Belmont states two extraordinarily insightful paragraphs, which essentially sums up the real problem with current military solutions to AQ's terror.
The incident at Ghazni indicates what radical Islamism thinks is the "winning combination" against Western armies in the field. Both Iraq and Afghanistan have taught them the West is willing to allow them a cross-border sanctuary. From Syria, Iran and Pakistan they can strike at leisure and from there can deny the West a strategic victory for as long as they please. They understand that a strategic victory for the West consists in being able to establish a stable, equitable and prosperous successor regime that will serve as a counterexample to radical Islamism. Iraq taught them it is unnecessary to defeat an opposing Western army so long as they can totally wreck the progress towards a successor regime. For so long as they can make life in the neighboring country a hell on earth their purposes are served. Promoting criminal activity, dealing in drugs, sowing chaos, unrestricted terrorism, sparking civil war -- all of these are acceptable and even lucrative tactics which prevent the emergence of a stable regime.
Unable to create a stable successor regime, the Western opponent is caught between the alternatives of struggling against chaos or leaving the field to Islamists ready to turn their conquered Caliphate into a gigantic terrorist training camp. This choice is stark in Aghanistan because everyone remembers how the Taliban and al-Qaeda once controlled it and know they seek to control it again. Once it was a base for al-Qaeda; and al-Qaeda is determined to get it back. But it is no different anywhere else. In Iraq, with its strategic location and oil wealth, lies a glittering prize ready to be seized; and if the US is unwilling to fight for such a valuable position why should they stand elsewhere?
Believe me when I say that the next phase of the War on Terror that's going to be fought with any gusto is all going to fall into the Directorate of Ops for the CIA. The nasty lesson is that the US, if it is humiliated properly, will completely undermine the principle of sovereignty in the future. Things will blow up, people will disappear, borders will be crossed. Speaking of which, I'm a bit angry at myself for not getting names of the Dems who were harping on the term in the months before the provisional government was established in Iraq. How many of their drawdown plans include partition? Hmmm.
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