Terrorism =piracy = terrorism = a big problem for the whole world

Stratfor recently published an analysis of what it calls the two battle spaces in the War on Terror (as President Bush has erroneously termed it): the physical battlefield and the ideological battlefield.  Fred Burton and Scott Stewart, the authors of the piece, have said that, though al Qaeda's central command is cut off from most of the rest of it and therefore weakened, various groups claiming to be allied with the terrorist group have seen failure in some places and success in others.  They say that the successes keep the terrorists in business, and that we must not let our successes lull us into a false sense of victory, unless we want to give them time to regroup and perhaps defeat us.

That's a grossly simplified version of what Stratfor's piece said, but bear with me.  I'm about to apply it.

Though we've seen some major successes on the physical battlefield--for example, kicking the Taliban (al Qaeda supporters) out of Afghanistan's government, and helping the Iraqi people throw most of al Qaeda out of their country--the best successes we've seen have been on the ideological front. 

Iraq, in particular, has seen al Qaeda for what it is: a radical, militant, religious tyranny that they really want nothing to do with.  They've decided for themselves that any group calling themselves Muslim who kills other Muslims just because they aren't "true, pure, Islamics" is nothing they want to ally with.  Though al Qaeda and allied groups still commit homicide attacks in Iraq, the Iraqi people are not going to permit the terrorists to take over.  Why?  

Because the United States, through the professional, protective behavior of most of its military, have convinced the Iraqi people that al Qaeda doesn't have their best interests at heart.  The only ones who do are the Iraqi people themselves.  Any Muslim who blows up, shoots, or otherwise murders other Muslims during worship instead of targeting military targets--Iraqi or American or allied--is not someone they want to trust enough to work with against Western interests.  If the terrorists had restricted themselves to military targets, instead, that might have been different.  In other words, because of al Qaeda's own behavior, we've won the ideological battle against terrorism in Iraq.  For now.

Where we seem to be stalemated or losing in the ideological war is in places like Somalia, Iran, and (not surprisingly, given recent developments in our relationship) Pakistan.

Somalia, in particular, has burst into the news recently: Somalian pirates have seized more than one cargo ship carrying heavy armor from vendor to buyer.  Last week in particular, the pirates--militant Islamic terrorists--seized a Ukrainian vessel carrying Russian made tanks to Kenya.  They're demanding $20 million in ransom before they'll let the ship go.  Excluding this demand, experts say that Somali pirates have raked in $30 million this year, following the same pattern.  

The Somali government has issued a statement that the world can use whatever force it cares to to resolve the situation.  It's unclear, at this point, whether we've won the ideological battle against the militant jihadists in Somalia, or if the Somali government simply doesn't want to risk the world taking it out of power.

Iran is simply an ongoing problem that we have to face, and keep facing, until something is finally done to take the physical battlefield away from the radical militant jihadist tyrants in power.  We have, after all, already won the ideological battlefield against the government with the people.  We will, however, have to be careful in how we prevent the problem with the regime from growing to keep from losing that ideological ground.  Our renewed diplomatic issues with Russia only complicate matters, on this battlefield.

Another place where it's unclear if we're winning or losing the ideological battlefield is in Pakistan.  A recent Spanish intelligence report has surfaced, charging certain elements within Pakistan's Inter-Service Intelligence agency provided weapons and training to Taliban terrorists as recently as 2005.  Their purpose?  To assassinate certain elements in Afghanistan's new government, destabilizing it's neighbor.  There's no telling whether this was an attempt to keep Afghanistan from becoming a threat, or whether it was al Qaeda backed and funded.  It could well be either.

In any case, Pakistan has, of course, denied the allegations.  However, it certainly explains their new attitude toward our pursuit of terrorists across the Afghani border.  

It also explains a recent call for help that the American commander in Afghanistan has made.  He alleges that there has been a recent uptick in border crossings, from Pakistan into Afghanistan, made by terrorists of several different nationalities.

Currently, the United States and our allied forces are holding ground against the terrorists.  We could not do it except for on their own soil, and except for defeating their ideologies with the common, everyday people that live there.  Unless we fully succeed in defeating Islamic terrorists, wherever they're found, on both the physical and ideological battlefields, what has been shrunk into a small, regional problem will quickly explode into a huge, world-wide problem.