NationStates Jolt Archive

Seeing that right now, the world, not just the US is in a "War on Terrorism' is there any end to it? Can anyone truly beat an ideology?

Many people bring up communism and yet there is stillcountries that have Communistic governments and do very well.

So, I ask the population, is there any way to win?

If so what may it be? Try to be realistic hear. We aren't going to nuke the middle east into the stone age anytime soon. And that just will not work.

The Khaos Project

No, it can't be won. They aren't even trying to.

Conspiracy theory anyone? The war on terror is to distract us from...

*Men in dark suits absail through the roof and abduct writer*

Seeing that right now, the world, not just the US is in a "War on Terrorism' is there any end to it?

Literally, there will be no end to the War on Terrorism - I've heard from intel officials that the plan would be to continue to make victories against the terrorists, until the threat from which it stems (since it is so abstract an ideal) becomes isolated, and maintain vigilance (intel-wise) in those areas

It seems illogical to fight terrorism with violence

Not completely. Never. There will always be people who stand behind these ideas, and as you said you will not nuke the entire Mid-East- let alone all the terrorist in Canada, USA and Europe, would you?
And with every terrorist you kill, 10 rise.
The point of the war agaist terrorism is to make them irrelevant, prevent them from being a real threat.
Will it succeed? Heh. Days will tell, I think that here, for once, we're stuck in an un-win-able war.

TWAT (The War Against Terroism) is quite pointless when you approach it the way that America is. In this form, it's already lost the war.

In order to beat TWAT, you would need to reach to the hearts and minds of the "terroists."

But you can't reach the hearts and minds of terrorists. That's the reason they become terrorists. Their ideology is so different from the majority that this is the only way they have to fight for their ideals.

But you can't reach the hearts and minds of terrorists. That's the reason they become terrorists. Their ideology is so different from the majority that this is the only way they have to fight for their ideals.
This is the type of thinking that will condemn us to even more terrorism. Until we try to understand and address the despair and desperation that drives people to such extemes we will never 'win' the 'War on Terrorism'.

This is the type of thinking that will condemn us to even more terrorism. Until we try to understand and address the despair and desperation that drives people to such extemes we will never 'win' the 'War on Terrorism'.

And how do you propose to do that?

This is the type of thinking that will condemn us to even more terrorism. Until we try to understand and address the despair and desperation that drives people to such extemes we will never 'win' the 'War on Terrorism'.

But that's the problem. We can't understand the despair and desperation. In the case of Al Qaeda(sp?) terrorists, they hate the western world for corrupting them. Can you understand that? I sure can't. I can understand why they don't want the west dictating politics and such but not how we're "corrupting" them. Although equally bad but much easier to handle were the terrorists who actually had demands/ransoms that could be dealt with rather than just crashing into planes with buildings to make a statement. It works both ways. One person does something that the other doesn't like so the other person retaliates. This causes more hatred and it just continues. I would like to know how to solve this little problem.

Terrorism will always exist against the U.S, until we change our foriegn policies that inspire such acts.

Like oh, say......building military bases on thier Holy Land.

They dont hate us becuase we eat Big Macs, and drive SUV's, they dont care if we live in big houses and walk our 1000 dollar purebred dogs...

They hate us because we invade them, take thier oil, or whatever, build a military base on top of thier Mosques, and then occupy thier country.

THATS why they hate our guts, and thier gonna keep on hating us, until we cut that shit out.

It could easilly be won. We just have to adopt a Hobbesian or Machievellian outlook on the war and go all out. You can't have any bullshit about a PC war. Or trying to be sensesitive to peoples feelings. If you have to kill every man woman and child in a town to get destroy a terrorist cell. If we have to smash a tank through the side of a mosque to get rid of the militants so be it, then we should drag out every muslim sacred symbol into the street and burn it and let our troops take the gold from them. Then tell the moderates if they don't police there own radicals we are going to do the same to there holy sights so they better get there damn act straight.

