Point-Counterpoint on Public Enemy #1
We’ve past Labor Day, the unofficial end of summer. Of course, many of us in California with our triple digit heat are asking What end? We are in the season that means baseball pennant races will be decided in less than a month—and I hope you’re enjoying the new theme here at The Space Between My Ears—new school years begin, and this being an election year, the political races really ramp up. Given that we’ll be inundated with loads of political debate for the next few months, what better time for a new installment of Point-Counterpoint?
The point in this debate comes from President George W. Bush in his speech on the global war on terror given today in Washington, D.C. (the full transcript is here):
These terrorists hope to drive America and our coalition out of Afghanistan, so they can restore the safe haven they lost when coalition forces drove them out five years ago. But they’ve made clear that the most important front in their struggle against America is Iraq—the nation bin Laden has declared the “capital of the Caliphate.” Hear the words of bin Laden: “I now address… the whole… Islamic nation: Listen and understand… The most… serious issue today for the whole world is this Third World War… [that] is raging in [Iraq].” He calls it “a war of destiny between infidelity and Islam.” He says, “The whole world is watching this war,” and that it will end in “victory and glory or misery and humiliation.” For al Qaeda, Iraq is not a distraction from their war on America—it is the central battlefield where the outcome of this struggle will be decided….
Bin Laden and his terrorist allies have made their intentions as clear as Lenin and Hitler before them. The question is: Will we listen? Will we pay attention to what these evil men say? America and our coalition partners have made our choice. We’re taking the words of the enemy seriously. We’re on the offensive, and we will not rest, we will not retreat, and we will not withdraw from the fight, until this threat to civilization has been removed.
The counterpoint comes from, well, President George W. Bush during a press conference held on March 13, 2002 (the full transcript is here):
Q: But don’t you believe that the threat that bin Laden posed won’t truly be eliminated until he is found either dead or alive?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, as I say, we haven’t heard much from him. And I wouldn’t necessarily say he’s at the center of any command structure. And, again, I don’t know where he is. I — I’ll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him. I know he is on the run. I was concerned about him, when he had taken over a country. I was concerned about the fact that he was basically running Afghanistan and calling the shots for the Taliban.
Do you think there is any true way of knowing what is actually going on, what Bin Laden really is saying? [Further, if truth is what we seek, the fact that we are not allowed to see images of the war is very disturbing and slanted toward the carrying out of the right’s ideologies. People who advocate this war should be subjected to the images, to digest them…so that a truer picture of the totality of what is going on is absorbed. Not just rhetoric…]. Recently, it was reported by the press that we had absolutely no idea of Bin Laden’s whereabouts. This is disheartening, particularly because Bush promised those victims of 9.11 that he would bring OBL to justice. Certainly there is a larger war taking place, but Bin Laden is a contributor to this war if not still a major player, and to remove him should be just as significant as removing a Hitler or Saddam.
To me, it seems that what Bush is striving for is making a connection between Bin Laden and Iraq, but simultaneously Bush declares that he is not concerned with Bin Laden. This seems to be two notions at odds. [Ponder: He uses Bin Laden as a way of justifying Iraq]. The entire war has smelled fishy. It has seemed from day one that Bush has had his eyes set on Iraq, needing a way to go in much like FDR needed a Pearl Harbor [the intelligence indicating 9.11 was about to take place is overwhelming]. What is further disheartening: we are on the verge of declaring further wars, wars that will cripple our economy, and leave thousands of our young dead. We fiscally do not have the money or the men/women to wage war against the Middle East. This war, rather than protecting our states and country, will in the end produce a poverty not dissimilar to the 3rd world. Project the spending necessary to carry out a 50 year war…
What are your thoughts?
Comment by Diran — September 6, 2006 @ 3:41 pm
Lots to respond to. For what it’s worth, I just wanted to point out some irony I see in the President’s recent speech. It was meant to be humorous. Anyway…
The Neo-Cons in the Bush administration have made no secret that they wanted to oust Saddam for years—it was a key agenda point to the Project for the New American Century (PNAC) since the 1990’s (see the Wikipedia entry for PNAC members who are a part of the Bush administration). Many thought the US should have finished off Saddam at the end of the first Gulf War and called for a new invasion during the Clinton years. PNAC and others have long considered Iraq key to securing US interests in the Middle East. I think that the Bush administration did use September 11 as a go-ahead to carry out their agenda regarding Iraq. I won’t go so far to think that they allowed the terrorist attacks to happen even though there was intelligence warning of it. If I remember correctly, the 9/11 Commission has stated that it was the lack of communication and lack of ability to communicate between various agencies that allowed some of the signs to slip through the cracks. That was a matter of incompetence and neglect on the part of the US and pure evil on the part of the terrorists, not the willful machinations or aquiesence of the administration, in my opinion.
I agree that Bush has recently used Bin Laden to justify Iraq, in a way that I find confusing. He has recently admitted that Iraq had nothing to do with September 11 (see here). I’ll say this, I don’t think that Iraq was the prize for Bin Laden prior to the invasion, but that it has become a battle ground between the jihadist and democratic ideologies now that we’re there. I take the politically untenable stance that I was against the US’ invasion, but that I think it would be pre-mature for us to leave now. My opinion is that if we leave now, Iraq will be in far worse shape and that the Middle East will be even more susceptible to the ideologies of the jihadists.
I would be hesitant of using the word “simultaneously” since the quotations I offered were four years apart. Though the administration keeps saying this series of speeches is not meant to be political, I am dubious. I think what Bush is doing is trying to link one of his and his party’s greatest strengths with one of his current weaknesses—the President is trying to link the perception that he and the GOP are strong on homeland security and fighting the War on Terror with the perception that the operation in Iraq is failing. That is, he’s saying, “People like me on X, but people don’t like Y. Well, Y is actually a part of X.” The thing is that public perception is seeing the War on Terror and Iraq more and more as separate issues.
I think we are in this for the long-haul. It’s going to be a costly war, or whatever we want to call it, Congress still hasn’t declared anything officially. I agree with Rumsfeld in theory that it is a different enemy and will require different thinking. I just find it odd that when he calls it a new enemy that he references old enemies and old means of fighting those enemies so much. My arm chair assumption is that it is a war of ideas and policing will more important than fighting.
That’s a long response.
Comment by Tyler Watson — September 6, 2006 @ 4:41 pm
“The thing is that public perception is seeing the War on Terror and Iraq more and more as separate issues.”
Do you feel this is the case?
That is what I am getting at when I say the war with Iraq “always smelled fishy.” Bush presents a convincing case. I think of Palpatine. He was so convincing. “Yes, but use your feelings Anakin something is out of place.”
We can discuss it forever. Mount mountains of evidence pro and con. My intuition doesn’t want to believe Bush. Many will say I put too much into such intuition. At this pint though, honestly, I really am to a point that I am nautious at the thought of all of it. I almost don’t want to talk about it anymore.
Comment by Diran — September 6, 2006 @ 6:14 pm
In answer to your question, I think that by and large the wars on terror and Iraq started out as separate issues, but have joined more closely as time has passed. (I have actually moved opposite to the opinion polls.) I am deeply concerned about what would happen in the Middle East if Iraq deteriorates even more. That is not to say I support the way that the US has handled and is handling Iraq, but that I think I agree with their basic argument that Iraq is important in the overall to the War on Terror. I don’t want to conflate the two subjects, but I think they are linked.
Comment by Tyler Watson — September 7, 2006 @ 3:25 pm