Water Wells Are a Big Part of Defeating Islamic Fascists---In Mosul

As children do around the world when there is a running water hose, these children of Shikhan village now can play in water available near to their homes. (USACE Photo)


By Claude D. McKinney
Gulf Region North
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
“I don’t know where they got their water from before this well was here,” said Bill Hood the program engineer for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Gulf Region North, who manages water project contracts for the Corps. “There was no river or stream that I could see anywhere near the well sites I visited.”
Now, another source of water has been found and tapped in this area -- an underground aquifer. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has begun a well initiative that is due to be completed in mid-summer 2006. At its completion, the initiative will create 49 wells to service 37 Northern Iraqi communities. Each well project consists of a pump house that encloses a well head, a pump, a generator to run the pump, and a chlorinator with all of its associated instruments, pipes and gauges. Included in the project is a reservoir, a supply pipe to the village and, where needed, a tap-stand. The reservoir is a 500-800 gallon tank placed either on high ground or on stilts to provide the needed pressure at the tap. Most of these villages have never had flowing water available within their boundaries before, so they had no tap-stand. Where one was needed, a tap-stand consisting of a shut-off tap from the water pipe, a catch basin with a runoff drain and a stone decking surrounding the stand was built. The local citizens still need to carry the water from the tap-stand to their homes, but it is a big improvement over trucking water in, or having individuals carry water in containers in their cars for many miles to supply their needs. he wells, many as deep as 600 feet and some as shallow as 200 feet, tap directly into an aquifer of nearly pure water. It receives chlorination as an assurance to kill any bacteria which may invade the system. This can do nothing but improve the health of the Iraqi people.

“Of the various type of projects I manage, which includes water, medical facilities, police and other security buildings, and airport facilities, I think these water projects do about as much to “win the hearts and minds” of the local Iraqi than anything else we can do,” said Sheryl Leeper the area engineer who manages the contractors and monitors quality assurance at the work sites. “Their quality of life is improved dramatically; almost instantly. We can complete one of these well projects within several months,” she said.

Whether it be a large water project like the treatment plant being built in Ifraz, which will provide water to 600,000 people in Erbil 31 kilometers away, or these wells which supply water to villages of 500 to 1,000 people each -- providing water is a most important task to building a workable infrastructure for Iraq.

Recruiter--recruitee reunite in the sandbox

U.S. Marine Corps Staff Sgt. Barrett A Kahl, a former recruiter, and Lance Cpl. Christopher M. Fallen, Kahl's former recruit are stationed at the same base in Iraq. The two got a chance to reminisce recently during their deployment in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. U.S. Marine Corps photo courtesy Staff Sgt. Barrett A. Kahl U.S. Marine Corps Staff Sgt. Barrett Kahl & Lance Cpl. Christopher Fallen
Recruiter, Recruitee Reminisce in Iraq
By Cpl. Adam C. Schnell 2nd Marine Division HADITHA DAM, Iraq, Jan. 10, 2006 — When Staff Sgt. Barrett A. Kahl was a recruiter in South Boston, Va., he talked with prospective enlistees about the Marine Corps being the smallest, yet most respected organization in the U.S. military. Little did he know that one day those words would apply in his own life when he got the chance to reminisce with one of his recruits while deployed to Iraq. “I saw him here one day standing in the chow line,” said Kahl, a native of Jarrettsville, Md. “It was weird how we were stationed at the same base in Iraq.” His former recruit, Lance Cpl. Christopher M. Fallen of Halifax, Va., is also serving here in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. While Fallen works as a machine gunner for the Dam Security Unit attached to 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, Kahl makes sure the DSU and other units attached to the battalion receive the food that keeps them going. “I knew I would see him out here once he was done with recruiting duty,” said 21-year-old Fallen. In early 2003, Kahl first met Fallen and knew he was different than other future Marines. Graduating in the top five in his class at Halifax County High School, Fallen could have been accepted to any college but instead chose to go into the Marine Corps. “Since I’ve known him, he has always had a lot of heart,” Kahl said. “Even out here, I see it because he volunteered to come out here when he didn’t have to.” Like most recruiters and their enlistees, they keep in contact with their Marines once they graduate basic training and go on to their units. Fallen kept in touch with his recruiter.

Santa and the Reindeers

Santa, played by Ken Rice, a civilian contractor with AAI Corp., and his six reindeer, Soldiers from Company E, 615th Aviation Support Battalion, prepare for launch on an unmanned aerial vehicle launcher at Camp Taji, Iraq Dec. 18. U.S. Army photo by Master Sgt. Winston Churchill.

But if we cannot resolve the question of whether or not we intend to win this war whatever the cost, then we will shortly lose the option of deciding.

Today, our choice is whether to fight for Western Civilization at whatever cost, or to stop fighting and accept the gradual erosion of our operating system. And we are so divided over this question that it is scarcely an exaggeration to describe our debate as a kind of civil war. Until we resolve this question, we are stuck with half-measures that delay our defeat while also blocking the path to victory. And in war, if you aren't winning you're losing. There is nothing in between. So we must decide either to give up, or to summon the will to victory.

The trouble is, we have very little time left in which to decide. Indeed, our time to decide has just about run out.

Herbert E. Meyer served during the Reagan Administration as Special Assistant to the Director of Central Intelligence and Vice Chairman of the CIA's National Intelligence Council. His DVD on The Siege of Western Civilization has become an international best-seller.

The Great Con: Tony Blair As Chamberlain Encourage Men of the West into Surrender

From "A Battle for Global Values"Tony Blair at Foreign Affairs

"To me, the most remarkable thing about the Koran is how progressive it is. I write with great humility as a member of another faith. As an outsider, the Koran strikes me as a reforming book, trying to return Judaism and Christianity to their origins, much as reformers attempted to do with the Christian church centuries later. The Koran is inclusive. It extols science and knowledge and abhors superstition. It is practical and far ahead of its time in attitudes toward marriage, women, and governance."



Elicits this response by a knuckle dragger not willing to go butt up
Brussels Journal

Slavery and Prostitution of The West

Submitted by American Conser... on Wed, 2006-12-27 16:27.

"We have to understand where Tony Blair is coming from.

Here's a guy who is a Premier of a supposedly Western free country/society but in reality, it is a country that is prostituting and enslaving itself to its Muslim population and to the Muslim world.

Tony Blair is proving to his new masters, the Muslims, that he his a loyal slave ready to prostitute himself anytime, anywhere for the sake of Islam.

By the way, the entire West, including America and Canada are becoming slaves and prostitutes to Islam and the Muslims.

Just look around you, check the daily news from around the Western world. Islam has bought the West.

The Muslims are fooling the West. They cry "unfairness," and they whine about their so-called "human rights" and play with and manipulate our laws to their benefit.

The Muslims succeeded with the help of Westerners IDIOTS in invading, dominating, and soon ruling the West.

The West claims to be smart, intelligent. Not so. The Muslims proved that they are smarter. What they couldn't do centuries ago by invading France and the rest of Europe militarily, they are succeeding in doing it these day, peacefully, by:

1- Massive immigration,

2- Breeding like rats,

3- Intimidation and threats of suing, i.e. using our own laws against us.

Thanks to IDIOT Westerners who:

1- Opened their countries' borders wide open to the Muslims,

2- By being coward toward Islam's intimidation,

3- By succumbing to political correctness,

4- By enslaving themselves to the Muslims' oil instead of drilling in their own lands because of so-called "environmentalists," who in my opinion are traitors and should be hanged in a public square.

5- And finally thanks to TRAITORS who are ready to sell themselves and their countries to anybody who pays more.

The West is doomed if it doesn't save itself soon and expel the Muslims out of its land, cut immigration completely, shut the borders, demolish the Mosques and outlaw this devilish cult called "Islam."

If the West will not take the previous measures, then say goodbye to your Western civilization as you know it and get ready to be governed by Islamic Law sooner or later.

