World Terror Attacks Tripled in 2004 by U.S. Count

No the world is a safer place now. The Iraq war made everything safer. The increase in terrorist attacks were the safe kind.

 

Away game.

 

350-198 = 152. That's actually down from 172 in 2003 when you exclude Iraq. The preponderance of the increase claimed is in Iraq - thanks we knew that. But if your argument is that the upswing in violence in Iraq has made us 'less safe' then I believe you are mistaken. We haven't seen any more AQ in the US. In fact, their resources seem to be concentrated in Iraq - hence the AQ in Iraq led by Zarqawi.

In addition, to claim this violent upswing is a result of 'legitimating torture or denying legal rights, invading countries, starting wars of civilizations, backing out of nuclear treaties, thumbing our noses at the UN/our traditonal allies' is a joke. Please explain how Zarqawi would not be setting off bombs in Iraq if we were on better terms with Europe, or had stayed in the ABM Treaty, lol. Rest assured Zarqawi's goal is not for us to be on better terms with Europe or Russia!

Finally, making the claim that actions are not working based on a short term stat such as this is silly. No matter what policy was pursued, the battle with AQ and their ilk would not be over in a year. Once the confrontation became open and declared (by 9/11), there was always a likelihood that violence would increase short term as AQ and others get rooted out and stamped out.

 

It would be more or less the same, cause he said 22 in Irag in 2003. 172-22 = 150 (more or less the same).

In either case, since Americans are in Iraq, it isprobably relevant to include their saftey as well. Is it better that violence is happening there rather than here...yes, but "we're" there, too, aren't we?

 

'More or less the same' still proves the point. The conflict with AQ is ongoing in Iraq, so while we certainly should be concerned about it - as 'we are there too,' its expected that there will be violence in a war. When you remove Iraq, which is the frontline battle with AQ, from the equation - all the hullabaloo glynch is ranting about is irrelevant to the over stats, which is my point.

 

But it does expose the myth that the world is safer because we invaded Iraq. You yourself seem to be saying that because we are there it has increased the attacks. In addition I would contend that only a portion of those are by AQ. So in essence it has given rise to additional terrorist attacks as well.

 

But if your argument is that the upswing in violence in Iraq has made us 'less safe' then I believe you are mistaken.

the us that excludes American soldiers in Iraq?

 

Does anyone believe that we are more popular in the Middle East since the invasion of Iraq?

Since there were no Weapons of Mass Destruction:

The invasion is seen as a "crusade" type invasion of the infidel over an Islamic state, to set up a puppet government so we can have access to the second largest oil reserves in the world. Do not underestimate the hated many feel at having "infidels" on Islamic soil. Also with bush's "axis of evil" stance, there is a belief that Iran will soon be next.

This has only decreased our popularity in the Middle East. Giving a great boost to terrorist recruiting.


So less popular with the population means, more people who wish to do us harm.

More Terrorists.

I find rather funny that people discount the Iraq numbers. The administration tried hard to link Iraq to terrorists. There were none before the invasion but now that we have created a terrorist heaven we are suppose not count that?

 

The problem is that you simply cannot quantify or qualify whether or not there are actually more terrorists as a result of our decrease in popularity. You can say the US is less popular - ok. You can say that provides a potential recruiting motive for terrorists. You cannot show that such an increase has actually occured. Nor can you determine whether our intervention in Afghanistan, which actually WAS an intervention against an Islamic state unlike Iraq, would have cause the same increase - if such an increase could be isolated - which it can't. The only thing you CAN say is there are more terrorist bombings in Iraq than before the intervention. Granted. In a conflict with terrorists there is more conflict. Again you cannot expect any action with terrorists to be over in 1 month. The question is whether or not we are safer engaging the terrorists or not. I think we are safer, or at worst on the path that will lead to a safer world without AQ and their ilk.

By that measure you could say there were more terrorist attacks post Afghanistan than pre Afghanistan. What does that prove? Not much except that in a war where terrorists are fighting for their lives, there will be more violence in the short term than not.

 

Hayes,

you make some good points.

you are right to say that there is no way calculate that there are now more terrorist than before the invasion of Iraq. ( Afgan. is a whole other matter. After 9-11 people i think the world realized that if you mess with the bull you get the horns.)
So don't confuse the two. As the government would like you to do.

