The American invasion of Iraq in 2003 would appear to have been a plus for al Qaeda, as Saddam Hussein, and his Baath Party, had long been an enemy of Islamic radicalism. But Saddam got religion after his defeat in the 1991 Gulf War. During the 1990s, Saddam became a major supporter of Islam, building many mosques and proclaiming himself a major defender of the faith. Al Qaeda was wary of this, but did enter into negotiations with Saddam. After all, Saddam and al Qaeda shared a hatred for the West, and especially the United States. A major fear was that Saddam would provide a refuge for al Qaeda, and supply them with chemical or nuclear weapons (if not a bomb, then radioactive material.) The fighting in Iraq is basically between the Sunni Arab minority, assisted by al Qaeda, against the majority Kurds and Shia Arabs. While much is made about Iraq becoming a “school for terrorists,” few of the “graduates” have shown up anywhere else, pulling off successful attacks. On the other hand, many known Islamic terrorists have gone to Iraq, and gotten themselves killed or captured. So Iraq has to be seen as a net loss for al Qaeda.
I just downloaded the latest version of Spybot Search & Destroy, with all the latest updates, on one of the Windows machines. When I ran it, it found quite a few problems (mostly cookies). Whenever I try to actually fix them, the program hangs, and has to be killed with the Task Manager. Anyone know what might be up?
[Evening update]
As some in comments suggested, I tried CCleaner. It was a martyr for the cause, dying before exiting. But it seemed to do the job. I ran Spybot afterward (two or three times) and it finally cleaned up all the issues. Or at least it said it did. We’ll see how it goes.
I’m feeling a little better about Bush’s plan now. Syria and Iran have denounced it. A lot of these statements sound like the current Democrat talking points, in fact. Of course, many of its domestic critics will probably think that this buttresses their own criticisms.
If my opinions about the war were the same as the enemy’s (or at least those stated by the enemy), I’d rethink them. But I guess the problem is that they don’t think that Tehran or Damascus are the enemy. For them, the enemy lives at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
A Navy sub got pulled into the bottom of a speeding oil tanker in the Straight of Hormuz:
That is the preliminary finding of Monday’s collision between the Norfolk-based submarine and the Mogamigawa, a 1,100-foot-long merchant ship displacing 300,000 tons.
Both were southbound, crossing the busy and narrow Strait of Hormuz while heading into the Arabian Sea.
“As the ship passed over the sub, it ended up sucking the submarine into it,” said Lt. Cmdr. Chris Loundermon, a spokesman for Submarine Force in Norfolk.
“It is a principle called the venturi effect,” he said.
I’ll bet the sub skipper’s got a lot of ‘splaining to do.
You know, I’m a lot less concerned with whether or not we have an exit strategy, as I am with making sure that the enemy doesn’t:
…the devastation left behind by our gunships is only part of a very big U.S. win:
* Thanks to resolute military action by Ethiopia’s government (quietly backed by Washington), the terror regime in Mogadishu crumbled overnight – collapsing the lie that extremist Islam is on the march to an inevitable victory.
* The speed of the Ethiopian advance cornered hundreds of hardcore Islamist fighters in a forlorn backwater, where they can be killed out of sight of their media defenders. And be killed they will.
* Islamist outrages and subversion inspired unprecedented cooperation between moderate Somalis, Ethiopians, Kenyans and Americans.
For its part, the Kenyan government grew sick of Somalia exporting hatred, weapons and terror. Now Kenyan troops have sealed their border so al Qaeda’s agents can’t escape.