..and we have a plan to deal with this?

uhhhhhhhhh

NOT TRUE! IT'S THE RELIGION OF PEACE (TM)!

ROP=RIP

Yes, but if we cross our fingers it will all go away...and if that doesn't work we can just blame you know who.

whats the plan?

give these fkrs more money??

give them visas to America??

I AM SICK OF THIS

“We teach jihad because the holy Qur’an teaches jihad, which is the defense of Islam.”

Which is (of course) an inner struggle a struggle to remove infidel innards.

oh god rip these poor poor souls.

“But if we return to jihad, God will lift us up.”

Please G-d Faster

Disclaimer: I am in no way suggesting that Allah (p word be upon it) is any relation to G-d.

Hi. I'm new here. OT: Did anyone ever mention that Oct 12 is the date of Cole Bombing (2000) & Musharraf's coup (1999) & Sept 11 is the date of the death of Jinnah, founder of Pakistan (1948?). I know it's probably just a coincidence...

This first Jihad of the 21st century will not end in the very near future. It may be disheartening to come to intellectual realization that this will be a long war; it will be a costly war as well in terms of the sacrifice which we in West will eventually have to make in order to preserve our freedom from the religious tyranny of Islam. But preserve we must for this is truly a fight against a new dark age.

It beats learning that nano-stuff.

Dear Lord help us.

I used to think the Paki-Bashers in Toronto, where I went to hig school, were evil... Now I wonder if they just knew more than the rest of us did.

Jihad is an inner struggle.

Truly!

Ibrahim Hooper told me so!

I call that school a legitimate enemy target, as it is a progaganda center, and possibly Command and Control Center as well.

Ibrahim Hooper is on those Ditech ads on Fox right?

I really think we should just eradicate the Muslims. A simple choice, conversion to christianity or death. We save them or we kill them and send them to meet their lord. It can start in Iraq, and what would the rest of those filthy animals do about it?

__________________

Editor's note: "American" is the same person who has been posting trollish comments at LGF for a week or two under the name "pink cream cheese," and he/she/it is using a computer at Stony Brook University in New York. I'll leave its comment here as an illustration that people with sympathy for the jihad schools of Pakistan are attending US universities -- and trying to smear LGF by planting phony comments like this one.

OT:

[Link: news.bbc.co.uk...]

Approx. 800 cannibals in Germany... And this is a nation which accuses Israel and the US threats to world peace and violent nations... And of course let's not forget the 20-40,000,000 murdered/killed in the World Wars because of Germany, including making innocent Jews into lampshades and soap.

A troll. How lovely.

#15 American

Nice try, dimwit.

La la la la hum hum hum la la la I won't listen to you...remember when you were a child and someone (some adult, usually) was telling you something you didn't want to hear? You'd sing and hum and stick your fingers in your ears. That's what the U.S. and the rest of the West seem to be doing. Time to grow up!

Pls forgive my frivolous last post. What is there to say about this jihad school? Didn't Pervez recently say he was cracking down on "militants"? Yes, the schools are dangerous & need to be taken out. But how? I doubt we would bomb "religous" schools w/all the fears of muslim/world sensibilities.

And of course, who will a LLL decide to quote when he tries to show how evil every one at LGF is?

#15

GAZE

And a spamming troll to boot.

Don't worry, it's probably not anti-Semitic, just "anti-Zionist."

Damnit. We just sprayed for trolls. Begone troll scum, you are not wanted here.

"American" #15 is the same person who has been posting trollish comments for a week or two under the name "pink cream cheese," and he/she/it is using a computer at Stony Brook University in New York. I'll leave its comment there as an illustration that people with sympathy for the jihad schools of Pakistan are attending US universities.

#15 American 11/23/2003 08:45PM PST

I really think we should just eradicate the Muslims. A simple choice, conversion to christianity or death.

You're not welcome here troll.

#15: Well then grow us up some, Queasy. Your commentary doesn't tell us where you stand. Just what lesson do you have for us? Bring it.

The annoying part is that other LLLs will quote "American"'s words and accuse us of all thinking like that. Not that I really care what those idiots think about us, but if it gives Charles any trouble, it bothers me. They're trying to convince Amazon and PayPal to yank any connections to this blog, for instance. This kind of thing is what they cite as racist or hateful.