The West will get what it deserves."

Merry Christmas to OUR Riverine Marines In Iraq DSU-3 AKA War Pigs Bravo 4th LAR

Hi-Van Pass VN Christmas 1967

Southwest Elementary adopts DSU-3--Care Paks and Art Work to Follow

DSU-3 Marines now guarding the Haditha Dam can look forward to goodies and art work from elementary school kids in Florida.

"Students plan to correspond regularly with soldiers during the coming months and will be sending care packages and inspirational pieces of artwork they created.

The school was connected to Bravo Company 4th Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion through a personal connection between fourth-grade teacher Katie Gill and a Marine major's wife.

The unit is providing dam security in the Euphrates River valley."

12 step program for leftists, Apparatchiks Anonymous: via One Cosmos

Heh....Gagdad heh at his finest heh 12 step program for leftists, Apparatchiks Anonymous.

1. We admitted we were powerless over the intoxicating dreams of socialism, and that our lives and governments had become unmanageable. 2. Came to believe that a power far greater than our own omnipotent little egoic dreams of control could restore us to true liberalism. 3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the Creator and Guarantor of our Liberty. 4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of the well-intentioned failures and frank evils of socialism. 5. Admitted to the Creator of our Liberty, to ourselves, and in a live phone call to C-SPAN the exact nature of socialism’s wrongs. 6. Were entirely ready to have the Creator of Our Liberty remove all these defects of ideology.

The And Improved 3-24 for Making Friends and Killing Vampire Orcs Is Here

The new 3-24 is out and Ralph Peters gives it a thumbs up. The New and Improved 3-24 doesn't make him throw up too much. At least, he says, they tossed out the warm, soft and cuddly parts the Army still hugged from their Clintonista Days. They had to, he says, Marines do not forget the prime directive: Kill Orcs. Actually, 3-24, is just a start. Better than nothing. But just one book in a 30 unit program. I found David Kilcullen's Twenty Eight Articles and you better start here before reading 3-24.
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Stuck Mojo Takes Takes on the Jihad Jocks in "Open Season"

Stuck Mojo
Selling copies here
of their new Album Southern Born Killers ---beats Tom Lehrer
Lyrics:

Lyrics:

I speak peace when peace is spoken, But I speak war when your hate is provoking, The season is open 24-7-365, Man up yo time to ride, No need to hide behind slogans of deceit, Claiming that you're a religion of peace, We just don't believe you, We can clearly see through, The madness that you're feeding your people, Jihad the cry of your unholy war, Using the willing, the weak and poor, From birth drowning in propaganda, rhetoric and slander, All we can say is damn ya

My forefathers fought and died for this here
I'm stronger than your war of fear
Are we clear?
If you step in my hood
It's understood
It's open season

I don't need a faith that's blind, Where death and hate bring me peace of mind, With views that are stuck deep in the seventh century, So much sand in your eyes to blind to see, The venom that you leaders preach, Is the path to your own destruction, Your own demise, You might say that I don't understand but your disgust for me is what I realize, Surprise! Your homicidal ways has got the whole world watching, Whole world scoping, So if you bring it to my home base, Best believe it, The season's open

I see you, Hell yeah I see you, Motherfucker naw, I don't wanna be you, If you come to my place, I'll drop more than just some bass, Yo you'll get a taste of a, Sick motherfucker from the Dirty, I ain't worrying not a fucking bit, I'm telescoping like Hubble, Yo you in trouble, Yo on the double, I'm wild with mine, Bring that style with mine, Fuck with my family I'll end your line, Just the way it is, Just the way it be, Do you understand? No matter if you're woman or man, or child, My profile is crazy, That shit you do doesn't amaze me, I'm ready to blaze thee

I don't give a damn what god you claim, I've seen the innocent that you've slain, On my streets you're just fair game, Like a pig walk to your slaughter, The heat here is so much hotter, And my views won't teeter totter or fluctuate, Step to me you just met your fate, And I'll annihilate, With the skill of a Shogun assassin, Slicing and dicing precise with a passion, In any shape form or fashion, Bring it to my home, Welcome to the danger zone, Cause your attitude's the reason, The triggers keep squeezing, The hunt is on and it's open season

It's Open Season

Rumsfeld-- Forced To Retire in Face of Impeding Islamic Fascist Enemy--Farewell Address

WASHINGTON, Dec. 14, 2006 – For these past six years, I have had the opportunity -- and, I should add, the privilege -- to serve with the greatest military the world has ever known.

To all of the men and women in uniform, all across the globe, I wish it were possible for me to meet with each of you personally today so I could look you in the eyes, shake your hands and express my heartfelt gratitude for your service, and to give you some sense of what you have given me -- pride in our mission and an abiding confidence in our country and in those of you who volunteer to risk your lives to defend us all.

As I complete my second tour as secretary of defense, I leave knowing that the true strength of our military lies not in our weapons, but in the hearts of the men and women in uniform, in your patriotism, in your professionalism, and your determination to accomplish the mission.

President Abraham Lincoln once said, and I quote, “Determine that the thing can and shall be done, and then we shall find the way.” That remains as true today as it did during President Lincoln’s time. I have seen countless examples of this resolve when I have met with those of you serving in this long struggle against violent extremists.

I remember visiting a base near Fallujah, where Marines had been engaged in some of the most intense house-to-house fighting since World War II. It was two days before Christmas. A staff sergeant asked me why there wasn’t a way he could extend his tour beyond his unit’s service limit in Iraq.

And, I think back to a young man I met at Bethesda naval hospital. He was in the very early stages of his recovery from multiple wounds suffered in Iraq. He looked up at me with a tube in his nose, and he said with force: "If only the American people will give us the time we need, we can do it. We are getting it done."

And a soldier I met in Afghanistan not long ago who said, “I really can't believe we're allowed to do something this important.” Well, I feel the same way. I can’t believe I have had the chance to be involved in something so important to the safety of the American people and the future of our country.

What you are accomplishing is not simply important -- it is historic.

When the cause of human freedom required men and women to stand on the front lines in its defense, you stepped forward to liberate more than 50 million citizens in Afghanistan and Iraq.

You captured or killed tens of thousands of extremists -- taking the fight to where they live, rather than waiting for the extremists to attack us again where our families live; and you helped alleviate the conditions that foster extremism in places like the Horn of Africa, the Philippines and elsewhere so that your children and grandchildren will not have to face the challenges that we face today.

This month has two important anniversaries -- the free elections of the Iraqi national assembly and the seating of the very first democratically elected president in Afghanistan’s long history. We all remember the images of Iraqis proudly raising their purple fingers in the air after voting in their first free elections and the images of the Afghan girls singing with joy as their new president took the oath of office. Those were historic chapters in the saga of human freedom, and you made them possible.

The long struggle we are in is complex; it’s unfamiliar; and it’s still little understood, leading some to believe that there is no need to go on.

The enemy is counting on us to falter and to fail. You are the ones who live the successes and who endure the setbacks of this struggle, who find your daily missions a personal test of will. And you are the ones who, above all, know that the cause of freedom is well worth the price.

In 10 or 20 years, when you are talking to your children or to your grandchildren, you will look back on your service and at what you have accomplished with a great sense of pride. You will know that you were part of a truly proud history. Indeed, you were the makers of that proud history and an inspiration to the generations that followed.

It has been the highest honor of my life to serve with you -- the men and women of the U.S. armed forces. You define the American spirit. You have helped millions triumph over tyranny, during this time of great consequence.

You have my eternal respect, and you will remain in my thoughts and prayers always. May God bless you and your families, and may God continue to bless our wonderful country.

Lance Cpl. Chris Charette Dam Security Unit 3

Home paper carried the story of our own Chris Charette recovery from wounds received in combat with vampire orcs.



Home from war: Wounded Leesburg marine describes facing enemy in Iraq
By: Anne Keisman

Lance Cpl. Chris Charette, 21, sat in his parents' comfortable living room in Leesburg on Friday. It was a far cry from the scene he faced seven weeks ago: on a boat, patrolling a strategic river in Iraq -- under fire from the enemy.

