for them. They hate and fear Bush and Rumsfeld, and clearly have no fear of Democrats leading the war: "I tell the lame duck [Bush], don't rush to escape as your lame and midget defense secretary [Rumsfeld] did, for we haven't yet had enough of your blood. Stand fast in the battlefield you coward, for we know the Romans [Westerners] are not ashamed of defeat." They call Bush "the most stupid president".
  • Again and again, it must be said, if evil people don't like you, there must be something right about you. And likewise, Democrats and left-wing Europeans should consider, if evil people like you, there must be something wrong with you. Aren't the Democrats worried that America's enemies see their election as a good thing?

• America falters by Melanie Phillips: "I think something different: that the most likely outcome of these mid-term elections is another major terror attack on America. ... America has now signalled a faltering of resolve; and that’s the cue for a redoubled Islamist attack."
• Mona Charen is bleak: "America is the world’s hyperpower. No other nation or group of nations can challenge us militarily or economically. ... But we are about to be defeated in Iraq by a few thousand cutthroats. ... The writing is not just on the wall, it’s on the floors, ceilings, tables, and chairs — we are about to give up."

• Abandoning Iraq, David Warren, November 8, 2006, is bleak: "Congress will take the war in Iraq out of President Bush’s hands, as Congress took the Vietnam War out of President Nixon’s. Iraq will then be delivered into the hands of Iran’s ayatollahs."
  • He notes perhaps Bush's greatest failing: "[Post-WW2] Germany and Japan had no neighbours like Iran and Syria, destabilizing Iraq by feeding weapons and jihadis into the country. The American and British refusal, from the outset, to make Iran and Syria pay, and pay heavily for their meddling, was noted and thoroughly exploited by the enemy."
  • And he remembers Vietnam all too well: "My 21st birthday happened to coincide with the final evacuation of Saigon. From my modest experience on the ground in that country, I knew what was coming next. The boat people were no surprise to me. I think that was the day I fully realized, in adult terms, that evil often prevails in this world. ... The fate that will befall all those millions of courageous Iraqis, showing the dye on their fingers after they had voted - in defiance of all the terror threats - will not come as a surprise to me, either. They are being sold out, as the Vietnamese were before them."

• U.S. must prove it's a staying power by Mark Steyn:
  • The modern western voter may not have the staying power for a long war. America is "the first superpower with ADHD". In response to an immediate attack, the US is not like Spain. It will fight, but soon it loses interest, so the end result is the same: "we are all Spaniards now".
  • "You can rationalize what happened on Tuesday in the context of previous sixth-year elections - 1986, 1958, 1938, yada yada - but that's not how it was seen around the world, either in the chancelleries of Europe, where they're dancing conga lines, or in the caves of the Hindu Kush, where they would also be dancing conga lines if Mullah Omar hadn't made it a beheading offense."
  • "What does it mean when the world's hyperpower, responsible for 40 percent of the planet's military spending, decides that it cannot withstand a guerrilla war with historically low casualties against a ragbag of local insurgents and imported terrorists? You can call it "redeployment" or "exit strategy" or "peace with honor" but, by the time it's announced on al-Jazeera, you can pretty much bet that whatever official euphemism was agreed on back in Washington will have been lost in translation. ... we're in a very dark place right now."

• How to lose in Iraq - "Go home"

Pessimism - The "Realists" will lose Iraq, as they lost Vietnam

• Tragically, as the jihad fights hard in Iraq, Bush looks as if he might abandon neo-conservatism and turn to the failed "realist" foreign policy of his father.
• It was realists (Nixon, Ford, Kissinger) who lost Vietnam. And the realists will lose Iraq too, if Bush listens to them.

• Rumsfeld and the Realists by Michael Rubin - a scathing attack on the "realists" James Baker and Robert Gates, who Bush is foolishly listening to.
  • "Realism promotes short-term gain, often at the expense of long-term security. ... Realists deny reality, and embrace an ideology where talk is productive and governments are sincere. While 9/11 showed the consequences of chardonnay diplomacy, deal-cutting with dictators and a band-aid approach to national security, realists continue to discount the importance of adversaries' ideologies and the need for long-term strategies."
  • Rubin is also (as am I) amazed by the left's support for such cynical realpolitik over idealistic neo-conservatism.

