It looks obvious

It is common knowledge that government use the fear to promote problematic regulations. It is easier to limits one’s freedom when warning about the “enemy in the gates”. It is much easier to pass laws such as the Patriot Act, or to suspend the Habeas Corpus when the government argue that these are necessary measure to prevent terror attacks. But since it is such an efficient tool to pass legislation it is being used to pass any kind of legislation:

The U.S. Justice Department seems to believe that if you tell a big enough lie, people will listen. Here’s the latest: Attorney General Michael Mukasey claims that terrorists sell pirated software as a way to finance their operations, without presenting a shred of evidence for his case. He’s doing it to push through a controversial piece of legislation that’s bad for you.

[...]

So why is Mukasey trying to convince people there’s a link between software piracy and terrorism, even though one doesn’t exist? To force Congress to pass controversial intellectual property (IP) legislation that would increase IP penalties, increase police power, set up a new agency to investigate IP theft, and more.

This yet another, small, example why War is the Health of the State

I just finish reading the testimony of General William E. Odom, a retired 3-star general and former Director of the NSA, given yesterday before the Senate Foreign Relation Committe. In the testimony General Odom refute some of the more ridiculous, and yet very popular, arguments that favor continuing the war in Iraq. He provides a fascinating analysis of the current situation and the reasons we should withdrawal as soon as possible. I strongly recommend reading the entire testimony ,it isn’t that long and it is worth your time.

One had to wonder how Giuliani established his public image as an national security expert. It is quite interesting how Giuliani, and his PR campaign, create such an image from his rule as the NY Mayor in the disaster recovery efforts after the terror attacks of 9/11/2001. It is undisputable that his behavior, and leadership, were crucial in the hard time after the attack, but that alone doesn’t qualify a person as a national security expert.

Nevertheless, Giuliani is a front runner in the white house 2008 campaign and his world view, his concept of the world and the strategy he will adopt, might be the one that will shape our near future. Although it is hard to decipher the real agenda of a politician, mostly when they are standing to election, it isn’t impossible. Giuliani provides such opportunity in a review of his doctrine for Foreign Affairs magazine.

Sadly, however, under the cover of promised strategy change I find no new hope, and no new concept. Giuliani’s doctrine accept the neo-conservative agenda, that the US should maintain its superpower policy and worse, that its the US rule and interest to promote democracy all over the world. With these assumptions as the base of Giuliani’s agenda his strategy is locked into more US military involvement combine with economical and diplomatic efforts to support this failed concept.

It is also interesting to note that Giuliani, the "nation’s security expert", interpretation - or for the benefit of the doubt - his description -  historical events wrong. It is hard to believe that anyone can describe this assertion has serious analysis:

America must remember one of the lessons of the Vietnam War. Then, as now, we fought a war with the wrong strategy for several years. And then, as now, we corrected course and began to show real progress. Many historians today believe that by about 1972 we and our South Vietnamese partners had succeeded in defeating the Vietcong insurgency and in setting South Vietnam on a path to political self-sufficiency. But America then withdrew its support, allowing the communist North to conquer the South. The consequences were dire, and not only in Vietnam: numerous deaths in places such as the killing fields of Cambodia, a newly energized and expansionist Soviet Union, and a weaker America. The consequences of abandoning Iraq would be worse.

The American strategy was to be able to withdraw from Vietnam, nobody had any illusion of sustainable victory by 1972. Moreover, the killing fields of Cambodia are much more likely to attribute to the American strategy than to the growing influence of Vietnam’s version of communism, or the legendary domino-effect. It took the US army more than a decade to rebuild and recover from the Vietnam disaster, and it was in no shape to confront the Russian’s Army in the early 70’s. But facts and serious analysis are much less interesting than wishful thinking.

If anything, we don’t need another 4 years of neo-conservatism shaping our foreign policy.

We had been asked to make sacrifices because of the war. We had to give up our liberties as a necessary measure to defeat the fundamentalist terrorism. We were supposed to accept torture as a valid tool to defeat our enemies. And we were called to send the American army to shape the Middle East as a western liberal democracy, convinced that the illusion of building democracy with bayonet is not only a must for our national security, and the security of the western world, but also a real possibility.
And now, years into the war, the successful results are obvious:

Technorati Tags: The War on Terror, Iraq, Al-Quida, Bush, The Patroit Act, Habeas Corpus

Justifying his position, opposing a withdrawal from Iraq, the President often argue that fighting the terrorist in Iraq prevents them from attacking us here in the US.  A much more simplistic argument than arguing, and being wrong, that building democracy in Iraq can trigger a major change in the Middle-East, which in turn will improve the US national security.