On Oct. 26, Charette was shot twice - once in the neck and once in the left hand, which caused him to lose his thumb. He is left-handed.

After three hospital stays - Iraq, Germany and Bethesda, Md. -- he is now home, recovering with the help of his family, his girlfriend and physical therapy three times a week.
The Marine reservist lives with his parents, Diane and David Charette, and younger siblings Chelsea and David, in the Potomac Crossing neighborhood in Leesburg.

"We're just glad he's back. He is leading a semi-normal life right now. He still needs a lot of help," said his mother.

His left arm is temporarily paralyzed, but he gains more sensation every day. The stitches in his neck were recently removed and the physical therapy helps keep his neck and arm muscles strong.

"I'm just looking forward to one day when I won't need any medications and can drive my car," he said. He owns a Nissan NX2000, which sits idle in the driveway.



Ambushed on the Euphrates



Charette, a 2003 Stone Bridge High grad, had only been in Iraq about 10 days when he was wounded. His unit, based out of Fort Detrick in Frederick, Md., is charged with protecting the waterways and dams near the city of Haditha in the Euphrates River Valley.

On Oct. 26, his unit had not yet engaged in any combat. This was about to change.

"We were on patrol on the [Euphrates] River and came under ambush," Charette said. He remembers hearing the "clanging" sound of metal hitting metal -- from his side of the boat.

"We looked onshore and there were guys hiding behind palm trees shooting at us. And we all started firing.

"We got through that ambush fine," Charette said. "But about 10 minutes later, we were ambushed again on the same side. And that time, I was hit. It hit my hand and it took off my thumb. At the time I had gloves on. I looked down and saw there was a hole in my glove and I was bleeding."

About 20 to 30 seconds later, he said, he was hit again through the neck.

"When I got hit in the neck, it threw me. It hit me hard and threw me onto my back and it paralyzed my left arm. And when I tried to get back up I couldn't do it because I couldn't move my arm.

"[The bullet] went through my neck at an angle so that it hit my collar bone, my clavicle, my scapula and went out through my shoulder. It didn't hit anything important, luckily."

Charette methodically listed everything the bullet missed: his carotid artery, his esophagus, his lungs.

"That's when the guy next to me yelled, 'Charette's hit! Charette's hit!'" One of his shipmates immediately placed a tourniquet on his arm.

Then a corpsman, the Marine equivalent to an U.S. Army medic, came over from another boat just as the second ambush ceased. The corpsman got the bleeding stopped in about a minute. But, before the Medevac arrived, the patrol boat was ambushed a third time.

"Immediately, Doc Schu, my corpsman, jumped on top of me so I wouldn't get hit or hurt anymore."

Through a reign of bullets, they finally made it to the helicopter, which transported him to Al Asad Surgical Hospital.

"They took care of me at the hospital. They put a mask on my face and I woke up a week and a half later in Germany," he said.



Two visions of Iraq



Charette reflected on two visions of war-torn Iraq: the violent one that left him bleeding on the deck of a boat, and another - one not often heard about.

His unit was stationed next to a large lake in the Al Anbar Province, Lake Qadisiyah. The lake made the news recently when a helicopter crashed into it.

"The lake was crystal clear. [There were] palm trees, yellow sand. In the early morning, you hear from the city ... the prayers. It comes out of nowhere. Sometimes they are singing, sometimes they are talking. But it's kind of peaceful, looking out over the water - the sun just coming up."

The soldier could see a kind of hope in the area's natural beauty. Since being home, he has stopped watching the news because of the constant barrage of negative images from Iraq.

"What I see on TV is not what I saw in Iraq. I saw a lot of positive stuff in Iraq." Schools are being built, he said, and police are being trained.

"There are so many people over there trying to make a difference, trying to help people out," he said. "Luckily, in Iraq, we didn't hear all the politics. We just do our thing.

"All the news shows is the body count."



Recovery



The doctors tell him he could have surgery to relocate his pointer finger to act as a thumb for his left hand. He is seriously considering it.

While in Bethesda recovering, he received many gifts and visitors. One day, singer Stevie Nicks dropped by and gave him a brand-new iPod with 800 songs on it. Actor Gary Sinese and Miss Pennsylvania Emily Wills also came by.

Charette still keeps in touch with his buddies in Iraq, sometimes by phone, mostly by e-mail and instant messenging.

He is currently on military leave from Best Buy in Leesburg. He looks forward to returning to work and possibly buying a house when he is fully recovered.

He said he has the option to return to Iraq but has not decided if he will. He will definitely stay in the reserves, even if his disability keeps him off the front lines.

"Even if they gave me an office job ... I'd do it - as long as I can serve in the military and serve my country," he said.

Charette will receive his Purple Heart as soon as the paperwork moves through the process.

Contact the reporter at akeiman@timespapers.com

Senator Rick Santorum--an American Churchill

Senator Rick Santorum gave his farewell speech to the voters of Pennsylvania, today. He will be sorely missed. His is voice unafraid to call the enemy by name-Islamic Fascism. In the face of the enemy, he did not hide ostrich-like from the evidence of U.S. fifth columnist activity or the provider of terrorist funding--Iran. As Churchill, his warnings have been ignored. As Churchill, he shall return.

Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I rise today to talk about why I voted against Dr. Gates and lay out in detail the concerns I have about the security posture of the United States today and how I do not believe that Dr. Gates is the appropriate choice to confront them. While I think he certainly has a lot of positive qualities, and in normal times I would certainly defer to the President's judgment on this, we are not in normal times. I believe we need a Secretary--and I think we need leaders in this country, particularly the Secretary--who has insight into the nature of our enemy and is willing to provide the vision necessary, not just for our people in the military but the country, on how to defeat them. On one particular vital aspect of that vision I think he is in error, and that error causes me to object and to vote no to his nomination.

What I would like to do is lay out what I see as the problem confronting America and the complexity of that problem, which I think has grown more complex since the last time that we have been in this Chamber, over 6 weeks ago. I would like to go back to two speeches I gave last summer, one at the National Press Club, and the other at the Pennsylvania Press Club--one obviously in Washington, the other in Harrisburg. I gave those speeches because I thought it was important that at a time when our country is at war and our country is struggling with this war that we have a better definition as to who the enemy is and what we need to do about it. I made that issue, the issue I discussed in these two speeches and subsequent speeches during my campaign, the centerpiece of the campaign. Many political advisers suggested to me that this was a wrong tactic in a State where the favorabilities for the war and the President were in the low thirties to make this the centerpiece and, in fact, draw divisions between myself and the President where I put myself in a position which some suggested was to the right of the President. But I thought it was important for the country and for me personally as a U.S. Senator to address the issues that I thought were critical to the time.

So I went out and gave two speeches about the importance of defining our enemy. If there has been a failing--obviously, for the last several weeks and months we have been talking about the failings of the administration with respect to the policies within Iraq--I would make the argument that the larger failing, not just of the administration but of the Members of Congress and leaders in this country, is that we have not had the courage to stand up and define the enemy as to who they are and study and understand them and explain to the American people who they are.

I defined the enemy back at the National Press Club speeches as Islamic fascism. I said that is the biggest issue of our time, this relentless and determined radical enemy that is not just a group of rag-tag people living in caves but, in fact, people with an ideology, a plan, and increasingly the resources to carry out that plan, as well as, increasingly, a bigger and larger presence throughout the Islamic world, these radical Islamic fascists.

As I said, I understand this is an unpopular war. When I stepped forward to define the enemy as radical Islamic fascists, I was ridiculed by the media and others, saying that my words were too harsh, saying that at worst my defining the enemy was incorrect, at best it was inflammatory. But I did so because I believe words matter. If you are going to confront an enemy you have to understand who that enemy is and you have to communicate that to the people of America. And we must do that.

