OUR FRIENDS IN PAKISTAN
"for more than 20 years, the pakistani government has used islamic radicals as an instrument of both domestic and foreign policy."
"now, many pakistani security experts doubt that the goverment has the will or the means to neutralize hat has become a huge network of violence..."
"according to pakistani experts on islamic militancy nd national security, there are as many as 500,000 members of jihadi--the muslim holy war organizations--in pakistan."
the above is from the new york times on may 27. the very next day the times' lead story was entitled "taliban and qaeda believed plotting within pakistan."
the article related that according to the american commander in afghanistan, "virtually the entire senior leadership of al qaeda and the taliban...are now operating with as many as 1000 non-afghan fighters in the anarchic tribal areas of western pakistan." among that senior leadership, still alive and plotting, is osama bin laden, who was reportedly seen in the area as recently as a month ago.
the may 27 article quoted an expert as saying that pakistani president pervez murharraf is aleady viewed as the enemy of these half million islamic footsoldiers because of his support of america in the afghan war.
these are our friends in pakistan. this is the people whose support president bush has made the centerpiece of his coalition in the war on terrorism. these are the facts that the bush administration ignores. this i why the bush war plan is incompetent, blind and will lead to the deaths of many, many more americans.
the above are just two of the countless reports in the last 8 months evidencing the support within the islamic world for jihad on the united states.
other reports have shown that the hatred of and obsession with destroying the united states is the product of the accepted teachings of the koran that every child in the islamic world is made to absorb.
item: public opinion polls showed plurality support within pakistan for bin laden.
item: since sept 11 the most popular name given to boys born in egypt is osama.
item: the notorious "protocols of the elders of zion," a vicious, long-discredited anti-semitic book is displayed as if it were the latest tom clancy novel in airport lounges and hotels in saudi arabia.
etc., etc., etc.
it is willful blindness to see this as other than a war by islam on america. the bush aministration is confused and paralyzed by the unfamiliarity of the islamic war strategy.
it's foreign policy "dream team" of cheney, rumsfeld and powell is an ossified reactionary triumvarite that has spent 8 months fighting the last war, in this case the gulf war, with useless coalition building and the ineffective use of military force.
ineffective? osama bin laden is alive, al qaeda has simply changed addresses from afghanistan to pakistan, the vice president and fbi dirctor acknowledge that new attacks are inevitable. ineffective.
it is this mindless strategy, this coalition-building hokum, this alliance with pakistan that is the very thing that prevents us from going into the are where we know bin laden is and killing him and routing al qaeda.
"oh well, " sigh american military officials at their bad luck that pakistan and india are on the brink of war and pakistani troops have been diverted from the pursuit of bin laden and al qaeda to the kashmiri border.
the bush administratio has left it to the pakistanis to safeguard our national interest. the pakistanis. the result of this madness will be more murderous assaults on our own people.
-benjamin harris
Saturday, May 25, 2002
While America Sleeps
WHILE AMERICA SLEEPS
this week provided more instances of the surreal disconnect that exists between the danger that america faces and the government's and the polity's complacency about the post-911 world.
vice-president cheney said this week that another catastrophic attack on america was "all but certain." fbi director robert mueller said that sucide bombings against the united states were "inevitable." and yet a voters poll found that most americans were more concerned with the economy an social security than with islam's war against us.
the result of this disconnect is that more american innocents will needlessly die. office workers will burn to death, given just enough time by the enemy to call their loved ones in terror to say "i love you" one last time and goodbye.
american schoolchildren, on buses carrying lunch boxes and backpacks, wil be dismembered and slaughtered by kamikaze footsoldiers of the jihad.
and the american public, confused and bereft of leadership and the bush administration, confused and devoid of leadership, will continue to see this as a "war" with al queda extremists.
rep porter goss of florida, the head of the house intelligence committee saidn this week that new attacks will come not just from al queda but from hamas and "a number" of other regiments of the islamic army. but it has not sunk in. america sleeps.
the public continues to give presidet bush hgh marks for his handling of the war, even as its top officials acknowledge tht further attacks ae coming and even though, after more than eight months, we still do not have osama bin laden and the taliban leader in custody.
