Now, if terrorists could strike more often, of course they would. If they could kill more people in each strike, of course they would. So it’s reasonable to conclude that, since so much time goes by between attacks and since fewer people are killed in each attack, our policies toward terrorism are working.
What are those policies? Well, fighting back, for one.
Commentators repeatedly complain that our wars against Iraq and Afghanistan have created more terrorists. “The U.S. invasion of Iraq serves as a recruiting tool for more terrorists, making the U.S. and its citizens abroad less safe,” is how the National Organization for Women put it in March 2003.
But in Iraq alone, we’ve killed thousands of bad guys. Recall that on Sept. 12, 2001, a lot of us wondered, “How will we ever get at the guys who did this?” We’re getting them because they’re coming to us in Iraq.
We can’t be completely safe as long as there’s a man willing to die for whatever it is the terrorists are fighting for. And what is that again? A free and independent Iraq? No, that’s us. A country where everyone can worship as he wishes? No, us again.
Oh, right, Osama bin Laden’s dream is a Muslim caliphate governed by a leader such as Mullah Omar. That goal is opposed by virtually everyone in the world, from China (eventually there will be train bombings in Beijing) to Canada. And it’s opposed by millions of Muslims, too. Let’s remember that Islamic suicide bombers have killed hundreds of Iraqis this year alone.
Many will note that these attacks came just a day after London celebrated winning the 2012 Olympics. But it’s worth remembering that, by the time those games are played, there will have been hundreds of thousands more celebrations by Westerners (for events large and small), and a mere handful of senseless attacks by terrorists.
Meanwhile, the world leaders gathered in Scotland ended up talking about the war on terror, which is far more important than global warming but probably wouldn’t have been on the agenda except for the London attacks. So, in a way, the terrorists may have ended up hastening their own inevitable demise.
Indeed, the terrorists won’t be ignored. But as British Prime Minister Tony Blair put it, the “bombings will not weaken in any way our resolve to uphold the most deeply held principles of our societies and to defeat those who would impose their fanaticism and extremism on all of us. We shall prevail and they shall not.”
The West is winning, and will win. It’s merely a matter of time.