The War Against Jihadism. Why can't we call the enemy by its name? We're going to have to ...to win

What kind of campaign is this? Six-plus years after 9/11; while the Taliban attempts an Afghanistan comeback; as Islamist terrorists cause mayhem in Algeria and occupy huge swaths of tribal Pakistan; despite "United 93" and "The Kite Runner," a library-full of books, presidential commissions, congressional hearings, and four election cycles—despite all of that, a strange, Victorian reticence about naming the enemy in the contest for the human future in which we are engaged befogs this political season.

Such reticence is an obstacle to victory in a war we cannot avoid and in which we must prevail. For if there is one thing certain in this season of great uncertainties, it is that the war against jihadism will be staring the next president of the United States in the face at high noon on Inauguration Day, 2009.

That is what we are fighting: jihadism, the religiously inspired ideology which teaches that it is every Muslim's duty to use any means necessary to compel the world's submission to Islam. That most of the world's Muslims do not accept this definition of the demands of their faith is true—and beside the point. The jihadists believe this. That is why they are the enemy of their fellow Muslims and the rest of the world. For decades, an internal Islamic civil war, born of Islam's difficult encounter with modernity, has been fought over such key modern political ideas as religious toleration and the separation of religious and political authority in a just state. That intra-Islamic struggle now engages the rest of humanity. To ignore this, to imagine it's all George W. Bush's fault, or to misrepresent it because of a prudish reluctance to discuss religion in public, is to repeat the mistakes the advocates of appeasement made in the 1930s.

In the mid-twentieth century, it was important to understand the ideas that fed the totalitarian passions of fascism, Nazism and communism. It is just as important today to understand the ideas of such progenitors of jihadist ideology as the Egyptian scholar-activists Hassan al-Banna (1906–1949) and Sayyid Qutb (1903–1966). Why? Because the power of ideas that can call men and women to make great sacrifices can only be trumped by the power of more compelling ideas that summon forth nobler sacrifices. Yet while our presidential candidates have endlessly debated who-was-right-or-wrong-and-when about Iraq, the imperative of effective U.S. public diplomacy—of making the argument for freedom and decency effectively around the world—has gone largely unremarked. That failure reflects a reluctance to grasp the nature of this new kind of struggle.

This is a war of ideas, pitting two different notions of the good society against each other. The jihadist vision claims the sanction of God. The western vision of the free society, in which civility involves engaging differences with respect, has both religious and philosophical roots. Some Americans have lost touch with the deepest cultural sources of the nation's commitments to religious freedom, tolerance and democratic persuasion, thinking of these good things as mere pragmatic arrangements. But if the United States can't explain to the world why religious freedom, civility, tolerance and democratic persuasion are morally superior to coercion in religious and political matters, then America stands disarmed before those who believe it their duty to impose a starkly different view of the good society on us.

The war against jihadism is being contested on many fronts simultaneously. There is a military front, which involves Afghanistan and Iraq but also includes such unlikely places as the Caribbean, Mali and the Philippines. There is an intelligence front, an economic front, an energy front and a homeland-security front. Such a complex war, which could last a generation or more, cannot be the prerogative or burden of one political party. The war against jihadism must be owned by both political parties. Thus one measure of any presidential candidate's seriousness is this: can he or she build a bipartisan coalition capable of sustaining the long-haul struggle required to defeat jihadist nihilism?

The landscape is indeed forbidding. Still, there is some good news: the war against jihadism can lead to cultural and political renewal in America. Making compelling arguments in favor of the free society reconnects us with the great ideas on which our liberties rest. Putting faith and reason into conversation strengthens the unity of our diverse society. Defending religious freedom, and supporting Muslim reformers who seek an Islamic case for tolerance and pluralism, reminds us that American civil society is built on truths about the dignity of human life. Energy policies that de-fund jihadism by reducing our reliance on petroleum as a transportation fuel can ignite entrepreneurial energies, revitalize the American auto industry, and help the environment. Rational homeland security policies can make us safer and less beholden to political correctness.

The jihadist merchants of death must be defeated morally as well as militarily. Doing so offers the American people the opportunity for national self-renewal and the chance to defend the cause of human dignity throughout the world. The stakes—the future of freedom—are very high indeed. It's past time for those who would lead us to acknowledge that.

