Problem with this: nobody likes your cause. The only people who can and possibly would support you are easily intimidated or killed (Saudi Royal Family, etc.). Finally, you're dumber than four day old goat grease in a Taliban beard.

The United States is not a country of Crusaders. We don't do holy lands. The only land which we place on a pedistal is that which is below our boots.

We don't wage religious wars.

Al Queda is nothing more than a bunch of goat f**kers.

After 9-11, their own self-worth went through the roof. They inflicted fear on the US, but better than that, they woke us up.

Let the Jihad Lemmings scream. Bring them to Baghdad. They are going to fight Americans one way or the other. I would rather them fight our soldiers in Iraq than our kids in America.

And we will exterminate them like the prickless cockroaches that they are.

Remember, it's not heroism, it's citizenship: Mow your lawn, pay your taxes, signal to change lanes, and kill terrorists.

It's an American thing. You wouldn't understand. And if any of the two-inch dicked Al Queda out there read the command post, recognize that we will wipe our asses with your worthless souls.

Damned, I sounded like an American Baghdad Bob, didn't I?

We'll see how anxious people are to join up with these losers. The "weak horse vs. the strong horse," remember, Osama?

The challenge for the US in Iraq is going to be to remain a neutral party while slowing turning over the administration of the country back to the Iraqis. We have to establish the rule of law and foment capitalism, first.

So long as we behave in a way that's perceived as fair to the legitimate stakeholders (but NOT the Baathists), the appeal of Al-Queda lunacies will fade, as it's been fading.

If the Iraqis have anything like a normal, prosperous country, terrorism is going to be a minimal threat and most will be directed by outsiders...which they aren't going to like.

The other thing we absolutely must do is identify and destroy training camps where ever they popup. Quite a bit of this could end up being black ops.

I guess the Al Queda Cockroaches need to ask the thousands of dead Syrians rotting on the streets of Baghdad just how well that guerilla warfare thing works.

Nothing like the smell of rotting terrorist flesh in the morning!

Baghdad Bob emails: "Cowboy Bob, take a deep breath. We mustn't let our emotion seize control of the camel reins of our tongue. You have made some good points, yes. I would just council a less heated, less "name-calling" approach. Yet remember: it will not be long before your intestines are pierced by the sword of our counter-attack and set aflame. Thank you."

Remember, it's not heroism, it's citizenship: Mow your lawn, pay your taxes, signal to change lanes, and kill terrorists.

I like this a lot! Its about civil and ordered societies! However, if you don't want to play by the rules then we are prepared to bomb you and send in the tanks.

And BTW we don't care what brain-dead rationalization you come up with - communism, islam, green-bunny worshippping its all the same.

(sarcasm)

Ease up on the green-bunny worship. Intollerance like that is why America is hated all over the world. Green-bunny worshipers are not all terrorists.

(/sarcasm)

Pity poor Putin. The Russians want to know why the Russians have been so incompetent in the field that all they can do is LOSE. They've lost in Chechnya. They've lost in Afghanistan. They've lost all over the Middle East where their crappy equipment couldn't match Israeli resolve (3 WARS) ...

YES, 9/11 was devastating. But if that's a victory then wait to you see what happens when we deliver the counter-blows.

I wouldn't want to be Putin today, for all the tea in the WORLD. How can he explain his country's experts? Pin medals on these folks ... they buy and sell garbage no one else would touch with a ten foot pole.

Okay. With the Arab words "MOTHER OF ALL BATTLES" be finally retired on Saddam's head? Or is there another fool out there? Hello, Assad. Eye doctor that you are ... are you blind? Or for safe keeping have you shoved your eyeballs up your damn-ass-cuz ... that's what I'm asking.

THE SMELL OF DEAD RAGHEADS ... ah, what a welcoming smell with my morning coffee.

"They came in the same old way. And, we killed them in the same old way."

The Duke of Wellington

"Always Out Front"

"Let us win your hearts and minds -- or we'll burn your damned huts down."

Funny. The American military will be studying the war and not be ready for conclusions for some time to come.

Baghdad Bob emails: "Carol, I hope you are a man with a woman's name. You sound like you are trying to run with the wolves, in your simplicity. The womanly virtues are for softer pursuits. Tell your husband he must whip the souls of your feet with the dull edge of his sword. And remember: once we launch the fury of our counter-offensive all your rhetoric will be seen for what it is, the ranting of simple-minded children who will be made to cook in the filth of their criminal delusions. Thank you."

Al Qaeda should take note of the fact that the Minute Men knew a thing or two about guerilla warfare. It's been part of our military heritage since the French and Indian Wars.

I nominate Cowboy Bob as the American Information Minister.

Get some more sound-bombs, ready, Bob.

No surprises here. The classical strategy whereby a very weak force tries to combat a very strong force is guerilla warfare.

However, Al Qua'ida has just been dealt several severe blows:

1. Undoubtedly, there were operational contacts between Iraqi intelligence and Al Qua'ida (not to mention the PLO, Hamas, Hezbollah, etc.). A great deal of these contacts and other intelligence data is now in our hands.