the truth is that the islamic world has long been mobilized against america but this has been downplayed or ignored because of our dependence on islamic oil and the unfamiliar way by which islam is waging and has waged war.
our "friends" in saudi arabia, one of the most repressive states in the world, produced more of the 911 hijackers than any other country. the saudi royal family maintains power by giving its mullahs free rein to inoctrinate its citizens in islamic war against jews and americans.
a post-911 visit by a new york times reporter to our "friends" in pakistan similarly showed the shockingly virulent anti-semitism and anti-americanism which the next generation of muslims will be inculcated with. they tteach their schoolchildren that all non-believers are sub-human and war should be waged on them.
so it is not just a sick interpretation of the koran by a band of extremists that is responsible for the hatred of america. it is the sanctioned teachings of "friendly" islamic governments that has produced it. a thousand years ago christianity fought a crusade against islam, and won. in our time we have been in cold war with iran for 25 years, we have fough a hot war against iraq, we have, and continue to, label other muslim states like libya and syria as states that sponsor terrorism, and yet---we are told by our president that "this is not a war with islam."
the attacks on us will continue, and could bring our economy and culture to their knees while this is the accepted version of events, while america sleeps.
-benjamin harris
this week provided more instances of the surreal disconnect that exists between the danger that america faces and the government's and the polity's complacency about the post-911 world.
vice-president cheney said this week that another catastrophic attack on america was "all but certain." fbi director robert mueller said that sucide bombings against the united states were "inevitable." and yet a voters poll found that most americans were more concerned with the economy an social security than with islam's war against us.
the result of this disconnect is that more american innocents will needlessly die. office workers will burn to death, given just enough time by the enemy to call their loved ones in terror to say "i love you" one last time and goodbye.
american schoolchildren, on buses carrying lunch boxes and backpacks, wil be dismembered and slaughtered by kamikaze footsoldiers of the jihad.
and the american public, confused and bereft of leadership and the bush administration, confused and devoid of leadership, will continue to see this as a "war" with al queda extremists.
rep porter goss of florida, the head of the house intelligence committee saidn this week that new attacks will come not just from al queda but from hamas and "a number" of other regiments of the islamic army. but it has not sunk in. america sleeps.
the public continues to give presidet bush hgh marks for his handling of the war, even as its top officials acknowledge tht further attacks ae coming and even though, after more than eight months, we still do not have osama bin laden and the taliban leader in custody.
the truth is that the islamic world has long been mobilized against america but this has been downplayed or ignored because of our dependence on islamic oil and the unfamiliar way by which islam is waging and has waged war.
our "friends" in saudi arabia, one of the most repressive states in the world, produced more of the 911 hijackers than any other country. the saudi royal family maintains power by giving its mullahs free rein to inoctrinate its citizens in islamic war against jews and americans.
a post-911 visit by a new york times reporter to our "friends" in pakistan similarly showed the shockingly virulent anti-semitism and anti-americanism which the next generation of muslims will be inculcated with. they tteach their schoolchildren that all non-believers are sub-human and war should be waged on them.
so it is not just a sick interpretation of the koran by a band of extremists that is responsible for the hatred of america. it is the sanctioned teachings of "friendly" islamic governments that has produced it. a thousand years ago christianity fought a crusade against islam, and won. in our time we have been in cold war with iran for 25 years, we have fough a hot war against iraq, we have, and continue to, label other muslim states like libya and syria as states that sponsor terrorism, and yet---we are told by our president that "this is not a war with islam."
the attacks on us will continue, and could bring our economy and culture to their knees while this is the accepted version of events, while america sleeps.