Many people talk about this war as if it is an attempt simply to create fledgling democracies in Iraq and Afghanistan. While this may be an appealing possible outcome, we all must recognize that Iraq and Afghanistan are battlefields in a much more complex and broader war. That includes every continent with the exception of Antarctica. The war is at our doorstep, and it is fueled, as I mentioned, literally and figuratively by the evil of Islamic fascism.

Whether we know it or not, they have been at war with us, and the State of Iran specifically has been at war with us, since 1979 when they declared war against the United States. They have not rescinded that declaration. So when we talk about engaging Iran as the Secretary, the new, future Secretary of Defense has talked about, we are talking about engaging someone who is at war with us, who has declared war with us, and who has been at war and, and as I will talk about here, and I think it has been widely reported in the press, has been doing a lot to substantiate the claim that they have been at war with us.

But this threat is not exclusively based in Iran. It is gaining strength and spreading throughout every region of the world. I have addressed the issue of Islamic fascism but have not yet spoken to the subject of Iraq. Iraq is the central front in the war on Islamic fascism. However, contrary to the Iraqi Study Group, the Baker-Hamilton commission, the answer to this problem can be found--the answer to Iraq can be found not in Iraq but in Iran. It is Iran and its client State of Syria that serve as the principal instigators and fomenters of the conflict in Iraq today.

The President gets advice from the CIA that the opposition in Iran is weak and divided and therefore we should do nothing in Iran because we have no alternative. We have no one we can use in Iraq to confront the Iranian Government to cause any kind of changes. So the President gets advice from his intelligence team that we are without options in Iran.

The Pentagon advises the President and says we don't know if we have the resources to open up a new battlefield or confront, militarily, Iran, and therefore we have limited options in Iran.

The State Department--yes, State Department--they think that Iran is the solution to the problem; that negotiating with them and getting them to be our pals can in effect solve the problems; so confronting Iran would be the absolutely wrong thing to do in solving the problem in Iraq.

So the President is being advised by all of his minions that Iran and confrontation with Iran is not an option, as we heard from the testimony of the new Secretary of Defense.

Let's look at other interested parties as we look at how we solve the problem in Iraq and dealing with Iran. The American media seems to be very focused and spends a lot of time talking about how poorly things are going in Iraq. They report daily--not just recently but repeatedly for the past 3 years, daily--the body count in Iraq. It is the lead and has been virtually every single day for 3 years.

Is their interest in shifting focus and covering the problems in Iran? Not if we can drive home a story like this in Iraq.

Republicans and Democrats, leaders in the Congress, why don't they focus and talk more about Iran? Democrats, if you look through--as unfortunately many Republicans and Democrats do--look at it through the eyes of politics, why would we change focus and focus on Iran as the problem? We saw from the last election there is grand political advantage of keeping the focus on Iraq and the problems in Iraq. Why aren't the Republicans, then, stepping forward and pointing to the difficulty and problems that Iran is causing in Iraq and call for confrontation? If we saw anything from the last election, the American public has no appetite for a broadening of this war, increasing the complexity of this war. You might be seen as warmongering, digging us deeper and more dangerously into a region of the world that we would rather not be in in the first place.

So what do we have? We have the Baker-Hamilton report which is a prescription for surrender. It is just a matter of time. It is certainly not a prescription for victory. Nowhere does it mention, other than of course that we would like victory, nor is there a prescription for victory in that report.

So now we have the slow process of how we exit ourselves because we have no option to confront the real problem. We have no willingness on the part of any level of Government to confront it. So we are destined at this point to focus on something that is insolvable without confronting Iran, and that is the war in Iraq.

Who are these Iranians? Who are these Islamic fascists? I do not mean to exclude Sunni Islamic fascists because they were the principal--or they were the first, let's put it that way--in launching the war against the United States. I should not say the first. They were the first in recent times--certainly 9/11--in launching the war.

So this is not just a Shia problem, but it is increasingly becoming a Shia-dominated field as they continue to spread control in Iran with their influence and money. But let's not leave out Saudi Arabia and others that have used their resources to foment Islamic fascism all over the world with their resources--Sunni Islamic fascism.

So where are we? What can we do to confront this problem?

The interesting thing is that this problem is growing--I don't know about exponentially, but I don't know of a single country in the Middle East where the threat of radical Islam has not grown over the last 30 years, since Iran took over control--since the radicals took over control in Iran, the last 27 years. Every capital, every regime is feeling the pressure. And not just since 2003, but systematically over the years we have seen, particularly in Arab Muslim countries and Middle Eastern Muslim countries, this rise. But, again, not exclusive: Indonesia, Malaysia--this is not exclusive to the Arab world. Obviously Iran, which is Persia.

So what have we seen over the past 6 months? We saw a situation in the central synagogue in Prague where the Islamic fascists intended to carry out, on Rosh Hashanah, a mass kidnaping when large numbers of Jews would be celebrating the new year. When the world's attention now was focused on Prague, they designed to make impossible demands and then blow up the synagogue and everyone within it. Those people were not marked for death because they supported the war in Iraq. They were not marked for death because they oppressed these Islamic fascists. They were targeted because they were Jews. This is evil.

Islamic terrorists organized an assault on civilian aircraft leaving London, planning to blow up 10 or more planes this summer as they flew over the North Atlantic. You may not know that two of those participants were a husband and a wife, a husband and a wife who were going to board that plane and explode that plane over the North Atlantic while holding in their arms their 6-month-old child.

This is evil.

Islamic terrorists slaughter innocent Iraqis every single day on both sides of the divide within Islam. As we know, in recent days they beheaded an orthodox priest and crucified a 14-year-old boy guilty of nothing but being Christian.

This is evil.

Almost everyone has now heard of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the fact that he denies the existence of the Holocaust and called for Israel to be wiped off the face of the Earth. But he has been remarkably clear about his mission, remarkably clear about his messianic vision of a Shiite religion, his vision to destroy the Western world and impose a caliphate on the world in which the world would submit to Islam or die in the process.

He said:

Is it possible for us to witness a world without America and Zionism?

Then he answered himself:

But you had best know this slogan and this goal is attainable and surely can be achieved.

So do we have any questions about the nature of our enemy? Do we have any questions about the capability of this oil-rich country? Yet just this past week President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sent an open letter, a conciliatory letter, to the American people, addressed to the ``noble'' American people. He called on America to withdraw from Iraq and end support for Israel, and, of course, to convert to Islam. This man may be a fanatic, but let me assure you he is not a stupid fanatic. This man understands and studies America. The Islamic fascists respect us enough to get to know us. They respect us enough so they know what buttons to push and how hard to push them. They respect us enough to figure out what it will take to defeat us.

I wish that were the case for the American people.

He couched his warning in the words that are familiar and comfortable with Americans--``freedom,'' trying to appeal that he would be free of this illegitimate regime in his mind, which is the current administration, and we would free them of this burden of fighting. It is a great appeal and many would like to see the end of this war, but we should not be fooled.

Our troops in Iraq are being killed by Iranian weapons today paid for with Iranian money smuggled into Iraq by Iranian logistics and utilized by Iranian-trained terrorists.

A couple of years ago you needed a security clearance to know this. Now, if you care to know, if you want to know this uncomfortable truth about Iran, you can know it. Iran is the centerpiece in the assault against us and other countries in the civilized world, which is why I fought so hard for passage of the Iran Freedom and Support Act.

I stood on the Senate floor at this very desk and argued in May or June of this year for passage of the Iran Freedom and Support Act. I said we should not be negotiating with Iran, that we should be confronting Iran.

Bernard Lewis tells a familiar opinion that he has. He tells a lot of them. He said that the oddity in particular of the Arab and Middle Eastern Islamic world is that the more we have strong relations with the government in an Arab Muslim country the more the people of that country hate us; and the more that we stand up and confront leadership of those countries the more the people like us. Is it no wonder he recounts on the day of 9/11 when there was but one Middle Eastern Muslim capital there was a candlelight vigil in support of those who died on 9/11, and that was in Tehran, Iran.

