New Name. Same Aim.
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in Foreign Policy, The War On TerrorismIt looks like the global “war” on terrorism is now a global “struggle”:
In recent speeches and news conferences, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and the nation’s senior military officer have spoken of “a global struggle against violent extremism” rather than “the global war on terror,” which had been the catchphrase of choice. Administration officials say that phrase may have outlived its usefulness, because it focused attention solely, and incorrectly, on the military campaign.Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the National Press Club on Monday that he had “objected to the use of the term ‘war on terrorism’ before, because if you call it a war, then you think of people in uniform as being the solution.” He said the threat instead should be defined as violent extremists, with the recognition that “terror is the method they use.”
Although the military is heavily engaged in the mission now, he said, future efforts require “all instruments of our national power, all instruments of the international communities’ national power.” The solution is “more diplomatic, more economic, more political than it is military,” he concluded.
Well put.
I welcome this change because I think the idea of it being called a war has been an excuse for many to treat it as such. In my mind it’s simply not the same, and I’m glad the Joint Chiefs of Staff agrees. Because would people really be okay with a “war” that goes on for 10, 20, 30 or even 40 years?
True, this is an indefinite struggle that must be fought, but we may never see any clear victory. The new terminology readies the world for this reality and that’s important.
One side note. Could this positioning modification also point to the end of the U.S. invading entire countries suspected of harboring terrorists and WMDs? If we’re no longer calling it a war, will it be that much harder for the Administration, or subsequent Administrations, to declare war on a rogue state?
(Hat Tip: New York Times)
This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 26th, 2005 and is filed under Foreign Policy, The War On Terrorism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
July 26th, 2005 at 10:36 am
An even better moniker would be “the global struggle against Islamic supremacism.”
This isn’t simply a case of the end not justifying the means. For al Qaeda and other Islamic supremacists, the end – a totalitarian Islamic world order – is evil in itself, regardless of the means used to advance it. Calling this a war on terror is like calling the Cold War a war against nuclear weapons.
July 26th, 2005 at 11:15 am
I think if it were put that way, many nations across the world would think we’re wanting to say that Islam is the problem and not the extremists.
I still think the idea of fighting “violent extremism” will be better for us in the end because it has more potential to gain us more friends and sympathy, especially in the Islamic world. Just so long as we separate Islam itself from the extremists who use it to terrorize the world.
July 26th, 2005 at 2:11 pm
We’ve had the Cold War recently and the Hundred Years War before that, so I don’t think the word ‘war’ is the problem. The real problem is characterizing the enemy we are fighting, without turning “global war on terror” into a paragraph.
Terrorism is a tactic, not the enemy per se. Movements that employ terrorism are generally inimical to us, but only AQ is an existential enemy.
AQ has Islamic roots and draws its support from within Islam, but it is counter-productive to reference Islam in naming the enemy, since we will require substantial Islamic support to defeat AQ.
August 4th, 2005 at 10:06 am
[...] I applauded the Administration for trying to change the terminology in an early post about the war on terror, but the President doesn’t want it that way. I realize this may seem like a small deal to a lot of people, but in this specific case I really thinks the semantics of the situation matter. Declaring war on a tactic doesn’t not help our cause, and especially when it seems like many within the administration want to change it. [...]