Are you kidding me? WOW, the world is saved and all the ones out to get us are magically going to lay down their arms. All I have to say is.....time will prove this administration to be TERRIBLY WRONG.
White House: 'War on terrorism' is over 'Jihadists' and 'global war' no longer acceptable terms
It's official. The U.S. is no longer engaged in a "war on terrorism." Neither is it fighting "jihadists" or in a "global war."
President Obama's top homeland security and counterterrorism official took all three terms off the table of acceptable words inside the White House during a speech Thursday at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank.
"The President does not describe this as a 'war on terrorism,'" said John Brennan, head of the White House homeland security office, who outlined a "new way of seeing" the fight against terrorism.
The only terminology that Mr. Brennan said the administration is using is that the U.S. is "at war with al Qaeda."
"We are at war with al Qaeda," he said. "We are at war with its violent extremist allies who seek to carry on al Qaeda's murderous agenda."
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in March that the administration was not using the term "war on terror" but no specific directive had come from the White House itself. Mr. Obama himself used the term "war on terror" on Jan. 23, his fourth day as president, but has not used it since.
Mr. Brennan's speech was aimed at outlining ways in which the Obama administration intends to undermine the "upstream" factors that create an environment in which terrorists are bred.
The president's adviser talked about increasing aid to foreign governments for building up their militaries and social and democratic institutions, but provided few details about how the White House will do that.
He was specific about ways in which Mr. Obama believes words influence the way America prosecutes the fight against terrorism.
Mr. Brennan said that to say the U.S. is fighting "jihadists" is wrongheaded because it is using "a legitimate term, 'jihad,' meaning to purify oneself or to wage a holy struggle for a moral goal" which "risks giving these murderers the religious legitimacy they desperately seek but in no way deserve."
"Worse, it risks reinforcing the idea that the United States is somehow at war with Islam itself," Mr. Brennan said.
As for the "war on terrorism," Mr. Brennan said the administration is not going to say that "because 'terrorism' is but a tactic — a means to an end, which in al Qaedas case is global domination by an Islamic caliphate."
"You can never fully defeat a tactic like terrorism any more than you can defeat the tactic of war itself," Mr. Brennan said.
He also said that to call the fight against al Qaeda and other terrorist groups — which he said remains "a dynamic and evolving threat" — should not be called "a global war."
While Mr. Brennan acknowledged that al Qaeda and its affiliates are active in countries throughout the Middle East and Africa, he also said that "portraying this as a 'global' war risks reinforcing the very image that al Qaeda seeks to project of itself — that it is a highly organized, global entity capable of replacing sovereign nations with a global caliphate."
The president's adviser said that in discussing counter terror operations, Mr. Obama "has encouraged us to be even more aggressive, even more proactive, and even more innovative" than they have been proposing.
But Mr. Brennan lamented "inflammatory rhetoric, hyperbole, and intellectual narrowness" surrounding the national security debate and said Mr. Obama has views that are "nuanced, not simplistic; practical, not ideological."
madcow states..."Are you kidding me? WOW, the world is saved and all the ones out to get us are magically going to lay down their arms. All I have to say is.....time will prove this administration to be TERRIBLY WRONG"
lol...and you're the expert...
Posted by CashCowMoo on :
Considering I have lived it first hand, im much more informed personally than you jordan. You are so far up Obamas rear end you cant make a realistic observation on something if it questions his administration. Put the kool aid down you have had enough.
For YOUR personal information check out this site Jordan and tell me how well you think THESE people will react to "unclinch your fist"
Only if your referring to your own posts. Most of them seem to be the work of a sick individual. And why do you feel the need to attack jordan to get your point across? Maybe you should pull your head out of the GOP rectum and take a look around without the blinders on. Whattya say? Can't hurt. Maybe you'll actually understand that the article only says they are changing the terminology that is to be used. Guess you missed that part huh? Just read the headline as usual again? Wake up dude!
Posted by glassman on :
cash, i've been posting about the mistake of calling it a war for years now.
by declaring war on terrorists? you do elevate them to the status of a nation.
they don't deserve that status.
the terrorists are benefitted by the declaration of war. it helps them recruit.
how did we end the Iraqi insurgency? by hiring the footsoldiers away from alqueda.
if you want to win against terrorism you have to reduce their status to scumbag criminal in the eyes of the people they seek support from, not elevate them to freedom fighter.
who cares what they call it as long as they are wiping them out?
