Today's article in the NY Post by Benny Avni discusses the Obama administration's penchant for not wanting to get it's hands dirty in the nasty business of fighting international terror organizations..
"Other failed or soon-to-fail African states range from Djibouti in the east to Western Sahara -- a zone of trouble that ranges at least to Lebanon and Gaza. Among the neighbors that instigate wars in those countries, some are our allies (Ethiopia), some are foes (Iran), and some are both (Saudi Arabia). We can trust some local leaders, but mostly we have to rely on ourselves...
In short, Obama can't deliver the peace in our time so anxiously anticipated by his supporters. This struggle will last at least as long as the Cold War (and won't be as "cold," either)... Much to Obama's credit, his administration has already widened the use of unmanned drones to assassinate top terrorists. But his bias against clandestine operations by humans is a big problem. To succeed in this war, he'll have to reverse his focus: coddle officials his political allies have publicly tangled with (CIA Director Leon Panetta) and muzzle the likes of Attorney General Eric Holder, who's threatened lawsuits against our frontline warriors.
And since we can't have a major war against each of our enemies, we must embrace some of the tactics that Obama's fans unfairly dub "dirty," from toppling bad overseas actors to assassinations -- and be ready to fight small wars, too.
If we're at war, we have to act like it. Forget the kid gloves."
In short, Obama can't deliver the peace in our time so anxiously anticipated by his supporters. This struggle will last at least as long as the Cold War (and won't be as "cold," either)... Much to Obama's credit, his administration has already widened the use of unmanned drones to assassinate top terrorists. But his bias against clandestine operations by humans is a big problem. To succeed in this war, he'll have to reverse his focus: coddle officials his political allies have publicly tangled with (CIA Director Leon Panetta) and muzzle the likes of Attorney General Eric Holder, who's threatened lawsuits against our frontline warriors.
And since we can't have a major war against each of our enemies, we must embrace some of the tactics that Obama's fans unfairly dub "dirty," from toppling bad overseas actors to assassinations -- and be ready to fight small wars, too.
If we're at war, we have to act like it. Forget the kid gloves."
Obama seems far too aloof in trying to keep America safe. These terrorists must be rooted out and killed and I don't think Obama has the stomach for such operations on a larger scale than currently in use. Holder should pipe down and worry more about locating the next occurance of domestic terrorism before it occurs than extending American rights and priveliges to non-citizens who have taken up arms against the US. But all of this was to be expected when we elected the first affirmative-action president in the history of the US.
9 comments:
Off Topic: Did anyone else see what happened in Venezuela last weekend?
I wish Obama would pull our troops out completely and let the citizens of these nations come to the same conclusion the Venezualans apparently are. There will always be people who hate us. If we fight needless wars, it will only result in their multiplication, not their eradication.
But should we permit an environment to exist whereas people are plotting the slaughter of innocent, non-combatants on American soil? I don't think there was any shortage of laissez faire from a foreign policy standpoint in the area of Afghanistan prior to 9/11.
Where is the fervor to take down domestic groups like the Army of God, or any of a number of domestic terrorist groups? This is all theatrics meant to justify bloated defense budgets.
Are there people in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, and Iran that would violently oppose the US if given the chance? Clearly. I just fundamentally disagree with how to go about handling hostile entities.
You cannot kill an ideology. It exists in he abstract, independent of the followers. Persecuting followers of an ideology will only "succeed" if everyone who ever heard of it is killed, and everyone who knew them and is angered by it is killed, and so on down the line. The injustices inherent in a sweep of this nature has a tendency to fan the flames, spreading it even further than if it had been allowed to slowly burn out on its own.
The death of Christ, MLK, Gandhi, and others like them have shown that killing the man only immortalizes his message. Violently attacking a group grants them the gift of a sympathetic position. I think we would have better results if we didn't spend a dime on blowing things up over seas and instead invested it in building up the crumbling ruins almost a decade of Rethuglican rule has left us to work with.
I'm not in favor of trying to kill an ideology either Ginx. However, if proponents of that ideology come onto the soil of my homeland and repeatedly launch terrorist attacks, then it becomes another matter.
I have to think any radical group that kills the innocents of their enemy or their own people can be considered a terrorist that has to be dealt with as if it was war.
Sadly in any war declared or not, it is always the innocents that pay the ultimate price with their lives to satisfy an ideaology or culture.
Agreed. ideology is one thing. Plotting n attack on innocent civilians is another. Thomas Sowell had a good article on the airline/airport madness that I posted earlier.
If anyone is interested, I've provided a link on the above, right margin to Sowell's archive. I think he's about one of the brightest out there.
Why is there not an equal urgency to end domestic threats?
You might have a point. What kind of "threats" are you be referring to?
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