This week, National Journal has run the iconic picture of a sailor kissing a nurse on VJ Day on its cover and wonders if the War on Terror is over with the death of Usama bin Laden. This highlights the fundamental misunderstanding that most of America has when it comes to the War on Terror. First and foremost, the war we find ourselves in does not have a defined beginning nor a defined conclusion. The death of one piece of crap does not end the perpetuation of an ideology that dates back centuries. Islam declared war on infidels at its inception. If you do not adhere to the principles and ideology of Islam, you are an infidel. That makes billions of us infidels.
James Kitfield writes in the National Journal piece, “With bin Laden silenced, the overarching question for Washington is, what becomes of the movement he claimed to head? After a leadership struggle, a much-degraded al-Qaida will likely try to remain relevant in the extremist pantheon by plotting reprisal attacks, and the scattered franchises that the organization spawned may well do the same. But the truly existential danger was always the power of bin Laden’s ideas in enticing legions of followers to his twisted narrative of holy war.” Our government and mainstream media have tried to focus the public on Al Qeada in an erroneous attempt to push the narrative that Bin Laden started an extremist segment of Islam and Kitfield has latched onto this narrative. Americans need to open a Koran and see that Bin Laden had no ideas of his own that inspired a single generation. He merely perpetuated the ideology that IS Islam. He may have inspired IEDs and the hijacking of planes to use as weapons, but he did not give Islam power. The power in Islam is its infusion into every part of the Arab lifestyle whether it be politics, religion, economy, family life, society, laws and so much more.
The proof that Usama Bin Laden was just a small part of Islam is the fact that he was found living in squalor as an old man in Pakistan. He was not living in a palace protected by his followers. He was not leading a country. He was not really leading a group. He may have slaughtered a significant number of my fellow Americans on 9/11, but individual Islamists are the ones who have made the news since that time and have been the ones that have drastcially changed our way of life in America. We have to remove our shoes and place liquids in small containers at the airport and six-year-olds are molested by the TSA because of more recent attack attempts. Anwar al-Awlaki seems to have inspired far more than Bin Laden. And even if we are successful in killing al-Awlaki, the ideology of Islam will continue.
Kitfield continues, “Polls in recent years have consistently driven home the fact that Muslim support for al-Qaida’s terrorist tactics and bin Laden’s vision of a fundamentalist Islamic caliphate was declining dramatically before his demise.” Really? And those uprisings across North Africa and the Middle East are the desperate cries for Democracy, right? Lara Logan’s arms were almost ripped from her body as she was sexually molested by this throng of “democracy lovers.” The Muslim Brotherhood is slowly taking over in Egypt and is decrying the death of Bin Laden. The Libyan rebels are in league with al-Qaeda. Muslim Londoners took to the streets to protest the killing of Bin Laden and issue threats. There is no decline in the forming of the Caliphate. It is foolish to not only think such a thing, but preposterous to write such a thing particularly based on polls.
The ideology of Islam is no freedom of expression in word or belief, the killing of gays, the subjugation of women by dressing them in potato sacks and stoning them to death if they are raped, genital mutilation, pedophilia, honor killings that have even come to America, using intimidation and brutality to spread its twisted ideas and carrying out Jihad on infidels, who are any people that do not adhere to Islam.
The War on Terror never was, but the War with Islam continues.
Diane is a conservative libertarian gay blogger and radio host. She not only blogs here at her home blog “Freedom’s Wings Politics,” but also contributes to various blogs and websites around the Internet. Host of the Freedom's Wings Show launched in January 2009. Co-host of Big Dawg's Music Hour. She is an original co-founder of the Conservative Alliance Media Network. Member of the Big Dawg Music Mafia Brigade. Active member of GOProud, Smart Girl Politics and Tea Party Patriots. Proud member of the Red State Talk Radio Network, Con Air Radio Network and broadcaster at From The Right Radio and Liberty Bell Radio. 
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It seems odd at times that many Americans are not willing, or not able, to be honest with themselves and just say that we are fighting Islam here. Those in the Islamic community that support the kinds of actions against innocent people like we seen on 9/11 are the same ones that declared a “Holy War” against the West and its allies, for many different reason. To single out one reason would probably not give this discussion as a whole justice because of the many reasons we have heard just in the past ten years, let alone before that. But I have always found it odd that while our enemies look at this as a Holy War we look at it as a man-made intrusion by an enemy that uses a religious book to start war on innocent people. It does not seem to add up. We either look at this the wrong way from a political standpoint or our enemies are not really fighting a Holy War. In their minds, they do believe they are fighting a Holy War while we in this nation believe we are fighting individual trouble makers who should be arrested and put on trial then thrown in a U.S. prison for the rest of their lives.
My point is if we do not, at some point, see this war for what it really is we may lose. This war stretches far beyond the battle field and is taking hold in our society with those who want to run individual communities or even states under Sharia. If we take our eye off the ball, we will never be able to gain any kind of handle on this situation. We must ask ourselves if those who want to turn America into an Islamic paradise want to do it using Constitutional standards. If the answer is no to that, then those fight for Sharia make up their own rules and play the Constitution of this great nation. If we, the people fighting this ideology, also play by the rules, at some point we will lose and I do not want to see that day. This war is fought on many fronts and we as Americans back home can use our voices to tell those whop want to change America in that way that we will never allow that happen while our men and women use their weapons elsewhere in the world to protect us on the other front of this war.
The problem is I do not think most Americans see this as a two-front war where ideology plays such a large role, but only sees the wars on television as the front against terrorism that we must support. Again, if we become complacent we will only have ourselves to blame in the end. This does not mean to treat others in a way that we may regret later, but to do what needs to be done using our voice and our pens in this nation while our men and women fight for our freedom elsewhere to circumvent the hatred that comes from our enemy.
Great points T & T!!