How to win friends and influence people who want to kill us.

Here’s what happened in Afghanistan: we took a highly influential, right-wing, religious fundamentalist political party, the Taliban, from being quasi-rulers and turned them into mountain guerillas who are in little danger of extinction. We did this by destroying or capturing their governing infrastructure while allowing a sizeable portion of their personnel to escape. Nonetheless, if our goal was to remove the Taliban from control in Afghanistan so that major al-Qaeda terrorist groups no longer enjoyed government protection, then we succeeded.

What can we do now?

Plan A. Declare victory. Withdraw our troops from Afghanistan. If the Taliban successfully reoccupy their former stations and decide to support more international terrorism, then do the same thing we did before, but try not to let anyone escape this time.

Plan B. Escalate our current military response. Scorch the earth wherever there are Taliban to be found. And then, because it will be the obvious next problem, find all of their relatives and kill them, too. Then kill anyone else likely to be sympathetic to Taliban beliefs or who are related to the innocent bystanders who were killed collaterally in the scorched earth campaign. After that, kill all the Muslims who think we are being anti-Islamic. And then kill everyone else who ends up hating us because of what we’ve done or who just hate us because of our freedom. Only then will the world be safe for democracy—at least for a few days.

OK, so Plan B is mostly just a rant. It won’t be my last.

Plan C. Keep doing what we’re doing. Keep doing what we’re doing. Keep doing what we’re doing. Keep doing what we’re doing. Keep doing what we’re doing. Keep doing what we’re doing. Keep….

Plan D. Stop being so gob-smacking stupid.

“They hate us for our freedom.” That has got to be the dumbest, lamest, baldest, most manipulative and strikingly concise piece of false propaganda I’ve ever heard. If you believe that, then you’ve been sold a pig in a poke.

Listen up: If you want to win, then you’d better know what drives your opponent, and this opponent doesn’t give a rat’s sass about our freedom.

But what they do hate is what they perceive as our political, cultural, corporate, economic and military influence, intimidation, interference and invasions in and of Islamic countries.

And how do we know this? Because those al-Qaeda terrorists, the criminals the Taliban allowed to shelter in Afghanistan, told us.

They told us not just in the controversial video tapes of Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders, but even more clearly in their choice of targets over nearly ten years of attacks.

• 1992, Aden, Yemen; two hotels that were expected to be housing American troops; the troops bivouacked elsewhere.
• 1993, New York City; first attempt to destroy the World Trade Center.
• 1996, Manila, the Philippines; thwarted (at the last minute) attempt to assassinate then President Bill Clinton during his visit there.
• 1998, Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania; simultaneous attacks on U.S. embassies.
• 2000, Aden, Yemen; attack on the guided missile destroyer USS Cole.
• 2001, New York City and Washington, D.C.; simultaneous attacks on the World Trade Center (second attempt), the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol (thwarted). 

For al-Qaeda, these were carefully chosen, symbolic targets. They exemplified our military, political and economic predominance throughout the world, especially in Islamic regions. And none of these targets symbolize freedom.

If someone wanted to attack symbols of our freedom, obvious choices are available, among others:

• the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor
• Independence Hall and the nearby Liberty Bell, part of Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia
• the Washington Monument, on the Mall in D.C.
• the National Archives Exhibition Hall in Washington, D.C., housing original copies of the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights
• “Old Ironsides,” the square-rigged frigate USS Constitution, in Boston Harbor
• the Bunker Hill Monument in Boston
• Fort McHenry National Monument near Baltimore, inspiration for our national anthem. 

No, al-Qaeda doesn’t hate our freedom. Their message is clear. As they see it, there is an entirely different set of problems having to do with oppressive and exploitive policies and actions on our part. That’s what has them miffed.

I do not pass judgment on the valdity of al-Qaeda’s complaints, but I vehemently condemn their acts of criminal terror. They have stooped to become what they denounce. Middle Eastern hypocrisy is just as disgusting as the western brand, no matter what name is used to call upon the Deity in justification.

However, I do have some questions: Why did many of our political leaders try to sell us a bill of goods about al-Qaeda’s motives? Were they too stupid to figure it out? Or did they just want to lead us around by the nose so they could pursue their own agendas? And did they think we’d be too stupid to figure that out?

Plan E. Give the President, Vice-President and each of our Senators and Representatives an M-4 carbine and a sack of grenades and send them to Afghanistan. Trust me, that war will be over before they touch down in Kabul. And we’ll have won.

Plan F. Starts with us looking in the mirror.