Wednesday, January 23, 2008

The Iceberg

Perhaps one reason why the West has proved so helpless in the face of threats like al-Qaeda is that it is culturally unable to resist, or even to condemn, extremist Islamic agitation in its pre-militant phase. By fighting only those who have crossed the sharp legal border between religious hate-mongering (which is tolerated as a multicultural right) and actual belligerency it is permanently restricted to chipping away at the tip of the iceberg, while nine-tenths of it is allowed to grow unchecked beneath the surface.

The West Point analysis points out that many of the problems which beset Iraq have their origins elsewhere; in so-called allied countries and even within communities in the West.
A foreign suicide bomber is man who by definition was ready to explode before he even got to Iraq. The country itself provided him with a graveyard, but the process which gave him birth is still in full swing.