• Victor Davis Hanson, November 13, 2006, is horrified by the return of the dictator-friendly, Islamist-friendly realists:
  • "Next will come the Baker group report on Iraq - no doubt with more calls to reassure regional dictatorships and to ask them to help "stabilize" Iraq, as if such creepy strongmen would find anything to their advantage in having a successful democracy next door."
  • On realism: "This was a policy that gave us the arming of Osama bin Laden et al. to stop the Soviets in Afghanistan, sort of played Iran off against Iran in their murderous war of the 1980s, abandoned the Kurds, favored the Soviet Gorbachev over the Russian Yeltsin, stopped outside Baghdad and let the Shiites and Kurds be gunned down after urging them to revolt, let Milosevic do his murdering unopposed, and established a revolving door in the Middle East in which former American officials [are] rewarded with legal, financial, and arms links to petro-dollar rich dictatorships."

• Victor Davis Hanson, November 21, 2006, on the appalling realists' idea of "talking" to (i.e. surrendering to) the enemy states Iran and Syria:
  • "But why would either Damascus or Teheran wish to talk? The answer is plain. The former wants to profess to cool it a bit in destabilizing Iraq in exchange for us turning a blind eye in Lebanon; the latter wants to act like stopping the sending of agents of our destruction into Iraq in exchange for cooling our rhetoric about their bomb. What we would be doing in essence by "dialoguing" is saying to both the democracies in Lebanon and Israel, "Sorry, but we have to find a way out of Iraq, and these fascists will promise to turn away from us if they can turn on you.""
  • "All this is dressed up with realist "maturity" and "concern" but it would be consistent with those who brought us Iran-Contra, aid to both Iran and Iraq in their war, stopping before Baghdad, hugs with the House of Saud that paid money to those who killed Americans, and on and on. If Syria and Iran can be assured of a truce, that we won’t destabilize them at home or stop their adventurism abroad, then they might let us save face in Iraq. That they would ever honor such a deal is absurd, that we would ever believe they would is worse than absurd."
  • In many ways, the "realists" are more naive than the most naive leftists.

• Henry Kissinger displays the realists' hallmark naivety: "A restarted Palestinian peace process should play a significant role" in solving the Iran crisis, apparently.

• Read all the neo-con blogs and sites. The people who stuck by Bush all through Iraq, the only people who support Bush and the troops and their mission, the only supporters of the Bush Doctrine - they are all horrified that Bush himself may abandon it for the appeasement of "realism", that Bush may not be Reagan's heir after all:
  • Comment: "If Bush buys this, he is as stupid as his critics say he is." Update 2007: Bush didn't buy it!
  • Comment: "I don't get why Baker and his ilk are considered realists. Sure they advocate national interest over morality in foreign policy but shouldn't part of a realist plan involve it having a realistic change of success?"
  • Comment: "Bush pissed away the mandate he was given in the 2004 election, to crush Islamofacism, through timidity, indecision and appeasement."

• Surrender as "Realism", Robert Kagan and William Kristol, Weekly Standard, November 27, 2006:
  • "'realism' has come to be a kind of code word for surrendering American interests and American allies, as well as American principles, in the Middle East."
  • From Lebanon to Iran to Iraq to Israel, it seems that: "'Realism' is letting dictators get away with terror and murder - and, in particular, letting them get away with the murder of our friends."
  • "So let's add up the "realist" proposals: We must retreat from Iraq, and thus abandon all those Iraqis .. who have depended on the United States for safety and the promise of a better future. We must abandon our allies in Lebanon .. in order to win Syria's support for our retreat from Iraq. We must abandon our opposition to Iran's nuclear program in order to convince Iran to help us abandon Iraq. And we must pressure our ally, Israel, to accommodate a violent Hamas in order to gain radical Arab support for our retreat from Iraq. This is what passes for realism these days. But of course this is not realism. It is capitulation. Were the United States to adopt this approach every time we faced a difficult set of problems, were we to attempt to satisfy our adversaries' every whim in order to win their acquiescence, we would rapidly cease to play any significant role in the world. We would be neither feared nor respected - nor, of course, would we be any better liked. Our retreat would win us no friends and lose us no adversaries."
• The danger of engaging with the enemy, Jeff Jacoby, December 6, 2006.
  • On "talks" with the enemy states Iran and Syria: "When democracies engage with fanatical tyrants, the world becomes not less dangerous but more so. ... with totalitarian regimes like those in Iran and Syria, the effect of such "conversations" is usually negative. It buys time and legitimacy for the totalitarians, while deepening their conviction that the West has no stomach for a fight."
  • On the absurd idea that Iran and Syria want a stable and peaceful Iraq: "No regimes on earth have more to gain from an American defeat in Iraq than the theocracy in Iran and the Assad dictatorship in Syria. They have every incentive to aggravate the Iraqi turmoil that has so many Americans clamoring for withdrawal."
  • And the brutal truth is that: "The war against radical Islam ... cannot be won so long as regimes like those in Tehran and Damascus remain in power." When will Bush explain this to the American people?
• Michael Rubin: "There is no evidence to support the assumption that Iran and Syria want a stable Iraq."

