To all Muslims

To all Muslims who have even an ounce of sense left in you, will you just give up the ghost? Islam is awful. Its founder was a brutal, psychopathic and sexually disturbed individual. He has fraud written all over him. No gettin' around this. Islam's conception of the afterlife is so primitive and childlike that it invites contempt whenever it is revealed. It has no Golden Rule for all for which eternal shame should be leveled upon it. It's the ultimate in fostering Us v. Them discord. It has stupidities all through it, like the requirement in Sharia that at least four male witnesses must substantiate a woman's charge of rape or in the Koran that Alexander the Great lived to an old age (he died at 33). Muslims of the world, I say to you that you've been had. Big time. Still time to realize this. So, realize this.

Why Islam must be criticized

Why Islam must be criticized

What the West Needs to Understand About Islam
by Arslan Shaukat

How unfortunate it is that whenever someone attempts to show the facts of true Muhammadan Islam in unflattering manner in a public forum, he risks being tortured or killed by pious Muslims, even in the West. Alas!

The Muslim Ummah is utterly intolerant to criticisms of the Quran, Prophet Muhammad and Islam. Nonetheless, there are individuals who are brave enough to face the challenge of exercising their freedom of speech, their freedom of expression. Ibn Warraq, Ayan Hisri Ali, Wafa Sultan and Maryam Namazie are some of the courageous individuals who have chosen not to indulge in appeasing Muslims and political correctness. They have chosen to speak the historical, factual truth about Muhammadan Islam. And, unsurprisingly, they have been living under constant danger to their lives.

Another brave individual is the Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard. He drew the cartoons of Muhammad that appeared in a Danish newspaper in 2006 that hurled the entire Muslim world into violent frenzy. They started demonstrations and demanded death of the cartoonists and their publishers. On January 2, 2010, a Somali man, armed with an axe and knife, entered Westergaard's house and tried to kill him.

This incident prompted me to write this article.

The reason for the attempted murder of Westergaard is his comical depiction of Muhammad, produced here.

He has drawn other depictions of Muhammad as well. It's interesting to note that although the illustration may appear somewhat derogatory toward Muhammad, but it does make an accurate point in artistic form, i.e. the blood-soaked and war-filled life of Muhammad. That is exactly what the bomb depicts. I personally believe that it's not inflammatory at all; it just makes a true representation of Muhammad in pictorial form.

This incident entails a number of issues within the context of western nations and within the context of a truly democratic set-up, which I will address in this article.

First: Why criticize Islam? And why should non-Muslims/atheists etc. indulge in such criticisms and 'inflammatory actions' when it's already given that Muslim world will react violently.

Second: What is the use of such 'transgressions,' i.e. what good will come out of it?

WHY ISLAM SHOULD BE CRITICIZED:

1. Firstly: Islam is an unproven and unsubstantiated religious dogma. Islam is a truth claim. It's a claim; nothing more. There is no logical reason whatsoever as to why a claim about the basis of existence and morality should not be questioned and analyzed. In fact, reason tells us that such a monumental claim that affects humanity in a big way should be critically analyzed vigorously.

2. Secondly: A great many aspects of Islamic teachings, namely from the Quran and Muhammad's life, are very disturbing and worrying. It's not an opinion but a fact. Although somewhat unnecessary, I will back up the above mentioned statements with a few examples:

a. Al-Quran:

This supposedly 'holy' book incites violence, aggression, hatred and bloodshed:

- O Prophet! Urge the believers to war; if there are twenty patient ones of you they shall overcome two hundred, and if there are a hundred of you they shall overcome a thousand of those who disbelieve, because they are a people who do not understand (Quran 8:065).

- Fight those who do not believe in Allah...nor follow the religion of truth, out of those who have been given the Book, until they pay the tax in acknowledgment of superiority and they are in a state of subjection (Quran 9:29).

-Warfare is enjoined on you, and it is an object of dislike to you; and it may be that you dislike a thing while it is good for you, and it may be that you love a thing while it is evil for you, and Allah knows, while you do not know (2:216).

The list goes on and on. I believe I have made the point as to why Quran should be criticized and questioned.

b. Muhammad: The person responsible for inventing Islam had less than stellar prophetic career:

- He was involved in many wars and looting of caravans. He ordered the killing of those who showed dissent. He was a polygamist and a rapist. It is also a fact that he married Ayesha when she was very young (Life of Mahomet, William Muir (1861); Bukhari, Volume 5, Book 58, Number 234, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad%27s_marriages).

I believe I have made the point as to why the character of Muhammad should be criticized and questioned.

3. Thirdly: The western civilization and nations believe in democratic values. In democracy, freedom of speech and freedom of expression is of paramount importance. Without freedom of speech and expression, a democratic society will become stagnant. It also includes criticism of religious dogma. So it's nonsensical to say that Islam should be or is somehow immune to criticism. Such a stance goes against the very core of liberal humanism and democratic values.

