Okay, we’ve got our new ‘terror <$NoAd$>war’ strategic concept of the day from President Bush.
We can’t win the war on terror actually means we can win but our victory won’t be memorialized in a peace treaty ….
I should have made my point more clear about what I meant. What I meant was that this is not a conventional war. It is a different kind of war. We’re fighting people who have got a dark ideology who use terrorists, terrorism, as a tool. They’re trying to shake our conscience. They’re trying to shake our will, and so in the short run the strategy has got to be to find them where they lurk. I tell people all the time, “We will find them on the offense. We will bring them to justice on foreign lands so we don’t have to face them here at home,” and that’s because you cannot negotiate with these people. And in a conventional war there would be a peace treaty or there would be a moment where somebody would sit on the side and say we quit. That’s not the kind of war we’re in, and that’s what I was saying. The kind of war we’re in requires, you know, steadfast resolve, and I will continue to be resolved to bring them to justice, but as well as to spread liberty … There’s no doubt in my mind, so long as this country stays resolved and strong and determined, and by winning, I just would remind your listeners that Pakistan is now an ally in the war on terror.
The president deserves every whack he gets for changing his position twice in three days on the issue he has made the centerpiece of his campaign. But folks should also start using his bobbling to make the point that the issue is less whether the president thinks the ‘terror war’ is winnable than the fact that he doesn’t even have any clear idea of how to fight it.
(A reader makes a good point: Reading the above, you can see why President Bush doesn’t ‘do nuance.’ It ain’t his strong suit.)