I'll leave its comment there as an illustration that people with sympathy for the jihad schools of Pakistan are attending US universities.

Perhaps it took its junior year abroad at a Peshawar madrassa.

#27: correction, that should have been addressed to #19. Aside from the snarkiness, it was practically value-free. Probably felt good or something, though.

#21   Kragar(Proud to be Kafir)

Oops. You beat me to it. Sorry.

I'm not a troll zulubaby... I'm merely pointing out the truly vile call the countries we love and are, as far as nations go, righteous.

#20

That's the million dollar question, the kind that makes my head explode.

#27, #30   ytf

S/he's saying that this problem is looking us right in the face, and we're practically ignoring it. What's your beef with what Queasy's saying?

ooops.. Didn't realize you were all refering to 'American' above... Sorry!

...tell me that this place isn't better off with some sort of munition fired at it on graduation day?

-Vic

Oh I'm sorry, Josephine. Bad timing :-)

The problem is not only in Pakistan. It's in Saudi and Iran and throughout the Mooselim world!

#30 ytf
My comment was not addressed at any of the good folks here at LGF. It is a sign of my annoyance that we (most people in the West including several governments, not at LGF) keep hearing about madrassahs and such, but we (again, most people in the West, not at LGF) don't seem to take it the threat seriously.

Maybe this story in Newsweek will be effective. It is, after all, the mainstream media.

Next time, I'll be sure to dot all my i's and cross my t's and not try to be at all unclear. I don't often post here, bcause everyone else is so clever and quick, and it can be kind of intimidating. I'm sorry I didn't write a formal essay. I just finished one for graduate school and wanted to see what was up at LGF.

#25

Charles, it may be a good idea to require registration for posting. Not the would eliminatetrolling altogether, but it would reduce the troll load substantially. Just a thought...

#34 Thanks.

It's way past my bedtime, so I'm a little too sensitive right now! I don't want anyone to think I'm a t-word!

What is complicated about this?

We have to stop these 'schools' and deadly force is appropriate.

This is war for us, jihad for them. But so what?

#39   Queasy

It's okay-- I think most of us got the drift the first time. And not only that, we agree with it.

#39 Queasy . . .

Don't be intimidated. Most people who post on LGF are quite rational and not mean.

#11 Josephine 

As much as I hate Islamists, "Paki-bashers" are wrong. A real gem of a guy I know here in Toronto is a Pak Ishmaeli (follower of the Aga Khan).

Whenever I think of moderate Islam, I think of him. I went to his wedding and spent my first time in a mosque during the rite.

The worst I could say about him? He's a wickedly savvy businessman. I've always been more of an engineer, and no competition in that regard :)

-Vic

Queasy (#39),

Don't worry the complaints. And good at ya for being polite in face of false accusations.

#39 Queasy.When you graduate and return home the folks can welcome you with a 21 gun salute for a real accomplishment. All that madrassa edcated musloid boy did was memorize the address on his personal shipping label to hell,

Want to bet that "American" was anything but?

#42 b

Cutting off the funding (Soddies) would do the trick. How, that is another question.

Perhaps some Israeli would come up with some other way to produce energy that would replace oil (given the distribution of smart people per capita, but I do not insist that it has to be an Isareli). That would be the singlemost tactical ace card in the sleeve.
Everything else would just follow with almost no resistance and the Slamic world would fold within a decade, economically. Then they would either discard the old bagage and move on with modern world, or they would be left to rot in their own backwaters.

OT:

More wailling from the people who brought us www.morallybankrupt.org.

Democrats Demand Bush Pull TV Ad Attacking Critics of Iraq Policy.

hmmm, and yet they still have this on their site;

Bushenstein

Ah, true Dhimmicrat tactics. Post that kind of crap, then when an actual issue is discussed, complain that they're being made to look bad.

Newsflash guys, you're doing enough on your own to look bad, no need to blame the Republicans for it.

Vic:

They say that most Arabs are like most Germans: Either at your feet or at your throat.

