Washington Post: war on terror a total failure?

In a article in today's Washington Post they argue based on the few studies that have been done that the GWOT has been a total failure. It has also been incredibly expensive. In terms of Monetary value and the sheer loss of Human life. Civilians, Service Members on both sides and sadly a vast number of Suicides. I have always wondered personally how you could fight a war against an abstract idea like terrorism. There is no real defined eny. As someone else posted it has worked as well as War on Drugs, Poverty etc.. I suppose I am arguing this is way way more costly both monetarily and with life. If it is a failure it is a monumental failure.

I guess I would say to someone who asked me to define it. I did not write the article but will say this. Ask yourself in 12 years of immense cost to the US in prestige and power to some degree and having spent huge amounts of Human capital and Monetary Capital. Has the global war on terror lived up to what you have expected to this point or has it failed to love up to your expectations. Has the loss of freedoms along the way been worth it?

They found:
"•••••o "Metal detectors reduce hijackings, but terrorist just do other stuff instead."

•••••"o Fortifying embassies and protecting diplomats doesn’t appear to reduce attacks.

•••••"o There’s no evidence harsher penalties reduce hijackings.

•••••"o Strongly written letters from the U.N. don’t help much.

•••••"o A military reaction can backfire.

•••••"o Changing political regimes can hurt too.


"Perhaps the most studied area since the Campbell review came out has been targeted killings of top terrorists. There, the evidence is somewhat mixed, but leans heavily toward finding that decapitation is ineffective or counterproductive. Matthews Dickenson looked at a dataset of attacks from 1970 to 2008 and found that leadership transition “generally causes a noticeable and statistically significant increase in attacks and casualties for the months immediately afterward.” Similarly, Jenna Jordan at Georgia Tech found that “Organizations that have not had their leaders removed are more likely to fall apart than those that have undergone a loss of leadership.”

Aaron Mannes at the University of Maryland also found decapitation strikes against groups to be ineffective, writing, “The most notable trend from the statistical analysis was that decapitation strikes on religious terrorist groups tended to be followed by sharp increases in fatalities.” Michigan’s Lisa Langdon, Alexander J. Sarapu and Matthew Wells failed to find significant effects of leadership changes, finding that “the arrest of the leader will not significantly alter the ideology or operations of the group in the long term.”


m.washingtonpost.com...

Thoughts?

It has cost between 2-3 Trillion Dollars to wage the Wars in Afganistan and Iraq. At one point in Iraq it was costing 300 million dollars a day to wage War.


I actually overstated the amount by quite a bit.

From Information Clearinghouse

"Number Of Iraqis Slaughtered In US War And Occupation Of Iraq "1,455,590"

Number of U.S. Military Personnel Sacrificed (Officially acknowledged) In U.S. War And Occupation Of Iraq 4,801
Number Of International Occupation Force Troops Slaughtered In Afghanistan : 3,372

Cost of War in Iraq & Afghanistan
$1,471,619,958,493"

www.informationclearinghouse.info...

reply to post by GArnold


Yep, even a blind man could see that.

About as effective as the wars on drugs, obesity, poverty, hunger... We could do this all day.

reply to post by GArnold


I suppose you would have to define success or failure...There were many companies who profited handsomely from the wars. If the goal was to piss everyone off and throw the world to the precipice of a world of constant chaos because of death and destruction then it was a total success..IMO

I wouldn't say it's a COMPLETE failure there OP. It's close...but one thing is missing for a complete and total failure declaration.

When the US takes another hit like what started it? Then we can say we've really come 100% full circle and all the hand wringing by all the paranoid freaks in Government have done absolutely no good...if not actually encouraging the repeat performance.

No, I'm afraid it isn't total yet. They can still say "There hasn't been another major domestic attack since 9/11!!"

Don't worry though, our President is very hard at work and that last issue should be a moot point, soon enough.

reply to post by GArnold


It's actually a misnomer to call it a "war on terror" because all along, it has been a "war on freedom".