Contrary to popular belief, I'm pretty sure the US hasn't built a base on a Mosque. There is a Mosque on the site of the old Jewish temple in Jeruselem though...Well that can't be helped nowadays but still, your statement is false. And no, we haven't gotten much oil out of this invasion. I'm guessing it's hurt oil exports more than helped. Bush may have invaded for oil as some of you say, but if he did, it didn't work. I may get flamed for this but the idea of a "holy land" is meaningless to me. Sure, the place may be important to your religion but worshipping the ground it's set at? Come on...That's liek saying you should worship the air because you're breathing the particles your ancestors once inhaled. That's true by the way. Weird molecule spread thing.

oil output is only at 10-25% efficiency because I believe they are still negiotating how the profits shoudl be distrubuted.

Terrorism will always exist against the U.S, until we change our foriegn policies that inspire such acts.

Like oh, say......building military bases on thier Holy Land.

They dont hate us becuase we eat Big Macs, and drive SUV's, they dont care if we live in big houses and walk our 1000 dollar purebred dogs...

They hate us because we invade them, take thier oil, or whatever, build a military base on top of thier Mosques, and then occupy thier country.

THATS why they hate our guts, and thier gonna keep on hating us, until we cut that shit out.

They do hate Western Culture.

It could easilly be won. We just have to adopt a Hobbesian or Machievellian outlook on the war and go all out. You can't have any bullshit about a PC war. Or trying to be sensesitive to peoples feelings. If you have to kill every man woman and child in a town to get destroy a terrorist cell. If we have to smash a tank through the side of a mosque to get rid of the militants so be it, then we should drag out every muslim sacred symbol into the street and burn it and let our troops take the gold from them. Then tell the moderates if they don't police there own radicals we are going to do the same to there holy sights so they better get there damn act straight.

Then we get nuked, we nuke back, and the whole world goes to shit.

About three days later, Jesus appears, and says "Fuck, you guys! Dammit! You're supposed to wait for me first! I swear, when I judge you, I'm gonna make a LOT more of you go to hell. YOU just had to go off and screw it all up."

Woot!(sarcastic woot) Someone's taken the doctrines of the Warhammer 40,000 Imperium to heart. I have a very long quote about doing exactly what Belem said but in 40k terms. Yes, you could "win" that way but due to a massive decrease in world opinion if you tried that, you'd have another world war. It's true, that's the only way to stamp out all traces of terrorism but that's also genocide.

They do hate Western Culture.


Bah! thats a side issue, and hardly important to them.

Its just another smaller example of our gluttonous ways, to them.

The looting, killing, and occupation are what pisses them off and want to destroy us.

Then we get nuked, we nuke back, and the whole world goes to shit.

About three days later, Jesus appears, and says "Fuck, you guys! Dammit! You're supposed to wait for me first! I swear, when I judge you, I'm gonna make a LOT more of you go to hell. YOU just had to go off and screw it all up."

sure and whos going to nuke us? which one of the middle east states has not only nuclear weapons and ICBMs capable of reaching America? Only Israel has nuclear weapons and there reach is on macro regional.

Woot!(sarcastic woot) Someone's taken the doctrines of the Warhammer 40,000 Imperium to heart. I have a very long quote about doing exactly what Belem said but in 40k terms. Yes, you could "win" that way but due to a massive decrease in world opinion if you tried that, you'd have another world war. It's true, that's the only way to stamp out all traces of terrorism but that's also genocide.

lol thats from 40k interesting. thats one RPG I never got into basically cause my friends didnt want to spend 200 dollars trying to build up armies.


Using a quote from Stalin: "and how many tank divisions does world opinion have?"

sometimes genocide is neccessary

sure and whos going to nuke us? which one of the middle east states has not only nuclear weapons and ICBMs capable of reaching America? Only Israel has nuclear weapons and there reach is on macro regional.


You should do some research.

There are currently 11 un accounted-for handheld nuclear devices in the world.

A man like Bin Laden, who had scads of money to purchase one of these....

...odds are pretty good that someone who really hates the united states has one of these devices.

Bah! thats a side issue, and hardly important to them.

Its just another smaller example of our gluttonous ways, to them.

The looting, killing, and occupation are what pisses them off and want to destroy us.

No, its a key issue. Western Culture and Islamic Culture will never agree...ever. Al Qaeda is fighting against Western Culture and its perceived influences.

No, its a key issue. Western Culture and Islamic Culture will never agree...ever. Al Qaeda is fighting against Western Culture and its perceived influences.


