How to Deal With Muslim Nations and Terrorist

How to Deal With Muslim Nations and Terrorist
Tuesday, November 15, 2005

Questions continue to be raised as how to deal with Muslim nations and the terrorist threats. I admit I probably don’t know what I’m talking about (except for what I hear and read), but maybe then I’m in good company because it seems few people know much about this quandary or how it may best be resolved.
Recently my friend Richard R. sent to me writing by Major General Vernon Chong, USAF, ret. and asks what I thought. Chong’s hypothesis is that the terrorist war is for real and we must unite to win the war. Read full text at: http://adjunct.diodon349.com/Attack_on_USA/this_war_is_for_real.htm

• Excerpts: “ I close on a hopeful note, by repeating what I said above. If we are united, there is no way that we can lose. I hope now after the election, the factions in our country will begin to focus on the critical situation we are in, and will unite to save our country. It is your future we are talking about! Do whatever you can to preserve it.” “Whether Democrat or Republican, conservative or liberal, and that includes the Politicians and media of our country, and the free World!” “There are those who find fault with our country, but it is obvious to anyone who truly thinks through this, that we must unite!”

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My response:

There is little in Chong’s composition that I would disagree.

Without question the terrorist war is for real – and civil society must win.

His writing was probably immediately following the 2004 Nov. election, so I wonder if the general after a year would have anything more to add – knowing of the every-growing difficulty to execute this war on Iraqi ground; another 1,000 war deaths and untold maimed, crippled bodies, not to mention the destructive toll on Iraqis and their infrastructure; secret prisons in Eastern Europe; the killing of three (3) defense attorneys for co-defendants in Saddam Hussein’s trial (more and more evidence of a civil war); what has happened in Spain, England, and now in France and the rising unrest among Muslim youth of inopportunity around the world.

GM Chong did not address a premise for alternative ways to wage the war (I’m not necessarily referring to winning hearts and minds.), which I believe to of furthermost importance:

1. How (in what ways; on what premises) should the terrorist war be fought? May I suggest:

• Guns, bullets, missiles, and bombs, to head off a few suicide boomers and insurgents in Iraq, will not win it alone. Overall, battle-force will prove to be the lesser element to effectively win the war.


• It’s a war of Ideology where sleeper cells must be disrupted and used to get to the nucleus of organization, but moreover the teaching cells of brainwashed sick minds must be uprooted.


• It will have to be a war more geared to covert operations with cooperation of many Islamist throughout the world. A Muslim problem must engender Muslin solutions.


• A greater effort must be made in world trades (to bring more Muslim nations into the World Trade Organization), to bring the deprived Islamic populations of theocratic, monarch, dictator, or even a republic such as Egypt (94% Sunni) rule into modernity. We can’t make all these free republics, but we can be proponents for equal opportunity in economic development to make modernity a possibility. Of course Islamic traditions must make way for change. A ray of hope may come for the fundamentalist (anti-modernist) if they can be raised in or the proximity of homes with some economic empowerment. When economic opportunity expands, people will gain promise of a better life and move in their own right to gain freedoms. Such has happened in Communist China, as economic markets continue to develop.

America may sell or market democracy to other countries, but we can’t impose it anymore than we can impose our religious beliefs on other cultures. However, with an ongoing commitment to diplomacy to work with Muslim nations it may eventually bring about some measure of democratic rule, even though that will be problematic. As reported: http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/egypt/index.html?inline=nyt-geo

“A meeting of Muslim nations initiated by the Bush administration ended in discord on Saturday after objections by Egypt blocked a final declaration supporting democracy.”

• The unity of world nations is more important than the unity of one US Nation to win this war. America unilaterally cannot win this war.

Few people would disagree that Saddam Hussein was a tyrant dictator who needed deposing (if it could benefit the county’s people as a whole), just as many more need disposing. We are now learning more about the North Korea’s tyrant one-man dictator, KIM Jong Il – who is unsurpassed in bringing dehumanization on a country’s people. Words cannot describe the images currently being reported by CNN.

Iraq may be a legitimate terrorist battleground, since we are now there. If it’s to be the forefront of the terrorist battle, then let’s change the course, set a new plan for winning. It’s seems doubtful that elections will be a turning point. Otherwise, as Chaney (or was it Rumsfeld) has suggested we could be there 12-years and more. Count the toll in financial, life, dismemberments, and Iraqi relations! Disunity will continue on this war until there is a better plan to win both on Iraqi soil and to other ends of the world. That’s a debate that’s needed, not only in the US but also more importantly with allies and Islamic nations, from which must come some basic resolution about “how and where”, even while we continue wholehearted support of our troops.

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For further interest I refer to two excellent articles that give what seems a possibility reasonable resolve and reality in our Iraqi battle dilemma:

Milton First’s op-ed, “The Arab League to the Rescue” in NYT on 11-12-05 may be a viable solution to the current Iraqi situation.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/12/opinion/12viorst.html?th&emc=th

• Excerpt: The Arab League can be America's best exit strategy. True, we would be asking Arabs to clean up our mess. But the Arab states have an interest both in America's leaving and in Iraq's cohesion. At the very least, the Taif model suggests that Arabs are likely to do better than America at getting Iraqis to rebuild their society together. The alternative, as it was in Lebanon, is more bloodshed.

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Additionally NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF op-ed “The Exit From Iraq” on 11-13-05 gives an enlightening, what I believe realistic, view of our current situation, especially with regards to the vast majority Iraqi’s opinion of our occupation: http://select.nytimes.com/2005/11/13/opinion/13kristof.html?n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fOp%2dEd%2fColumnists%2fNicholas%20D%20Kristof

• Excerpt: Cut our losses This has an obvious merit: Iraq may fall apart no matter what we do, and if we're going to give up and pull out we should do so now rather than wait until after we've spilled more blood.

• That said, immediate withdrawal strikes me as utterly immoral. A surgeon who botches an operation should not walk off and leave the patient on the table with a note: "Oops. This didn't go as planned. Good luck, but I'm outta here."

Politics aside on how we got in the war, there is plenty room for debate such as the division even within the Republicans: the fight between the views of John McCain, Colon Powell and apparently 90% of the US Senate with regard to prisoner torture vs. the administration’s will to continue in what some consider inappropriate prisoner treatment.

Yes, GM Chong, we need to unite, but first let’s make sure it’s a winnable plan. Anything short of a plan to win requires an exit strategy. Our forces have gone beyond the call of duty in a mire of civil strife. If the “terrorist war” is lost it will not be on Iraqi soil – for the war extends far beyond. Iraqis will lose whatever is lost in Iraq, not American forces. Now, after two and a half years, it’s Iraqi’s responsibility to defend their country from a civil war.

My conclusion is that the inevitably growing world-economic interdependency, economic opportunity for all, by which tools must come to collapse anti-modernist values and cultures in the long term will prove the most important component of the plan to win the terrorist war. In the meantime, it will be the unity of all concerned nations for our safety and building a platform - whereby a seamless communication between nations will join the battle to uproot the ill mind of the terrorist.

Cornell Cox
Smithfield, NC 27577
cornellcox@msn.com