Posted on 01/26/2006 8:29:20 AM PST by SirLinksalot
Al Qaeda's Big Boast
By DANIEL BENJAMIN and STEVEN SIMON
IF Osama bin Laden's aim in releasing an audiotape was to gauge his enemies' reaction, he must have been gratified to find that America's leaders and opinion-makers understand him little better than they did on 9/11. The proof is in how his offer of a "long-term truce" was treated. The White House spokesman, Scott McClellan, declared: "We do not negotiate with terrorists." Vice President Dick Cheney saw Mr. bin Laden's offer as "some kind of ploy."
SNIP
Yet, while Osama bin Laden has seldom used the word "truce," the vision outlined in the rest of the message is not new: a withdrawal of the United States from Muslim lands and a rebalancing between the Muslim and non-Muslim worlds. (One Qaeda spokesman has insisted that only when America has lost four million people would the field be even.) In other words, this "truce" must be preceded by total capitulation.
The author of the 9/11 attacks did not, of course, think that his musings would jump-start a negotiation. Had Americans instead listened with the ears of those for whom the message was intended - Muslims around the world - they would have heard something very different. Instead of a weak Osama bin Laden, they would have heard a magnanimous one who could offer a truce because "the war in Iraq is raging, and the operations in Afghanistan are on the rise in our favor." Mr. bin Laden staked his claim to leadership of the Muslim world on 9/11, striking us as others only dreamed of doing. On the tape, he shows strength by taking credit for America's humiliation in Iraq and continues to do what we are not: fighting for the hearts and minds of the Muslim world.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
1) The emerging breed of self-starter terrorists with few or no ties to Osama bin Laden, like the Madrid and London bombers, and others who have been arrested before they were able to carry out attacks in Pakistan, Australia and elsewhere.
We have not captured them all, therefore we are losing.
2) The emergence of an indigenous jihad in Iraq. The truly dramatic development is the radicalization of Iraqis who will continue the insurgency or travel abroad to kill, like those who bombed three Western hotels in Jordan in November.
Since we have Iraqi radicals who continue to wreck havoc in Iraq and overseas still uncaptured, we are losing.
THEIR CONCLUSION IS SIMPLY THIS -- The Jihadists are winning sympathy, therefore they are winning ( actually they don't say outright that they themselves are sympathetic ). COWARDS.
Hey Stupid: care to explain the Red-on-Red attacks in Iraq? Even know what that means?
The only insteresting thing from OBL's latest tape is that he taking his talking points right off your op-ed page.
Treason is as treason does - arrest the NY Slimes (all of them).
I don't think this message was intended for Muslims. He spoke directly to the American people--told them not to believe Bush, offered a truce, etc.
Other messages he's given had lots of religious references in them. This one did not because it was intended for Americans.
Consider however that the Iraqi radicals who are in favor of tossing Zaquawi out are probably the "get America out of our country" type, not the "we hate America so much that we're going over to their country and kill them" tpe.
I don't know what dream world the dolt at the NYT are living in, but the American invation of Iraq and less than three weeks to the fall of Saddam represents the fastest military victory in history.
It's as simple as this. When you are winning a war, you do not discuss a truce.
He offered the truce to give cover in the Muslim world when he orders the butchering of more innocents. It's a PR move directed at Muslims and his god, not the USA.
I'm sure we are all glad geniuses like these two are around to explain these intricate details to us poor dumb folks!
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