It is not hard to understand when you have regimes throughout the Middle East who oppress their people that when you stand up and confront those regimes and call them the evil they are the people understand and respect your honesty, agree with you, and support you.

This summer when we attempted to negotiate with Iran, we told the people of Iran that we are not on their side, that we want to make deals with people who oppress them, who torture them, who enslave them, who abuse them, and who kill them. That is why we should not have entered into any negotiations in spite of the entreaties of Europe with this evil regime in Iran. We should confront them, and only confront them. If we want the support of the people of Iran, we have to earn it with the integrity of our mission, and we are not doing that.

So I stood up on the floor of the Senate and said we needed to confront Iran, that we needed to fund full democracy groups, that we needed to use the public airwaves and the Internet to disseminate information to cause a change in the Government of Iran, and that we needed to sanction them. And this administration opposed me. The Senate opposed me by, I think, a 54-to-46 vote. That is why I continue to work on the Iran Freedom and Support Act.

Over the intervening months, what happened? Iran did as I predicted on this floor back in the spring--they played us along. They said: Well, you know we will negotiate with you as long as we can continue to produce nuclear materials and continue our nuclear program. So we negotiated and we negotiated and they developed and they developed. So finally in September of this year, enough people on both sides of the aisle and enough people in the administration finally were convinced that this was not a viable strategy anymore. What did we gain? We passed the Iran Freedom and Support Act, which probably surprised most people in this Chamber. We passed it unanimously--one of the last things we did before we broke. Most Americans don't know it. Unfortunately, most in the Middle East don't know it. I suspect if we went into the bowels of the State Department they may know it, but they are not going to do a damned thing about it because that is not their intent. They do not want to do anything about it. My guess is they will take that money and spend it on a lot of conferences and studies on what we should do instead of giving it to the bus drivers who went on strike as a strike fund so they can stand up to the government. Instead of giving it to dissent groups so they can disseminate information, instead of actively engaging we will appease. We will study, we will delay, and they will have time to further build.

But we did pass the bill. That would be on one of my to-do lists in the next Congress.

Is this bill going to be enforced? Are we going to confront Iran? Are we going to try to do something or are we going to sit by and allow them to develop these weapons? They are not developing them alone. No, there are a lot of reports that they are working with others around the world. Who are those others? I talk about Islamic fascism, and I keep focusing on that. But, unfortunately, over the past several months it is increasingly clear to me that the situation is becoming even more complex. We are not just facing a group of people who are in the Middle East desiring to overthrow the world and oppose a caliphate on us, but they have allies--unlikely allies in some respects, unlikely allies as the German Nazis and Japanese imperialists who had very conflicting ideologies but had a common purpose, and that was destroy the West, destroy the English-speaking world and the Western world, and put it under the domination of those countries.

So it is today. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. What Iran has found and the Islamic fascists have found is there are plenty of enemies of the United States. In fact, they had a meeting just this year a couple of months ago in Havana, Cuba. The nonaligned states met. There were 100 nations. On their agenda was to redefine the word ``terror'' to include ``the U.S. occupation of Iraq'' and the ``Israeli invasion'' of Lebanon. Of course, there was no mention about the incursion of Hezbollah. They found solace with these countries. We saw it played out at the United Nations just a couple of weeks later where President Ahmadinejad, President Hugo Chavez, to thunderous applause of many in the United Nations community, demonized America. But another member of that crew of nonaligned nations was North Korea.

I mentioned before that Iran is pursuing a nuclear program. They are indeed pursuing a nuclear program, and there have been many intelligence reports published that have suggested there were Iranian scientists there the day North Korea exploded their nuclear weapon. In fact, the scientist who had been working with North Korea, AQ Kahn, is the same scientist who has been working with Iran in the development of their nuclear program. Some have suggested that they are working collaboratively and jointly in their development of nuclear weapons which, of course, would have put Iran's nuclear program well ahead of where everyone believes it to be.

So we have not only the Islamic fascists led by Iran, but we now have an alliance between Iran and North Korea; North Korea, which is a threat in their own right, now with nuclear weapons and their increasing ability to deliver them with long-range missiles, including the development of, as they hope to do, ICBMs which could reach the United States of America.

We confronted North Korea as soon as they detonated their explosives. We had a U.N. resolution confronting them. North Korea condemned that nuclear U.N. resolution and called it ``a declaration of war'' and threatened the United States by declaring:

We will deliver merciless blows without hesitation to whoever tries to breach our sovereignty and right to survive under the excuse of carrying out a United Nations Security Council resolution.

Not only do we have a threat of North Korea now launching a nuclear weapon, but we have the clear threat of North Korea and Iran proliferating nuclear technology. In addition, as Iran, working with North Korea, develops their nuclear program, and as the world sits fecklessly by and lets them do it, others in the region legitimately have their tensions increased and have talked about the need for those nations to develop nuclear weapons,

Thus starting an arms race in a region of the world where it is the last place we want a nuclear arms race.

Finally, we have the issue of whether this nuclear material that is being developed in both North Korea and Iran will end up in the hands of terrorists, to be delivered in a nonconventional way. North Korea is a new threat on the horizon, but it is not alone. In fact, North Korea has expressed direct support for Iran's nuclear development program and stressed that the United States and the West have no right to defy such a program.

The Iranians have also commented officially on friendly ties between Tehran and Pyongyang after the Islamic revolution, saying Iran ``highly praises North Korea for its steadfastness against the domineering policies of the United States.''

But the threat goes even further. Ahmadinejad, with Kim Jong Il, like Mussolini and Hitler, intends to conquer Western civilization. Again, that is not Hitler. But they also, like the Soviets under Nikita Khrushchev, see the advantage of placing weapons of mass destruction within short ranges of the United States.

Obviously, one likely candidate would be Venezuela. I don't know of any regime currently that is more vehement and more anti-American than Hugo Chavez and the regime in Venezuela, so it probably comes as no surprise that Ahmadinejad and Chavez have had meetings, and they are now aligned and allies and working together and have, in fact, formed a defense pact between the two countries.

Venezuela is a serious threat not just because of their relationship within Iran but because of what it has attempted to do throughout the region, as well as its own potential threat.

Just a few weeks ago there was an election in Nicaragua, right before our election, where Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega won the election, took a congratulatory call from Hugo Chavez, who said:

We're happy here. We're very proud of you.

Now, like never before, the Sandinista revolution and the Bolivarian revolution unite, to construct the future, socialism of the 21st century.

Chavez made no secret about his support for Ortega or his support for the new rulers in Bolivia. Chavez is doing all he can to build military power and might and influence in the region of the world that is uncomfortably close to the United States.

As we know, Chavez has been clear about his disdain for America. What we don't know is what Venezuela has been up to. I suspect that most Members of this Senate do not know that Venezuela is the leading buyer of foreign arms and military equipment in the world today, that Chavez is building an army of more than 1 million soldiers. I suspect most in this Senate do not know that over the next year he plans to spend $30 billion to build 20 military bases in neighboring Bolivia which will dominate the borders of Chile, Peru, Paraguay, Argentina, assembling those military bases on the borders of the countries I just mentioned. These military bases, while they will be manned by Bolivian soldiers, will be commanded by Venezuelan and Cuban officers.

How does he do this? How is he able to accomplish what Fidel Castro has been seeking to accomplish now for 4 1/2 decades? The answer to that, of course, is very simple. It is a three-letter word: oil. Oil and its huge profits are financing this, just like oil and its huge profits are advancing Islamic fascism in the Middle East. It is no wonder again that Venezuela and Iran have formed an oil pact. Why? As they have clearly said before, oil is a ``geopolitical weapon,'' according to Chavez. He also said:

I could easily order the closing of the refineries we have in the United States. I could easily sell that oil that we sell to the United States to other countries of the world ..... to real friends and allies like China.