While your friend may very well be decent, I wonder if he';; hem and haw were you to ask him re Israelis/Jews being blown to smithereens by his coreligionists.

I hope you're pleasantly surprised, but do be prepared to lose a 'friend'.

#39, 43, 44, 46: Glad I didn't make any accusations, so I don't have to be worried about them being false. :) Thanks to Queasy for clarifying a post which was, facially, equally able to be interpreted as coming from several viewpoints, some of them anti-LGF. Feelings do run high. Pax?

#41: Thanks for seeing what I was getting at. :) I lack the skill/esp to be able to tell you what "most" people think, but *I* appreciate the conversation.

Hard to make a pretty future out of this.
But at least Rumsfeld gets it.

Related to the recent post by Queasy (and his/her defenders): I used to believe that the human race had to "grow up" or it was doomed. I no longer find that notion a source of any comfort, because (grown-up?) people don't even agree on how grown-ups (ought to) behave. So that utterance, taken alone, just maps to "people ought to think what I think they ought to think". I agree, of course! People ought to think what I think they ought to. Sigh. [rueful grimace/grin] Humans. They're the worst form of intelligent life except for the fact they're the only ones we've got. Sorry for blathering, I just want to do what I can to convey that I wasn't just trying to do a drive-by on Queasy, I actually did think about the possibility that I might not understand what she was saying, and ask for clarification, albeit in an "oh, yeah?" way. /overexplain

#54: Yeah. Pretty isn't in the big picture for a while unless you squint and focus decades out. The venom runs deep, but there are also schoolkids with parents who snap to and salute when Americans drive by (I'd post the iraqnow.blogspot.com link, but that site doesn't work and play well with Opera). So there's hope. Hope is not a strategy, but it's something.

Krager (#50),

Thanks for the Bushenstein link. Who the hell approved that? The Democrats are there own worst enemies.

Just as 'total war' emerged from the fusion of industrialism with military capability, so a new type of absolute warfare seems to be looming, in which the fusion of culture and military mobilization becomes primary.

Madrassas are evidently key elements of Jihadi military capability, but the strategic adjustment to this fact is proving very difficult for Western countries, for a number of obvious reasons. Even during the cold war communist ideological activity was considered 'off-limits' as a legitmate military target, permitted to spread throughout Western academies, for instance, at the same time Western military personnel were dying in combat against communist opponents. This is probably due to the fact that irregular warfare and terror tactics were still relatively restrained during WWIII (no North Vietnamese ever attacked a US city).

Suicide terrorism obviously changes the situation radically, but it will take time to catch up with reality. Since a suicide terrorist is 90% cultural preparation and 10% military logistics, it doesn't seem sustainable to continue to treat Islamist cultural installations as legitimate 'culural difference' or 'free speech' issues.

“If you are a friend of Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar, please sit down. But if you are a friend of Bush, keep standing.” Everyone immediately sat, and a mullah delivered the invocation. “

It would of been great to keep standing and shout BUUUSH AAAAK-----BAAAAAR BUUSSSH AKK------BAAAAR

This is the most worrying report I have read in months.

If the US government isn't doing something right now to respond to this, whether it be covert or overt, they havent learnt the lesson of 9-11.

3000 hard-core jihadists pose as much potential danger as an entire rogue state such as Iraq.

These guys will not live out peaceful lives and become lawyers or doctors. Most of them will take up arms against American soldiers in the future.

Jono (#60):

I wish I had hard data on this. But for what it's worth, there's a persistent rumor/legend that the active membership ("soldiery") of the IRA never exceeded four figures in the last 75 years of the 20th Century, and rarely if ever reached over 1000 in the last 50 years. OK, what does that tell us? Me, I think the "growing up" we (the USA) have to do might very well include the development of "mental toughness" that might look positively scary to others, and the making (by our population) of tougher sacrifices than those faced by "The Greatest Generation". I hope to the God I doubt exists that I'm wrong. Because it's Scylla and Charybdis if I'm not.

#58

I don't even understand why there is discussion about this.

I think we should atleast be taking out the clerics and supervisors of these mad-rassas. ie Haq

If not demolishing the buildings too.

