Jeremy Hammond on Israel's war on terror

That the real threat to Israel has been that of peace achieved through implementation of the two-state solution is well evidenced by its policies and their predictable consequences.  This is oftentimes the only rational explanation for Israel’s actions.  Its continued occupation, oppression, and violence toward the Palestinians have served to escalate the threat of terrorism against Israeli civilians, but this is a price Israeli leaders are willing to pay.  Indeed, the threat of terrorism has often served as a necessary pretext to further goals that would not be politically feasible absent such a threat.

This was recognized within the Israeli government itself.  In October 2003, for example, Moshe Ya’alon, the Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), criticized the policies of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon because they served to increase hatred of Israel and strengthen terrorist organizations.

~ Jeremy R. Hammond, Obstacle to Peace: The US Role in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

2016

Henry Kissinger on terrorists

What we in America call terrorists are really groups of people that reject the international system.

~ Henry A. Kissinger

Israeli hostage crisis, 1972 Munich Olympics

David D'Amato on the war on terror and growth of the surveillance state

In the United States, particularly in the hysterical environment of the post-9/11 War on Terror, terrorism has been the convenient, go-to pretext for violating the civil and human rights of political dissidents and activists.  In the years following 9/11, the national security state carefully cultivated an environment of fear and paranoia, a social atmosphere in which Americans would be billing to abandon high-minded ideals of civil liberties and due process in favor of safety.  If we were to be safe, those suspected of terrorism couldn’t have rights, not the same rights anyway.  A new, exceptional kind of war required new, exceptional powers—and, besides, those pesky constitutional safeguards were for real Americans, not suspected terrorists.  It is at this juncture that the racial and religious dimensions of terrorism as a concept played their critical role, buttressed by “a pervasive media and political discourse that insisted the disciplinary techniques available to the state were insufficient for dealing with the threat that terrorism posed.”  The terrorist or suspected terrorist becomes an “exceptional figure,” dehumanized and subject to different rules, to “excess levels of state power” and disciplinary actions that would not be permissible absent this context of race.  The War on Terror became the primary means through which an imperial ruling class could consolidate its real and psychological power by punishing the other.  Policing at home could become ever more militarized and oppressive, surveillance more pervasive—justified by an omnipresent threat that has already infiltrated the homeland.

~ David S. D'Amato, "Power and Punishment in the Construct of Terrorism," CounterPunch, November 24, 2023

Mike Huckabee wants to spend 6% of GDP on defense to fight war on terror

Right now, we spend about 3.9 percent of our GDP on defense, compared with about six percent in 1986, under President Ronald Reagan.  We need to return to that six percent level.

~ Mike Huckabee, "America's Priorities in the War on Terror: Islamists, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan," Foreign Affairs, January/February 2008

Andrew Bacevich on the failure of the global war on terror

I believe - I think the record shows - that inflated claims about our influence and about our capacity to direct events in the world leads to disaster.  Where is the proof?  Well, the proof is in the behavior of the United States (an example)... after 9/11 when we launched this, the folly of the global war on terrorism which has cost our country dearly in blood, in treasure and perhaps at least as important, in creating instability in our own democracy.  We can't afford anymore of that and therefore we need to think about what a more prudent and realistic way of dealing in the world might be.

~ Andrew Bacevich, co-founder, Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, "Historian Andrew Bacevich questions the U.S.'s moral authority in global conflicts," GBH News, November 3, 2023

Doug Casey on terrorism

The fact is, believe it or not, there are over 100 distinct definitions of terrorism out there, mostly put out by various US government agencies. Perhaps they can’t agree on a definition because it’s useful to leave the concept as a floating abstraction to be used when convenient. 

I would define terrorism as a tactic of warfare intended to have mainly psychological effects on a civilian population. 

But, remember, terrorism is a tactic of warfare—like artillery barrages, cavalry charges, frontal assaults, and a hundred other tactics.  They’re all nasty.  But properly applied, terrorism can often achieve an objective with vastly fewer casualties than the alternatives. 

Napoleon said, quite correctly, that in warfare, the psychological is to the physical as three is to one.  That’s why there’s an emphasis on winning—or at least changing—the hearts and minds of both the enemy’s troops and his people. Terror is one way to do that.  And it’s typically the lowest-cost alternative.  The US, currently still a rich country, rails against “terror” because it’s mainly a poor man’s tactic.  But we use it when it suits us. 