-benjamin harris
Wednesday, May 22, 2002
NO PITY
the washington post recently published a review of a book detailing the rape of up to two million german women by conquering soviet troops as they entered berlin at the end of wwii.
a young man, one of three co-defendants accused of a brutal kidnapping, murder and rape in florida, has been moved to a safety cell because of threats by other inmates to do to him what he did to his victim.
an american intelligence official wrote some months ago that torture and humiliation are particularly feared by the muslims who the united states is currently at war with.
the reaction to the book has been revulsion at the russian crimes, the reaction to the threats against the florida rapist has been revulsion at the lawlessness in our prisons, and i imagine the reaction to the report by the american intelligence official was revulsion also.
in all three cases i disagree with the conventional reaction.
retribution is a dirty word today. our values have "matured" so that these actions are considered morally reprehensible. in fact, retribution is a necessary component of any well-ordered system of justice. in each of the three cases mentioned above i believe that the actions of those who sought revenge are understandable human responses to high crime.
german women fawned over adolph hitler. they were the ladies auxiliary of the wehrmacht. as the book notes, the russian lust for revenge was fueled by the equally unspeakable atrocities inflicted by the nazis in the siege of stalingrad. russian rape of german women is justified by these previous acts. it should not be condoned, much less encouraged but it is justified. russia was not the aggressor in wwii, germany was. an aggressor deserves retributive punishment. i'm sure there were "innocent" german women who were raped, innocent in the sense that they did not support the nazis and their rapes are not justified but actions in war cannot be judged by a standard requiring perfection and the desire of the russian soldiers for revenge and their method of extracting it was justified.
likewise though it should not be condoned or encouraged there is great justice in the brutalization of civilian criminals who have committed brutalities on innocents. there is a natural sense of street justice that is obtained and that is viscerally satisfying in an act of prison rape of a man who has raped a woman in our society. that sense of satisfation is not one that society should be ashamed of.
in war, we must use whatever means are necessary to break our enemy. one of the enduring images of the gulf war was the footage of a beaten, terrified and thoroughly humiliated iraqi soldier coming out of his bunker crying, begging for mercy and supportingly chanting "bush, bush, bush."
there may be truth in the intelligence officer's belief that there is something in the muslim culture or psyche that makes it particularly vulnerable to the threat of humiliation and torture. if so, we should exploit it. if by some miscalculation osama bin laden is captured alive he should not be accorded the human dignity of a civilized trial whose result would be to give him an international stage for his cause and make him the martyr every islamic believer aspires to. whatever would be considered most humiliating to him, and most horrifying to other muslims, should be done to him. perhaps shave his beard; parade him in front of cameras forced to wear a dress and high heels. publically anally raped. if that will horrify other muslims, we should do it.
there is a modern belief that "violence only begets violence." violence is man at his worst but it is not ineffective. violence ended world war ii. it will end world war iv also.
-benjamin harris
the washington post recently published a review of a book detailing the rape of up to two million german women by conquering soviet troops as they entered berlin at the end of wwii.
a young man, one of three co-defendants accused of a brutal kidnapping, murder and rape in florida, has been moved to a safety cell because of threats by other inmates to do to him what he did to his victim.
an american intelligence official wrote some months ago that torture and humiliation are particularly feared by the muslims who the united states is currently at war with.
the reaction to the book has been revulsion at the russian crimes, the reaction to the threats against the florida rapist has been revulsion at the lawlessness in our prisons, and i imagine the reaction to the report by the american intelligence official was revulsion also.
in all three cases i disagree with the conventional reaction.
retribution is a dirty word today. our values have "matured" so that these actions are considered morally reprehensible. in fact, retribution is a necessary component of any well-ordered system of justice. in each of the three cases mentioned above i believe that the actions of those who sought revenge are understandable human responses to high crime.
german women fawned over adolph hitler. they were the ladies auxiliary of the wehrmacht. as the book notes, the russian lust for revenge was fueled by the equally unspeakable atrocities inflicted by the nazis in the siege of stalingrad. russian rape of german women is justified by these previous acts. it should not be condoned, much less encouraged but it is justified. russia was not the aggressor in wwii, germany was. an aggressor deserves retributive punishment. i'm sure there were "innocent" german women who were raped, innocent in the sense that they did not support the nazis and their rapes are not justified but actions in war cannot be judged by a standard requiring perfection and the desire of the russian soldiers for revenge and their method of extracting it was justified.
likewise though it should not be condoned or encouraged there is great justice in the brutalization of civilian criminals who have committed brutalities on innocents. there is a natural sense of street justice that is obtained and that is viscerally satisfying in an act of prison rape of a man who has raped a woman in our society. that sense of satisfation is not one that society should be ashamed of.