They have even closer relationships with the Islamic fascists in Iran. A recent congressional report found that Hezbollah may right now have established bases in Venezuela which have issued thousands of visas to people from places such as Cuba and the Middle East, possibly giving them passports to a vague United States border security.

To make matters worse, we see, with the help of Venezuela, Cuba and China are now exploring for oil within 50 miles of the coast of the United States, while the Senate blocks a measure to allow us to explore for oil within 100 miles of our own shore. So while China, Cuba, and Venezuela draw oil from our shores, we stand idly by and let them do it to arm against us.

Let's not overlook the role of Russia in working with all of these governments--Iran, North Korea, and Venezuela. Last summer, Russia signed an arms deal with Venezuela to the tune of $1 billion. Last month, Russia began deliveries to Iran of highly sophisticated SA-15 anti-aircraft missiles valued at $700 million. The purpose of these missiles? To defend Iran's nuclear program. That shouldn't come as a surprise. Russia has consistently

opposed the efforts of the United States to sanction the other enemy, North Korea, for their nuclear programs, and has insisted on diluting the effects of every resolution that was passed condemning North Korea. The Russians claim sanctions don't work. Yet, oddly enough, they just imposed sanctions on their neighbor, Georgia.

Yes, we live in a very complex time and we have enemies who are very dangerous, in which their relationships are growing, and so with it their commensurate power to confront terrorists of the world, and the rest of the world sits and hopes and hopes that we can negotiate our way out of this problem; that since we are people of reason and rational folks, we can deal with them on that level. Have we forgotten our history? We have been in this situation before.

I have titled this address ``The Gathering Storm of the 21st Century.'' It is not a coincidence that I do so in harkening to the book written by Winston Churchill, ``The Gathering Storm,'' talking about the lead-up to World War II. Just like Britain in 1940, after the fall of France, we are engaged with a struggle now with the enemy--alone. Just like Britain in 1940, we entreated the rest of the world to join us against this evil, and the world fell silent. For a year and a half until Pearl Harbor, and actually long after that, since the United States was certainly not prepared for war, Britain fought this battle alone. And with the exception of the State of Israel, we are fighting this battle alone, and I suspect we will for quite some time. So what lesson can we learn? What lesson can we learn from history? What we know is America is very reticent to get involved in wars, and rightfully so. In the First World War, we only entered after a German U-boat sank American civilian and commercial ships in the North Atlantic. World War I was the war to end all wars. After the defeat of the German armies, it seemed as if peace was going to be with us for a long time. But it did not last a generation. As I said, we ended up with the situation in World War II. But even after the fall of Europe to the Nazis and the Italian fascists, America stood by, hoping this problem would go away. It was not until Pearl Harbor that things changed.

The Cold War was only after Stalin's aggression in the Middle East in Greece that we decided to engage and recognize that the Soviet Union was not our friend as many thought after World War II but, in fact, our new foe. And now, after the fall of the Soviet Union we thought we would have a peace dividend, peace for a long time, and we find that other forces of evil have cropped up to confront us.

If it were not for the fact of September 11, we would be allowing that to continue today. But we engaged the enemy because they attacked us directly here at home. But now we are growing tired. We are wearying of the battle. I said earlier that these Islamic fascists understand us better than we understand them. They understand our history better than we understand their history. They need not look long to see how quickly America tires of confrontation and conflict and death.

And so they plan and, more importantly, they kill, every day. It is recorded here every day, and support for this war goes down every day. And they check another box in Tehran.

Winston Churchill wrote in ``The Gathering Storm'' a short description of the gathering storm:

How the English-speaking peoples, through their unwisdom, carelessness and good nature allowed the wicked to rearm.

We are at such a moment. Are we going to allow the wicked to rearm? We paid a terrible price for waiting. We lock at each war, each major conflict, we paid a terrible price for waiting. In many cases, it was a price paid in America. In many other cases it was a price paid in countries around the world. Are we going to pay that price at some day in the future or are we going to confront this enemy?

If we learned anything from the 20th century, it should be this lesson: When leaders say they are prepared to kill millions of people to achieve their goal, we must take them at their word. The enemy before us that I have described has said it clearly, repeatedly, and pointedly, and even more threateningly, because this is an enemy who doesn't see death as a tragic consequence of the war; they see it as their objective of war.

The ayatollah and the mullahs of Iran have repeatedly said that the object of jihad is not success, it is death. It is reaching the next level. It is ending this miserable life which we have on Earth and in pursuit of jihad, guaranteeing yourself eternal life with Allah.

Here in America, we refuse to recognize, many, that we are at war with this great evil.

We shrink from the recognition of identifying the enemy and confronting them, whether they be the Islamic fascists led by Iran or the socialist rulers of North Korea and Venezuela. We are sleep-walking through the storm, as we have done in the past. We pretend it is not happening or that it is simply because of the incompetency of the current administration or of a member of that administration.

But how do those who deny this evil propose to save us from these people? By negotiating through the U.N. or directly with Iran? By firing Don Rumsfeld, now getting rid of John Bolton? That is going to solve the problem? These people are now going to be nice to us because we removed these people who were agitating them or causing problems? Maybe relocating our troops to Okinawa or Kuwait or some other place will get these people to simply leave us alone? Maybe if we just abandon Iraq and Afghanistan to the chaos and slaughter of Islamic fascists, their thirst for blood will be met? Or maybe it is just engaging in one-on-one discussions with Iran and North Korea and other reasonable dictators?

No, I do not think any of those things will work. And history has proved they have not worked. We need to begin to confront our enemies. And that does not mean we have to launch a military mission into the countries I spoke of. But we have to do more than just adjust tactics in Iraq. If the focus of the next year and a half is simply adjusting tactics within Iraq, it will fail. It will fail. We must go after the regimes that recruit, pay, train, and arm their surrogate militias in Iraq. Again, I am not talking about military confrontation; I am talking about political and economic warfare to bring down the terror regimes in Tehran and their satellite puppet state in Syria. The best way to do that is to work with their own people who want freedom.

I talked about the Iran Freedom and Support Act, but there is much more we need to do. We need to implement it. And we need to use the public diplomacy apparatus we have to motivate and change the hearts and minds. A free Iran will change the world because it will deprive the terrorists of the single greatest source of support and isolate the likes of Hugo Chavez and Kim Jong-il.

Why is a free Iran and a free Iraq so essential? Because neither the United States of America nor any of our Western allies can defeat radical Islamic fascism on our own. We cannot defeat radical Islamic fascism. The only thing we can do is, through democracy-building and through support of moderate Islam, give those who truly seek the true meaning, the true moderate meaning of Islam the opportunity to be successful in suppressing its radical elements. We have to create that environment, and we have not in Iraq because Iran and Syria have not let us.

I remember reading commentaries from so many people talking about that things went well originally in Iraq. It seems like things were going OK, and then, after a year or so, it really started to turn south. Well, immediately after we were there, the Iranians were scared to death of us and dared not play in that sandbox. But they quickly surmised that we were not serious, that we were not going to confront this evil, so they began what we now see.

We need to counter Hugo Chavez. We need to do more to develop closer relationships with the countries in Central and South America, through trade and through diplomatic negotiations. We must fight for the hearts and minds of Central and South America, and we must do so much more deliberately and aggressively than we have. We have to do more to confront North Korea and its threat. That includes options, particularly missile defense. Finally, we have to confront the root cause of all of this, the root cause being oil.

There is one regret I have of not coming back here. It is--and my colleagues know I can be somewhat single-minded--to focus the attention of this body and this country on energy security. It is lunacy, it is suicidal to continue to allow the energy markets at the levels they are right now given the fact that a vast majority of those energy dollars are going to people who want to kill us and destroy everything we believe in. We can no longer play games with our energy security.