In the last century or so, the US has fought a lot of guerrilla conflicts.  But it typically forgets that when you’re an outside third party fighting a guerrilla war in someone else’s homeland, you’re almost certainly on the wrong side because guerrilla wars are people’s wars.  And it’s a thin line between a guerrilla war and terrorism.  I’m a freedom fighter; you’re a rebel; he’s a terrorist. 

Governments have always used terror.  The Assyrians—proto–Middle Easterners, if you will—liked to scare enemies by skinning alive those who resisted.  Genghis Khan and Tamerlane purposefully used terror by piling up skulls into pyramids.  The Romans purposefully committed genocide as a method of warfare on occasion and reserved crucifixion as a terror punishment. 

Let’s not be too sanctimonious about terrorism.  Bombing cities, which are by definition full of civilians, is just state terrorism, tarted up, justified, and rationalized with legalities and rhetoric.  The real enemy here isn’t terrorism, writ small or large, it’s politics.  The real enemies are the institutions of politics and governments themselves.

~ Doug Casey, "Middle East Conflict and What Comes Next," International Man, October 26, 2023

President Biden on U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan

We no longer had a clear purpose in an open-ended mission in Afghanistan.  After more than $2 trillion spent in Afghanistan, costs that Brown University researchers estimated would be over $300 million a day for 20 years — yes, the American people should hear this... what have we lost as a consequence, in terms of opportunities? ...I refuse to send America’s sons and daughters to fight a war that should have ended long ago.

~ President Joe Biden, August 31, 2021

(as quoted by Jill Kimball, "Costs of the 20-year war on terror: $8 trillion and 900,000 deaths," Brown University, September 1, 2021)

Joe Murphy on twin threats to freedom: 9/11 and Covid

9/11 did not wake up Americans to the danger they faced in a corrupt and despotic government that could create money out of thin air, fund whatever wars they wanted, perpetrate heinous crimes in full view, and brainwash millions to believe that it is all for their good when in fact all of those things are threats and detrimental to freedom and peace. It didn’t wake Americans up. It did the opposite. People embraced the national governments call to action to punish those they blamed, to wage war on Iraq and Afghanistan based on completely false claims, to wage an endless “Global War on Terror” to allow government more power in the National ID act, the Homeland Security Act, the Military Commission Act, and so on. Americans didn’t wake up, they cheered on the despots, dutifully complied to more restraints on their freedom. Americans yawned and went back to work. 

Twenty years later, 2021. The despots are marching to a pre-planned and choreographed script. It is in full view and the propaganda machine is well oiled and more insidious and powerful than it ever was in 2001. Those that study history and the lessons of history can see the step by step march that bring us to the tyranny that we are experiencing in the name of Covid19 not only since 9/11 but since the ratification of the Constitution of these united States of America. At this juncture we are not just facing some more tyrannical government agencies, a few more losses of freedom, and a call for more foreign wars. We are facing the loss of all of our freedoms: The right to control your own body, the right to private property, the right to travel, the right to converse freely, the right to buy and sell, and even the right to make a living.

~ Joe Murphy, "What Was 9/11 Then and What Is It Today?," LewRockwell.com, September 13, 2021

Eric Snowden on his post-9/11 reaction

September 12 was the first day of a new era, which America faced with a unified resolve, strengthened by a revived sense of patriotism and the goodwill and sympathy of the world.  In retrospect, my country could have done so much with this opportunity.  It could have treated terror not as the theological phenomenon it purported to be, but as the crime it was.  It could have used this rare moment of solidarity to reinforce democratic values and cultivate resilience in the now-connected global public. 

Instead, it went to war. 

The greatest regret of my life is my reflexive, unquestioning support for that decision.  I was outraged, yes, but that was only the beginning of a process in which my heart completely defeated my rational judgment.  I accepted all the claims retailed by the media as facts, and I repeated them as if I were being paid for it.  I wanted to be a liberator.  I wanted to free the oppressed.  I embraced the truth constructed for the good of the state, which in my passion I confused with the good of the country.  It was as if whatever individual politics I’d developed had crashed—the anti-institutional hacker ethos instilled in me online, and the apolitical patriotism I’d inherited from my parents, both wiped from my system—and I’d been rebooted as a willing vehicle of vengeance.  The sharpest part of the humiliation comes from acknowledging how easy this transformation was, and how readily I welcomed it. 