I feel if we don't start doing this, it is irresponsible in terms of self defense.

#62 b. If there isn't a discussion it's because it's not even being considered, not because it's so obvious. That's why Rumsfeld's honest words are truly revolutionary, but we're getting used to that.

The US does not have a liquidationist policy viz Islamofascism. The policy is inclusivist, and that is why the loathsome rainbow-coalitionary, Nancy Powell (US Ambassador to Pakistan), met with members of a Taliban-al-Qaeda linked party (Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal) on Sept. 23, 2003, and thanked them for participation in the democratic process:

[Link: usembassy.state.gov...]

[Link: www.pakistanchristianpost.com...]

#64 Camel prophet. Frustrating for sure.

what we need to do is go covert start picking the leaders off from 5 yards after a while someone will realize the unhealthy consequences of preaching hate kinda like mossad did after the munich olympics we know who they are where they are why not dispatch em to hell use their strategy against them i'm sure in the military there would be no shortage of volunteers other countries should have 3 categories friend foe or enemy and to judge their status one only has to look at their society

I think Osama woke the muslims up - certainly the ones I met in the UK became more radical from the time of 1999 until now. They are just preparing and organising now - there will come a time as the war on terror goes on that they become more confident and attack us in our own cities. They are only 18-25 at the moment, 2nd generation and haven't got organised. Once they are about 30 and there are more of the younger ones....I give it 2-4 years...Next up will be Iran.....

#66 Jimmytheclaw,

You are so correct, the time has come to go on the offensive and to start terrorizing the professional terrorists, those who launder the money and otherwise make it possible for terrorists to do their business. Track them down where ever they are, be it London, the US, Germany, France, Sweden etc...etc.... It is time to take off the PC handcuffs and get down and dirty in the shadows. This is the only way we are going to win this war. The children in the Madrasses are only going to be foot soldiers that will be easily killed on the battlefield, the real brainpower resides in those terrorists who have taken on the cover of western businessmen or even politicians. They have been educated at Western Universities and blend in easily but none-the-less they are the brainpower behind the money-laundering and coordination that make terrorist strikes possible. Hunt them down and kill them ASAP.

'Students spend most of the day reciting the Qur’an; memorizing every one of its 6,666 verses is the main requirement for graduation.'

Interesting number of verses in there.

#68 Jim Brown

'It is time to take off the PC handcuffs and get down and dirty in the shadows. '

If only if were all as easy as it seems to be from your statement.

I agree with you fully, however the LLL and every other moonbat with a 'cause' is going to try their hardest to stop us (US/UK) from taking off the PC handcuffs.

I thought the most telling comment in the article was when Haq says "I challenge Musharraf to find any extremism here...We teach jihad because the holy Qur’an teaches jihad...”

Particularly the Liberal mind-set, but also a good many Conservatives, seem to want to continue to live in the warmer and cosier fantasy that all this trouble comes from a tiny minority of fringe islamo-wackos. If we take them out, it is hoped, then the greater peaceful muslim population will get back to business as usual.

Haq's remarks make it very clear (and it coincides with the overwhelming evidence) that the bloody worldwide Islamic offensive against the Western way of life is in fact the MAINSTREAM Islamic ideology.

From Pakistan, to Nigeria, to the Sudan, to Turkey, from Palestine, to Syria, to Iran, to Iraq - from Saudia Arabia (who are exporting it everywhere else in the world) to Indonesia, the message is clear and consistent. The message comes from "official sources" as well as from the caves of Afghanistan.

Jihad is mainstream Islamic thinking folks. The concept of Jihad, the current building up of jihadi fever in the minds of Islamic young people around the globe, is intended to ultimately bring down the West (and even the "moderate" Islamic states).

Is this goal far-fetched? All it would take is the overthrow of the nuclear armed government of Pakistan, and then the funneling of the materials and technologies necessary to Iran (with North Korea's help likely) to light the final fuse. How many nukes (clandistinely placed in key Western cities) would it really take to devastate the worldwide economy, and seriously disrupt our ability to wage a meaningful war against this Islamic foe? Five? Ten?