In order for the argument, that the American present in Iraq is preventing the terrorist from attacking in the US, to be true some conditions has to exist. Such condition can include - importance for the specific territory as a base for operations, logistical and financial support etc; It might be a physical barrier (like the security zone Israel created in Lebanon between 1982 and 2000) or it preventing the terrorist from being able to initiate attack. But none of these condition exist when discussing the importance or Iraq. In addition, between the first attack on the WTC - in 1993 - and the second attack on September 2001. In this period Muslim’s terror organizations, mainly Al-Qaeda, carried several attack against American targets - none of them in the US.

But we missed one condition - motivation,  which makes the President’s argument to be not completely wrong, and Ironically this is much worse.  Al Qaeda focus in Iraq, not because our presence there prevents them from attacking in the US (I’m sure that other measure that are being taken making terrorist attack in the US harder), but because it is more beneficial.

The US presence in Iraq providing quality targets to the terrorist and it provide them with an opportunity to win a strategic victory.  The attempt to change the Middle-East into a democracy, by forcing Iraq to change, seems appealing on paper. But the fragility of such attempt, and developing no alternatives, created a major opportunity to weaken the American influence and to gain support for anti-western ideologies. Therefore it is more important to these organizations to defeat the American efforts in Iraq, as it will carry very high return.

But what will happen when the US will stop delaying the inevitable and withdrawal from Iraq? would the region fall into the hands of Osama Bin Laden and alike? I doubt. Very much like the Domino Theory , the Middle-East will not fall piece by piece into the hand of the fundamentalist. However, the US will find that it has much less ability to protect its interests and that other forces emerge to balance it. It might be some European countries - like France and Russia, and very likely we will see more of china.

And again, short sighted policy aimed to achieve a win all victory is found to be far less effective than more patient approaches. Or better, what would happened would this administration will adopt a policy of abstinence that they like so much.  

While I was cheering to the decision to only use eavesdropping with court warrant a new threat to civil liberties emerged:

 This isn’t the first time this administration passed laws and regulations that are in direct contradiction with civil liberties: The Patriot Act, The military Commission Act and more. and Once and Again the administration come with more reasons why it should limit, slightly more, the same liberties it put on the flag of war. I do not understand why we insist on trials for terrorist instead of holding them as prisoners of war. However, once we decided that we are going to trial terrorist we should not ease the requirement of guilt proof. We can’t win a war to "defend liberty", while destroying its meaning at the same time.

Technorati Tags: Human Rights - Guantanamo Bay - War on Terror - Liberty

Although I don’t agree with the editorial on the WSJ today, I have to admit that it has a good point:

The temptation in many quarters in the West is to assume that Crazy Mahmoud can’t really mean what he says; he must be acting out for “domestic” political reasons. And even if he does mean what he says about wiping Israel off the map, well, Europeans and Americans don’t need to worry about that. Call us conservative, or even neoconservative, but when a leader relentlessly seeking weapons of mass destruction starts issuing apocalyptic ultimatums, our instinct is to believe him.

Believe him or not, what question about should we do remain completely open.

Technorati Tags: Ahmadinejad - Iran - Access of evil - War on Terror - Nuclear Weapon

We sent them to fight over seas. We sent them to risk their life for causes they didn’t choose. We ought to listen to them when they are back.

Kevin Tillman joined the Army with his brother Pat in 2002, and they served together in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Pat was killed in Afghanistan on April 22, 2004. Kevin, who was discharged in 2005, has written a powerful, must-read document.

Technorati Tags: War on Terror - Human Rights - Liberty

Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, public support of the Pope’s view is very important. It might be a sign to many other in Europe to join. I wonder who will be the first, non-religious, leader to speak out.

Memri published a new documentary video about the Arabs and Iranian reaction to the 9-11 terror attack. 

Memri is doing important work by translating, mostly from Arabic, media documents and bringing into the readers attentions many unknown aspects of the Arab world.

The Documentary can be also watched in YouTube in 3 parts ( 1 , 2 and 3)