I spent a lot of time talking about this war, and I have fought very hard to pass legislation, both the Syrian Accountability Act and the Iran Freedom and Support Act, that will try to hurt our enemies and strengthen our country. I will do my best, after I leave this place, to continue to confront these enemies and to give the United States the opportunity to succeed in this war.

Osama bin Laden said:

In the final phase of the ongoing struggle, the world of the infidels was divided between two superpowers: the United States and the Soviet Union. Now we--

Understand this.

Now we have defeated and destroyed the more difficult and the more dangerous of the two.

Understand what bin Laden is saying. ``We,'' these Islamic fascists--they claim they defeated the Soviet Union, not Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, not Pope John Paul II, but Islamic fascism, the mujahedin in Afghanistan. History will make a plausible case for this assertion that, in fact, they had a lot to do with defeating the Soviet Union. But he continues with one final sentence:

Dealing with the pampered and effeminate Americans will be easy.

You see, they think they understand us. They think they know how to get to America. Open a paper every day and see what their tactic is. Open a paper every day, turn on a television every day, turn on your radio every day, sign on to the Internet every day and see what their tactic is and see how they believe they will defeat us.

I believe we need strong leadership to confront this greatest enemy that we have. The stakes are high, too high not to join together--Democrat, Republican, liberal, conservative, American, European--to confront this dangerous enemy. We must stop them.

Winston Churchill, in June of 1940--I will close with this, for my colleagues who have been patiently waiting--Winston Churchill, in 1940, addressed the British people as Britain stood alone:

What General Weygand called the Battle of France is over. I expect that the Battle of Britain is about to begin.

Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilization. Upon it depends our own British life, and the long continuity of our institutions and our Empire. The whole fury and might of the enemy must very soon be turned on us. Hitler knows that he will have to break us in this Island or lose the war. If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be free and the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands. But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science. Let us therefore brace ourselves to do our duties, and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, ``This was their finest hour.''

This is the call of this generation. This is America's hour. This is the hour that we need leadership, Churchillian leadership, who had a keen eye for the enemy and a resolve in spite of the political climate to confront it. I ask my colleagues to stand and make this America's finest hour. I regret that the new Secretary of Defense is not up to the task, in my opinion. I hope others are.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.

Its the Great Islamic Jihad War, Stupid!

Pierre Legran @ The Pink Flamingo Bar gets it right. A long post that needs to be read and passed on before the spell of the stupid old men takes hold upon the land and lulls all to slumber to wake as Islamic drones....

There is a global jihad. It’s on, now. Like it or not. Rise to the challenge or not. You don’t want war with Iran? Fine. But never forget for a second that Iran is already at war with you.

Sooner or later, we are going to have to match with action the president’s ambitious post-9/11 promises that our enemies would be pursued globally, relentlessly, and until their defeat. Democracy promotion and regional conferences at which we pretend that the problem — Iran — may be the solution are not going to get this done.

If we’re shrinking from the greater war, of course our troops shouldn’t be sitting ducks in Iraq. If we’re not going to turn them loose against the forces that most threaten them, as well as the rest of us, of course we should get them out of there.

Won’t that give al Qaeda and Iran a crucial victory? No, it would make official the victory they are certain to win if we don’t refocus. Unless our actual, overriding purpose in Iraq is to crush al Qaeda and its sponsors — rather than hope we can delegate the job to the newly trained forces of a Maliki-led government — our enemies will have their victory. All we’re otherwise doing is running out the clock and running up our casualty count.

Wouldn’t leaving guarantee more 9/11s? No, because if we don’t rededicate ourselves to the original mission, more 9/11s are already assured. That, as we should by now know only too well, is what happens when you choose not to fight the people who are sworn to fight you.

“Death to America” is not just a slogan for our enemies. It’s a deeply held conviction, on which they are feverishly acting. Only when we are ready to take them seriously, when our leaders’ brave words are matched by determined deeds, can we win — in Iraq and, more importantly, in the greater war. Andrew C. McCarthy

The Over What Hill Gang of Surrender Monkeys Get Weighed and Found Lacking

The net is wall to wall with stink on ice reviews of the "elder statesmen" efforts at selling out Israel kissing Syrian and Iranian Ass and crossing their fingers and hope nothing happens in Iraq while American Marines retreat: From the American Thinker

How could a bipartisan panel of elder statesmen suggest something as moronic (and oxymoronic) as a "diplomatic offensive" to cover our retreat from Iraq? Even making due allowance for senility, it boggles the mind.

James Baker and his over the hill gang are disconnected from reality as only VIP's can be. There is an international guild of self-important blowhards with members in every country. The members have a great deal in common with one another even though their countries do not. They are chauffeured about in similar vehicles and go to the same tailors in London. Naturally they tend to believe that the solution to any dispute between nations lies in getting the right self-important blowhards together to talk things out over a good meal.

This isn't a new phenomenon. Richard I struck up an improbable friendship with Saladin during the third Crusade. At one point he tried to resolve the dispute between Christendom and Islam by agreeing to marry his widowed sister Joanna to Saladin's brother Saphadin and set them up as joint monarchs of Jerusalem with guaranteed access to the holy sites for Christian pilgrims.

Apparently it never occurred to Richard that the gap between his people and Saladin's was much too wide to be bridged by a simple dynastic marriage. Saladin seemed to him like a decent guy and he thought they could do business. Joanna knew better. She flatly refused to marry outside her faith and the Church supported her. Richard had to sail for home with a brief truce instead of a grand bargain.

Richard was too self-important to grasp the limits of his own power to arrange things. The ISG has all the self-importance without any of the lion's heart.

We don't really need much from our leaders right now. They would be capable of dealing with our present situation if only they could recognize a war when they see one, distinguish enemies from friends and understand that you win a war by killing enemies."

Baker-Hamiliton Surrender Group Is Aid and Comfort to the Enemy

The best this surrender group can do is provide aid and comfort to the enemy and endanger our sons and daughters in combat. To put these old farts out to pasture is a kindness they do not deserve. Their work is highly appreciated by the enemy. Abu Abdullah, a big time thug with Hamas said at WorldNet: “The big superpower of the world is defeated by a small group of mujahedeen. Did you see the mujahedeens' clothes and weapons in comparison with the huge individual military arsenal and supply that was carrying every American soldier?”
Thanks Baker, thanks Hamiliton.
By the way, why couldn't you find a single retired Marine General to guide you to the road to victory instead of the loser exit.

AP Refuses to Release Jamil Hussein and clear His Name As Thug Enabler

Support the Fight for the First Amendment

The laws of Saudi Arabia, based upon the sharia law mandated by the Koran, do not recognize the rights and freedoms guaranteed Americans by the Constitution. The Saudi government makes no secret of its ambition to export Islamic tyranny worldwide, as the Koran commands. What most Americans don’t realize, is that American courts are helping it in a number of ways. For example, they are collaborating with Saudi attempts to squash the free-speech rights of Americans with abusive libel lawsuits. Jihad Watch


American Center for Democracy

Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld

, a U.S. Citizen, is suing Saudi billionaire Sheik Khalid Salim bin Mahfouz, the former banker of the Saudi royal family who is has been widely reported to fund terrorist organizations such as HAMAS and al-Qaeda. She is suing Mahfouz in the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit to protect her First Amendment right after he sued her for libel in the UK in an attempt to silence her from reporting about his activities and reported links to Islamist terrorists.

