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Sun. Nov 18, 2001

QuoteLog, 11/18

QuoteLog, 11/18 – ”By overthrowing the Taleban and scattering its mad mullahs, America has sent the clearest possible signal to other regimes which harbour terrorists or support violent religious fanatics. The carnage in New York defined the limit of Americas forbearance, both for its sworn enemies, such as Iraq and Syria, and for some traditional allies, such as Saudi Arabia. In future, attacks on civilians in America and other Western countries will be treated not as isolated crimes by individuals but as hostile acts of state. Any government that can be associated with such acts of terror can now expect the same treatment as the Taleban. The Talebans defeat has set a precedent for the kind of treatment that other governments, in the Middle East and elsewhere, can expect if they allow their territory, their finances or their intelligence resources to be used for terrorist acts. For despotic rulers, whose main motivation in life has always been personal political survival, the overthrow of the Taleban after September 11 should prove a much more salutary lesson than the capture or killing of bin Laden.”

Anatole Kaletsky,The Times

”If the sheer barbarism of the Taliban regime is your version of an Islamic society, then you must be a true dreamer to think that any Muslim with half a brain will listen to you. The long lost tribal simplicity and austerity that once characterised the practice of Islam interest no one today. The self-inflicted death of intellect in Islam a thousand years ago is the main cause of the retrogressive and unenlightened mullah culture in Muslim societies today. Your self-selected messiahism is too opportunistic and shallow to become a political movement of a revolutionary sentiment among the dispossessed Muslims of the world. If you are offended at the presence of US troops in Saudi Arabia, let me tell you something: the great majority of us Muslims do not give a damn. Oil is what matters to the West and the East and Pax-Americana would be just as happy with the oil fields belonging to this or that political entity along the eastern board of the Arabian peninsula where all the oil rests. So now, much too late, if you want us to believe that apart from your petty vendetta against the Saudia, you are also the leader of the Palestinians, it’s just too late my friend – the people of Palestine have been betrayed far too long by their Arab brothers.”

Izzat Majeed, Open Letter to Osama bin Laden

”I don’t know about you, but I’m having a hard time learning to crawl. Not the hands-and-knees thing babies and apologetic spouses do. I got the hang of that a while back. I’m talking about learning to comprehend the glut of information that crawls across the bottom of the TV screen that’s increasingly cluttered like a King Kullen window [...] CNN is the worst when it comes to blitzing viewers with an undifferentiated melange of McNuggetized news and tabloid trivia, but it hardly has a monopoly on annoying use of crawls. MSNBC and Fox are probably more inclined to misuse the crawls for promoting Web sites or upcoming programs. CNBC’s triple-decker crawl of stock prices and headlines creeps so high the actual humans on screen sometimes bring to mind the ’Home Improvement’ character, Wilson, whom we could never quite see over the backyard fence.”

Noel Holston

”The Leonid Meteor Storm is starting. Best viewing time on the West Coast is 1 a.m., Sunday morning. We’re headed out to the Mojave, or maybe Joshua Tree, to see the show. I’m going to make Laura wear a burqa, and pretend I’m watching U.S. bombing raids in Afghanistan. Once the storm ends, she can take off the burqa and I’ll start playing music while trimming my beard. It’s gonna be some kind of party.”

Ken Layne

”Today the entire world stands by the US in its war on terrorism. It is inevitable that the US will adopt a balanced and responsible foreign policy based on the value of justice. At that point, the US will realize how simple is the substitute for an isolationist policy. In my opinion, the US will not be able to pursue its isolationist policy because it will be more harmful than useful and is based on hostility and dominance. In fact, following the fall of the Soviet Union, the world which is now living in the American era is in need of a force working for justice, a force working for authority and credibility, a force taking firm stands and adopting solid and transparent principles, more than it needs anything else.”