But you must admit however that when you are less popular it is not hard to take the next step to assume that there will be an increase in people who wish do you harm. After all people who like you are far less likely to do you harm. People who trust you are more willing to give you the benefit of the doubt even if they dissagree with you on a perticular issue.

In vietman, the military understood this, thus the whole "win the hearts and minds" campain. And by the way, we didn't win their hearts and minds and lost.

 

It went up in 2002? I hadn't seen the reports, so I don't know.

I will say there is a huge difference. If they went up because we were defending ourselves and responding to being attacked, that is understandable. If they went up because we went after someone who was not a threat, then that is unacceptable.

 

I was qualifying the possible increase in 2002 vs. the increases in 2004.

I was saying that one case(Afghanistan) might make the increase in terrorism acceptable, while another case(Iraq) would not make an increase acceptable.

The difference is this. Hypothetically speaking, let's say one year our nation was at peace. No soldiers died. The next year we were attackd, and responded by invading our enemy and we lost a lot more soldiers, that might be acceptable.

But if one year we weren't attacked by a certain nation, and didn't lose many soldiers, but decided to attack that nation anyway the following year the increase in deaths would not be acceptable.

 

I hate to break it to you guys, but the Arabs have not liked America for about 40 years, at least. 9/11 was before we invaded Iraq OR Afghanistan. The Arab governments blame all of the problems the people have on the two Satans: Israel and the United States. As long as there are totalitarian regimes in the Middle East blaming all of the myriad problems the people there have on us and Israel, we are going to be hated over there. If anything, the liberation of Iraq and the installation of a Democratic process and a free press should help to decrease negative attitudes toward America in the long run. When the Arab people can see that we are not the cause of their problems, that is when they will stop hating us.

 

We support and fund (through subsidies or cheaper military hardware) regimes like Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia. The later two were homelands of the 9/11 bombers. How much of a role does popular dissent play into the fact that they want to overthrow regimes we consider as allies? While those regimes may demonish the US to placate their oppressed publics, they show their good faith to the US through other methods like cheaper and more plentiful oil and a "willingness" to collaborate with Israel.

Iraq is a testbed more than we really know. We're attempting to shape a government against natural forces of popular sentiment. There isn't a ruling government right now because the current constitution is designed to water down Shia influence. We're more likely to let Iraq rot than to allow it to fall under the influence of Iran or be a foundation for a anti-US bloc. So who's to say that we would allow our allies in Egypt or Saudi Arabia fall under the prospect of a freer Arab world?

 

OK, then your explanation is pretty much irrelevant. You can't show that Afghanistan wouldn't have caused an increase in terrorist recruiting absent Iraq.

If your argument is that there is more terrorism in Iraq than pre-intervention, and thus the intervention was not justified - that is a different argument altogether. I would answer that by pointing out that we are, in fact, engaging AQ in Iraq, and that is a good thing. That doesn't even TOUCH on the other net benefits on intervention in Iraq (ie no sanctions, removing Saddam, etc).

 

This is where the debate becomes interesting. On one hand you have the bbs defenders of Islam insisting that fundamentalists are an extremely small percentage of the population. On the other you have those raising the fear of a fundamentalist dominated Islamic world (not just Arabs in Islam donchaknow). Which is it I wonder?

 

"If anything, the liberation of Iraq and the installation of a Democratic process and a free press should help to decrease negative attitudes toward America in the long run. "

The "long run" is the operative phrase. What we are doing may help in the long run or it may not, but we won't know until events play themselves out. Certainly, when Clinton was president, and the U.S. was "nice" the terrorists didn't stop hating us.

The other strategy would be for the U.S. to be truly nice and stop supporting any regime that was totalitarian. But I believe that if the U.S. is "nice" we'll just get taken advantage of by people like Osama or Putin or Chirac. You've got to be as nice as you can, but you still have to fight for your agenda. The world will ALWAYS be full of people with different agendas and when people are willing to die for their agenda there's gonna be violence.

Another option would be to be like Canada. Just lay low on the radar and not do too much. Then no one will hate you (will they even know you exist) but you won't do much in the world either.

 

I wish we wouldn't support totalitarian regimes in Saudi, Jordan, or anywhere else for that matter. If Iraq works out and provides a stable supply of oil, or we can actually break our addiction to the black goo, then maybe the US will stop getting in bed with all of the horrible people over there. This is just another possible benefit to the war in Iraq.