I believe these three reasons are more than enough justification as to why Islam should not be considered protected against criticism by the west.

WHY CRITICIZE ISLAM WHEN ISLAMISTS WILL REACT VIOLENTLY:

Now, why critics in the West, or everywhere for that matter, should criticize Islam despite however violent way the Muslim Ummah would react.

Firstly: Let me give the answer by asking a question:

Why should we criticize anything at all then? Isn't it possible that Buddhists, Jains, Christians, Marxists etc., living in the West will react violently if I criticize their ideology? Why not just ban criticism all together? Why not just 'respect' everything than?

Secondly: It is the responsibility of every conscientious citizen to uphold the ideals of democracy and civil liberty by exercising their sovereign right of freedom of speech and expression. To not criticize an ideology that is manifestly anti-democratic and against human freedom is tantamount to giving into imaginary fears and cowering to political correctness.

Thirdly: One may argue that it is counterproductive to indulge in unnecessary attacks and ad-hominem statements with regards to Islamic ideology. Most western countries have Muslim populations and it will decidedly be counterproductive and unintelligible to drum up misdirected rhetoric against Islam. But, Islamic dogma warrants criticism on many levels as I have striven to show. So, on one hand, we have Muslim populations in the West, and, on the other, we have Islamic dogma. The correct approach should be a justified and well-articulated criticism of Islam without indulging in too much anti-Islamic rhetoric. A balance so to speak (although it is extremely hard to imagine how such a feat is possible!!!)

Of course, disenfranchising Muslim populations in the west is not a good idea, but that does not mean that Islam is off limits. Muslims should be made to realize that they are living in a democratic system, and, in a true democracy, criticism of a truth claim is a very essential and healthy activity.

Therefore, I do not believe that a possibility of backlash is any justification to keep away from criticism of Islam.

WHAT GOOD WILL COME OUT OF CRITICIZING ISLAM?

Now, what good will ever come out of such criticism of Islam? Let me explain.

I will take England as an example. England is witnessing a minor yet subtle surge in fuming Islamic rhetoric, being propagated by different UK-based Islamists.

Although the majority of Muslims in England are well adjusted within its socio-cultural and economic milieu, there is a strong and vocal minority that is trying to win over these 'westernized and liberal' Muslims and convert them into true Muslims.

One such example is that of Anjem Chaudary, formerly the head of Islam for UK (Islam4UK), established by pious Muslims as a platform to "propagate the supreme Islamic ideology in the United Kingdom as a divine alternative to man-made law."

Islam4UK; the caption in itself explains the agenda. The UK government recently banned the organization for its vitriolic rhetoric. This is indeed a 'great set back' for Anjem (pun intended). All he has to do is change the name of Islam 4 UK and come back to the forefront of Islamist propaganda machine to forward its message.

In November 2008, Chaudary convened a meeting for Islam4UK to "convince the British public about the superiority of Islam, thereby changing public opinion in favor of Islam in order to transfer the authority and power, to the Muslims in order to implement the Shariah (in Britain)." In 2004, he said that a terror attack on the British soil was "a matter of time"; following the 7 July 2005 London bombings, he refused to condemn the atrocities. Anjem wants Sharia implemented in UK. He wants to dismantle the democratic system and replace it with Islamic law and Jurisprudence.

England has approximately 1.6 million Muslims. Now, suppose a raving, hate mongering, idiotic lunatic like Anjem Chaudary can sway even 2% of this Muslim population; that will amount to ~ 20,000 radical Muslims. Suppose out of these, just 2% are radicalized enough to engage in terrorist activities, there will be 200 to 400 Islamic terrorists on the streets of Britain. That is a large number, given that the 9/11 atrocity was orchestrated by no more than 20 individuals.

So how can we meet this challenge?

Well, one strategy to confront such people and fanatics is the strategy of Political correctness (PC) , 'opening a constructive dialogue', 'better understanding of their problems', 'addressing underlying socio-economic issues' that fuel such feelings.
But such a strategy of PC and appeasement is utterly flawed, short sighted and doomed to fail. I will say a few things as to why it is so:

WHY POLITICAL CORRECTNESS, APPEASEMENT WILL NOT WORK:

This is perhaps the most important point of this whole article:

1. What the West must realize is that Islamists and Muslim fanatics are actually practicing and pious Muslims who follow the Quran and Sunnah and Muhammad. They have not hijacked Islam. They are simply following it to the letter. The above mentioned Quranic Surahs and a few tidbits of Muhammadan life is just a glimpse as to what Islam actually says about infidels and war. Thus, the strategy of PC, a 'constructive dialogue' etc; which assumes that there is something wrong with such people and their interpretation of Islam; in itself is illogical and fallacious.

The problem is Islam, Quran and Muhammad. People like Anjem Chaudary are but good Muslims. Tackle Islam and through that, tackle such Islamists.

2. These Islamists are utterly convinced of the supremacy and transcendence of Islam. To them, all that matters is forwarding the message of Islam and Quran. Nothing the west may do to appease these Islamists will work. Absolutely and literally nothing.