And we have lost.

It wouldn't call it a failure although in a way it was doomed right from the start when Bush said "war on terror"

You cant have a "war on terror" but you can take measures to prevent terrorist attacks against state interests

so lets focus on these measures

Now counter terrorism is a huge topic and one i have studied at a academic level which shows that there are a number of models of counter terrorism that the state can use such as the law enforcement model, the military model and a hybrid model (all of which are self explanatory). The biggest problem as i see it with America's "War on terror" is that it has been way to aggressive and not surgical enough with huge failures early on such as the battle of Tora-bora and thinking it was a good idea to invade Iraq.

But the key question to weather or not the war has been a successes is to ask if we are now safer.

Well yes we are, since 9/11 there has never been a attack on that scale and since 2005 Al-Qa'ida (and i mean the core Al-Qa'ida) has not attacked in any real way.

The big problem though is the beasts that we have created, true blow back, America invades Iraq, Al-Qa'ida in Iraq pops up, years later Al-Qa'ida in Iraq turns into Al-Nusra who try to take contorl of Syria which could then turn into the next Afghanistan.

I personally think that it has been a success but they made huge huge mistakes along the way and made massive sacrifices to "win".

Really it would have been much easier if they done what they should have done during the battle of tora bora, left Iraq the hell alone and just conducted directed killings against known terrorists.

oh and Gitmo, huge mistake as well, like torturing the brothers of the terrorists is going to stop them

Same with the Patriot act, grate Idea now its easier to catch terrorists, just a shame its also taken away a whole bunch of rights and every body hates it.

In short they won, as much as you could win a war on terror, but in doing so the sacrificed way to much so the win doesn't really matter.

727Sky
reply to post by GArnold

 

I suppose you would have to define success or failure...There were many companies who profited handsomely from the wars.

This guy/girl gets it. Every once in a while someone hits the nail right on the head. Failure? Well I guess that really depends on what perspective you're looking at it from.It's the same silly argument people make when they say Obama or Bush are/were stupid, or they don't know what they're doing. In essence you remove the possibility of blame when you claim they don't know what they're doing. It removes the understanding of conscience intent.If you think these guys are stupid and they don't know what they're doing, then that makes them smarter than you, and you don't want that.

The war on terror as advertised to the American public is an epic failure. The war on terror or rather the war on the Constitution is going splendidly. Though I must say they lost a battle when the American public refused to let us go into Syria, though that is just one battle, they have won far more battles against us.

The irony of the war on terror, I agree that the government can tell all the lies about US "success" on diverting domestic attacks and foreign because we have not gotten another attack in our soil, I forgot, the "Boston bombs", with a show of police state power to show those domestic terrorist in waiting what is in sorry about that.

Still what can we expect now that the present administration is funding terrorist (I mean rebels) in the middle east with tax payers money, and promises of a piece of the destabilized countries in the US path for private interest in the region, I guess the war for terror I mean on terror is going great.

Beside that we have been fighting pretty good here like another poster said for the war on constitutional rights.

reply to post by GArnold


Are you telling me the US government has done a poor job spending OUR money? That there (re)actions don't seem justify the results in any way? That they have grown into a bureaucratic over-zealous rube goldberg type machine? I just can't believe it....

Why... who'd a thunk it? They always have behaved rationally before!

Yes, that it is called sarcasm for those people who don't get it. To see how completely stupid the US government can become i ask you to visit our nations airports and witness the TSA. Please do a bit of Googling the TSA. They took minimum wage high school drop outs, federalized them, and gave them badges.


V

Somebody thought harsher penalties would reduce hijackings? That's hysterical.

Gee, guess I cant take a plane of 180 passengers captive because I might get in trouble.

Was going to capture a cruise liner with my machinegun wielding buddies this weekend but now that I know I might get in trouble or maybe even shot I'll go play soccer instead.