Iraq Study Group Report, Dec 2006

• Iraq Study Group Report, released 6 Dec 2006 - Urges US surrender. Urges betrayal of Israel, Lebanon, Iraqi democrats and Iranian democrats.

• America's enemies love it, smell victory:
  • Iran positive, promises to help US surrender.
  • Islamists all over the region welcome impending surrender.
  • Iraqi "resistance" loves it, urges implementation. - "For militants and insurgents in Iraq, the report represents hope that the Americans will finally leave, and sooner than expected." This report gives them hope, i.e. encourages them to kill more. "This report just makes us stronger in our beliefs and reinforces our view that the best choice to be taken by the United States is to leave Iraq soon", said an enemy jihadi killer.
  • Islamic Jihad celebrates: "The report proves that this is the era of Islam and of jihad ... the Americans came to the conclusion that Islam is the new giant of the world and it would be clever to reduce hostilities with this giant. In the Koran the principle of the rotation is clear and according to this principle the end of the Americans and of all non-believers is getting closer" "Islamic Jihad's Abu Ayman said after the US "defeat" in Iraq is finalized, insurgents there should move to the West Bank and Gaza to help destroy Israel." "the terror leader said the report shows insurgent actions are working."
  • Hamas says it is a great victory for Islam: "It is not just a simple victory. It is a great one. The big superpower of the world is defeated by a small group of mujahedeen. ... It is a sign to all those who keep saying that America, Israel and the West in general cannot be defeated on the ground so let us negotiate with them. ... the next step would be a total defeat on their (American) land, not a relative one like they are facing in Iraq"
  • Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades celebrate: "Just to think that this resistance is led by hundreds of Sunni fighters who defeated hundreds of thousands of Americans, British and thousands of soldiers who belong to the puppet regime in Baghdad." "The al-Aqsa leader said his group learned from the "Iraqi resistance" that jihad will ultimately destroy Israel."

• And of course America's rare allies in the region are horrified and betrayed:
  Olmert rejects linkage of Israel with Iraq. He is horrified by the idiotic Baker group suggestion that solving the Israel conflict will help in solving the Iraq conflict. In reality, the very destruction of Israel would not stop the jihad in Iraq.
  • Kurdish leader blasts Iraq group's report - Let's betray the most pro-American people in Iraq. That will help, surely.

• Commentary:
  • New York Post: "The Iraq Study Group report delivered to President Bush yesterday contains 79 separate recommendations - but not one that explains how American forces can defeat the terrorist insurgents, only ways to bring the troops home."
  • Charles Johnson: "All these recommendations stem from a basis of complete fantasy, in which Israel’s Arab neighbors are genuinely interested in peace and all we have to do to get it is ask them the right way."
  • Michael Rubin: "even if the president does not accept the report, its very presence will embolden Iraqi insurgents and militias."
  • Melanie Phillips: "the harm done by the mere publication of this report is severe. Its authors have shamefully heartened and strengthened the enemies of the west at a time when coalition soldiers are fighting and dying to defend it."
  • Mark Steyn: "Why would anyone - even a short-sighted incompetent political fixer whose brilliant advice includes telling the first Bush that no one would care if he abandoned the "Read my lips" pledge - why would even he think it a smart move to mortgage Iraq's future to anything as intractable as the Palestinian "right of return"?" "The Surrender Gran'pas assert that Iran and Syria have "an interest in avoiding chaos in Iraq." This, to put it mildly, is news to the Iranians and Syrians, who have concluded that what's in their interest is much more chaos in Iraq."
  • Daniel Pipes: "one wonders how exactly the Iraqi civil war would be ended by pleasing the Palestinian Arabs. Or why the unresolved Arab-Israeli conflict is any more relevant to Iraq than the unresolved Azeri-Armenian conflict, which is closer to Iraq."
  • Charles Krauthammer: "Baker thinks that if only the Israelis would surrender to Arab demands, all would be well in the Middle East." "these 10 establishment sages have labored mightily to produce a mouse"

• Hilarious video: by David Zucker mocking James Baker and the Iraq Study Group as hopelessly naive appeasers.