2. Available caches of WMD Al Qua'ida might have been able to bribe from Iraq or steal or buy outright are also no longer available.

For guerillas to win, they need secure operations and weaponry. Weaponry they can probably obtain from other sources, but they must assume their operational security is compromised severely.

Guerillas also need the support of the larger population, both material and moral support, which implicitly protects them from the stronger power. It is not clear this is now so, since the population of Iraq is willingly turning over and pointing out collaborators and Fedayeen. Also, the Iraqis are now jostling for influence in the post-war government, and most seem to have calculated that support for Al Qua'ida, with US combat forces in the vicinity, is detrimental to obtaining US support for their political ambitions.

It's rarely mentioned what the real war is - Iraq is just one more step in the fight against it. The real war, in my very humble opinion, is against muslim clerics who seek not only religious power but political and economic power expressed through an all islamic regime. Just today, clerics in Iraq were telling their people, "death to America, death to Zionists" and on and on it goes. Existing regimes in the arab world are always at risk to this movement as secular arab states are also their enemy. Israel, poverty, perceived american transgressions, holy-war mentality, are all just grist for islamic cleric aims - these issues are not root causes only tools to be used to further their cause. And a cleric without an army or guts to actually fight themselves relies on terrorism as their only modus operandum, hence al Quida, Hezbollah, and all the martyrs who unfortunately are whipped-up into a frenzy by these zealots and I might add the arab press.

How one fights this is extremely difficult. A democratic and successful Iraq would help tremondously - at some point people will question the advisability of following their religious leaders. A resolution of the Palestinian issue would also help.

I only wish that parts of the west would not fracture in the face of this real enemy and that our own internal enmities cause disagreement on these issues(democrats vs republican squabbling, France and Germany vs the coalition).

Any chance these foreign invaders in Iraq (Arab terrorists from Yemen, Egypt, Syria, etc. - definition provided by the Iraqi people) are motivated by money rather than the peaceful religion of Islam? Any chance that the same is true for the leaders of Arab countries loyal to Saddam? Could it be money? Naw. Couldn't be. Could it?

ABC, I would think it would take more than a few dollars for someone to willingly get shot to pieces - I think they are motivated by blind hate fuelled by what they are taught by the clerics and what they read everyday in the arab press.

I think that it may be a mistake to treat "the Arab street" as a single, monolithic entity. Clearly, your point has merit. However, it seems that "the financially motivated" are a significant faction in this sordid mess.

>>>>>>>Derek said:ABC, I would think it would take more than a few dollars for someone to willingly get shot to pieces - I think they are motivated by blind hate fuelled by what they are taught by the clerics and what they read everyday in the arab press.

EXACTLY!!!!! And the French, German, Russian, and Chinese governments,and all of their (and America's) Socialist Liberal, anti-American media.

>>>>>>Cowboy Bob said: guess the Al Queda Cockroaches need to ask the thousands of dead Syrians rotting on the streets of Baghdad just how well that guerilla warfare thing works.

Nothing like the smell of rotting terrorist flesh in the morning!

Cowboy Bob....you rock!

Haven't these schlemels ever read any Mao or Che'? Or do they just think that because God's on their side, that they can ignore how the population feels about them? Maybe it's because they're a desert people that the anology of how the people are tot he rebels as water is to a fish... And it's not like we're going to allow Syria to be the Sierras for the Iraqi Ba'athists, either.

Maybe we should prolong the war a bit, and bait the terrorists to fight in Iraq. We could bring in some busses along the Syrian border and provide free transportation and rooms at the Palestine. Interviews on Al Jazeera would be provided by P. Arnett!
CNN will gladly provide coverage and we would get to see some old Toyota trucks running into an M1...KABOOM...
Hey, if Cowboy Bob rocks, i'd rather listen to him than the Dixie Twits!

Conneticut Yankee:
"Al Qaeda should take note of the fact that the Minute Men knew a thing or two about guerilla warfare. It's been part of our military heritage since the French and Indian Wars."

Yup.

And guess who fought the best guerilla war in Iraq?

US/UK/Aus Special Forces.

Special Forces in huge numbers, precision bombing in huge numbers, and lots of talented grunts on the ground and in tanks and Bradleys.

The Rumsfield Offence(tm) looks pretty damn effective to me.

Derk,

I must disagree with you on the need for harmony within the West in order to win. An apt historical analogy would be the American Civil War. Then as now, there were deep divisions within the North, with opinion ranging from complete appeasement of the South to scorched-earth firebreathers who wished to annihilate all Southerners. Although this division made the war a near-run thing, the final outcome now seems inevitable, especially after 1863, when the North really got war production going. The South could not respond in kind, having already maxed out its production capacity.

Yes, these political divisions now will make the current war vastly more difficult, but the clerics only have Allah on their side. As Churchill said, "the resources of civilization are not yet exhausted." We haven't gotten serious yet about fighting them. I doubt not the final outcome.