Author: Jim Guirard -- TrueSpeak Institute
Direct Communication to Multiple NSC Staffers: July 07, 2005
According to media reports, National Security Council strategists may be planning to drop the word "Terrorism" from the long-standing name for our war on al Qaeda-style suicide mass murder -- in favor of the word "Extremism." In view of the possible "down sides" of such a change, here are several factors the NSC planners should weigh before reaching a final decision:
1. The commonplace shortening of the term to "Global War on Terror" is, indeed, wrong and should be avoided in favor of the name actually adopted almost some four years ago. Terror is what is caused by terrorism -- particularly when the latter is so pervasive as to have become the ideological nature of its perpetrators. Nor was our 70-year War on Communism ever shortened to a "War on Communes."
2. While not perfect, the term "Terrorism" is increasingly correct -- in part because this ancient method or "tactic" of causing fear, helplessness and compliance has now been transformed by Osama bin Laden into his own ideological, political and pseudo-religious ism. In this context, the silent or understood word within the GWOT title is, of course, "al Qaeda-style" or "bin Laden-type" Terrorism.
3. But in context of the proposed new label, the silent modifier would become the word "Islamic" -- resulting in the "Global War on (Islamic) Extremism" -- and would tend to affirm that our newly-renamed enemy is, indeed, Islamic but apparently no longer "terrorist." This would be tactically unwise and factually wrong on both counts. A central feature of our policy and war-fighting Doctrine is that Islam itself is not the enemy but is being "hijacked" by un-Islamic evildoers.
4. Complicating the matter further, it should be noted that in today's highly partisan anti-war rhetoric, President Bush, Vice-president Cheney, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld and virtually all things Republican or Conservative are routinely condemned as "Extremist" or products of right-wing "Extremism." (Sample question from the largely anti-Bush, anti-Iraq War media: "Mr. President, whose Extremism is most extreme -- yours or Osama bin Laden's?)
5. On a more serious note, this word warrior's truth-in-language and truth-in-Islam thesis is that both the substance and the false language of bin Ladenism are in fact pseudo-Islamic, infidel, blasphemous, outside-the-religion (khawarij), in the nature of an apostasy and -- according to the Spanish Muslim clerics' fatwa of 3/11/05 -- constitute the grievous sin of "istihlal" (the arrogance of concocting one's own self-serving perversion of Sharia, Islamic Law.)
6. To abandon the derisive term "Terrorism" (and perhaps the word "terrorist," as well...??!!), would place us squarely in bed with Reuters, the BBC and Al Jezeera . These far-left foreign news organizations have always avoided applying either of these powerfully negative terms to al Qaeda and other suicide assassins -- and have relied, instead, on the patently false and pro-UBL language of so-called "Jihadi martyrdom."
7. Thinking again of the media's and the Bush-haters' likely reactions to this conclusion that the enemy is really not Global "Terrorism" after all, one can imagine an endless line of cynical comments and questions such as: "Mr. President, you have been calling Terrorism the enemy for almost four years, but now you say that this was wrong. You used to call al Qaeda's suicide mass murderers evildoers, but now the State Department has persuaded you that was wrong, too. Are there still other negative and erroneous labels for the enemy that you might also be changing?"
The barrage could be as unrelenting as the answers are difficult for the Administration -- and needlessly confusing to the President's supporters and to the general public.
Next, if in the bureaucratic spirit of "doing something" the name must be changed, it should not be the "woefully" counter-productive name of GWOE. Why not such options as
o GWOBL (Global War on Bin Ladenism), or
o GWOW (Global War on Wahhabism), or
o GWOAQA (Global War on the Al Qaeda Apostasy), or
o GWOSMM (Global War on Suicide Mass Murder), or perhaps best of all
o SLWEA (Simply Leave Well Enough Alone)
Finally, on a more positive note, if these NSC strategists are truly serious about winning the war for hearts, minds and souls in the broader GWOT, they should raise their sights and declare war on AQ’s patently false and blaspemous language of so-called "Jihadi martyrdom" which has so thoroughly polluted both the Arabic and English lexicons. In other words, they might now begin planning to
o avoid the false word "Jihad" (Holy War) and turn to the truthful Islamic word "Hirabah" -- which means Unholy War or strictly forbidden "war against society."
o avoid the false word "mujahideen" (holy warriors) and return to "evildoers" -- which was once the President's correct English word for those who the Quran calls "mufsiduun."
o drop the "martyrdom" references in favor of references to al Qaeda "apostates" and "infidels" and "blasphemers" and "desecrators" against authentic, Quranic Islam.
o drop, therefore, all references to their supposed destiny in Allah's "Jennah" (Paradise) and point to their likely destiny in Shaitan's "Jahannam" (Eternal Hellfire), instead.
o challenge at every opportunity the patently false charges of "infidel" -- when the Quran clearly calls Christianity, Judaism and Islam all "Abrahamic" religions and their believers all "Children of the Book" (the Old Testament).
o All of this would signal that the NSC is finally beginning to take seriously the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan's warnings of a quarter century ago about the dangers of "semantic infiltration," which he and Reagan Under-Secretary of Defense for Policy Fred Ikle defined as follows:
"Simply speaking, semantic infiltration is the process whereby we come to adopt the language of our adversaries in defining political reality. The most brutal totalitarian regimes in the world call themselves 'liberation movements.' It is perfectly predictable that they should misuse words to conceal their real nature. But must we aid them in that effort by repeating those words? Worse, do we begin to influence our own perceptions by repeating them?"
Of course, we do begin to influence our own perceptions by using these false words, just as Osama bin Laden's pseudo-religious forebear, Vladimir Lenin, knew would be the case when he cynically proclaimed almost a century ago:
"We will find our greatest success to the extent that we inculcate Marxism [substitute "bin Ladenism"] as a kind of religion. Religious men and women are easy to convert and win, and will easily accept our thinking [as in "Jihadi martyrdom"] if we wrap it up in a kind of religious terminology."
JIM GUIRARD -- TrueSpeak Institute 703-768-0957 Justcauses@aol.com