Bush tosses the ISG report

• Bush essentially tossed the ISG report in the bin! Good for him! We underestimated him again.
  • Robert Kagan & William Kristol: "President Bush has made clear that he has no intention of following the commission's recommendations. ... He intends to pursue steadfastly his own course in Iraq. He is determined not to withdraw before it becomes stable and, yes, democratic. He will not be buffeted by conventional wisdom or by Baker and his colleagues ... right now we can only applaud the president's courage and determination and his willingness to resist the pressures of those who would now sound the retreat."

• Instead of adopting the ISG's idea of surrendering, there are signs that Bush is finally looking at How to win in Iraq - i.e. destroy the militias, and start hurting Iran and Syria.
  • U.S. Troops now authorized to kill Iranian Operatives in Iraq, January 26, 2007. "For more than a year, U.S. forces in Iraq have secretly detained dozens of suspected Iranian agents, holding them for three to four days at a time. The "catch and release" policy was designed to avoid escalating tensions with Iran and yet intimidate its emissaries. ... Last summer, however, senior administration officials decided that a more confrontational approach was necessary ... 'There were no costs for the Iranians,' said one senior administration official. 'They are hurting our mission in Iraq, and we were bending over backwards not to fight back.' ... The new "kill or capture" program was authorized by President Bush in a meeting of his most senior advisers last fall"
  • "Kill or Capture" strategy
  • US detains Iranian diplomats in Iraq, Dec 2006.
  • US raids Iranian office in Iraq, Jan 2007.
  • Death squad chieftains flee to beat Baghdad surge, The Sunday Times, January 28, 2007 - The butcher Abu Deraa, and many al-Sadr death squad leaders, have apparently fled Baghdad.
  • The butcher Al Sadr and his Shia death squad leaders flee Iraq to Iran, Jan-Feb 2007 (this has been confirmed). "He is scared he will get a JDAM dropped on his house." He should have been killed or expelled years ago.

• U.S. talks to enemy state of Iran about Iraq, May 2007.
  • As Iran helps kill American troops in Iraq to try to prevent democracy, U.S. Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker claims that Iran is interested in "a stable, secure, democratic, federal Iraq that is able to control its borders, is at peace with its neighbors and is bringing prosperity to its citizens." Surely he doesn't believe such bullshit? This looks really bad.
  • Pat Dollard, May 30th 2007, says it's not as bad as it looks: "For some reason, no one told you that just 5 days before Monday’s talks, an entire floating army, with nearly 20,000 men, comprising the world’s largest naval strike force, led by the USS Nimitz and the USS Stennis, and also comprising the largest U.S. Naval armada in the Persian Gulf since 2003, came floating up unnanounced through the Straight of Hormuz, and rested right on Iran’s back doorstep, guns pointed at them. The demonstration of leverage was clear. And it also came on the exact date of the expiration of the 60 day grace period the U.N. had granted Iran. And it came just a few weeks after Vice President Dick Cheney had swept through the region and delivered a very clear and pointed message to the Saudi King Abdullah and others: George Bush has unequivocally decided to attack Iran’s nuclear, military and economic infrastructure if they do not abandon their drive for military nuclear capability."

Optimism - How to win

• If we want to win this war, the West needs to seize the initiative again. It needs to surprise our enemies, put them under pressure, attack them in unexpected ways, cause them great expenditure, start rebellions in their countries and mount up endless problems for them, in the way that Reagan caused endless trouble for the Soviets. The West needs to push the Iranian and Syrian regimes to the wall, by hot war, cold war, and a combination of both. The West needs to take the war to the enemy again.

• How to win in Iraq
  • How to win in Iraq I - "Go long" (stay the course)

  • How to win in Iraq II - "Go wide" (destroy the militias, hurt Iran and Syria)

  • Ralph Peters' rules for victory

The West falters, yet Al Qaeda have failed to follow up 9/11

Instead it is dying in large numbers in Iraq and Afghanistan.

