From Jim Dunnigan’s Strategy Page:
Many of the people involved in doing development work in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other places frequented by Islamic terrorists, actively discourage reporters from “telling the good news” about their particular project. Aid workers have concluded that when word of a successful project gets into the media, the terrorists will sometimes learn about it and target it. This has happened many times in Afghanistan, in the aftermath of news stories about schools for girls, and rural education in general. This is where the Internet comes in, because that’s how widely dispersed Islamic radicals can stay in touch. For these fellows, publicity is very important. And when they see a story that appears to disrespect them, like girls going to school, retaliation is discussed, and eventually someone follows through.
I don’t think that the pro-war commentariat is stupid because they hold a manifestly indefensible position, but rather because they so reliably demonstrate their ability to understand why things happen the way they do and to foresee the probable consequences of the actions they so loudly recommend. Their feeble capacities can be seen by the way in which they regard “well, we have to do SOMETHING” as passing for a defense of the Bush administration’s bungling.
The fact that they cannot even recognize that the enemy follows the Western media, (despite the way in which numerous organizations and individuals have played it so adroitly), does not lend credence to their assertions that the only thing standing between the USA and victory over “Terror” is will. This is, in fact, a monstrously stupid supposition, the same one that lies behind numerous 20th century military disasters from the Somme Ypres to Barbarossa and the Six-Day War.
Any adroit student of military history knows that the two previous waves of Islamic expansion were not defeated by offense, but by defensive measures. The Crusades were a near-complete failure; what little success was enjoyed by the first Crusaders was entirely dependent upon the unstable nature of the Dar al-Islam. I will post more on this soon, but as has been obvious from the start, a winning strategy in this latest round of Islam vs the West requires understanding the lessons of past successes as well as failures.