Heck, our airline industry just about collapsed because they knocked down two buidlings in New York City. There were hard economic waves made due to "mysterious" blackouts in the U.S., Canada, England and Italy this year, as just another example of how precarious our system truly is.

These people that are coming after us may, in large part live in simpler or backward cultures - but they know how to push the bottons on some very destructive technology that we in the West have developed over the last half-century.

They have the petro-bucks to buy this technology. They have the hearts and minds of the people in countries with the infrastructure now to produce nuclear weapons - all they need is the reigns of power, and they are working on that.

I guess my overall message is, never underestimate your opponent. Most people seem to think that what is going on is not much more than a nuisance. That we have all the power, that we are vastly superior in terms of military capability, technology, political and economic muscle...that all we have to do is decide to flex our muscles some day (if these guys get a bit too pesky) and we will win the game without even breaking much of a sweat.

Problem is, we aren't even playing the same game. Or, at the very least we aren't playing the game by the same rules. These people are nasty, they are motivated and they don't intend to stop until the entire world is hard-core Islamic. They want you, your children and your grandparents dead. Sorry to be quite so blunt, but they are willing to be dead - no, that's wrong, they are eager to be dead - just to make you dead!

The guys pulling the strings are smart. They have billions of dollars. They have studied, and infiltrated, us. They know our weaknesses and they are fixing to attack those weaknesses.

Not the most hopeful message for a Monday morning I know but don't say we were never warned. Heck, they've been telling us for at least the last ten years that war has been declared on us...they just can't seem to get us to take them seriously...

9/11 was just a probing action.

Western leaders are find it difficult to get 'moderate' Muslims in the West to condemn violence and terrorism. When Muslims are pressed hard they do condemn terrorism but also join it with, BUT Israel etc.

What our leaders have to do is to is press moderate muslims to condemn THE JIHAD. This will sort out who are with us from those who are here in the West simply biding time till they are strong enough to wage proper jihad in the West.

The Wall Street Journal printed a rather long and detailed article about madrassas shortly after 9/11. I've looked for it high and low and haven't been able to locate it. It was the first I'd read about these 'schools'. The strange thing was that, in a speech shortly after the article was printed, Clinton referred to the article incredulously - as though it was the first he had learned about them. I had to wonder whether this 'revelation' was staged - to give the impression that he was truly surprised by the information in the article, or whether he really was that clueless.

45 Vic

As much as I hate Islamists, "Paki-bashers" are wrong. A real gem of a guy I know here in Toronto is a Pak Ishmaeli (follower of the Aga Khan).

You may well be right. However there was the guy from London, a Muslim and a Sufi, the most peaceful branch of Islam, who went to Israel and blew himself up, killing several Israelis in the process.

Just don't where to start.

From the Newsweek

Students spend most of the day reciting the Qur’an; memorizing every one of its 6,666 verses is the main requirement for graduation

Four sixes! Wonder if there is a hidden message here.

Honestly, these Islamofascists' very first call of Jihadi action is Kashmir. It is there that they earn their 72's.

What US (and Israel too) must be worrying about is the fking NUKES which the Pakis got from China and call them the 'Islamic Bomb'!

It is a wakeup call; The time is tickling!

[Link: www.freeman.org...]

On May 28, 1998, when the jubilant masses poured to the streets to cheer Pakistan's string of nuclear tests, they shouted "Allah Akbar!". They paraded, and celebrated around, models of the Hatf - Pakistan's tactical nuclear missile - marked "Islamic bomb". In Friday prayers, Mullahs stressed that the tests are a "triumph for Islam." Completely ignored were President Nawaz Sharief's explanations that these nuclear tests were Pakistan's reaction to the Indian threat. And herein - in the stark difference between action and the politicians' rhetoric - the quandary lies.

[Link: www.mfa.gov.il...]

It would perhaps be hard to maintain that the nuclear tests carried out by Pakistan awakened great happiness among the Palestinian public, but it was certainly possible to observe signs of satisfaction in the territories. The regime in Islamabad reported the realization of the dream of the "Islamic Bomb", and the Palestinians joined in the feelings of pride of many of the hundreds of millions of Muslim believers throughout the world.

