Posted on 05/07/2006 3:10:45 PM PDT by churchillbuff
Forget it Peggy. Osama is under tons of rubble. No sense wasting our manpower to dig up the body. I mean, if Osama were alive would it not be in the interest of terrorism to show him calling on terrorists to fight? But he is nowhere to be found and to the terrorist organizations it is best to just not say anything than to admit (take the wind out of terrorists sails) that he is dead. Until I see a video of him holding up the daily newspaper I will consider him fertilizer.
Not to mention a thousand or so miles of caves.
Not necessarily. There are billions of Mohammedans in the world - in Indonesia, Philippines, Malaysia as well as in the Middle East. The percentage who are terrorists is small. Osama is one of the top terrorists. He's the most visible evil Islamic, and yet we don't seem to have put highest priority on capturing him and making him pay for 9-11 and Flight 93.
She is one of the best writers out there and what she wrote this time is absolutely correct.
a very difficult area to operate in with ground troops - OBL knew that all along, that's why all the OBL and the AQ leadership went there to hide after 9-11.
Osama's been marginalized. It's the other 40 million Mooselimb fanatics we need to work on.
Agree completely - The WH/GOP PR staff need to fight with the same 24/7 intensity they are asking of our warriors in the field -
They have done a piss-poor performance in this regard (too a large degree).
he's not dead.
Congratulations. You're the first person on this thread to have the right response.
Simply incredible how many people are uninterested in making Osama pay for having perpetrated 9-11. Even people who went to the movie about Flight 93 and the horrors that Osama did to those people -- Me, I believe in punishing murderers. Osama has murdered more Americans than any other individual currently walking the planet. He needs to be caught and executed -- and that should be the government's top priority right now. The families of 9-11 are owed that justice.
If he were in Pakistan, we'd have him already.
The reason I said Iran is going to be a tough decision is that Russia and China will be ACTIVE in any US decision to take action with Iran. If it's nukes and threatening Israel, it would be tough, If it's that coupled with evidence of OBL in Iran, it gets doubly tough...
symbolically, OBL is the "big catch" in the war on terror. getting him would be huge - politically, symbolically, and as a message to AQ leadership, telling them "no matter how long it takes, we'll get you".
there is no single big event that will materialize in iraq for the president to hang his hat on as a "victory". No VE or VJ day of surrender, no signing of a surrender agreement on a battle ship someplace. yes, things are improving there, but the sheeple aren't going to see any of that, they get their news through 30 second segments and soundbites.
You are absolutely right. The majority of Americans have not come to the understanding that we are fighting an ideology not just one man. That's why they don't understand the war on terror and Iraq's role in it or how it affects the greater Middle East. However, Peggy is right that if we caught OBL -- Bush's numbers would go up. That seems like a given.
Her other points are well taken. Securing the border and talking up the booming economy would be good strategies. Can't hurt.
It is a ridiculous assumption
Exactly right - Peggy is dead wrong in regard to the premise that we don't have UBL simply because we haven't gone after him enough (that simply isn't the case).
With that said, that UBL remains alive is definitely a real kick in the balls (to be polite). Killing him (along with Zawahiri, G. Hekmatyar in Stan and Zarqawi in Iraq) will be a big lift to our side and have a much larger negative effect on our enemies then most suspect.
Both of you are wrong about OBL.
The terror organizations are not set up in the same way that western hierarchical organizations are structured. (Sorry but big word must be used here.)
Terrorists are organized in loose informal units called "cells" and there really is no central head cell like say, an IBM or a General Motors. Our Administration is totally aware of this and are not killing themselves trying to "get the head man" because there is no head man.
When you start to analyze that many nation states are funding and supplying all manner of terrorist activities you may start to realize the enormous task that lays before us.
Terrorism is literally everywhere around the planet. OBL ,though charismatic, is not crucial at all...his capture or killing will have no impact whatsoever to the world-wide terror picture.
Rest easy in the knowledge that your President and his staffs know all of this and really have from the start. It's the Media Numb Skulls who have made OBL the "Holy Grail that Is'nt".
At least you are not alone in your lack of knowledge.
You, Peggy Noonan and lots of other nice folks don't know your butts from third base about terrorism.
we don't have that kind of enemy in this war - large formations of organized troops that you can conduct those kind of operations against. this is like conducting war against well armed Crips and Bloods streetgangs.
how many soldiers do you want to lose conducting full scale operations in the Pakistan tribal region? would that even work, we can't even find Zarqawi in iraq, and we have 140,000 troops there.
OBL killed thousands on 9-11, including the people on Flight 93. He must be caught and executed. I believe in punishing murderers, especially mass murderers. If we don't put a priority on doing that, with Osama, it sends a bad message to the world, and it deprives the 9-11 families of the justice they are owed.
Under tons of rubble? That's not possible.
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