I wanted, I think, to be part of something.  Prior to 9/11, I’d been ambivalent about serving because it had seemed pointless, or just boring.  Everyone I knew who’d served had done so in the post–Cold War world order, between the fall of the Berlin Wall and the attacks of 2001.  In that span, which coincided with my youth, America lacked for enemies.  The country I grew up in was the sole global superpower, and everything seemed—at least to me, or to people like me—prosperous and settled.  There were no new frontiers to conquer or great civic problems to solve, except online.  The attacks of 9/11 changed all that. Now, finally, there was a fight.

~ Eric Snowden, "9/12: The Greatest Regret of My Life," September 11, 2021

Rob Stallard on the impact of withdrawing from Afghanistan on the U.S. defense budget

We doubt if the end in Afghanistan will have any more impact on the US psyche than the withdrawal from Iraq.

We see the conclusion of the longest war in US history as dovetailing with the shift from counter terrorism to containing China, and an increased aversion in the West to open ended military expeditions. 

~ Rob Stallard, Vertical Research Partners defense analyst, "7 Defense Stocks That Still Offer Value Now That the U.S. Has Left Afghanistan," Barron's, September 1, 2021

(Barron's: The Afghan war stretched over 20 years, so the exit is a quite a milestone for the U.S..  Yet the implications for the military budget aren’t significant.  Afghanistan was due to consume about $9 billion in fiscal year 2022 spending, according to Stallard.   The total defense-funding request from President Joe Biden tops $750 billion. compared with the $741 billion spent in the current fiscal year.)

Eric Swergold on the war in Afghanistan

To the Editor: 

For investors, there is a simple way to think about the U.S. experience in Afghanistan.  Twenty years ago, you bought a stock for $100. The investment lost $4 dollars a year and is now worth $20.  You finally have had enough and give it to your trader to sell, and he butchers the sale and gets you out at $5. 

President George W. Bush is the analyst who got you in at $100, and President Joe Biden is the trader who got you out at $5. Now, set politics aside and remember the trillions of dollars we spent under both Republicans and Democrats and, in human terms, the U.S. soldiers who are dead or wounded.  The tragedy was the entire 20 years, not the last 20 days. 

~ Eric Swergold, Mill Valley, Calif., Barron's Mailbag, August 28, 2021

November 19, 2001

Fred Reed on pulling out of Afghanistan

So why did this happen?  Why another rush to the exit as the world laughs?  Which the world is doing.  In a sentence, because if you do something stupid and it doesn’t work, it probably won’t work when you do it again. 

The psychological explanation is slightly more complex. Vietnam is a good example. America invaded a country of another race, utterly different culture, practicing religions GIs had never heard of, speaking a language virtually no Americans spoke, a country exceedingly sick of being invaded by foreigners, most of them white.  In Afghanistan the designated evil was terrorism, in Viet Nam communism, but the choice of evils doesn’t matter.  You have to tell the rubes at home something noble sounding.

~ Fred Reed, "Despair in the Empire of Graveyards," LewRockwell.com, August 21, 2021

George W. Bush on Afghanistan

The men and women of Afghanistan are building a nation that is free, and proud, and fighting terror - and America is honored to be their friend.

~ President George W. Bush, Third Presidential State of the Union Address, January 20, 2004

Kevin Duffy on open-ended government wars

We should be opposed to all government wars: on drugs, on poverty, on terror, on racism, on climate change and, yes, on Covid. They are always open-ended, unwinnable and come with crushing costs. The only winner: Big Government.

~ Kevin Duffy, tweet, August 13, 2021

Doug Casey on George W. Bush's war on terror

It’s a pity that Bush, when he was in office, made such a big deal of evil.  He discredited the concept.  He made Boobus americanus think it only existed in a distant axis, in places like North Korea, Iraq and Iran, which were and still are irrelevant backwaters and arbitrarily chosen enemies.  Bush trivialized the concept of evil and made it seem banal because he was such a fool.  All the while, real evil, very immediate and powerful, was growing right around him, and he lacked the awareness to see he was fertilizing it by turning the U.S. into a national security state after 9/11.