in war, we must use whatever means are necessary to break our enemy. one of the enduring images of the gulf war was the footage of a beaten, terrified and thoroughly humiliated iraqi soldier coming out of his bunker crying, begging for mercy and supportingly chanting "bush, bush, bush."
there may be truth in the intelligence officer's belief that there is something in the muslim culture or psyche that makes it particularly vulnerable to the threat of humiliation and torture. if so, we should exploit it. if by some miscalculation osama bin laden is captured alive he should not be accorded the human dignity of a civilized trial whose result would be to give him an international stage for his cause and make him the martyr every islamic believer aspires to. whatever would be considered most humiliating to him, and most horrifying to other muslims, should be done to him. perhaps shave his beard; parade him in front of cameras forced to wear a dress and high heels. publically anally raped. if that will horrify other muslims, we should do it.
there is a modern belief that "violence only begets violence." violence is man at his worst but it is not ineffective. violence ended world war ii. it will end world war iv also.
-benjamin harris
Sunday, May 19, 2002
The New War
THE NEW WAR
lead story in times today points up the truth that wwiv is with islam, that it is wrongly characterized as a "war" on al queda, a radical fringe. public opinion is generally supportive of president bush's handling of the post-sept. 11 world. why, i don't know.
eight months now and we still don't even have bin laden or the taliban leader, much less have we won the war and ended any threat. instead, islam now plans a new attack that will make the wtc attacks pale in comparison.
why has this been allowed to happen. first and foremost, it it a consequence of misconceptualilzing the war as with al queda. the fact is islam is nazism by another name. it is a philosophy that is fascistic, anti-west, anti-woman, anti-semitic and anti-tolerant. that is the case not in some warped al queda conception of islam but in islam itself. that is the case in iraq, iran, lybia, syria, as well as "friendly" islamic states like pakistan and saudi arabia.
second, it has happened because of a misconceptualization of the islamic strategy in the war. a guerilla war beguiles america into thinking that we are fighting a rag-tag band of extremists, with no state behind it, sanctioning it or directing it. the truth is that throughout islamic history the preferred mode of military engagement is through just such guerilla warfare. the western concept of melodramatic state "declarations" of war is much less familiar in islam. combine america's ignorance of the nature of the islamic threat with the capablilties of a well-financed, disciplined group like al queda and a "defeat" of america is indeed plausible.
islam will never occupy the united states--that's the western conceptualization of losing a war that lulls us--but it can defeat america on it's own battlefield, the battlefield of culture. an attack like that alluded to in the times article today, say with a "dirty" a-bomb detonated near manhattan, would plunge the u.s. and the west into economic depression. and that would dramatically lessen the influence of our culture worldwide. that manhattan would be rendered radioactive for decades is incidental.
so the nature of the war and it's perceived lack of state sponsorship leads everyone from the president to the man in the street to think that we can defeat the enemy with surgical strikes, that such a war must be waged with a "coalition" of western nations and "good" islamic states.
in fact, this war makes the western concept of war as outdated as the the tactic of the british in wearing bright red coats against the colonists in the revolutionary war.
we must realize the dire threat to our way of life presented here and the identity of the enemy. this is indeed a "clash of civilizations" and must be fought as such. we do value life more than islam does, and we should never destroy it casually, but we must be prepared to use the force necessary to win this clash. i do not know all of the high-tech options we have in our arsenal and we should attempt to get the job done with the least loss of life, but if we are to err, it should be on the side of making sure that we prevail and that our enemy is defeated rather than wounding, but not killing the enemy, and letting it live another day to attack us.
my prescription today is the same as it was on sept 12. we should simultaneously destroy the cities of the terror crescent, from damascus to tripoli to baghdad to tehran. that destruction should be effectuated with the most efficient means that we have, including nuclear weapons. the american conscience, my conscience, recoils at the thought of women and children and non-combatant men being slaughtered. it should not. a majority of islamic followers worldwide supports osama bin laden. like japan did during ww ii with the use of kamikaze bombers, islam ruthlessly uses it's civilians in suicide missions against american civilians.
of course,in addition to the above we must find bin laden and kill him. if we have good cause to believe that he is in the "lawless" area in pakistan bordering afghanistan then we should absolutely use nuclear weapons on that region. he must be destroyed. now.
i have no illusions about what would happen next. islamabad would erupt and it also should be destroyed. the nazis of saudi arabia will erupt too, and they should be destroyed. we should then hunt down active islamic nazis whereever they exist, in france, germany, the philippines, and we should bomb those areas where they live.
madness. utter madness. no. we dropped atomic bombs on two civilian centers of japan after an attack on pearl harbor less deadly than that on new york on sept. 11. this is ww iv. it should be prosecuted as such.