• Playing Offense (and copy here) by David E. Kaplan, June 2, 2003 - The war, 2 years on. Al Qaeda has been decimated, but may have "one more 9/11 in them".

• Al Qaeda offer a truce:
  1. Al Qaeda are hurting, Oct 2004. - They offer a "truce". The correct response, of course, is to finish them off.
  2. Al Qaeda again desperately offer a truce, Jan 2006.
     • The correct response is to escalate. To win, to destroy the jihadis' world. To demoralise them, humiliate them, and make them lose all hope. No one wants their stupid state. They are dying for nothing, and should give up now and go home.
     • They say: "The delay in similar operations happening in America has not been" [yeah, sure] "because of failure to break through your security measures. But the operations are happening in Baghdad" - In other words, the strategy of getting them to fight against soldiers in the Middle East instead of against civilians on the streets of America has worked. Otherwise, why didn't they just ignore Iraq and carry on with the jihad in America?
     • As Richard Fernandez says: "The enemy is even now dying at our feet, where we should kick him and kick him again."

• It may well take 20 years. But al-Qaeda's days are numbered, optimism from Jason Burke, The Observer, September 10, 2006
  • "Five years after 9/11, Osama bin Laden waits in vain for a Muslim 'awakening'. The lure of the West is just too powerful a force."
  • "Yes, there is a small, if growing, number of Muslims who are attracted to 'al-Qaedaism' in its largest sense. But the truth is that out of a total of 1.6 billion Muslims, very few have joined terrorist organisations. In countries that have suffered violence, such as Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Iraq, there has been a strong counter-reaction to the atrocities of recent years. The number of young men attracted by violence in the UK is larger than it was a decade ago, but is still statistically insignificant. If bin Laden's 'awakening' has started, it is taking a long time."
  • In a century's time, Islamism will be gone. And the West will still be here.

• Jihadis fight (and die in large numbers) in Iraq, not in the streets of America:
  • Angels and Intelligence Estimates by Charles Krauthammer, October 6, 2006 - Al-Qaeda says 4,000 of its recruits have been killed in Iraq since liberation in 2003. Yet at the same time there has been not a single large terror attack in the US. In fact, in 5 years now there has been no major attack in the US. "It is clear that one of the reasons we have gone an astonishing five years without a second attack on the American homeland is that the most dedicated and virulent jihadists have gone to Iraq to fight us, as was said during World War I, 'over there'."
  • I wouldn't want to give the jihadi scum any ideas, but: Maybe the jihadis are wasting their time in Iraq. Maybe they have allowed themselves be distracted by a pointless war (Iraqis hate them and will fight them forever, even after the Americans leave). Maybe the jihad should have ignored Iraq and concentrated on following up 9/11. All that jihadi energy wasted. All those young jihadi lives lost - for nothing. Maybe the enemy is just being stupid, like Hitler invading the Soviet Union. Let's hope so.

• Victor Davis Hanson on the debate as to whether Iraq is creating more terrorists, or whether it is drawing in all the world's terrorists to fight in theatre and die:
  • "We have taken apart two-thirds of al-Qaeda and forced it to spend its youth and treasure in Iraq, not here. At the same time, al-Qaeda finds itself in the unenviable position of fighting Iraqi Muslims to stop democracy. Who accomplished that? The diabolic George Bush? ... Genocide existed before we invaded Saddam’s Iraq, a regime without any chance of reform. Now terrorists like moths to a searing flame are flocking there and in most cases being incinerated. They show their true colors in trying to destroy a government voted in by the people. When rats flock to a tray of D-Con, few say that the poison created rats out of thin air and made the problem worse."
  • "Right now about the only place in the world — not in Egypt, Pakistan, or Saudi Arabia — where large number of Muslim fanatics and terrorists are being killed is in Afghanistan and, yes, Iraq. I am not of the persuasion that D-Con trays create, rather than merely draw out, rats, although the results are often messy and smelly, and reveal a seemingly endless supply of such pests that we scarcely knew were deep within our walls."
  • On the fact that no second 9/11 has yet taken place: "Tragically few will credit the US military in the next decade should we not have another 9-11 attack or something far worse. We know Islamic fascists and their autocratic supporters wished such slaughter; their only problem, once the US military took the offensive, was an increasing inability to carry it out. It is my belief that our soldiers in both Afghanistan and Iraq have saved tens of thousands of American lives, by routing the Taliban and scattering al Qaeda, and by removing Saddam Hussein and changing the entire landscape of the Middle East"