Palestinian acquaintances of mine agreed that if it was an Iranian or Iraqi bomb under discussion, an outburst of joy would have taken place across the West Bank and Gaza. That bomb would be aimed against Israel, while the Islamic bomb of Pakistan has no direct connection to Israel.

The Pakistani bomb does have an indirect connection to us, which finds expression in the hints in the Palestinian media that the nuclear developments in the Indian sub- continent bring closer the day when there will also be an Iranian bomb.

#70 JWarrior

If only if were all as easy as it seems to be from your statement.

I have reread my post and I do not know where you got the impression that I consider it easy to do. Of course it will be hard, what with the 5th column, aka the elite media and the Democratic Party, operating right out in the open here in America. Difficult or not it has to be done and if that means internment camps for those 5th columnists, so be it. We are rapidly nearing the point where the US will have to make a descision as to whether we are actually on a war footing like we were in WWII. This is a fight to the death and we better start taking it seriously. I find it quite dispiriting that when I am swilling beers and talking to people, most have already forgotten 9-11 and do not take the threats to our country seriously. The next major strike by al-queda in America is almost certainly going to be a WMD. Maybe then America collectively will wake up and stop ignoring those actions which are hard and instead realize that those actions are needed. America's greatest strength has always been the ability and where-with-all to do that which is difficult but necessary.

“But if we return to jihad, God will lift us up.”

"Right after the JDAM lands," he added.

The generation of Germans schooled in the Hitler Youth and other Nazi "educational institutions" did not abandon the Fuehrer's ideology, it merely adjusted to the new masters. De-nazification was an administrative ruse. It took another 25 years and the rise of a new generation to power to change Germany.
And any of this could not have happened without turning almost all German cities to rubble.

We do not (yet?) have the will or stomach to oppose and stop the Islamic jihad.

What good is being civilized if it's going to cost you your civilization?

Newsweek???

Kind of makes me wonder that since other reporting has been so wrong and/or slanted, they're throwing this in for balance or they're finally waking up.

#77 Jim Brown

I wasn't necessarily implying that you yourself considered the problem of throwing off the PC handcuffs as an easy thing to do.

My thoughts behind my comment to your post were more to do with the complexity of the tasks in front of us, as opposed to any criticism of your thoughts. I apologise if that is the way my post came across to you, but that really was not my intention. :)

I was trying to highlight the fact that we have a huge war looming in front of us, yet even the job of 'throwing off the PC handcuffs' put on us by various active and vocal elements in society, is going to be a huge task in itself.

81 JWarrior,

No apology is necessary and none is expected. I have a bad habit of sounding pissed off when I type or talk, please take no offense. After all we are on the same side in this war which is more than I can say for some of our fellow citizens.

Best regards and keep up the good fight.

Did anyone catch that part about Mullah Omar sending his congratulations and the teacher telling the students to pray for Mullahs Omar and Osama "because they are living in caves" and are uncomfortable?

I still think Osama is dead else why doesn't he send his congratulations but be that as it may, that little hint about where Mullah Omar is hanging is interesting.

I'm not so pc. I think it may be necessary to get tough and totally bomb these schools with their students. There may not be any other way but Americans have no stomach for that sort of extermination and it will take another strike or two on US soil to toughen them up.

It's a mess, alright. I think back to that piece by Thomas Madden on the history of the Crusades and I realize we're in for a lifetime struggle.

The 6,666 verses makes me wonder if that is what the book of Revelations was referring to; remember those books were dictated long ago and the writer may have left off a 6. Certainly with everything else it would seem that "Mohammed" is the anti-Christ spoken of and his followers and their religion of Islam is what G*d and his prophets were talking about when they foretold the great struggle in the 'last days'. I think this is supposed to last for 7 years and then there will be 1000 years of peace? My knowledge of the bible teachings is a bit hazy since I haven't studied it since I was a child but maybe someone here can clarify.

#83 JB

No offense taken what so ever!

I found your comments very interesting. I look forward to posting with you again in the future.

I spent a term at SUNY at Stony Brook in the late 70s. The school was/is? plastered with graffiti; no building was spared. It's interesting that 25 years on, the school continues to be a cesspool of juvenile delinquents who, in the internet age, have moved on to fresh canvasses.