-benjamin harris
lead story in times today points up the truth that wwiv is with islam, that it is wrongly characterized as a "war" on al queda, a radical fringe. public opinion is generally supportive of president bush's handling of the post-sept. 11 world. why, i don't know.
eight months now and we still don't even have bin laden or the taliban leader, much less have we won the war and ended any threat. instead, islam now plans a new attack that will make the wtc attacks pale in comparison.
why has this been allowed to happen. first and foremost, it it a consequence of misconceptualilzing the war as with al queda. the fact is islam is nazism by another name. it is a philosophy that is fascistic, anti-west, anti-woman, anti-semitic and anti-tolerant. that is the case not in some warped al queda conception of islam but in islam itself. that is the case in iraq, iran, lybia, syria, as well as "friendly" islamic states like pakistan and saudi arabia.
second, it has happened because of a misconceptualization of the islamic strategy in the war. a guerilla war beguiles america into thinking that we are fighting a rag-tag band of extremists, with no state behind it, sanctioning it or directing it. the truth is that throughout islamic history the preferred mode of military engagement is through just such guerilla warfare. the western concept of melodramatic state "declarations" of war is much less familiar in islam. combine america's ignorance of the nature of the islamic threat with the capablilties of a well-financed, disciplined group like al queda and a "defeat" of america is indeed plausible.
islam will never occupy the united states--that's the western conceptualization of losing a war that lulls us--but it can defeat america on it's own battlefield, the battlefield of culture. an attack like that alluded to in the times article today, say with a "dirty" a-bomb detonated near manhattan, would plunge the u.s. and the west into economic depression. and that would dramatically lessen the influence of our culture worldwide. that manhattan would be rendered radioactive for decades is incidental.
so the nature of the war and it's perceived lack of state sponsorship leads everyone from the president to the man in the street to think that we can defeat the enemy with surgical strikes, that such a war must be waged with a "coalition" of western nations and "good" islamic states.
in fact, this war makes the western concept of war as outdated as the the tactic of the british in wearing bright red coats against the colonists in the revolutionary war.
we must realize the dire threat to our way of life presented here and the identity of the enemy. this is indeed a "clash of civilizations" and must be fought as such. we do value life more than islam does, and we should never destroy it casually, but we must be prepared to use the force necessary to win this clash. i do not know all of the high-tech options we have in our arsenal and we should attempt to get the job done with the least loss of life, but if we are to err, it should be on the side of making sure that we prevail and that our enemy is defeated rather than wounding, but not killing the enemy, and letting it live another day to attack us.
my prescription today is the same as it was on sept 12. we should simultaneously destroy the cities of the terror crescent, from damascus to tripoli to baghdad to tehran. that destruction should be effectuated with the most efficient means that we have, including nuclear weapons. the american conscience, my conscience, recoils at the thought of women and children and non-combatant men being slaughtered. it should not. a majority of islamic followers worldwide supports osama bin laden. like japan did during ww ii with the use of kamikaze bombers, islam ruthlessly uses it's civilians in suicide missions against american civilians.
of course,in addition to the above we must find bin laden and kill him. if we have good cause to believe that he is in the "lawless" area in pakistan bordering afghanistan then we should absolutely use nuclear weapons on that region. he must be destroyed. now.
i have no illusions about what would happen next. islamabad would erupt and it also should be destroyed. the nazis of saudi arabia will erupt too, and they should be destroyed. we should then hunt down active islamic nazis whereever they exist, in france, germany, the philippines, and we should bomb those areas where they live.
madness. utter madness. no. we dropped atomic bombs on two civilian centers of japan after an attack on pearl harbor less deadly than that on new york on sept. 11. this is ww iv. it should be prosecuted as such.
-benjamin harris
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