3. Dialogue is possible only where there is something to discuss. The West doesn't realize that there is absolutely nothing to discuss with Islamists and those who indulge in religious rhetoric. Such people follow Quran and Sunnah and according to those sources it is incumbent on every practicing Muslim to forward the message the Islam in what ever way and manner.

4. Also, what the West must understand is that such Muslims will inevitably increase in number, so will there radical voice. They will make increasing demands; there already are Shariah complaint courts in England. Next, there will be demands like separate schooling for Muslim children, segregation of Muslim women from non-mahram (unrelated) men in work places, and so on and so forth.

Although people like Anjem Chaudary are a fringe minority, to underestimate them will be disastrous. Even one good Islamic preacher and Islamist can sway, arguably, hundreds of moderate and westernized Muslims towards his/her Islamic ideology. It is an ideological war that such people are waging and they need to be taken very very seriously. The concept of tableegh or preaching Islam is central to Islamic dogma and such people have historically been very successful in swaying large number of westernized Muslims.

WHAT SHOULD BE DONE?

The answer is simple; exercise the sovereign right of freedom of expression and speech. Show these radicals that their dogma is flawed, hollow and incompatible with civilized ethos. There is no other alternative. Such Islamists, although a small minority, must be challenged squarely; no more, no less. Their so-called divine religion, which they claim to be the best of all, must be analyzed and duly criticized. That is the only way to confront challenge of the Islamists.

Ad-hominem attacks and empty rhetoric against Islam will accomplish very little, but rational criticism of Islam, namely of the Quran and Muhammad, will accomplish a number of things:

1. It will make the Islamists realize that they are living under a democratic system and in true democracy; criticism of a truth claim is a very natural and healthy activity.

2. Criticism of Islam will make Islamists realize that no matter what they do or say, democratic system (which they are enjoying) will not become subservient to their rhetoric.

3. Such criticism will impact the psyche of Muslim and non-Muslim population and make them, at least, think that there, perhaps, are aspects of Islam that are incompatible with many a things they take for granted in the West.

4. Rational criticism of Islam will, in the long run, lead to greater understanding of issues and problems within Islamic dogma, and how they can be addressed.

Currently, many ex-Muslims, atheists and liberals in the West are raising concern about messages of the Quran and life of Muhammad. Individuals like Geert Wilders and Wafa Sultan are trying to shed light on exactly how dangerous the Islamic Dogma is. But much more needs to be done. Every ex-Muslim, Humanist, liberalist, and atheist must do whatever in his or her power to make sure that sovereignty of basic human rights such as freedom of expression and speech is protected.

If the West is to remain truly democratic, then there is simply no other choice then to assert their core values in effective and efficient manner.

Comments and feedback is welcome at: [e-mail]

Arslan Shaukat is an ex-Muslim residing in Britain.

Compressed Air Engine

http://thekneeslider.com/archives/2010/01/12/airhead-air-powered-motorcycle-design-concept/

The media

One needs to view the media like one views things in a mirror. Everything is in reverse. Over time one gets used to it. Like many, one learns early on how to function in front of it. you accept it as a reality and go about your business. It’s like shaving. You learn. and continue to do it in front of it. Tomorrow. get rid of the Mirror and experience the disconnect. It is a small example where the reality of what one is doing matches the reality of what is being done. the physical act of shaving doesn’t change but the way your mind views it does.

hopefully you won’t cut yourself learning the lesson

http://www.jihadwatch.org/2010/01/why-the-mainstream-media-never-tells-the-truth-about-jihad.html#comments

 

Silencio y Soledad

Entre los indios de América del Norte, y en todas las tribus sin excepción, existe, además de los ritos de distinto género que tienen un carácter colectivo, la práctica de una adoración solitaria y silenciosa, que se considera es la más profunda y de orden más elevado (1). Los ritos colectivos, en efecto, tienen siempre, en un grado u otro, algo de relativamente exterior; decimos en un grado u otro, porque, respecto a esto, es necesario naturalmente, en ella como en cualquier otra tradición, establecer una diferencia entre los ritos que podrían calificarse de exotéricos, es decir aquellos en los que todos participan indistintamente, y los ritos iniciáticos. Bien entendido, por lo demás, que lejos de excluir estos ritos o de oponérseles de alguna manera, la adoración de que se trata solamente se les superpone como siendo en cierto modo de otro orden; e incluso hay por entero ocasión para pensar que para ser verdaderamente eficaz y producir unos resultados efectivos, debe presuponer la iniciación como una condición necesaria (2).
A propósito de esta adoración, se ha hablado en ocasiones de "plegaria" pero eso es evidentemente inexacto, porque no hay en ella ninguna petición, de cualquier naturaleza que ésta pudiera ser; las plegarias que generalmente se formulan en cantos rituales no pueden dirigirse por otra parte más que a las diversas manifestaciones divinas (3), y vamos a ver que es de otra cosa de lo que aquí se trata en realidad. Ciertamente, sería mucho más justo hablar de "encantación", tomando este término en el sentido que hemos definido en otro lugar (4); podría igualmente decirse que es una "invocación", entendiéndola en un sentido exactamente comparable al del dhikr en la tradición islámica, pero precisando que se trata esencialmente de una invocación silenciosa y completamente interior (5). He aquí lo que con respecto a ella escribe Ch. Eastman (6):

