It should go without saying but probably does not: Most of the world’s Muslims are not participating in this struggle, are not eager for bloodshed, and do not want to live under clerical dictatorships. But if, as has been conservatively estimated, only seven percent of the world’s Muslims support Jihadism and/or Islamism, that’s more than 80 million people – a formidable force backed by enormous Middle Eastern oil wealth. By contrast, Islamic reformers and peacemakers are isolated, targeted and without substantial resources.
After 9/11, the Bush administration conceived this conflict as a “Global War on Terrorism.” The link with Islam as preached by fiery clerics was acknowledged but not examined. The Obama administration has backed away from even that incomplete analysis. Government spokesmen now talk only of “violent extremism” and “overseas contingency operations.” The first term ignores the ideologies motivating those battling us. The second term denies that it’s a serious global conflict. President Obama has conceded that al-Qaeda is at war with the U.S. – as though that’s all there was to it; as though that explained something.
In his address on Afghanistan last week, President Obama added that “open-ended war” does not “serve” American interests. That’s true but irrelevant since wars are not theatrical productions – you can’t just bring down the curtain at a time certain. Wars generally continue until one side wins and the other loses.
The U.S. and the West are not prepared to escalate the conflict in order to defeat our enemies any time soon. Nor are we likely to accept defeat in the near term. So what we’re left with is indeed an “open-ended war,” a long war, a low-intensity war, on a variety of fronts.
Afghanistan is one of them. It is instructive to note that the Sunday Times of London reported last weekend that Iranians are paying members of the Taliban to kill American soldiers there. Think about that: Iran’s rulers are collaborating with the Taliban, an affiliate of al-Qaeda – evidence, hardly the first, that while Shia jihadis and Sunni jihadis may be rivals, they can and do find common causes: slaughtering Americans, for one.
Political leaders and the intelligence community ought to be pondering what this means – and what it will mean if Tehran succeeds in acquiring nuclear weapons. Based on past performance, we cannot be confident that is the case.
According to the Times, Iran is financing the Taliban using aid money from the West which is being paid to Iranian firms involved in the reconstruction effort in Afghanistan. In other words: NATO countries are funding the slaughter of NATO troops. Will President Obama hold Iran responsible and take steps to end this practice? Will he even speak clearly of Iranian culpability?
More likely, he will repeat that our goal must be to avoid “open-ended war.” How encouraging that will be to the jihadis and Islamists in Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Somalia, Yemen, Gaza and other fronts. It will reassure them that, nine years after the 9/11 attacks, they are thinking strategically – while their infidel enemies are not.