President Bush has said that this war will be “unlike any other.” I agree with that statement in that I think all wars are unique, and that this will be unlike WWII or Vietnam (although invading Afganistan, should we do it, will have many of the guerrilla aspects of Vietnam), I do think this war has a lot in common with our perpetual “War on Drugs.” It needs to be fought both here and abroad (some of those implicated in the original WTC bombing were US citizens). The enemy is fuzzy. It crosses many international boarders. It is tolerated by some governments and supported by others, but mainly practiced by individuals.
We’ve debated the war on drugs before and (although I haven’t gotten too involved, it doesn’t interest me that much) think we have a consensus that the war on drugs has not been a complete success.
I believe this “war like no other” will in fact be just that. However, this war will be very similar to, say, the “war on drugs” in that in will be continuous and (offensively) hard to measure the success of. (Defensibly, it will be very easy to see, unfortunately.)
I’m scared that Bush’s words are cream filling, though. I sincerely hope he is vigilent in fighting this new “war” with countries right and left bowing out already.
Yeah, like the rest of the world wants terrorists hanging around. They just don’t want to be on the receiving end of bad press for doing something about it agressively.
Our options were to pull out years ago (pre-Gulf War) and try and let the Middle East forget our meddlings, but the Palestinians would have a hard time forgetting since they were fighting Israel who had weapons and planes we gave them.
In other words, we walked into quicksand quickly, and now find it impossible to leave. Leaving itself won’t diffuse the situation.
But I was just in this conversation yesterday: is the war on terroism likely to be similar to the war on drugs? Not in a very tight analogy, but sure it could be similar. Our humanitarian efforts will need to be a bit stronger (read: fucking go balls out) and our expression of force must be stronger (read: accept no substitutes) but yeah: terrorism itself can never be wiped out completely. What can be done is that we can set up a situation where terrorists are not able to amass time and resources to make more terrorists, and that they will have a more difficult time finding places to hide.
In the end, only education and humanitarian efforts will prevail; in the beginning, only force will suffice. So yeah, it will compare to the war on drugs for quite some time: it will appear unsuccessful. I only hope the short-sighted voting public can understand that so that we don’t get a new administration to come in and shift gears midstream. That will piss everyone off who we need to definitely not be pissed off. But I can see the democratic platforms already…
IMO the “war on drugs” is unwinable. As long as there are people who want drugs, there will be people who supply them. The only way to “win” is to change human nature.
The war against terrorism is winable though. The vast majority of people don’t want terrorism. We need to get rid of the current terrorists and work to change the conditions that created them. It won’t be easy (understatement of the year) but it is winable.
The vast majority of people don’t want drugs either. Or at least they don’t want the impact of drugs (drugs and minors, drugs and crimes, drugs and public health issues).
And I think what drives terrorists is as much human nature as the desire to use drugs - perhaps even more so. It is part of human nature to risk or even sacrifice yourself for something you believe strongly enough in. It is human nature to hate and even depersonalize the other. Terrorists don’t see themselves as terrorists, they see themselves as noble heros.
that’s just the thing, the vast majority don’t want the impact of drugs, but those same people will go home and have a gin and tonic. I feel that the hatred of terrorism is fundamentally different than that. The desire for foreign substances that make you feel good goes down to a biochemical level, whereas people can choose whether or not a cause is worth dying(or killing) for. The war on (some) drugs is almost more like the terrorist position. Simplified, there is a big difference in the opposition people feel for hedonistic pursuit and murder. The drug war is responsible for many of the effects of drugs, terrorism is murder regardless.