Herodotus

Thanks for the comments, this is a friendly enough board, and so if there are no objections I will continue.

Now that I have established my philosophy about opinion vs. "knowing" something in absolute terms, (so everyone can take what I saw with a big grain of salt...no ego here) let's get back to this argument. It seems from the poll taken and judging by responses to this thread that posters here have dismissed the connection between Saddam Hussein and 9/11 (that is to say if he had a hand in it or not), but also judging by the responses 9/11 is linked to the war in Iraq, since it "changed" the world (debatable since for some people it certainly did change the world-victims, families of victims, and for others it didn't really change anything at all--but I digress, a debate for another time).

So let's say it did change America's outlook, and its focus on a new (old) threat. What is the threat? Terrorism, radical Islam? Some definitions are in order that should be universally agreed upon so there can be no semantic arguments.

Terrorist...what is a terrorist? A practioner of terrorism...what is terrorism? The use of violence for politcial purposes, the killing/targeting of non-combatants for political purposes, the unlawful use of violence for political goals, or something similar. We know politics (as opposed to money/revenge) is the primary motiviation, we know that civilians or non-combatants are targeted, and we know violence is used...seems fair enough.

It's nice to say we are there in Iraq to change the culture but what culture are we trying to change...Islam, radical Islam? What is radical Islam, who are radical Muslisms? Terrorists (haha, just kdding). But seriously what is a good definition of radical Islam...is it Wahabisim, and followers of Wahabisim; so does it follow necessarily that all practioners of Wahabisim are radical and thus prone to violence? What about radical Shiite Muslims? Anybody who is Muslim and opposes American policies? What's the dividing line between who we need to change and who we don't need to change? Or do we change everybody, just to be on the safe side?



Sorry, I ask a lot of questions, but I think they are pertinent to what our strategy is in Iraq. We can say we are winning all we want, but at the end of the day what exactly do we win? S-2 says we will win if we make Iraq more like Turkey; but Arabs are not Turks, and that change came from within, and only because Islam and Islamic parties are kept at bay. So can it really be the case that Iraq will be democratic...and is this a necessary good?