Only We Can Stop It

Trey Smith

We've all heard about the "War on Terror." Supposedly, we will continue to fight this war until not a terrorist is left. Once this occurs, some future President will stage a big photo op and declare, "Mission Accomplished!"

Of course, the chief problem with this strategy is that, as long as we continue arbitrarily to kill innocent civilians, we will continue to manufacture more people bent on revenge. In other words, the so-called "War on Terror" can never be won BY DESIGN. What this means is that our children's children's children will hear about the need to give up ever more civil liberties -- if there are ANY left -- to insure their peace, freedom and security.

What a deal!

As Glenn Greenwald reported on Tuesday, in the year since the assassination of Osama bin Laden, the War on Terror has escalated substantially. Here we supposedly rubbed out World Public Enemy Number 1 and yet it surprisingly didn't make our world any "safer."

The US Government keeps telling us how they have thwarted or diminished al-Qaeda time and time again, yet these acts don't seem to slow down the ever-expanding war. It seems that, no matter how many people we kill with drones or eliminate with special forces, the War on Terror doesn't skip a beat.

In truth, there is only one way to stop this infernal "war": We need to back off! If the US decided to quit indiscriminately killing people, particularly Muslims, there would be far less people wanting to seek revenge. If we married this strategy of refusing to kill people indiscriminately with a foreign policy based on a strong human rights component and the idea of helping other nations become economically sustainable, we would quickly move from being viewed as the enemy to being viewed as a friend.

I know, I know. That's just a Pollyanna pipe dream.

Sigh...