John LeBoutillier
Monday, Oct. 1, 2001

Since then we have had a torrent of loud rhetoric from the administration – and no retaliation.

We read that we have an "evolving" plan.

But lost in the 24-7 coverage of this disaster is a subtle – but huge – change in the goals of this effort.

Originally, President Bush and his War Cabinet all said, "We will target the terrorists and the states that harbor them."

Colin Powell changed that last week when he was asked about Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz's urging to go after Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq. Powell said, "We will go after terrorism. I'll leave it at that."

Suddenly we are not going after the "states" that harbor the terrorists.

There can be no victory if we leave the very governments that arm, finance and support Osama bin Laden in power.

Thus, even before our response has been delivered, we have undergone severe mission creep. The administration had originally ratcheted up the rhetoric to a fevered pitch, promising that "those who did this will hear from us soon."

Clearly, what has happened since then is that our so-called coalition partners have leaned on Powell to back off any thoughts of widespread bombing/invasion of other countries other than Afghanistan. And even there, we have resorted to nothing but Special Ops and – hold your breath because it is right out of our failed Vietnam effort – defoliating the poppy fields!

Of course the specter of Vietnam hovers over all that we do militarily. The popular phrase has always been "If we do that, a lot of body bags are going to be coming home."

On Sept. 11, 6,000 body bags were filled – right here in our back yard! War was declared that day, and yet many – Powell and this useless coalition – still want a 'measured response.'

Back in World War II – the last real war the USA won – we didn't believe in 'measured responses.' We believed in killing the enemy – all of them.

Korea – fought under U.N. auspices – was a 'tie' precisely because we did not fight to defeat and kill the enemy.

The situation on the ground in Vietnam in the early 1960s is a perfect analogy to this post-Sept. 11 world. There we fought against a state-supported guerrilla organization – the Viet Cong – which disguised its suicidally devoted followers in civilian clothes and infiltrated them into the everyday life of South Vietnam. From "inside" these Viet Cong soldiers then waged a war against soldiers, civilians and the South Vietnamese infrastructure.

We never effectively defeated the Viet Cong for one reason: We never cut off its support, its supplies and its direction by invading North Vietnam and taking control of enemy territory. Had we done this, the Viet Cong would have ceased to be a threat.

In this present-day war we need to define a few things:

1) Who exactly is the enemy here? Is it merely 'fundamental Islam'?

2) Is this a War on Terrorism?

The answers to both questions are simple: No.

The enemy here is more than 'fundamental Islam.' And this is not a War on Terrorism.

This is a war on all those who declared war on us by killing 6,000 Americans.

That means we must kill everyone in any way involved in waging war on America. And we'd better kill them soon – before they unleash an even more horrendous attack on us.

If our enemies are going to use a suitcase nuke or biological/chemical agents, those weapons do not come from a cave in the mountains of Afghanistan. They come from secret government research facilities – most likely either in Iraq or Iran.

These nations have declared war on the USA. Only they have cleverly disguised it by hiding behind the veil of Osama bin Laden. He is their Viet Cong.

He does the dirty work – but if Saddam and the ayatollahs and their political parties and supporters are eliminated, then the Osama bin Laden threat is largely defused.

We'd better be prepared to kill – or be killed.

Listening to 'coalition partners' is a prescription for another Vietnam-like failure.

Sadly, we can already see the 'mission creep' and lack of clear focus that have caused us to lose most wars and conflicts since 1945.

Is it going to take yet another, even more horrendous, attack to get the American government mad enough to kill our enemies – before millions of American civilians are killed?

Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
Bush Administration
War on Terrorism