I don’t want to fight 200 million! I think the problem with the Jihadi is the enemy position is that it means only some Moslems are incompatible with the West, and we can’t tell who they are, so we let them into our midst.

Then we have to sacrafice our rights to deal with the threats we have created by letting them in.

The alternative is exclusion and seperation. To seperate we need to get it through our thick heads that the problem is ISLAM not Jihadism. We should, therefore, feel fine about just excluding them from the USA. (Poor Europe! Not sure how they fix their mess.)

Seperation means no honor killings, female mutilation, halal butchery in the kitchen and all the other charming habits and customs of their religion. No burkas as the mall! No ‘women only swim periods’. No hand basins made un-usable due to non-stop foot washing. No more “meditation rooms” coverted to Mosques. No more calls to prayer disturbing our sleep. No fifth column slowly building strength inside our nation.

I think we can avoid a war altogether. We avoided (excepting a few proxies) war with the Soviets in part because we clearly saw them, all of them, as the threat they were. We didn’t give out thousands of student visas to Russians, or invite Cubans to attend our law schools, or allow untrammeled immigration from North Korea.

Islam is a lot like Communism. Its a horrible, misguided ideology that is absolutely at odds with Western Civilization. We have every right, in fact a duty, to clarify this and to exclude those who believe in it.

We can not, and probably should not, prevent the Islamic world from making their civilization into whatever weird 6th century parody they want. Stalin’s crimes against the Russian people in the name of his twisted ideology were far, far worse then even Saddams torture and wars against his subjects. But, we understood: Russia is not us. They are going to screw up their country, but that’s not our problem.

The alternative is the neo-con position. It says the enemy is Jihadism. Most moslems are against Jihadism, so we have to help them fight it. We can’t let Jihadism run a country, so whenever some (hard to quantify) set of Islamic rules builds up past some (un-specified limit) we have to overthrow that country. This is the real, proven, recipie for non-stop war. Not my “It’s Islam” position.

Countries will need to choose, just like in the cold war. Many are defacto Islam. They go their way. A few are wobblers. They have to decide which world they join. If they join the Islamic world we seperate from them. No easy visas for the USA, etc. Maylaysia has some choices to make.

But we also stop the incrementalism that lets Islam, the totalitarian ideology, use our own freedom of religion habits against us. They are effectively doing this everywhere. If we come to the conclusion that Islam is the enemy we will stop this, draw some lines, and perhaps help Europe find the way to resist, exclude and restore their damaged societies.

The alternative is Eurabia, which would be a tragedy for the West and make our own position that much more precarious. But if the problem is only “Jihadism” then what is the rational for excluding ‘peaceful’ Muslims from France, Germany, the Neatherlands?

There isn’t one. Soon they will beging working on their typical Islamic democracy: “One man, One vote, One time” and Sharia will be the new law in Lisbon.

>>>Not really. “Jihadism” is still a big dodge.
The enemy is ISLAM. Full stop.

It is the Islamic nations, not the Jihadi scum, that created OPEC that has been screwing with the world economy since Nixon.
It’s Islamic nations, not Jihadis, who invaded Israel in 1948, 1954, 1967, 1973 and many times since.
It is Islam itself, not Jihadis, that gives support to the terrorist Palistinians, 1/2 of whom are not Jihadi’s, but semi-secularized.
It is Islam, the religion, that oppresses woman and continues to put forward the customs of female cicumcision, honor killing, oppressive traditional polygamy.
It is Islam itself which has created the madrassas that poison the minds of millions, some small percentage of who eventually become Jihadis.
It is Islam itself, not Jihadis, that does not acknowledge freedom of religion and supports the death penalty for aposty.
It is Islam, not the small Jihadi offshoot, that has turned huge swaths of Europe into “no-go” zones for the native Europeans.
It is Islam, itself, not just Jihadis, that enjoins followers to war continously against all other faiths.
It is everyday Moslems, not Jihadis that continuously riot over cartoons, the Popes speech and anything else.
It is Islam, and it’s followers that is so stealthiy taking over institutions and using them to squelch dissent. (Such as the Canadian Human Rights Comission, the Finland Internet censors, etc.
In summary it is ISLAM that is the problem.

There. I’ve named it.

This article STILL misses the damn point. <<<

Gee, you’re already illegal in Canada and much of the European Union. In other words, we’re screwed.

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