#79 Observer

Can we really afford to look the other way while another incarnation of these sprout up all over the world?

Jim Brown writes:

We are rapidly nearing the point where the US will have to make a descision as to whether we are actually on a war footing like we were in WW

I agree--I don't think Bush has another full year of talking tough but acting soft against the Islamic Fascists, both here and overseas.

He's tried to make it a police-intel campaign, with the occasional low-intensity war overseas. But the counter-campaign by the Islamofascists is accelerating beyond his strategy's capacity for containment and plans for political reform.

As you correctly point out, the absence of violence here at home has successfully recast the spell we lived under before 9-11, to our shame and eventual regret. That has been a smart strategic response on their part, while our inability to regulate Islamic propaganda in our schools and mass media does not bode well for our safety.

When the next attack comes, it will generate the kind of war the politicians will not be able to control.

.....continued Pakistani assistance to the Taliban -- whether covert or open -- is necessary because of Taliban limitations in operating communications technology and sophisticated weapons systems.

The arrest of the Pakistani officers earlier this year precedes international news and news agency reports this weekend that hundreds of young Pakistani students are leaving seminaries to join the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan.

UPI cited a report in the Pakistani magazine Newsline as saying, 'At least 5,000 youth including former Taliban soldiers and students from religious seminaries of Baluchistan, have joined their compatriots in Afghanistan.'

The Karachi-based monthly, according to UPI, also quoted prominent Taliban activist Habibullah as claiming 'we could probably even take Kabul, but we recognize our limitations and the fact that we probably wouldn't be able to hold it.'.....

Exposed: Pak army links with Taliban

Gary Bruce:

"As you correctly point out, the absence of violence here at home has successfully recast the spell we lived under before 9-11, to our shame and eventual regret. That has been a smart strategic response on their part, while our inability to regulate Islamic propaganda in our schools and mass media does not bode well for our safety."

I disagree that OBL & Co. are showing good strategic reasoning because of no major follow-up in the US to 9/11. Instead, we need to understand what 9/11 was all about. It has been called an act of terror and has spawned a "War on Terror". But is that the case? Is there an analogy available to help us understand the thinking of the enemy?

I'll propose one: Halloween has recently passed reminding us of the comic strip "Peanuts". Schroeder goes out to the pumpkin patch in hopes of seeing the "Great Pumpkin" if only Schroeder is sufficiently sincere. Of course, the hoped for vision doesn't happen but the blame for this is always insufficient sincerity.

Now, I suggest that 9/11 was not an act of terror but rather a demonstration of sincerity. If OBL & Co. along with enough Muslims are sufficiently sincere, an intervener (Pumpkin, whatever) will appear and set everything to rights. It is not necessary to "win" in any sense we in the West would recognize. "Insh'allah" is the incessantly repeated mantra; if only we Muslims are sincere enough, everything will come our way.

What, in this formulation, would be the key to the frequency, location and nature of further acts? I suggest that it's not offensive moves on our part knocking out support, infrastructure, etc. Nor is it defensive moves on our part with better intel, police work, etc. Rather, future OBL & Co. actions are driven by the need to renew and/or advance the overall level of sincerity.

#83 Elizabeth 11/24/2003 07:53AM PST

revelations was written long after jesus died nobody is sure when if it was written in the 7th century then yes you can point to those that decieve the world ie stole christian and jewish tradition its somethin thats been on my mind since 9/11

Notice how Newsweek's Moreau/Yousafzai/Zahid Hussain blame America for the growth of radical Islam.

Newsweek writes:

"Abdul hears such calls to arms incessantly. Hardscrabble madrassas like his, in the north Waziristan town of Mirali, are where many Taliban leaders got their start two decades ago during the CIA's war against the Soviets in Afghanistan."
 

This is weak.

Why is it the "mainstream" media consistently omit the actions of the Soviet Union, and focus solely on America's response?

The above Newsweek excerpt should have read:

"Abdul hears such calls to arms incessantly. Hardscrabble madrassas like his, in the north Waziristan town of Mirali, are where many Taliban leaders got their start two decades ago when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan."