STRATFOR summarized my thoughts nicely, regarding how we are letting terrorists “win the war”, in their latest report. We need to shake it off and stop letting them call the shots (read: Impeach Bush Now). Excerpt:
Terrorism: Psychology as Force Multiplier
With that psychological component in mind, terrorist acts do not
have to be tremendously successful (in terms of physical casualties
or damage) in order to be terribly effective.
About 3,000 people were killed in the 9/11 attacks. That is an
enormous toll, certainly (the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, by
comparison, resulted in only six deaths), but it pales in
comparison to the number of Americans who were killed in highway
accidents in 2005 (more than 43,000) or the hundreds of thousands
who lost their lives in the tsunami that struck Asia in December
2004. The true power in terrorism rests in the ability to commit
spectacular strikes and the psychological impact that such
spectacles can have. In many cases, the “psychological casualties”
far exceed the number of physical casualties that can be realized
with any given strike.
The anarchists of the late 19th century referred to terrorism as
the “propaganda of the deed,” meaning that their acts of violence
had an ability to send messages to their friends and foes alike. Al
Qaeda certainly fits this mold: The group has been struggling since
its inception to convince the “ummah,” or Muslim people, that the
United States and its allies are not invincible. The group also
spent several years attempting to provoke the United States into
invading a Muslim country — so that it could launch a war of
attrition against the United States, similar to the way it fought
(and defeated) the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. After many smaller
attempts, al Qaeda succeeded in this goal with the Sept. 11
attacks, which took U.S. forces into Afghanistan. The 2003 invasion
of Iraq provided an even better theater for al Qaeda’s war of
attrition against the United States.
Al Qaeda measures its progress in the war of attrition not only by
the number of American servicemen killed, but in terms of American
treasure expended in furtherance of the war. In essence, bin Laden
and his planners adopted a concept that is familiar to Americans:
“It’s the economy, stupid!”
Bin Laden outlined this very clearly in his October 29, 2004 ,
message to the American people. In that recording, he estimated
that it cost al Qaeda only $500,000 to carry out the 9/11 attacks,
whereas the estimated cost to the United States from the event and
its aftermath was measured at $500 billion. In the same message,
bin Laden also mused about how easy it was to “provoke and bait”
the U.S. administration. All that was needed, he claimed, was to
“send two mujahideen to the furthest point east to raise a piece of
cloth on which is written ‘al Qaeda,’ in order to make the generals
race there to cause America to suffer human, economic, and
political losses without their achieving for it anything of note
other than some benefits for their private companies.” Later in the
same message, he stated: “So we are continuing this policy in
bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy — Allah willing, and
nothing is too great for Allah.”
This theme of economic warfare has been echoed in several
subsequent messages from al Qaeda leaders, and there is no evidence
at this point to suggest that al Qaeda has decided to scrap this
approach.
