Are US Wars Fueling Domestic Terrorism?

[bigtree]

by Katrina Vanden Heuvel at The Nation: http://www.alternet.org/blogs/world/144828/are_u.s._wars_fueling_domestic_terrorism/


December 28, 2009

Are the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan creating a domestic terrorist threat? The potential disaster of a Nigerian man attempting to blow up a U.S. airliner on Christmas day forces us to confront the question.

As the New York Times recently reported, there is increasing evidence that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are fueling a radicalization of young Muslims in the United States who are angry about the military occupation of Muslim lands and the killing of innocent Muslim citizens. There are legitimate concerns that this may lead to more ethnic profiling, but I believe the lesson is that we need to end as quickly as possible the military occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan and call for an end to permanent war against Islamic terrorists.

What is needed now are not partisan fights about whether the Obama Administration was doing enough to guard against terrorist attacks in the wake of shootings last month at Fort Hood, Texas. Instead, we should question whether our overreaction to the crimes against humanity on 9/11 -- including the creation of an endless "war" against terrorism -- has done more to undermine our security than enhance it. American safety will be better ensured through common-sense counterterrorism and homeland defense measures, including extensive intelligence cooperation expert police work and border control.


read: http://www.alternet.org/blogs/world/144828/are_u.s._wars_fueling_domestic_terrorism/

[mdmc]

1. Does US wars promote peace solutions to conflicts or violent solution to conflicts

Society will be influenced by how the powers that be solve problems.

Just as the death penalty causes an increase in violence in a society, war does the same thing..

[timeforpeace]

2. Of course.Just because we changed administrations doesn't mean they change their motives for terror.

[AnOhioan]

3. Short answer - yep

[NJmaverick]

4. short answer no

longer answer it is completely opposite of these claims. The Afghanistan conflict is keeping that nation from becoming Al-Qaeda's main base of operation and allowing them to consolidate and launch larger scale operations like 9/11

[bigtree]

5. 9-11 wasn't 'launched' from Afghanistan

The hijackers had been living in Hewitt, New Jersey, at the time of the terrorist attacks.

Complete 911 Timeline
Flight Training Undergone by Alleged 9/11 Hijackers
http://www.historycommons.org/timeline.jsp?the_alleged_9/11_hijackers=complete_911_timeline_alleged_hijackers__flight_training&timeline=complete_911_timeline

[NJmaverick]

6. So Japan didn't attack Pearl Habor?

At the time of the attack they were living on a ship at sea.

[bigtree]

10. waste of time explaining the acts of a nation vs. the actions of rogue individuals

[ixion]

7. Of course they are

No one enjoys being bombed by another country, even if that country claims to be "liberating" them.

The GOP-DLC claim to the contrary is awe-inspiring in its ignorance.

[amborin]

8. short answer: yes

[Mari333]

9. Yes, Indeed. knr

[amborin]

11. article: which worse threat? terrorism or U.S. climate policy?

Tony Blair's chief scientist has launched a withering attack on President George Bush for failing to tackle climate change, which he says is more serious than terrorism.

Sir David King, the Government's chief scientific adviser, says in an article today in the journal Science that America, the world's greatest polluter, must take the threat of global warming more seriously.

"In my view, climate change is the most severe problem that we are facing today, more serious even than the threat of terrorism," Sir David says.

The Bush administration was wrong to pull out of the Kyoto protocol, the international effort to limit the emission of greenhouse gases, and wrong to imply the protocol could adversely affect the US economy, Sir David says. "As the world's only remaining superpower, the United States is accustomed to leading internationally co-ordinated action. But the US government is failing to take up the challenge of global warming.

"The Bush administration's strategy relies largely on market-based incentives and voluntary action ... But the market cannot decide that mitigation is necessary, nor can it establish the basic international framework in which all actors can take their place."

Results of a major study showed yesterday that more than a million species will become extinct as a result of global warming over the next 50 years. Sir David says the Bush administration is wrong to dispute the reality of global warming. The 10 hottest years on record started in 1991 and, worldwide, average temperatures had risen by 0.6C in the past century.

Sea levels were rising, ice caps were melting and flooding had become more frequent. The Thames barrier was used about once a year in the 1980s to protect London but now it was used more than six times a year.

"If we could stabilize the atmosphere's carbon dioxide concentration at some realistically achievable and relatively low level, there is still a good chance of mitigating the worst effects of climate change."

But countries such as Britain could not solve the problem of global warming in isolation, particularly when the US was by far the biggest producer of greenhouse gases on the planet. "The United Kingdom is responsible for only 2 per cent of the world's emissions, the United States for more than 20 per cent (although it contains only 4 per cent of the world's population)," Sir David says.

"The United States is already in the forefront of the science and technology of global change, and ......"



http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0109-02.htm

[Behind the Aegis]

12. Slippery slope.

[Vidar]

13. Of course they are!. Our "War on Terror" funcitons mainly as a

recruitment drive for the Taliban.

[amborin]

14. and: an unfortunate distraction: "Christmas for Bankers"

"Christmas Presents for Bankers
by Dean Baker

On Christmas night in 1776, George Washington led a surprise attack on a group of Hessian mercenaries employed by the British to suppress the American revolution. This was one of the biggest military victories of the Revolutionary War.

In the same spirit of surprise, the Obama administration announced on Christmas eve that it was removing the $400bn cap on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's access to the US Treasury.

The new draw is limitless. It also announced that the chief executives of the two government-controlled mortgage giants would be getting compensation packages worth $6m a year. This was another big blow for the financial sector in its effort to sap every last cent from the productive economy.

After throwing the economy into the worst downturn since the Great Depression and bringing the whole sector to the edge of collapse, the financial industry has used its political power to succor itself back to life. It is now stronger than ever.

In the last quarter, the financial sector accounted for 34% of all corporate profits, dwarfing the share reached in the mad days at the peak of the housing bubble. The economy might look bleak on Main Street, with double-digit unemployment rates and nearly 200,000 foreclosures a month, but they were dividing up $13bn in bonuses at Goldman Sachs this Christmas.

Most people already knows the various public pots that Goldman and the rest tapped to make themselves healthy and rich again. There was the $700bn troubled asset relief programme (Tarp) loan fund, the hundreds of billions of dollars worth of guarantees that the FDIC provided to cover their borrowing at the peak of the crisis, and the trillions of dollars lent out by the Fed. However, the bottomless line of credit for Fannie and Freddie could prove to be the biggest pot of gold of all."

snip

http://www.economicpopulist.org/content/fannie-mae-freddie-mac-get-unlimited-bail-out

[Vidar]

15. Good point.