There's always a hole in the fence. Any fence.

Security is like raising goats. They have nothing better to do all day than test fences for weak spots and they'll eventually find one and you'll patch it up and then they'll find another and you'll patch it up and they'll find another and on and on it goes.

It's a pointless battle.

Like goats, if you have enough land and you treat them right they always come back to eat and sleep and they wont get into any trouble with neighbors. Open space and freedom makes for happy goats and save a lot of wasted time and money trying to build the perfect fence.

reply to post by thisguyrighthere


Lol ya, if your intent is to hijack a plane and blow it along with yourself up with it, I can't imagine that harsher penalties if you are arrested are going to be much of a deterrent...

reply to post by GD21D

GD21D

727Sky
reply to post by GArnold

 

Failure? Well I guess that really depends on what perspective you're looking at it from.

Absolutely. Its actually been a great success.

As a result of 9/11, Americans can now be indefinitely imprisoned, held incommunicado without access to a lawyer, spied on without warrants, have every electronic communication recorded, forced through naked body scanners and be placed on a citizen kill list to be executed by simple government decree.

The Rothschild central banking scheme couldnt be more pleased as more money in the form of interest has been promised to them via trillions more in debt.

These borrowed trillions are of-course for the benefit of the Military Industrial Complex and other war profiteers.

The US government no longer has to hide the truth about Al-CIAeda.

Israel is happy because the US is attacking and occupying their enemies. Dual benefit here because it also allows the US to take control of the world's most precious natural resources.

So all of the groups which stood to directly benefit from the 9/11 false flag have done so.

However, they have not succeeded in taking away our guns but they havent stopped trying either.

watchitburn
reply to post by GArnold

 

Yep, even a blind man could see that.

About as effective as the wars on drugs, obesity, poverty, hunger... We could do this all day.

Yes and as long as there is tax payer money to be spent in the waging to the benefit of a few we will.

War On Terror= Military industrial complex lobbying for interventionist policy abroad while selling arms to all sides and spying on us citizens at home.
War on Drugs = Private prison industry that lobbies for Mandatory Minimums.
Etc.

All of it is on Our dime, its time we start demanding better.

reply to post by GArnold


I wouldn't call it a total failure simply because at least we have the radical Muslims fighting with their local governments.....or our proxies.....rather than bombing the west.

Krazysh0t
The war on terror as advertised to the American public is an epic failure. The war on terror or rather the war on the Constitution is going splendidly. Though I must say they lost a battle when the American public refused to let us go into Syria, though that is just one battle, they have won far more battles against us.

I couldn't help but notice the glaring irony of the pres wanting to support the SFA with weapons and air strikes and then a late report of him producing an executive order to curtail certain weapons coming into the US. WWII surplus combat weapons which have been coming into the country for decades. Makes one wonder how he sees the armed american and his blasted constitution and 2nd amendment.

So we is just a bunch of gun fundamentalist "clinging to guns and the bible" but never mind the anti tank weapons we have been smuggling into Syria to a bunch of AK-47 and Koran clinging revolutionaries!

Oh you dont say...I thought we all knew this war on terror is just another war for money.

If they wanted to fight terrorism they shouldve spend the money for the war and Israel on reducing poverty in arabic countries instead.

All weve done is throw a #load of oil on the fire.

It's been as successful as the "War on Drugs". When's the last time the "great" USA won a "war" of any kind? WWII (as part of the Allies, ofc, as Russia did much of the real bleeding and sacrificing, imo)?

reply to post by finitedualities


Yea and it couldn't have happened to a nicer bunch of people.

reply to post by whatsup86


War with the main aggressors in the region (the Palestinian Occupiers) would be the water for that fire. I doubt the majority of the world would miss a "nation" that would fail to exist without leaching on the international community. The greatest cover-up in the world are the atrocities this scum society commits. It's Europeans vs Native Americans for the modern age.