ArabNews, Saudi Arabia’s Official English Daily

”The view of Air Force officials is that Franks frequently was swayed by the excessive doubts of his subordinate intelligence officers and his legal adviser, Air Force officials said. The Central Command’s top lawyer—in military parlance, the judge advocate general, or JAG—repeatedly refused to permit strikes even when the targets were unambiguously military in nature, an Air Force officer said. At one point in October, a Taliban military convoy was moving north to reinforce positions facing the front lines of the Northern Alliance, the Afghan rebel army. Air Force targeters thought it was a prime target—easy to hit and of clear military value. The JAG, Navy Capt. Shelly Young, declined to approve it on the grounds that ”it might be a trick,” the officer said. The target was so obvious that it worried Young, who suggested that the Taliban might have put children in it [...] This long-standing issue was complicated by the personality of Young, who has a reputation of being cautious and a habit of playing ’devil’s advocate,’ he said. When clearance was sought, officials said, Young frequently would ask, ’Are you sure?’ When faced with that question, the officials said, Franks would then turn to his top intelligence officer, Army Brig. Gen. John F. Kimmons, who tended to say they did not have total certainty about the target. ’That got General Franks twisted into a pretzel,’ this official said.”

Thomas Ricks, Washington Post

”It was just before 1am local time on Thursday when the Americans went in for the kill. The convoy had stopped at a small town. Men in other vehicles were there, too. Some sort of gathering was taking place in the hotel. The single Predator, now overhead, gave a clear picture of the hotels crowded car park and of the fighters apparently pacing nervously as they waited for their commanders to finish their meeting [...] Locking the cross-hairs of their weapon guidance systems on the hotel below, each of the three F-15s let loose a single GBU-15 smart bomb. Weighing 2,500lb each, these bombs are guided on to their targets by infrared cameras in their noses. As the bombs slammed into the side of the hotel, the Predator completed the mission, launching its two Hellfire missiles at the vehicles in the car park. Almost everyone at the scene was incinerated, with close to 100 people killed. It was many hours before American officials could know just how much they had achieved. Then, in panic and pandemonium, an Al-Qaeda operative breached the organisations strict security rules and revealed that a large number of the movements senior figures had been killed including Mohammed Atef, the 57-year-old deputy to Bin Laden and the terrorist groups senior military commander.”

Stephen Grey, The Times

No one can be certain what effect the fall of Kabul will have on the ’war against terrorism’. But it is already clear that, back home in the British press, it has done nothing to end the escalating war of words [...] Few hawks, who had endured an uncomfortable few weeks, could resist the opportunity to gloat. The worst culprit, inevitably, was the Sun, which ran an editorial labelling the anti-war lobby in general, and the Mirror in particular, as ’traitors’. It even went on to lambast newspapers that had published dissenting pieces as part of the general debate. Everyone took the bait, and no one more so than the tabloid’s rival, the Mirror, which responded by calling the Sun ’a Pravda -like government propaganda sheet’. The Mirror ’s editor inadvertently undermined his paper’s calls for restraint in Afghanistan by explaining his reaction to the Sun ’s attack on him. ’If someone sticks it to you,’ he said, ’you stick it back.’ ”

Guardian Observer

”The rhythm of war – often described as long periods of boredom interspersed with moments of sheer terror – does not fit very well with the speed and demands of the modern media industry. The reporters have been blamed, not least by the commentators, for failing to anticipate the rapid advance of the Northern Alliance. But there was no shame in this, nor in failing to predict the ease with which Kabul was taken. You can imagine that everyone from the Pentagon to the Northern Alliance themselves were equally taken by surprise. No, what is unforgivable is refusing to take stock of the situation and adjust one’s perception of this different world, however slight the change. And that has been the universal response of all commentators, Left or Right, pro- or anti-war, to the events of last week. The urge to prove that they have been right all along is so much greater than the need to adapt to new circumstances. So it is the circumstances that are adapted to fit the pre-existing line. All sides will say that it is a question of morality. But the suspicions remain that deep down it is a matter of pride.”

Guardian Observer