I garauntee you that they hate what we have done to them for the last 50 years, much more than what we eat for dinner, or what kind of houses we live in.

Dont delude yourself.

You should do some research.

There are currently 11 un accounted-for handheld nuclear devices in the world.

A man like Bin Laden, who had scads of money to purchase one of these....

...odds are pretty good that someone who really hates the united states has one of these devices.

ok of these 11 un accounted for nukes if they are in the hands of terrorists they would be used anyway.

Also Im pretty sure handheld nuclear devices have a relatively short shelflife being only a year or two. And these handheld weapons are hardly a massive nuclear attack the average handheld nuke has blast radius of only a few blocks not to mention they would be easilly found if someone tried to bring them into an airport.

I garauntee you that they hate what we have done to them for the last 50 years, much more than what we eat for dinner, or what kind of houses we live in.

Dont delude yourself.


hmm lets see for the past fifty years we have given them billions of dollars for oil. educated there children. Brought them out of a virtual stone age where they actually used camel piss as a hair gel. Yeah we really hurt them alot.

They are just vehement and bitter that for the past 500 years not one invention, or great scientific achievement has come out of the middle east. They became backwards and inepts and were surpassed in power by the rest.

I'm guessing the jealousy issue is pretty high up there though. Masked by religious dogma. Perverted and warped religious dogma I might add. Most religions are generally peaceful. Major grievances can be seen as a reason to fight according to the religions. The problem is who is allowed to say when something is bad enough to fight for it. And I hope that grammaticaly incorrect statement made a shred of sense. Why would the Taliban not like us? No, they're not really contenders in the grand scheme of things anymore but the US helped them when the Soviet Union attacked. We put Saddam into power. Well Saddam never really did anything to us but he was a jerk anyway. We helped Iran. Really, the worst(from their point of view) thing we did to start terrorist attacks was support Israel. How were we the agressors to begin with?

ok of these 11 un accounted for nukes if they are in the hands of terrorists they would be used anyway.

Also Im pretty sure handheld nuclear devices have a relatively short shelflife being only a year or two. And these handheld weapons are hardly a massive nuclear attack the average handheld nuke has blast radius of only a few blocks not to mention they would be easilly found if someone tried to bring them into an airport.


What makes you think that you cant use other refined uranium, that many other countries willingly sell...thus "recharging" the shelf-life of these bombs.
Also, you underestimate the yield of these weapons, not all of them are "low-yeild".

Also, what makes you think that these would be delivered by plane?

Have you ever seen how many shipping crates get shipped into the U.S everyday?

Its impossible to search them all.

Entire families sneak through the borders this way.

Taking a briefcase along with you is no major accomplishment.

I'm guessing the jealousy issue is pretty high up there though. Masked by religious dogma. Perverted and warped religious dogma I might add. Most religions are generally peaceful. Major grievances can be seen as a reason to fight according to the religions. The problem is who is allowed to say when something is bad enough to fight for it. And I hope that grammaticaly incorrect statement made a shred of sense. Why would the Taliban not like us? No, they're not really contenders in the grand scheme of things anymore but the US helped them when the Soviet Union attacked. We put Saddam into power. Well Saddam never really did anything to us but he was a jerk anyway. We helped Iran. Really, the worst(from their point of view) thing we did to start terrorist attacks was support Israel. How were we the agressors to begin with?

just a note: we helped the Shah we didnt help the Ayatollahs. Thats why Iran is the only other country to have F-14s I believe. But They dont have any firing triggers for the computer system so they are useless since the engineers removed them from the planes once the ayatollah took over.

hmm lets see for the past fifty years we have given them billions of dollars for oil. educated there children. Brought them out of a virtual stone age where they actually used camel piss as a hair gel. Yeah we really hurt them alot.

They are just vehement and bitter that for the past 500 years not one invention, or great scientific achievement has come out of the middle east. They became backwards and inepts and were surpassed in power by the rest.

Belem has a point. The middle east used to be a powerhouse for medicinal advancement but most progress in scientific and industrial fields has stopped. They say that we're corrupting them but they allowed themselves to be "corrupted" by Western culture. Why use violence against us now when the mistake was theirs?

hmm lets see for the past fifty years we have given them billions of dollars for oil. educated there children. Brought them out of a virtual stone age where they actually used camel piss as a hair gel. Yeah we really hurt them alot.

