Military Analysts Hope Bush Will Clarify Scope, Strategy in War on Terror
by Chad Groening and Jim Brown
January 10, 2007
(AgapePress) - - A Pentagon advisor and military analyst believes President George W. Bush needs to remind Americans that the war against Islamo-fascism is not limited to Iraq, and that the U.S. and its allies are battling dangerous terrorists in other areas of the world. One of these areas is Somalia, where U.S. aircraft and Special Operations forces have conducted attacks against suspected al Qaeda members. According to retired Army Lieutenant Colonel Bob Maginnis, a U.S. military expert, one of these terrorist suspects is believed to have played a major role in the attacks on American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.
"Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, of course, is on the FBI's Most Wanted list," Maginnis points out. "He was probably one of the primary targets that we went after," the Pentagon advisor says, "and of course he was trained in Afghanistan as an al Qaeda operative working with Osama bin Laden."
The conflict in the Horn of Africa is not a new one, Maginnis notes. "This is something that has been sort of a hidden war and that has been ongoing across the entire swath of the Northern African continent for quite a few years," he explains. "It's just ... that they've gotten our attention now."
The retired Army officer says the recent operations in Somalia are evidence that the war against Islamo-fascism stretches beyond the borders of Iraq -- a reality he believes George W. Bush must bring home to the American people as he lays out his highly anticipated new plan for Iraq in an address scheduled for tonight.
"I would expect the president to take advantage of the present situation and say, 'Look; we've warned you about the long war,'" Maginnis says. "It is indeed a long war; it does involve many countries," he adds. "Some of those who trained in Afghanistan and Iraq have found safe harbor in places like Somalia."
Military Affairs Expert Questions Thoughtfulness of Troop Surge Plan
Another leading military analyst, Dr. Jim Carafano of the Heritage Foundation, believes the new U.S. strategy for Iraq will have to support two primary goals. Although President Bush is expected to call for an increase of as many as 20,000 troops to add to the 140,000 already in Iraq and also to propose spending an additional one-billion dollars on a jobs program for Iraqi citizens, Carafano insists, "Troop numbers are not a strategy."
The Heritage Foundation defense expert says two key things have to happen in Iraq for that country to succeed as a self-governing nation. "One is a national reconciliation process that, even after the election, really pulls the major Kurd, Shia and Sunni leaders together to agree that they're going to support the government," he observes.
"And the second is you have to have Iraqi Security Forces that are loyal to the government and effective and can actually put support out in the countryside," Carafano asserts. "Those are the two critical tasks." But unfortunately, he contends, what has characterized discussion of President Bush's new Iraq policy up to this point has been "a kind of vacuous and really inane debate."
The defense and military affairs specialist feels merely talking about the U.S. sending more troops into or out of Iraq makes no sense unless someone explains the political and security strategy involved in making the decision. "It's just mentioning numbers without saying what are they going to do or what or they not going to do, or why you need more or [why] you need less," he says.
In any case, Carafano contends, any Iraq strategy that is not predicated on making the Iraqis take responsibility for their own future is wrong. He believes there is no long-term U.S. military solution to the Mideast nation's problems, and that the future of Iraq lies largely in the hands of the Iraqi people themselves.
Chad Groening and Jim Brown, regular contributors to AgapePress, are reporters for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