~ Doug Casey, "The Ascendance of Sociopaths in U.S. Governance," International Man, April 28, 2021

Ron Paul on how Big Tech helped the U.S. government fight the War on Terror

Those who continue to argue that the social media companies are purely private ventures acting independent of US government interests are ignoring reality.  The corporatist merger of “private” US social media companies with US government foreign policy goals has a long history and is deeply steeped in the hyper-interventionism of the Obama/Biden era. 

“Big Tech” long ago partnered with the Obama/Biden/Clinton State Department to lend their tools to US “soft power” goals overseas.  Whether it was ongoing regime change attempts against Iran, the 2009 coup in Honduras, the disastrous US-led coup in Ukraine, “Arab Spring,” the destruction of Syria and Libya, and so many more, the big US tech firms were happy to partner up with the State Department and US intelligence to provide the tools to empower those the US wanted to seize power and to silence those out of favor. 

In short, US government elites have been partnering with “Big Tech” overseas for years to decide who has the right to speak and who must be silenced. What has changed now is that this deployment of “soft power” in the service of Washington’s hard power has come home to roost.

~ Ron Paul, "The 'War on Terror' Comes Home," LewRockwell.com, January 12, 2021

Gary D. Barnett on terrorism

The point I’m attempting to make is that terrorism is terrorism regardless of the players involved. I think this fact is overlooked by the masses who simply bury their heads in the sand in order to escape the hard truth. When the general populations, in this case much of the population in America, accept barbarous torture, rendition, suspension or elimination of common rights, military tribunals, rape and murder, then they have become part of the problem, not the solution. Support of any government that participates in this kind of behavior is indicative of a blind society, and one that has lost its soul. This kind of hypocrisy is the epitome of immorality, and if continued can only lead straight to hell!

~ Gary D. Barnett, "Terrorism Is Terrorism: An American Contradiction in Terms," LewRockwell.com, February 13, 2010

Erasmus on lasting peace

Never, however, will we obtain concord if each man tries to hold stubbornly to his own opinion; nor will there ever be a firm, long-lasting peace if it is not sealed with true and solid reasoning. Nothing will last that is patched up with terror and threats, nor can anything endure which is woven of human tricks and devious counsels.

~ Desiderius Erasmus, Forward to the Third Edition, The Latin New Testament (1522)

George Soros on George W. Bush and the war on terror

Bartiromo: Your book is unusually harsh on President Bush. At one point you write: "The Bush Administration and the Nazi and Communist regimes all engaged in the politics of fear." Do you really believe the Administration is a threat to democracy?

Soros: Yes, I really do believe that, and that is why I got involved in politics. By claiming to engage in a war against an unknown enemy that will never disappear...President Bush has appropriated excessive powers for the executive branch...undermining the division of powers that have been the mainstay of our democracy. In addition, he succeeded for a while in making any criticism of his policies appear as if it was unpatriotic. That undermines the first principle of an open society: critical thinking.

~ George Soros, "What Soros Sees Ahead," BusinessWeek, June 26, 2006, interview by Maria Bartiromo

Christopher Manion on the HMS Cornwall incident (seizure of British sailors by Iran in Iraqi supposedly waters)

Remember when those poor Brits were captured in Iraqi waters last year, bringing Bush to the brink of war with Iran?

Well, it turns out they weren't Iraqi waters. The U.S. occupation force had changed the border between Iraq and Iran! Only -- and this exemplifies their crafty, twenty-first century strategic brilliance -- they didn't bother to tell Iran!

Of course, this blunder was kept secret for a year, and hats off to the London Times for its persistence -- the documents were released only after the Times lodged a Freedom of Information suit. The documents included this gem from Tony Blair's Defence Secretary -- who knew the whole thing was bogus a year ago! From April 13, 2007:

"[Top Secret] The exact coordinates to the Op Line have not been published to Iran."

"History will vindicate us," blurted Blair on one of his visits to Bush early in the war.

Tony, history is not vindicating you, it's convicting you.

~ Christopher Manion, LewRockwell.com blog, "What? More Lies? I'm Shocked, Shocked!," April 19, 2008