No Misunderstanding of a Changing Taliban Front

I'm republishing the following short piece for the browsers of this new blog.

A reply by Con George-Kotzabasis to:

Understanding a Changing Taliban Front

Post Global, June 23, 2008

By Dr. Ali Ettefagh

In an apocalyptic religious cult as the Taliban, criminality has no separate existence as all means of warfare are justifiable in the eyes of fanatics. A “conditional amnesty” follows the rudimentary stage of defeat of the Taliban in the field of battle and cannot be a precursor of that defeat “that should be traded with the Taliban promise to re-group as a non-violent, unarmed political party in Afghanistan”. This follows the logic of the Irish experience, as Dr. Ettefagh himself points out, with the realization “of Irish militants that they could not win and had to settle for a deal”.

Hence, “a changing Taliban front” must not be based on the misunderstanding that NATO and the  Americans should start negotiating with the Taliban before the ”umbilical cord” of the latter is cut from Pakistan and thus strategically weakening it. And this cut can only be accomplished by the incursion of Coalition and American troops of Pakistan’s borders and the destruction of Taliban and al Qaeda sanctuaries and supplies.

In a war of global borderless terror, a nation that cannot prevent, either due to a political unwillingness or military incapacity, terrorists from using its territory as havens of safety, supplies and recruitment, the principle of national sovereignty is completely inconsistent with the military and strategic goals of such war and is inherently obsolete.  

Your opinion…

War on Terror Must Include Imams who Preach their Evil Doctrine in Mosques

By Con George-Kotzabasis

It’s utter foolishness to fight al Qaeda and its sundry holy warriors in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Somalia and at the same time allow the “sires” of the jihadists to propagate from the sanctuaries of their unholy Mosques their evil doctrine against the West and its Great “Satan”America. They should be immediately arrested and incarcerated by special urgent retrospective legislation passed at least in all the countries of the West.


The war against global terror should be not only against its armed contingents but also against its religious ideologues. It should be a war on all fronts. And the imams who operate in the West inciting and recruiting young Muslims to their “caliphatic” cause should not be permitted to claim any rights under the loose garments of human rights lawyers.

The Danger of Tyros Handling War Strategy

A short reply by Con George-Kotzabasis on:

Clinton’s Statement on Kyl-Lieberman Resolution

Like the two eminent commentators of the New York Times  Paul Krugman and Frank Rich, respectable in their own professions as an economist and art critic respectably, and a bevy of politicians like Nancy Pelosi and John Reid, not so respectable because of their populist stunt, all of them being  novices par excellence in the affairs of war who have attempted to pass judgment on the war in Iraq and cashier its victory despite evidence to the contrary, we now have another “tired less” tyro joining them in war strategy, the scholar and blogger Steven Clemons of the Washington Note. The latter indirectly rebukes Senator Clinton for her support and vote of the Kyl Lieberman resolution that designates the Iranian Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization, fearing that this will allow Bush to manipulate this resolution and use it to attack Iran.

He calls therefore on Senator Clinton to exercise “leadership in passing an explicit Senate resolution forbidding Bush from taking action against Iran without clear advice and consent from Congress”. But such action is not a declaration of war against Iran needing the authorization of Congress. It’s a strategic force de frappe on the part of the US against Iran in which the elements of secrecy and surprise are pivotal and decisive in the success of such an attack. Therefore Clemons’ call is strategically oxymoronic.