Posted by CashCowMoo on :
Pagan stop crying.
Glass, only part of the insurgency was won that way. It was called the awakening where your tax dollars were spread all over anbar province to hire disloyal al queda. They go to the highest bidder. The surge helped kill off a lot of the troublemakers. I have to disagree with you on that. I see what you are saying and it make sense, but it wont work. If this is NOT a global war/fight on terrorism then what is it?
Posted by CashCowMoo on :
quote:Originally posted by Pagan: "Is this some sort of sick joke?"
Only if your referring to your own posts. Most of them seem to be the work of a sick individual. And why do you feel the need to attack jordan to get your point across? Maybe you should pull your head out of the GOP rectum and take a look around without the blinders on. Whattya say? Can't hurt. Maybe you'll actually understand that the article only says they are changing the terminology that is to be used. Guess you missed that part huh? Just read the headline as usual again? Wake up dude!
I voted independent this last election so I dont know where you get a lot of this big GOP monster conspiracy.
Posted by Pagan on :
quote:Originally posted by CashCowMoo:
quote:Originally posted by Pagan: "Is this some sort of sick joke?"
Only if your referring to your own posts. Most of them seem to be the work of a sick individual. And why do you feel the need to attack jordan to get your point across? Maybe you should pull your head out of the GOP rectum and take a look around without the blinders on. Whattya say? Can't hurt. Maybe you'll actually understand that the article only says they are changing the terminology that is to be used. Guess you missed that part huh? Just read the headline as usual again? Wake up dude!
I voted independent this last election so I dont know where you get a lot of this big GOP monster conspiracy.
Because you espouse the right wing GOP view. If you actually did vote independent, what candidate? Ron Paul?
Posted by CashCowMoo on :
Ron Paul wasnt even on the ticket in my state. I figured a write in, but knew that would be more worthless than Nader.
I couldnt vote for McCain, and damn sure couldnt vote for Obama.
Did any of you even go to the link I listed above? Just go and check out the jihadist videos and manuals and ask yourself if Obama was right in pacifying that word.
Changing the words around, spreading the wealth around...its just messed up. Joe Entrepreneur makes 350,000 his 4th year in business after hard hard work and because of that "spread the wealth around" philosophy cuts deeper into his take home.
Sure I agree with Bush should NOT have cut taxes, especially when getting into the Iraq mess. We would have a lot more resources if he didnt do those things. We need a more business friendly administration. Not an administration that says they are for the little guy, but hands out billions to GE to build wind turbines in China, or pampers Goldman Sachs. By the way, Goldman would sure love cap and trade to go through. They dont give a shi* about the environment as much they do getting that tax money from trading carbon credits like stocks. Now I have to deal with Keith Olberman talking points and people who accuse ME of Rush Limbaugh talking points when I dont even listen to him! BAH!
Sick....everything is just sick.
Posted by glassman on :
quote:Originally posted by CashCowMoo: Pagan stop crying.
Glass, only part of the insurgency was won that way. It was called the awakening where your tax dollars were spread all over anbar province to hire disloyal al queda. They go to the highest bidder. The surge helped kill off a lot of the troublemakers. I have to disagree with you on that. I see what you are saying and it make sense, but it wont work. If this is NOT a global war/fight on terrorism then what is it?
it's like the "war on drugs" cash, we can't "win" by any definition of winning a war that we have had in the past.
suppose we get binalivetoolong next month? will it b over? no.
we can win the war against AlQueda in a decade or so by getting binalivetoolong and then wroking to make joining alqueda a bad thing culturally.
there's always going to be another group to fight tho.
the vacation home the CEO of Novartis was fired bombed today by a militant animal rights group.
i didn't mean to say that the awakening was the only way we shut down the insurgency.
there were alot things we did to end it, including making moves to prove we were not here to make Iraq our puppet state.
Pakistan is a major problem in the terror situation today, we have to be able to help THEM destroy alqueda in their country without the Pakistani people coming to beleive we are making Pakistan into our puppet too.
Bush and the neo-cons really had poor diplomatic skills. or maybe they had none, and they were just a bunch of imperialistic basterds, either way? they didn't make friends too well.
i see this as simply a reasonable name change of a strategy, with some strategy change too.
if they were cutting funding too? i would be concerned.
Posted by raybond on :