From Dori, at Talk Nation Radio

Our dysfunctional leaders have ended their “War on Terror” and started “a war on extremism” while policy experts Like Gareth Porter craft real exit strategies; Here is an overview of what the White House is doing in their war on words followed by a transcript (next post above) of my Friday, July 29, 2005 interview with Gareth Porter for WHUS radio and Talk Nation Radio.

Beyond Words! How To End the Real War, Not Just Bush’s War of the Words
Dori Smith, Talk Nation Radio, July 29, 2005

At least one of the Bush Administration’s wars has ended, according to Gen. Richard B. Myers. Unfortunately, it is only a war of words and talking points. We should now expect the phrase, “global struggle in the war on extremism” to replace “war on terror” during White House press conferences. Those of us who feel terrified about U.S. foreign policy are supposed to feel better now.

The change comes as the White House faces growing criticism about policy failures in Iraq. If the President does not use the term: “war on terrorism,” anymore people from the Middle East to Middle America are supposed to regain their confidence in him.

This is hardly encouraging, but it may be telling. The U.S. Military brass have been pressing for this change in rhetoric for some time. In fact, A few days earlier Lt. Gen. Wallace Gregson told the Naval War College’s Current Strategy Forum that the U.S. should be seen more as siding with moderate Islam, and “avoid being set up as an enemy of Islam,” reported, “Inside Defense.”

Could this signify that the policy of the neoconservatives is under more careful scrutiny by the military men and women being asked to carry it out? Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker wrote in the New York Times July 26th that the retooling of slogans is designed to accommodate those in the Military who have seen the term “war on terror” as something to be fought by people
in uniform.

Naturally, this raises confusing issues about just who will be fighting the new “war against extremism.” But in the new wars of words such things may be seen as unimportant. Schmitt and Shanker suggest that the language change was made by PR maven Karen Hughes as she tries to win the war for hearts and minds again.

Unfortunately, for those seeking a real end to the Iraq war the retooling signifies no sea change in U.S. policy toward those Bush has described as America’s “enemies.” It merely suggests that the White House wants to stop using rhetoric that has gotten Bush into trouble with conservatives and liberals alike.

No one should assume that this retooling of words indicates an honest desire to return the nation to the days when diplomacy didn’t imply weakness though. In fact, the word change really signals a return to the face off against “good and evil” defined by neoconservatives like Bill Bennett and Michael Ledeen.

Bennett famously told CNN that Congress should wage war against “militant Islam” in Lebanon, Libya, Syria, Iraq, Iran, and (strangely) China. In a March 24, 2003 American Conservative piece on the neoconservatives, Patrick J. Buchannan explained that rhetoric about using America’s military was incorporated into the “National Security Strategy,” playbook the White House has been using to wage real war. General Meyers merely dropped the word “Muslim” from Lt. Gen. Wallace Gregson’s description of the war the White House intends to finish regardless of the cost.

When Buchannan traced the language used in the early 1990s by neoconservatives like former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, now head of the World Bank, he was demonstrating that the Wolfowitz doctrine on creating a “permanent U.S. military presence on six continents,” had been transformed into dangerous policy. In fact, Wolfowitz and others planned to use their PNAC plans to discourage other nations from becoming “competitive with America” as Buchannan feared, and the beating down any extremists along the way was a secondary issue, in spite of 9/11.

Where Buchannan expressed his highest level of concern about where the war of words, and less obvious policies would lead America in the Middle East, he linked the issue of “competitor” nations to the Arab countries that the right wing Likud Party in Israel saw as a problem too.

Now, two years later, foreign policy analysts who see the danger in the neocon’s “National Security Strategy” are working overtime to develop their own strategies for American troops to leave Iraq.

Historian Gareth Porter, has written one of the most comprehensive analyses on a workable exit strategy from Iraq. He asserts that negotiations between and Shiite and Sunni leaders are vital so American forces can leave behind a more stable country and not provoke further civil war.

In an interview July 27th, Porter discussed research on his, “Third Choice” for Iraq; “A Responsible Exit Strategy.” The findings will be published in the September issue of Middle East Policy.

“I really believe that our only hope for turning this policy around is that we could get responsible leaders in Congress to take a direct role in working with the administration on fashioning a new policy in Iraq,” he said.

The post above this contains a transcript of the interview with Gareth Porter in which he explains how armed groups resisting the U.S.-led government in Iraq and Sunni leaders are now interested in negotiations. He said such negotiations are needed to prevent the worsening of a civil war that has already started and will get much worse unless America provides an exit date and a strategy to leave behind a more united Iraq.