Originally Posted by Eric5273

I don't intend to make peace with a bunch of fanatics. I would just like to create an environment in their own countries where they are seen as fanatics and not mainstream. And the only way to do that is to show the people of those countries that they are wrong about the United States.

For years Osama bin Laden and Al-Queda have preached the following points:

1) once America opens military bases in the Middle East, they will never leave

2) they kill civilians and are fighting a war against Islam

3) they are also there to steal the economic resourses of the Middle Eastern countries


They only way to decrease their influence is to prove them wrong. And as the old saying goes, actions speak louder than words. Publicly saying they are wrong will not do anything. We must speak with our actions.

The one thing President Bush is right about is that this is not a war that can be won overnight. It will take years. What we need to do is to create an environment where people are not attracted to fanatics. And the way to do that is to have good living conditions with no starvation, good economic conditions, and no war. If that is achieved, Al-Queda will quickly find themselves as influential as the KKK is in the United States. Yes they still exist, but are a small shadow of their former selves.

Unfortunately, to achieve such things, politicians will be forced to go against the desires of all the special interests. They will have to take on the military industrial complex and put an end to war in the Middle East. They will have to take on the oil & energy companies and not help them gain a foothold and privatize the oil supplies of the Middle Eastern countries. They will have to take on the AIPAC and support a 2-state solution in the Middle East. And lastly, they will have stop their financial and military support for dictatorships like those in Pakistan, Turkmenistan, and Saudi Arabia.