"La adoración del Gran Misterio era silenciosa, solitaria, sin complicación interior; era silenciosa porque todo discurso es necesariamente débil e imperfecto, también las almas de nuestros antepasados alcanzaban a Dios en una oración sin palabras; era solitaria porque pensaban que Dios está más cerca de nosotros en la soledad, y los sacerdotes no estaban allí para servir de intermediarios entre el hombre y el Creador (7)."

No puede, en efecto, haber intermediarios en semejante caso, puesto que esta adoración tiende a establecer una comunicación directa con el Principio supremo, que es designado aquí como el "Gran Misterio".

No solamente no es sino en y por el silencio que esta comunicación puede obtenerse, ya que el "Gran Misterio" está más allá de toda forma y de toda expresión, sino que el silencio mismo "es el Gran Misterio"; ¿cómo hay que entender exactamente esta afirmación? Primero, puede recordarse a este respecto que el verdadero "misterio" es esencial y exclusivamente lo inexpresable, que no puede evidentemente ser representado más que por el silencio (8); pero, además, siendo el "Gran Misterio" lo no manifestado, el mismo silencio, que es propiamente un estado de no manifestación, es por ello como una participación o una conformidad con la naturaleza del Principio supremo. Por otra parte, el silencio, referido al Principio, es, podría decirse, el Verbo no proferido; por ello "el silencio sagrado es la voz del Gran Espíritu", en tanto que éste es identificado con el Principio mismo (9); y esta voz, que corresponde a la modalidad principial del sonido que la tradición hindú designa como parâ o no manifestada (10), es la respuesta a la llamada del ser en adoración: llamada y respuesta son igualmente silenciosas, siendo ambas una aspiración y una iluminación puramente interiores.

Para que esto sea así, es necesario además que el silencio sea en realidad algo más que la simple ausencia de toda palabra o de todo discurso, aunque fuesen formulados solamente de manera enteramente mental; en efecto, ese silencio es esencialmente para los Indios "el perfecto equilibrio de las tres partes del ser", es decir, de lo que, en la terminología occidental, puede designarse como el espíritu, el alma y el cuerpo, pues el ser todo entero, en todos los elementos que lo constituyen, debe participar en la adoración para que pueda obtenerse un resultado plenamente válido. La necesidad de esta condición de equilibrio es fácil de comprender, pues el equilibrio es, en la manifestación misma, como la imagen o el reflejo de la indistinción principial de lo no manifestado, indistinción que está asimismo bien representada por el silencio, de suerte que de ningún modo hay motivo para sorprenderse de la asimilación que así se establece entre éste y el equilibrio (11).

En cuanto a la soledad, conviene ante todo destacar que su asociación con el silencio es en cierta manera normal e incluso necesaria, y que, hasta en presencia de otros seres, aquél que hace en sí el silencio perfecto forzosamente se aísla de ellos por eso mismo; por lo demás, silencio y soledad también se hallan implicados ambos igualmente en la significación del término sánscrito mauna, que es sin duda, en la tradición hindú, el que se aplica más exactamente a un estado como aquél del que hablamos en este momento (12). La multiplicidad, siendo inherente a la manifestación, y acentuándose tanto más, si puede decirse, cuanto más se desciende a grados inferiores de ésta, aleja pues necesariamente de lo no manifestado; también el ser que quiere ponerse en comunicación con el Principio debe ante todo hacer la unidad en él mismo, tanto como sea posible, mediante la armonización y el equilibrio de todos sus elementos, y debe también, al mismo tiempo, aislarse de toda multiplicidad exterior a él. La unificación así realizada, incluso si no es todavía más que relativa en la mayor parte de los casos, no deja de ser, según la medida de las posibilidades actuales del ser, cierta conformidad con la "no dualidad" del Principio; y, en el límite superior, el aislamiento toma el sentido del término sánscrito kaivalya, que, expresando al mismo tiempo las ideas de perfección y de totalidad, llega, cuando posee toda la plenitud de su significación, a designar el estado absoluto e incondicionado, aquel del ser que ha arribado a la Liberación final.