Dr. Ehrenfeld's suit is important because she is fighting for the freedom to expose those who fund Islamist terrorists.
R. James Woolsey, the former Director of the CIA, who wrote the foreword to "Funding Evil":
"Justice Brandeis once wrote that 'sunlight is the best disinfectant'. That principle is being undermined today, even in our own country, by British libel law rulings that are increasingly tendentious and protective of wealthy plaintiffs from Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the Gulf who badly need some sunlight focused on their activities. Rachel Ehrenfeld is fighting a lonely and vital battle to limit the chilling effect of these British rulings and keep them from being given effect here. She deserves all of our help."
"Dr. Ehrenfeld is a respected scholar, who, to my knowledge, does not make irresponsible charges ... She currently serves with me and former Secretary of State George Schulz on the board of directors of The Committee on the Present Danger. We are dedicated to winning the war on terrorism, and the contribution of members like Rachel Ehrenfeld has been invaluable."
Floyd Abrams, a First Amendment lawyer:
"This is an important issue. It imperils American authors writing for Americans about issues of interest to them. American authors should line up and support the lawsuit."
James Goodale, former general counsel and vice chairman of the New York Times Co.:
"The Mahfouz suit is totally unfair. Ehrenfeld has not published her book in the United Kingdom. She published it in the United States and has no control over special orders that have the book sent abroad through the Internet."
Richard Perle, Resident Fellow, the American Enterprise Institute:
"Rachel Ehrenfeld has meticulously researched and responsibly written about the financing of Islamist terrorist organizations. The Islamists whose activities have been revealed don't like that so they have used their Saudi billions to silence her--and others--by suing her in the United Kingdom, even though her book was published only in the United States. She has launched a counter suit of immense importance and it is vital that she prevail.
If Rachel's suit fails due to lack of financing, no publisher will print books or articles exposing terrorist financing--and one of the essential weapons in the war against Islamist terror will be struck forever from our hands."
Statement of 9/11 Families for a Secure America Board of Directors:
"The members of 9/11 FSA, as direct victims of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, have therefore have a special interest in the uncovering of all those individuals and organizations which played a role, either directly or indirectly, in the conspiracy which led to the mass murders of that day. It is for this reason we support the position of the plaintiff Ehrenfeld."
Statement of The 9/11 Families United to Bankrupt Terrorism:
"The 9/11 Families United to Bankrupt Terrorism (9/11 Families) is an organization comprised of thousands of family members who lost loved ones or were injured on September 11, 2001…are devoted to cutting off the flow of terrorism financing. It is for this reason we support the position of the Plaintiff/Appellant Ehrenfeld.
This lawsuit, brought by Ms. Ehrenfeld, is the best way to insure that these rights which are fundamental to our concept of freedom and liberty are not denigrated overseas by individuals who have channeled their money and energy into an effort to destroy our citizens."

The NS Sherlock Report--The stupidity of the Baker Peace Wagon:"Let's Talk"

Andrew C. McCarthy gets it right in describing the depth of stupidity in the proposals of the Baker Iraqi Study Group.

This is a war of will. If we lose it, the historians will marvel at how mulishly we resisted understanding the one thing we needed to understand in order to win. The enemy.

In Iraq, we’ve tried to fight the most civilized “light footprint” war of all time. We made sure everyone knew our beef was only with Saddam Hussein, as if he were a one-man militia — no Sunni Baathists supporting him, no Arab terrorists colluding, and no Shiite jihadists hating us just on principle.

No, our war was only with the regime. No need to fight the Iraqis. They, after all, were noble. They would flock to democracy if only they had the chance. And, once they hailed us as conquering heroes, their oil wealth would pay for the whole thing … just 400 billion American dollars ago.

This may be the biggest disconnect of all time between the American people and a war government.

In the wake of 9/11, the American people did not care about democratizing the Muslim world. Or, for that matter, about the Muslim world in general. They still don’t. They want Islamic terrorists and their state sponsors crushed. As for the aftermath, they want something stable that no longer threatens our interests; they care not a wit whether Baghdad’s new government looks like Teaneck’s.

To the contrary, Bush-administration officials — notwithstanding goo-gobs of evidence that terrorists have used the freedoms of Western democracies, including our own, the better to plot mass murder — have conned themselves into believing that democracy, not decisive force, is the key to conquering this enemy.

So deeply have they gulped the Kool-Aid that, to this day, they refuse to acknowledge what is plain to see: While only a small number of the world’s billion-plus Muslims (though a far larger number than we’d like to believe) is willing to commit acts of terrorism, a substantial percentage — meaning tens of millions — supports the terrorists’ anti-West, anti-democratic agenda.

Islamic countries, moreover, are not rejecting Western democracy because they haven’t experienced it. They reject it on principle. For them, the president’s euphonious rhetoric about democratic empowerment is offensive. They believe, sincerely, that authority to rule comes not from the people but from Allah; that there is no separation of religion and politics; that free people do not have authority to legislate contrary to Islamic law; that Muslims are superior to non-Muslims, and men to women; and that violent jihad is a duty whenever Muslims deem themselves under attack … no matter how speciously.

These people are not morons. They adhere to a highly developed belief system that is centuries old, wildly successful, and for which many are willing to die. They haven’t refused to democratize because the Federalist Papers are not yet out in Arabic. They decline because their leaders have freely chosen to decline. They see us as the mortal enemy of the life they believe Allah commands. Their demurral is wrong, but it is principled, not ignorant. And we insult them by suggesting otherwise.

Democratizing such cultures — in anything we would recognize as “democracy” — is the work of generations. It is a cultural phenomenon. It is not accomplished by elections and facile constitution writing … especially, constitutions that shun Madisonian democracy for the State Department’s preferred establishment of Islam and its adhesive sharia law as the state religion.
Elections, in fact, play to the strengths of Islamic terrorists. Jihadists are confident, intimidating, and rigorously disciplined. They are thus certain to thrive in the chaos of nascent “democracies.” Consequently, it should be unsurprising to anyone with a shred of common sense that terrorist organizations are ascendant in the new governments of Iraq, Lebanon, and the Palestinian territories.

So now comes James Baker’s Iraq Study Group, riding in on its bipartisan white horse to save the day. The democracy project having failed, this blue-ribbon panel’s solution is: Let’s talk.

Let’s talk with our enemies, Iran and Syria. Let’s talk with terror abettors as if they were good guys — just like us. As if they were just concerned neighbors trying to stop the bloodshed in Iraq … instead of the dons who’ve been commanding it all along.

Someone, please explain something to me: How does it follow that, because Islamic cultures reject democracy, we somehow need to talk to Iran and Syria?

What earthly logic that supports talking with these Islamic terrorists would not also support negotiating with al Qaeda — a demarche not even a Kennedy School grad would dare propose?

There’s none.

When I grew up in The Bronx, there were street gangs. You mostly stayed away from them, and, if you really had to, you fought with them. But I never remember anyone saying, “Gee, maybe if we just talk with them ...”

Nor do I remember, in two decades as a prosecutor, anyone saying, “Y’know, maybe if we just talk with these Mafia guys, we could achieve some kind of understanding ...”

Sitting down with evil legitimizes evil. As a practical matter, all it accomplishes is to convey weakness. This spring — after trumpeting the Bush Doctrine’s “you’re with us or you’re with the terrorists” slogan for five years — Secretary of State Rice pathetically sought to bribe Iran out of its nuclear program with a menu of all carrots and no sticks … and certainly no demand that the mullahs stop fomenting terror. The result? They’re still laughing at us, even as they build their bombs, harbor al Qaeda operatives, and arm the militias killing American soldiers in Iraq.

While our rhetoric blathers that we’ll never let them have a nuke, our talk begs them, pretty-please, to stop building one. And our actions all but hand them one. If all that makes you wonder who’s the superpower, what do you suppose they’re thinking?

That’s talking with an enemy that has us pretty well pegged, while we stubbornly resist even thinking about what motivates him. We wouldn’t want to question his ideology. After all, what would CAIR say?

The democracy project tells Islamists that we don’t understand them — or care to try understanding them. The “let’s talk” gambit confirms that we’re not just studiously ignorant; we’re ripe for the taking.

For our own sake, we need to respect the enemy. That means grasping that he’s implacable, that he means us only harm, and that he must be subdued, not appeased. Negotiating with such evil is always a mistake, for any accommodation with evil is, by definition, evil.

Rejecting the democracy project is about respecting the enemy. Declining to talk to the enemy is about respecting ourselv

es.