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War On Terror. ... The Bolsheviks were the minority party and in order to win
the Russian civil war they used terror and intimidation. ...
War on Terror. Justifiable War on Terror There is a lot of debate and
discussion on the Iraq war of late. Some say we shouldn?t ...
War On Terror. War on Terror A brief history ... World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
The US responded to the attack through War on terror. ...
War On Terror. The ... Prior to the war on Terror was the much publicized attempt
to search Saddam?s warehouses for chemical weapons. Having ...
The War on Terror. When President Bush ... secret? "War on terror" is useful for
the President, but irrational for the nation. Terrorism is ...
Submitted by autumnsollock on November 29, 2006
Category: American History
Words: 1311 | Pages: 6
Views: 107
Popularity Rank: 71,346
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When President Bush called Americans to enlist in his "war on terror," very
few citizens could have grasped the all-encompassing consequences of the
proposition. The terrifying events of 9/11 were like a blinding flash,
benumbing the country with a sudden knowledge of unimagined dangers. Strong
action was recommended, skeptics were silenced and a shallow sense of unity
emerged from the shared vulnerabilities. Nearly three years later, the
enormity of Bush's summons to open-ended "war" is more obvious. It
overwhelmed the country, in fact deranged society's normal processes and
purposes with a brilliantly seductive political message: Terror pre-empts
everything else.
What this President effectively accomplished was to restart the cold war,
albeit under a new rubric. The justifying facts are different and smaller,
but the ideological dynamics are remarkably similar--a total commitment of
the nation's energies to confront a vast, unseen and malignant adversary.
Fanatical Muslims replaced Soviet Communists and, like the reds, these
enemies could be anywhere, including in our midst (they may not even be
Muslims, but kindred agents who likewise "hate" us and oppose our values).
Like the cold war's, the logic of this new organizing framework can be
awesomely compelling to the popular imagination because it runs on fear--the
public's expanding fear of potential dangers. The political commodity of
fear has no practical limits. The government has the ability to manufacture
more.
Nor is there any obvious ceiling on what the nation must devote--in JFK's
famous phrase--"to pay any price, bear any burden" in defense of liberty and
homeland. Long after the Soviet Union was recognized as a failed economic
system, US intelligence agencies continued to warn that it was...
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