John Edwards at the recent Democratic Candidates debate.
People need to understand simple English and logic here. In order for the phrase "a War on Terror" to have any meaning in the real world, there has to be an object "Terror" on which to make War. But this kind of War (similar to the War on Poverty and the War on Drugs) is not a War at all, but a kind of smoke and mirrors done by a politician in order to have a rhetorical phrase (a War on Terror) that is so empty of real meaning, that they can do anything they want and hide the real motives behind a completely false front.
That some people use the means of "terror" to seek to achieve political ends is nothing new in history. Alexander used it, it was the point of the Blitz applied by Hitler on London and the Shock and Awe Campaign at the beginning of the Second Gulf War was a very intense practice of the application of terror. History also shows that it seldom works (the raw application of terror). It mostly tends to create a stronger opposition, because as an application of force (causing terror) it only makes folks angry and is so indiscriminate in its victims (far too many civilians) that as a real strategy in war time it has too much of a down side. I could go on, but anyone who thinks this is a viable strategic doctrine or even useful in a tactical sense doesn't know anything about history, about war or about psychology (which pretty much sums up the thinking of the Bush administration).