• Hope keeps the jihad alive:
  • Michael Novak, 22 Nov 2006, points out the incredible military weakness of the Iraqi "resistance". After nearly 4 years, they hold no territory. They have taken no allied strongholds. They have no public support. No one votes for them. Their numbers are few: "Even if you can muster only 10,000 soldiers over the entire countryside of Iraq". They can hardly even engage in combat: "Even though our own forces (for nearly two whole years now) can no longer afford to fight in a single operation lasting longer than a few hours".
  • And yet they may win because America may defeat itself. They may win simply because Americans get fed up seeing a steady drip of atrocities on the news: "the more stomach-turning the better". "To defeat the United States, then, it suffices to demonstrate that their vaunted military, for all its awesome power and tactical bravery in the field, cannot halt daily "chaos." To achieve this victory over America, it is not even necessary to create actual "chaos," but only its appearance. ... the shadowy existence of this "chaos" in Iraq is projected by a steady stream of stomach-churning, atavistic, destructive acts, staged day by day where the cameras of the U.S. press cannot resist them."
  • It is rarely recognised that almost all of the killings in Iraq achieve nothing militarily. They contribute nothing towards defeating the enemy - if the enemy is determined to stay. It is as if, as the allies surged through Normandy in 1944, the Nazis thought killing French civilians would stop the allies. If the allies are determined to stay in Iraq, the "resistance" killings cannot stop it. Rather, the killings are aimed at the psychological war, not the military war.
  • As I have said many times, it is hope that keeps the Iraqi jihad alive. They cannot win militarily. What keeps them going is the hope that America will give up, and they are encouraged in this almost every day by the west. Every leftist marching to "end the occupation" gives the jihad that hope and keeps them going. Every Democrat and "realist" Republican looking for an "exit strategy" gives the jihad that hope and keeps them going.
  • What Bush needs to do, what the West needs to do, is to crush that hope, destroy it. Make them despair that the West will ever give up, and then (and only then) they will stop, and they will leave Iraq alone.

Interview with the leader of the Islamofascist massacre of non-Muslim civilians at Khobar, Saudi Arabia, May 2004, sums up the evil religious psychosis we are up against:

"As soon as we entered, we encountered the car of a Briton, the investment director of the company, whom Allah had sent to his death. ... We left him in the street. We went out, and drove our car. We had tied the infidel by one leg [behind the car]. ... The infidel's clothing was torn to shreds, and he was naked in the street. The street was full of people, as this was during work hours, and everyone watched the infidel being dragged, praise and gratitude be to Allah. We told [Muslims], 'Calm down, don't be afraid, we don't want you. We want only the Americans. ... We are Mujahideen, and we want the Americans. We have not come to aim a weapon at the Muslims, but to purge the Arabian Peninsula, according to the will of our Prophet Muhammad, of the infidels and the polytheists' We entered one of the companies' [offices], and found there an American infidel who looked like a director of one of the companies. I went into his office and called him. When he turned to me, I shot him in the head, and his head exploded. We entered another office and found one infidel from South Africa, and our brother Hussein slit his throat. We entered and in front of us stood many people. We asked them their religion, and for identification documents. We used this time for Da'wa [preaching Islam], and for enlightening the people about our goal. We spoke with many of them. At the same time, we found a Swedish infidel. Brother Nimr cut off his head, and put it at the gate [of the building] so that it would be seen by all those entering and exiting. We continued in the search for the infidels, and we slit the throats of those we found among them. ... We found Filipino Christians. We cut their throats and dedicated them to our brothers the Mujahideen in the Philippines. [Likewise], we found Hindu engineers and we cut their throats too, Allah be praised. That same day, we purged Muhammad's land of many Christians and polytheists. Afterwards, we turned to the hotel. We entered and found a restaurant, where we ate breakfast and rested a while. Then we went up to the next floor, found several Hindu dogs, and cut their throats. ... We utilized the time for [teaching] the Koran to the Muslims who remained. We taught them how to read [Surat] Al-Fatiha properly. They were amazed by us"