They are just vehement and bitter that for the past 500 years not one invention, or great scientific achievement has come out of the middle east. They became backwards and inepts and were surpassed in power by the rest.


Right, and this was told to you by the very people who want you to support Bush's little war.

What makes you think that you cant use other refined uranium, that many other countries willingly sell...thus "recharging" the shelf-life of these bombs.
Also, you underestimate the yield of these weapons, not all of them are "low-yeild".

Also, what makes you think that these would be delivered by plane?

Have you ever seen how many shipping crates get shipped into the U.S everyday?

Its impossible to search them all.

Entire families sneak through the borders this way.

Taking a briefcase along with you is no major accomplishment.

The sale of refined uranium is highly highly regulated. Sure you could get unrefined some easier but it is still extremely difficult. Then you have the job of making it weapons grade and lacking massive machinery you have to do it the dirty method of basically bleeching the bomb which will probably result in killing everyone in the installation.

On average the suitcasebombs known to exist are between a .01 and a .1 on the kiliton scale.

Its possible to bring it through via shipping crates and since im not familar with port security I cant comment on that.

But walking it across the border still requires getting it to this hemisphere.

Right, and this was told to you by the very people who want you to support Bush's little war.

no this is all factual.


In the 50s and 60s arab princes sent there sons to Europe and America to be educated in business and engineering. Im pretty sure this was done by the oil companies so they didnt have to send as many people overseas to operate the wells. Once they were educated thats when oil prices went up because they realized that oil wasn't as worthless as they thought. So we educated them and gave them money for something they considered worthless 30 years before.

It just seems so easy to sneak stuff into countries and into various hemispheres. I'm actually surpried by the lack of terrorist attacks. Pleasantly surprised.

It just seems so easy to sneak stuff into countries and into various hemispheres. I'm actually surpried by the lack of terrorist attacks. Pleasantly surprised.

Well the most smuggling the U.S. sees is drugs and theres a difference in sneaking in a kilo of cocaine and sneaking in a tactical nuclear device. You can hide the kilo in your colon, I think you would have a kinda messy result if you tried to hide a nuke there.

But it'd make our lives much easier.

Terrorism will always exist against the U.S, until we change our foriegn policies that inspire such acts.

Like oh, say......building military bases on thier Holy Land.

They dont hate us becuase we eat Big Macs, and drive SUV's, they dont care if we live in big houses and walk our 1000 dollar purebred dogs...

They hate us because we invade them, take thier oil, or whatever, build a military base on top of thier Mosques, and then occupy thier country.

THATS why they hate our guts, and thier gonna keep on hating us, until we cut that shit out.

Don't forget the part of how americans do threat the terrorists...

I heard on the television about the americans do really wrong things with them.

no this is all factual.


In the 50s and 60s arab princes sent there sons to Europe and America to be educated in business and engineering. Im pretty sure this was done by the oil companies so they didnt have to send as many people overseas to operate the wells. Once they were educated thats when oil prices went up because they realized that oil wasn't as worthless as they thought. So we educated them and gave them money for something they considered worthless 30 years before.


No No, you missed my point.

I wasnt denying these events took place, what I was implying is that these people dont see it like that, or care about the good things we've done for them, they only care about the awful shit, and theres plenty of that to see.

The Right wants to stress the issue of thier hatred towards our culture, although they minimize the impact that our horrible deeds have impacted thier lives.

Bush wants you to support him becuase "They hate our way of life", not becuase "Weve screwed them over for a very long time, and now thier sick of it, and fighting back."

I garauntee you that they hate what we have done to them for the last 50 years, much more than what we eat for dinner, or what kind of houses we live in.

Dont delude yourself.

There is more to culture than what we buy and what we eat. The difference in culture and beliefs is what makes Islamic fundamentalists dislike the West. Therefore it is a key reason for the conflict we are in today.

Other than your idea of stomping on Mosques, how have we screwed them over for a long time?

They do hate our way of life. In Afghanistan being rebellious was listening to American 80s rock music and thats what was outlawed. They hate us because they are envious of our power not because we screwed them over.

