The problem with Islamic religious fanaticism is it is unable to apply realpolitik when necessary for it’s goals. To the True Believer, America is the evil fortress blocking the way of the Righteous in bringing the world to the Glory of Allah. They can not see their only one way to “defeat” America: make the cause so boring and of so little value to American interests that the taxpayers turn on it. An enemy must jujitsu like, use America to defeat America while not actually threatening Americans at home.
This is what happened in Vietnam.
North Vietnam never attempted to threaten American civilians. On the contrary, they played to the American public. They pictured themselves as victims of a foreign imperial venture who magnanimously did not blame the people of their tormenter. They set out to split the people from the government policy and they succeeded.
They could do so because total victory for North Vietnam posed little threat to Americans or their way of life. The fall of Saigon made for a few good pictures in Life Magazine. Then it was forgotten about.
Ho Chi Minh succeeded because there was a grain of truth to it. North Vietnam’s defeat of South Vietnam had hardly any affect whatever on the life of the average American. Regional Geopolitics may play well inside the Beltway (the Washington DC ringroad), but it does not hold the interest of normal folk for very long.
But this is not the case with the al Qaeda and their ilk. The attack with which they opened the War was a direct strike on Americans in America. People know they cannot just pull out of the fight. People know in their guts the enemy victory conditions are not just a state for Palestine. They are not even met by the destruction of Israel and the mass murder of everyone there, although that would have a far greater impact than Vietnam since many of those people have relations in America.
It is our entire way of life and our core values they hate. So long as we exist they cannot re-make the world into a Moslem theocracy as their mullahs tell them is right. Since it is god’s work, they are free to do anything. They will do whatever is necessary to prevent Palestine from being sorted out. It is too valuable an excuse for what they intend to do any way. Remember the answer of the alien to the President in science fiction movie Independance Day?
“What do you want with us?”
“For you to die.”
How did it come to this? I can see three equally reasonable ways.
Scenario 1: Saudi Arabia as a conspirator. The Saudi camel herders cum princes come to the realization oil money gaves them great power. They decide to use it over a period of decades to bring the decadent West under Islam. They fund a global 5th column. They use whatever tactics are necessary to infiltrate and take over Mosques in the West: education, grants… and bribery, extortion, threats and murder when necessary. Through plausibly deniable intermediaries they fund uprisings and the facilities to train armies of Orcs… I mean the faithful. They secretly do anything possible to assist in the creation of nuclear weapons under Islamic control. All the while they execute their Byzantine game they play the West for a fool and feign friendship.
Scenario 2: Son of Cold War. Much of the environment for what has come is due to the short term moves made in the global chess match of the Cold War. The propaganda, the stirring up of trouble behind the other guys lines, the money and weapons to clients, supporting friendly rulers who are kept in power by violence on their own people (The Shah of Iran for example)… all of these fertilized and created the environment now filled by the fundamentalist.
Scenario 3: It’s all their fault. The population growth in some of these Arab countries has been immense. It has turned relatively unpopulous desert into crowded slums. The combination of ignorance, poverty, crowding and incompetent government set the stage. The refusal to accept blame for their own condition made the populace an easy target for the worst sort of religious nuts.
I would personally say each of the above is partly responsible for the situation we have today. I must admit I do not think the Saudi’s actually sat back and seriously planned things that long ago. They aren’t Sauron, they’re simply opportunists with religion. However I would not be surprised to find some radical mullahs spoke with a Prince or two about such grand ideas for conquering the West from within and received a tithing of a few hundred million to just go away – but to be sure to say what fine Islamic Princes they were.
Meanwhile back in America… Americans don’t really see any way out. The Mideast crazies will commit mass murder on us if we fight; they’ll commit mass murder on us if we try to ignore them; they’ll destroy our civilization in a century or two if we try to appease them… and in the mean time they’ll commit mass murder on us just because we’re still here.
This is why there aren’t a lot of Americans out calling for “peace”. If people are going to kill us, we are not the sort to go down meekly. We’re far more likely to be every bit as vicious and a damn site more ruthlessly calculating than the mad mullahs worst nightmares can concieve.
They really have no choice but to come to terms with a pluralist, live and let live world. Because that is the world which is coming. Even if we have to kill them all to get there.