En un grado mucho menos elevado que ése, y que incluso no pertenece todavía más que a las fases preliminares de la realización, puede señalarse lo siguiente: allí donde necesariamente hay dispersión, la soledad, en tanto que se opone a la multiplicidad y que coincide con cierta unidad, es esencialmente concentración; y ya se sabe qué importancia se da efectivamente a la concentración en todas las doctrinas tradicionales sin excepción, en tanto que medio y condición indispensable de cualquier realización. Nos parece poco útil el insistir más sobre este último punto, pero hay otra consecuencia sobre la cual todavía tenemos que llamar más particularmente la atención para terminar: y es que el método del cual tratamos, en razón de que se opone a toda dispersión de las potencias del ser, excluye el desarrollo separado y más o menos desordenado de tales o cuales de sus elementos, y en particular el de los elementos psíquicos cultivados en cierto modo por ellos mismos, desarrollo que es contrario siempre a la armonía y al equilibrio del conjunto. Para los indios, según el Sr. Paul Coze, "parece que, para desarrollar el orenda (13), intermediario entre lo material y lo espiritual, sea necesario ante todo dominar la materia y tender a lo divino"; ello en suma equivale a decir que no consideran legítimo abordar el dominio psíquico más que "por lo alto", no obteniéndose resultados de este orden sino de una manera muy accesoria y como "por añadidura", lo que en efecto es el único medio de evitar sus peligros; y, añadiremos, ello está sin duda tan lejos como es posible de la vulgar "magia" que demasiado a menudo se les ha atribuido, y que es incluso todo lo que se ha creído ver entre ellos por parte de observadores profanos y superficiales, sin duda porque ellos mismos no tenían la menor noción de lo que puede ser la verdadera espiritualidad.

Muslims and Muhammad: The Impossible Task

Saturday, December 5, 2009
Muslims and Muhammad: The Impossible Task

I've reached the conclusion that Muslims face an impossible task. Simply put, their entire faith rests upon defending a man - Muhammad - who is indefensible.

Wafa Sultan expressed it best when she said, "It is impossible that a man who did the things Muhammad did could be a prophet of God."

It is impossible that a man in his mid-50's could engage in sexual intercourse with a nine-year-old child, possibly damaging her physically so that she never became pregnant, and be a prophet of God.

It is impossible that a man could finance his religious and political community by robbing the trade caravans that passed through his area on their annual trips between Arabia and Syria, and be a prophet of God.

It is impossible that a man could encourage his own son to divorce his wife so that he, the father, could marry her, and be a prophet of God.

It is impossible that a man could lie to his wife to get her out of the house so that he could sleep with the slave girl he had given her as a gift, and be a prophet of God.

It is impossible that a man could call other men to follow him, and then watch them die one after the other in the battles he instigated to build his empire while giving them promises of the sensual Paradise that awaited them, and be a prophet of God.

It is impossible that a man could behead 800 Jewish men who had lived in his city for centuries for the simple reason they refused to accept him as their leader, and be a prophet of God.

It is impossible that a man could trade the Jewish wives and daughters of the men he had just beheaded for weapons and horses, and be a prophet of God.

It is impossible that a man could be so fearful of criticism that he would send a man at night to kill the mother of a nursing child because of the poems she had written against him, and be a prophet of God.

It is impossible that a man could sentence a woman to death by having her limbs attached to camels that moved in opposite direction pulling her apart, then behead her and parade her severed head throuth Medina, and be a prophet of God.

It is impossible that a man could torture a young Jewish tribal leader to death to obtain his money, and then "marry" his 17-year old widow the same night, and be a prophet of God.

It is impossible that a man could allow his followers to have sex with their female slaves as well as their prisoners of war, whether or not they were married, and be a prophet of God.

For the past several months on Al-Hayat TV, Father Zakariya Boutros has been discussing the dozens of stories Muhammad "stole" from the Old and New Testaments, as well as from the Midrash and other ancient Jewish documents, and inserted into the Qur'an as revelations from Allah. Zakariya makes a clear distinction between "plagarism", which is the Arabic word "iqtibas", and "theft". He points out that Muhammad did not merely copy and paste stories from these documents into the Qur'an, but essentially changed their meanings in the Qur'an to indicate that he, Muhammad, was not merely similar to but essentially superior than the individuals such as Adam, Moses, and Abraham whose stories he stole.

For the first part of his 90-minute program Zakariya presents his evidence, and then opens the lines for people to call in. His live programs do not contain the 10-second delay to block out explicit language found in American programs such as the Larry King Show, which means the listener gets to hear exactly what the caller says. More than one call has a sequence similar to this:

Moderator: Our next caller is Abdul Rahman from Bahrain. Hello, Abdul Rahman.

Caller: You bastard, you son-of-a-bitch, you son of a whore, you MF'ing infidel...

Zakariya Boutros: Thank you, may God bless you and forgive you...

Very rarely do the callers actually challenge the information presented by Zakariya, because they cannot. No-one can.

a comment

I have heard all these arguments before and while they are realistic given the nature of the U.S. government at this time, they are not valid.

Viet Nam was lost solely to two things, first, a terrible strategy on war prosecution that cost 50,000 U.S. lives. Secondly, the left ran an all out propaganda war.

At the end, the U.S. had won the fight, and won the war but failed to solidify the victory.

wars are ultimately won by making the enemy despair. That's it, (or wiping out every man, woman and child of the opposition, which is total despair) Hanoi didn't despair, they just waited for Cronkite to kill the will.

Viet Nam could have been far lest costly if the U.S. wasn't so squeamish about leveling N. Vietnam. You can't care about borders, you can't care about niceties and politics, you have to care about making the enemy despair. When all their hope is gone, you win.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki are classic cases in point.

Afghanistan is no different, if you catch bad guys being aided by a village, you wipe out the village. You don't worry about borders and you certainly don't worry about waterboarding KSM.

War is evil, cruel, impersonal, and final. If you play it like a game you are going to lose. Nobody, but countries that have "progressives" worry about beating the crap out of the enemy to help your side. Treating people that want to kill you like
bad children is the definition of stupidity. It has nothing to do with "American values". "We are better than that" You are stupider than that. Niceties are for your guys, not the others. Ten minutes before you just shot 15 of his buddies in the back without blinking an eye and now you want to had him a Koran.

Had he had the honor of being in a Uniform, and fighting by rules, then by all means treat them with in the bounds. (Which still may include leaving him in a very cold room for a few hours while listening to a loud Springsteen. (Now that's torture)

This doesn't mean you don't make friends, you just can't be squeamish about your enemies. Germans who had been bombed into submission did not give the invading WWII troops much trouble even though those armies just killed their sons, fathers and families. In fact, many Germans had already despaired and wanted an end.

We cannot win in Afghanistan with wimpy, half-baked, half-assed policies. We need to go in there like we mean it.
So, the Mr. Miller's thoughts are realistic, just not valid.

 

Posted by: Redhawk   Dec 14, 12:16 AM

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Sadly, the author is correct – there is no way to win this war short of a total war that would inflict massive casualties on the civilian population in Taliban-controlled areas that could carry over into the tribal areas in Pakistan where the Taliban find refuge. But the stakes, such as our national survival, have never been at the level where this would ever be considered. As far as our national interest, maintaining a presence in that backward country does not seem like it should be high on our list of priorities. The non-Taliban Afghans do not have much will to fight their brethren; far less than did the south Vietnamese population against the north, so there is little hope that the non-Taliban Afghans could ever be an effective deterrent. One thing Vietnam taught us is that in a long, drawn-out war of attrition which this war will become, fought with PC-rules of engagement and with an administration whose heart is not really in it and only stays engaged for political reasons, we cannot win.

Posted by: Respublica   Dec 14, 12:44 AM

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I agree with Mr. Millers assessment on most points. However I must point out that Osama had been given official aid and coverage by the Taliban in charge of the Afghan government (the half baked theocratic mess that it was). That is enough to justify a Just War to smash the government to pieces and send the Taliban scurrying like the rats they are. However when we undertake the Utopian idea of Nation building it is pure folly. America is great and good because our Nation is great and good. Montesquieu said it best when he stated that a people get the government they deserve (not exact quote). The Afghani people at large do not understand concepts of Liberalism (using the classical sense of the word) and Freedom. Sure there are outstanding examples of individuals, but the average Afghani doesn't prize individualism and justice, it is still a very much tribal society. Nations shape their governments, not the other way around. The Germans and Japanese took to Liberal Democracy easily because they had known it for a whole century. It was ingrained, but at the time stifled, in their culture.

The most effective way to keep Afghanistan safe is to buck the constantly rumblings of the UN and pledge to knock down any government the Afghanis are forced to put up with if it threatens the safety and liberty of the people of these United States. Let the Taliban know that anytime they try and erect a state in Afghanistan, they will get have themselves get obliterated. The sheer effect of a siege every time will give Afghani's a reason to resist any encroachments upon them by Theocratic fundamentalists, if not for the sake of their survival. However, the willingness to do this rests in good minds prompted by good hearts, and sadly both are lacking in our congressmen and President. Our Republic will only survive with Statesmen, not the political, bureaucratic faceless mess we have now.

Posted by: azcIII   Dec 14, 01:59 AM

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bmatkin,
You certainly have valid points, but the whole point of Mr. Miller's article is that we aren't fighting the war like "we mean it". We haven't been for some time (due to internal politics, etc) and we won't in the future. So why sacrifice the lives of our finest and money we don't have to fight a war our "leaders" have no will to win?

I supported going into Afghanistan, and Iraq at the time, to neutralize any threat from the radical regimes. I don't support this notion of nation building we've taken up since WWII. As Mr. Miller points out, we bombed Germany and Japan into oblivion, then rebuilt on our terms. But in neither nation were we faced with a fanatical ideology like islam. Islam is a whole other ball-game and one we cannot reform. Only muslims can and they don't want to. Even reforming Afghanistan won't do much to solve the problem of islam. But destroying our already-fragile economy will certainly go a long way towards aiding their cause. In fact, several muslim leaders have talked about destroying America by dragging us into endless wars. I don't remember where I read it...maybe Robert Spencer's site?

Occupying Afghanistan for 20 years is a large part of the reason the USSR collapsed, and our finances are in worse shape right now than theirs were. We are in very serious danger of an economic collapse, and must immediately stop spending money we don't have and wasting scarce resources. I, for one, am not willing to see our economy collapse, citizens starving en masse, children/grandchildren consigned to de facto debtor's prison for life, possible civil war and possibly even worse to continue occupying a medieval country that cannot be reformed into a viable, stable modernized nation.

Posted by: Ron44   Dec 14, 01:59 AM

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I am not a military expert, but I would prefer to win this conflict and then get the heck out of there. However, this article by Mr. Miller makes a lot of sense.

I would be real curious to find out Mr. Miller's sentiments on the result of the Korean War. It seems to me that the people of South Korea have taken hold of many of the freedoms and benefits that a free Republic can offer. Is it at all possible that the people of Afghanistan can do the same... if opposing forces are dealt a mortal blow... acknowledging that the collateral damage will be horrific? Like all wars?

Posted by: epaminondas   Dec 14, 02:43 AM

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It was the Taliban which made the force projection of Al Qaeda POSSIBLE via the shield they afforded them. It was the Taliban who working with the ISI created the wahhabi lunatic asylum. And it is the Taliban and the Pushtun on both sides of the border who have a religious mission not with the american govt but with those who make that govt what it is. We make up our own laws, and therefore usurp god's rightful authority.

Like it or not the reality is that we do not have the 'luxury' of a Viet Cong and NVA which had no interest outside it's nation state's borders. Withdrawal CANNOT increase the security of our interests or the safety of our people.

We either KILL the Taliban, and create a situation in which the populace abandons them, or we lose THE GREATER WAR until the moment we grow tired of it all, and we employ the 20 minute solution. Or we fail to do even that and go the way of all other civilizations. I see no sign, certainly in the present govt of ANY ability to be FDR in that vein.

It's that simple. Mr. Miller while making some obvious points fails at the end to comprehend what has been percolating for 1500 years to one degree or another, and was made obvious to me when Barbara Walters interviewed Zia ul Haq and she questioned him about what he was going to do about democracy and human rights in Pakistan...and he asked her what in the world made her imagine that democracy was either the best or final form of govt the world would see.

Posted by: otisg1   Dec 14, 03:17 AM

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It is the real estate! ……….
The Taliban gave Al-Qaeda unfettered access for their training bases.
Sadam gave them the carcass of a Boeing jetliner to practice their moves on for 9/11 and subsequent operations.
Iraq, Iran, the Taliban, the Palestinians and A.Q. were allied enough in their wish to destroy America and Israel. I doubt that even they thought that they would have so much help from the inside.
The genius of the Rumsfeld/Bush Iraq strategy was to force Al-Qaeda into fighting a war on a battlefield of OUR choosing.
Flat, open and where we could use our considerable technological advantages (night vision etc) to kill off the A.Q. leadership. Isn’t it obvious the mountainous regions simply bring armies back to the Stone Age?
This also created the advantage of being geographically positioned to create a double envelopment for dealing with Iran. Look at a map. The strategy was simple and working: Drive A.Q. out of the mountains and the KILL them. The message to Iran was also simple: We can hammer you from two directions……..
The real tragedy is that the Democrats through their politicalization of our post 9/11 actions have destroyed most of the hard work our military accomplished.
The DNC’s creation of faux scandals (“torture” etc.) have simply advertised our weaknesses.
We will pay an enormous price for this in the very near future.
I can find nowhere in Sun Tzu or Clausewitz any mention of advertizing your plans to your opponents as being a wining strategy.
But, Of course Sun Tzu and Clausewitz never faced the military genius of a Messiah!

Posted by: cg   Dec 14, 04:55 AM

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Sad but true. However I would say that even if Congress stopped the war tomorrow and took the money to apply to the economy, it would be squandered. Instead of actually solving the economic crisis, which Congress has yet to do with the billions already spent, the money would go to some pet project like monitoring a duck pond out in the middle of nowhere. Also, when did Biden become a military expert? Did I miss his time as a General? Why do "politicians" feel the need to dictate how a war should be fought? Do they not pay military leaders for this? As Comander in Chief, Obama should rely on the expertise of the military leaders HE appointed to do their job without interference from novice Congressmen. Yet again our government is putting a band-aid on a sucking chest wound.

Another sad fact is that Afghanistan is severely backwards. While many Afghanis would love the notion of real democracy, not the corrupt type practiced by Karzai, they are ruled by the whims of the Taliban and/or the tribal leaders. Leaders who still practice the arrangement of child brides. You can tell a lot about a society when young women would rather set themselves on fire than to be in an arranged marriage to their uncle who is 40 years older than them. Rampant inbreeding aside, there is no infrastructure to speak of. How do you enforce democracy in such a place? There is no industry besides the drug trade. The past attempts to introduce other crops into the economy has failed miserably. Of course Karzai's government refuses to crack down on drug trafficking especially since his brother has been running his own cartel.