The US aren't fighting one but two wars at the moment: a war against terror in Afghanistan and a war for terror in Iraq. The latter is more succesful, unfortunately.

Right, and this was told to you by the very people who want you to support Bush's little war.

Its actually true. Islamic fundamentalists and governments that support them are keeping their countries and therefore their people living in conditions that are well behind those of the west. They then try to say that it is the West that is holding them back to generate anti-West sentiments and as a result terrorism.

Its actually true. Islamic fundamentalists and governments that support them are keeping their countries and therefore their people living in conditions that are well behind those of the west. They then try to say that it is the West that is holding them back to generate anti-West sentiments and as a result terrorism.

This is actually true if you listen to some of the bull **** coming from the mouths of the ayatollahs. This is something you can't deny.

This is actually true if you listen to some of the bull **** coming from the mouths of the ayatollahs. This is something you can't deny.

I wasn't denying anything. My post was a statement which, from what I can ascertain, agrees with the comments you are making.

And I was agreeing with you for boredom's sake.

and the person who "can't deny" is backwoods although they seem to have ignored us

and the person who "can't deny" is backwoods although they seem to have ignored us


Say what?

cant deny what?

What was I ignoring you about?

Terrorism is not an ideology, it's a method.

Say what?

cant deny what?

What was I ignoring you about?

hehe. you just stopped posting. read the above posts.

Other than your idea of stomping on Mosques, how have we screwed them over for a long time?


Oh.

That.

Well, for starters, how about our propping up of ruthless despots that torture and abuse thier own people?

Hussein for instance....who do you think put him in power?

That's the thing. We put these people into power. However, it's not those who were opressed under those regimes that started the terrorist attacks but the regimes themselves.

sure and whos going to nuke us? which one of the middle east states has not only nuclear weapons and ICBMs capable of reaching America? Only Israel has nuclear weapons and there reach is on macro regional.

So that's all right then. Why don't we invade Israel? They have ignored loads of UN resolutions, and that's one of the reasons we were given for invading Iraq. Oh yes. The US funds Israel. Hmmm.

Other than your idea of stomping on Mosques, how have we screwed them over for a long time? Bin Laden started targeting the West after US troops were stationed in Saudi Arabia.

Basically, he wants the West out of the Islamic world.

That's the thing. We put these people into power. However, it's not those who were opressed under those regimes that started the terrorist attacks but the regimes themselves.


Not entirely...

In Afganistan for instance, we have placed Karzai in office.
However, the real power in Afghanistan comes from the local warlords.
The Bush administration has a standing deal that allows them to leave him alone, and leting him rule the urban areas.

What do they get in return?

We dont burn down thier opium fields.
They sell the opium, and heroin.....and buy more guns.
However, where does this opium, and heroin end up?

In the schoolyards all over the world.

How do you think the taliban made thier money?

Bin Laden started targeting the West after US troops were stationed in Saudi Arabia.

Basically, he wants the West out of the Islamic world.

Well it's not his choice. It's the choice of the government of Saudi Arabia. The problem with some of these governments is that they're dictatorships so the people have no say. The people get pissed and start blowing us up because they think we're the ones opressing them. It's not us, it's their governments.

Not entirely...

In Afganistan for instance, we have placed Karzai in office.
However, the real power in Afghanistan comes from the local warlords.
The Bush administration has a standing deal that allows them to leave him alone, and leting him rule the urban areas.

What do they get in return?

We dont burn down thier opium fields.
They sell the opium, and heroin.....and buy more guns.
However, where does this opium, and heroin end up?

In the schoolyards all over the world.

How do you think the taliban made thier money?

So shouldn't this make them like us? We let them have their drugs.

So shouldn't this make them like us? We let them have their drugs.


Now ask the people who are oppressed by these ruthless warlords, how much they love us.....

So terrorize the warlords...Or is it because we're infidels?

So that's all right then. Why don't we invade Israel? They have ignored loads of UN resolutions, and that's one of the reasons we were given for invading Iraq. Oh yes. The US funds Israel. Hmmm.

Nothing wrong with what Israel does. They should have our full support U.N. be damned if we just let Israel do whatever they want the mideast would be a better place.