So, when and how does the War on Terror end?

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elbrandino

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Dec 8, 2010
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As cynical as it sounds, it won't ever end. Just like the War on Crime and the War on Drugs with never end. You can't clean up every junkie, you can't catch every criminal, and you simply can't stop every terrorist or group of terrorists. I hope eventually we'll give up major military action in favor of small strike teams, and just defend potential targets better. I think that's the only way to be as safe as we can.
 

zarguhl

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Oct 4, 2010
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Why would governments let the war end? If it ended it couldn't be used as an excuse to slowly suppress and enslave the world.

I'm not convinced the US government planned the 9/11 terrorist attacks, but I have no doubt they were dancing with joy at the possibilities after it happened.

Like the hilarious "war on drugs." They pump the nation full of legal, prescription drugs and go on about how bad illegal drugs are. The whole purpose of the war on drugs is to get people on drugs.
 

Genericjim101

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Jan 7, 2011
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It ends with Fixer(Batman)beating the hell out of every terrorist in existence while looking gritty and possibly brooding.
 

Project_Xii

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I don't know, but there better be a wicked sweet end boss for how long it's taken us to get through.
 

Genericjim101

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Project_Xii said:
I don't know, but there better be a wicked sweet end boss for how long it's taken us to get through.
Sorry the importance of end bosses as a gamin experience may have been phased out was being discussed in an article X D
 

berettastorm88

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Mithol said:
As long as humans have free will people will die because of their opinions. Sad really, but this has always happened, only in the last 10 years its got the media fanfare to accompany it.
this, always and forever...
the war on terror will simply never end.
 

Craorach

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The American government has hit on the perfect war to inspire and unite its people against an outside foe so they don't look to closely at their own society. Also, a war they can use to demonise anyone who disagrees with them, or their policies.

You cannot win a war against Terrorism because terrorists are more than willing to die for their cause. You cannot beat terrorism with weapons, only with peace.

The goal of the 9/11 Terrorists has been achieved, many many times over, through the actions of the united states and its allies, including the country I was born in and the country I live in. Terrorists do not only want to scare and terrify people, but to inspire others and cause reactions in their own people to aspire to the same ideals and goals. This is done, most effectively, when your target responds with overwhelming force and violates it's own principles, making itself an easy target for blame.

The only way to beat Terrorists is to stop screaming for blood and start being the "better man". Meetings, diplomacy, compromise.. but the United States, already torn and divided internally, seems to consider compromise a dirty word... and has been so long without truly knowing what peace is, that it derives it's strength and unity more from the fear of outside threats than any sense of community and shared culture.
 

spartan231490

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Manji187 said:
It's been almost 10 years since 9/11, Osama bin Laden is dead...like so many other Al Qaeda/ Taliban insurgents. Is the end in sight? How does the end even look like?

Even if you kill every single Al Qaeda/ Taliban operative and their financial backers...the pain and sorrow of 10 years of atrocities (Abu Ghraib/ Guantanamo Bay) and incidents (infamous collateral damage) could possibly inspire a new generation. What is the U.S. gonna do...wipe entire nations of the map...women and children included?

Will the War on Terror end when every single "rogue state" will be a liberal democracy with free market capitalism for ideology and a U.S. base on its territory? What are the chances of that?

Or will it end with the downfall of the U.S. economy (national debt over 14 trillion and counting and the upcoming Medicare/ Medicaid trouble)? Isn't the U.S. technically bankrupt?

Or is there another way?

Or....will it continue indefinitely? Like in the saying "Eternal war for eternal peace"...basically meaning that there never will be peace.
The war on terror is an illusion. You can't fight terrorism and geurillas because the collateral damage creates new enemies faster than you can kill them. Hell, just killing the right people will often convert their friends and family to the cause. Beyond that, the occupation itself is probably creating enemies, and we haven't changed the policies that created terrorists in the middle east. We still interfere in their politics for our own good to their detriment, so of course they will continue to want us to stop. and some of them will be willing to kill and die to make us.

I don't understand why anyone thinks we will win. Napoleon couldn't do it in Spain, we couldn't do it in Korea, the British couldn't do it in America. I am not aware of any time when an insurgency has completely been irradicated by the occupying force. It's a pretty good bet that the American government is well aware of that and has no intent to ever "win" the war on terror, but that the war on terror is actually a cover for some other agenda.

As to you mentioning the possible collapse of the US economy, that's actually a pretty likely event. Many economists predict that the US economy can't continue more than about 6 years, some say that it will collapse as early as this winter. And if our idiot leaders can't get out of their own way and pass an increase to the debt ceiling cap, it will collapse in august. Personally, my bet is on about the 5 year mark.
 

mikeybuthge

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It'll end either when Nazi zombies appear, transformers hit earth, or when epic meantime makes an epic meal of unification
 

Lazy Kitty

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It'll stop when the US has control of the oil.
Terrorism was just a excuse.
Otherwise they would have been out of there 9 years ago.
 

Thaluikhain

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spartan231490 said:
I don't understand why anyone thinks we will win. Napoleon couldn't do it in Spain, we couldn't do it in Korea, the British couldn't do it in America. I am not aware of any time when an insurgency has completely been irradicated by the occupying force. It's a pretty good bet that the American government is well aware of that and has no intent to ever "win" the war on terror, but that the war on terror is actually a cover for some other agenda.
The reason you don't hear about successful campaigns against insurgents is because victory isn't achieved by big newsworthy conflict, but by careful economic and social reform that doesn't interest the general public.

You don't fight insurgency, any more than you fight religion or other ideas. You take away the social factors that make it worth fighting about.

This runs contrary to most popular notions of warfare (if you call the enemy a military force) or justice (if you call them criminals), though, so it's not palatable. It's also time consuming and makes your much loved fancy toys fairly irrelevant.
 

spartan231490

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thaluikhain said:
spartan231490 said:
I don't understand why anyone thinks we will win. Napoleon couldn't do it in Spain, we couldn't do it in Korea, the British couldn't do it in America. I am not aware of any time when an insurgency has completely been irradicated by the occupying force. It's a pretty good bet that the American government is well aware of that and has no intent to ever "win" the war on terror, but that the war on terror is actually a cover for some other agenda.
The reason you don't hear about successful campaigns against insurgents is because victory isn't achieved by big newsworthy conflict, but by careful economic and social reform that doesn't interest the general public.

You don't fight insurgency, any more than you fight religion or other ideas. You take away the social factors that make it worth fighting about.

This runs contrary to most popular notions of warfare (if you call the enemy a military force) or justice (if you call them criminals), though, so it's not palatable. It's also time consuming and makes your much loved fancy toys fairly irrelevant.
If you read my whole post(I'm sure you did, I'm just pointing it out for people who read this post and not my last one), you will notice that I say kinda the same thing. I say that you can't beat an insurgency with military force, but I also say that the war on terror will never end because the US policies that lead to terrorism in the first place are still in place, which is exactly what you said, just from another angle.

Also, I wasn't just talking about modern times, I was talking about historically, where newsworthy has very little to do with it. Admittedly, history doesn't have very much to do with it either.
 

SenseOfTumour

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It'll be bubbling under, like the IRA, but if you look at now versus 20 years ago, there's not the fear that bombs are being set all over the UK any more.

I think give it 5 - 10 years and even America will get bored of throwing billions into the black hole that is 'fixing' the middle east, when someone finally realises that, short of killing every man woman and child that doesn't think like you, you can't stop it. That's a fix worse than the problem.