These are just a few of the problems in Afghanistan that our Comander in Chief has to consider. While the military cannot combat all of these problems, it makes their job that much harder. Maybe it would be better to withdraw a large part of the military and let special operations do their thing. Then they could decimate the Taliban and al-Qa'ida enough that the remaining fighters would run away, like in Iraq. The American public would forget about the war in two seconds without a major force stationed there. If it weren't for Congress or the media bashing the military, the objection to the war would be relegated to San Francisco.

Maybe the American public should practice the land for time doctrine so commonly used by insurgents, wait until the next election in hope of electing a real Comander in Chief.

Posted by: cedarhill   Dec 14, 05:21 AM

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War is war. You either go for a win or you lose or you draw. The best with this Administration is a draw. What we're getting is just a long drawn out draw with a high likelihood of lose. That would be OK except for the lives lost. How does one morally justify the killing of our soldiers in this manner?

Afghanistan: The Senseless War

Afghanistan: The Senseless War
By Abraham H. Miller

With the impending escalation in Afghanistan, we have finally arrived, after decades, at a bipartisan foreign policy. Regrettably, it is the wrong consensus for the wrong policy.

Afghanistan is the graveyard of empires. There is no way to win in Afghanistan without a massive commitment of troops, a willingness to stay there nearly indefinitely, and the ability to pursue insurgents across Afghanistan's porous borders.

We have neither the military capacity nor the political will to do any of that. Indeed, we probably do not have the financial capability to do it.

What we can do is prolong the war and increase the misery of the Afghan people. As in Vietnam, this is now a war where domestic politics strongly influence military decisions. The president waits for months to make a decision on troop reinforcements. He sends fewer troops than the number requested. The escalation offends his base, so the president attempts to placate them with an arbitrary withdrawal date.

Caught in the escalating crossfire, Afghan civilians are going to have one motivation: survival. In Vietnam, villages often divided in two, one side going to the Viet Cong, one to the government, both sides looking out for the interests of the village and each other.

A withdrawal date tells the civilian population that the Taliban will be there long after we are gone. All the Taliban has to do is to follow the grand strategy of all insurgencies, buy time. The Taliban disappears into the sea of the civilian population. The Taliban hides and waits. It yields land for time. It fights selectively. It evaporates when outnumbered. It reduces its operations. It lingers to fight another day, when the Americans will be gone, when the poorly trained, corrupt, and easily infiltrated Afghan army will be the primary enemy.

Afghanistan's army needs nearly a quarter of a million troops to fight the insurgency, and by most estimates, it will be lucky to produce 140,000. The fighting age population in third world countries is not sufficiently healthy to produce as high a proportion of troops as first world countries take for granted. And because insurgents generally choose the time and place of engagements, they need fewer troops and require a lower support to combat ratio. By traditional gauges, a traditional army must outnumber an insurgency by twelve to fifteen to one.

Certainly, we will have military victories. In Vietnam, we never lost a major military engagement. During the Tet Offensive, we wiped out the fighting capacity of the Viet Cong, inflicting one of the worst military defeats on an enemy in the history of combat. The Viet Cong was replaced by the regular army of North Vietnam, and the war shifted to a conventional war. But we were incapable of creating a legitimate, widely- supported government. So, even Tet was a pyrrhic victory, and then, of course, our media turned it into a defeat, a turning point in the war created by definition.

Our very presence as foreigners, in Vietnam, propping up a regime, raised questions of the regime's legitimacy, as it now does in Afghanistan. We make much of elections in Afghanistan, but the proportion voting in many provinces was negligible, as was the integrity of the election process itself.

The reality of Afghanistan is that it is not a necessary war. The Taliban did not orchestrate the events of 09/11. Osama bin Laden did, and he is most likely in Pakistan, moving back and forth across the border, safely hidden in the tribal areas. If we seriously want to defeat the Taliban, we must escalate the war, commit to staying there, and change the rules of engagement regarding civilian casualties. And then what? We will have so alienated the population that they will produce another insurgency, one sustained by Islamists across the world who cannot countenance the presence of infidels on Muslim soil.

If we are concerned about our own security, then we might want to look at the Islamist training bases on American soil, the probes by terrorists of our air safety, and the vulnerabilities this administration has created by redefining terrorism as a criminal justice issue.

American security doctrine has always used World War II as the paradigm to justify the projection of power. What we have forgotten is that in World War II we bombed our enemies into oblivion and then rebuilt their societies on our terms. We do not have the legitimacy or the moral justification to follow that model in Afghanistan. We certainly do not have the political will.

There is nothing patriotic about sending our young men and women to die in a war that will be fought in the absence of compelling military considerations, a war without resolution, a war where success eludes definition, and a war where the enemy and civilian population already know when we will be gone.

Bring the troops home. There is much to do here to promote our own security, beginning with not further debasing our economic strength by spending money on needless wars.
Abraham H. Miller is an emeritus professor of political science and a former head of the Intelligence Studies Section of the International Studies Association.