"War on Terrorism" is the Correct Label

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Peter Beinert's "The War of the Words" essay in the Washington Post (Op-ed, April 1) is seriously lacking on several counts. He demonstrates the same blind spots and faulty analysis as the Pelosi-Murtha House Democrats do when they issue a cut-and-run document which, along with other nonsense, condemns use of the "Global War on Terrorism" label.

First, what has been going on in Iraq for over four years is, indeed, a War -- as opposed to a mere effort at crime control or law enforcement. The same was true of the Korean and Vietnam Wars, both of which were once mistakenly (but are no longer ever) called mere "Conflicts."

Second, all of this country's "Death to America" enemies are delighted to call it "war" -- beginning with al Qaeda's preposterous claim that it is a Holy War "Jihad" and continuing apace with all the "Illegal War" and "Bush's War" and "Immoral War" condemnations which have long been voiced by the President's cut-and-run detractors in this country, in Europe and elsewhere.

(Never have you heard or will ever hear these critics complaining of Bush's "law enforcement" surge or his augmented "Peacekeeping" efforts in Iraq. Such correct terms do not demonize the man sufficiently.)

Third, while Mr. Beinart spends several paragraphs concluding that "war" label is "increasingly problematic," he admits to having no preferred alternative. He then proceeds to reject the word "terror" -- which is, indeed, grammatically wrong but whose correct replacement is simply the word "Terrorism," al Qaeda-style and Hizballah-style Terrorism. (Recall, please, that the Cold War was not a war on communes but on fascist-Left, Soviet-style Communism.)

Fourth, a useful alternative label might be the "War on Irhabism" -- Irhab being the Arabic word for Terrorism, which even after five and a half years of same remains virtually unknown, unwritten and unspoken by any of us. Are we asleep at the linguistic switch, or what?!

Fifth, both Mr. Beinart's and our own "war of words" efforts -- and surely the Poop-on-Petraeus Democrats' pathetic postulations -- would be much better spent branding and loudly condemning al Qaeda's (and al-Sadr's and Hizballah's) suicide mass murderers

(1) NOT as waging so-called "Jihad" (Holy War) but ungodly "Hirabah" (unholy war, war against society) and forbidden "Irhab" (Terrorism), instead;

(2) NOT as the "jihadis" and the "mujahideen" they falsely claim to be but as the irhabis (terrorists) and the mufsiduun (evildoers, mortal sinners and corrupters) they really are;

(3) NOT as the Godly heroes of "Jihadi martyrdom" they falsely claim to be but as the Satanic perpetrators of "Irhabi Murderdom" (terroristic genocide) they really are;

(4) NOT as destined for a virgin-filled Paradise for killing all of us so-called kuffar (infidels) but to a demon-filled Jahannam (Eternal Hellfire) for killing so many thousands of innocents, fellow Muslims, "People of the Book" and "Sons of Abraham," instead;

(5) NOT as the abd'al-Allah (Servants of Allah) they falsely claim to be but as the abd'al-Shaitan (Servants of Satan), the murtadduun (apostates) and the khawarij (outside-the-religion deviants) they really are.

Clearly, when we counterattack al Qaeda's pseudo-Islamic scam of so-called "Jihadi Martyrdom" in Western secular words only -- criminals, thugs, killers, bring to justice, etc. -- we are simply shooting with blanks.

Worse yet, when we parrot the Terrorists' own words of self-sanctification, we even shoot ourselves -- by the perverse effects of "semantic infiltration," which the late great Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan defined thirty years in a Cold War context as follows:

"Semantic infiltration is the process whereby we come to adopt the language of our adversaries in describing political reality. The most brutal totalitarian regimes in the world call themselves 'liberation movements.' [Just as today's AQ-style Terrorists call themselves 'holy warriors']. It is perfectly predictable that they should misuse words to conceal their real nature. But must we aid them in that effort by repeating those words? Worse, do we begin to influence our own perceptions by using them?"

Both in his op-ed writing for the Washington Post and in his own excellent The New Republic magazine, Mr. Beinart (and the Post, as well) would do well to call our enemies the "Irhabis" and the "mufsiduun" they so desperately do NOT want to be called -- and to avoid anointing them as the holy-guy "Jihadis," the brave "martyrs," the "mujahideen" and the "Mahdi Army" saviors of Islam they so fervently DO want to be called.

Finally, to abandon the derisive term "Terrorism" (and perhaps the word "terrorist," as well...??!!) would place us squarely in bed with Reuters, the BBC and Al Jezeera . These far-left foreign news organizations have always avoided applying either of these powerfully negative terms to al Qaeda and other suicide assassins -- and have relied, instead, on the patently false and pro-UBL language of so-called "Jihadi martyrdom."

Thinking ahead to the media's, the terrorists' and the Bush-haters' likely reactions to a conclusion that the enemy is not really Global "Terrorism" after all, one can imagine an endless line of cynical comments and questions such as:

"Mr. President, you have been calling Terrorism the enemy for almost four years. But now you concede that this was wrong. You used to call al Qaeda's suicide mass murderers "evildoers," but now your own State Department has persuaded you that was wrong, too. Are there still other negative and erroneous labels for the al Qaeda, Hizballah and al-Sadr martyrs that you might also be changing? And if the proper word is 'Extremism,' what about the partisan Democrats and the Euro-Leftists who routinely condemn your policies as 'extremist,' also?"

To the "War on Bush" (but not on Terrorism) Democrats' delight, the propaganda barrage could become as unrelenting as the answers would be difficult for the Administration -- and most dangerously confusing to the American public, Western World opinion and the Muslim World (the Umma), as well.

Surely, that is not what either Mr. Beinart or the Post would want, particularly not at a time of War and of deadly threat to the national security. As for the "AWOL" and "ACE" -- Always Weak On Liberty and Aid and Comfort to the Enemy -- House and Senate Democrats, ons ne sais jamais. (This is French for the wartime unreliability of those who George Washington derisively referred to as "Sunshine Patriots.")

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Jim Guirard -- TrueSpeak Institute 703-768-0957 Justcauses@aol.com

A Washington, DC-area attorney, writer, lecturer and anti-terrrism strategist, Jim Guirard was longtime Chief-of-Staff to former US Senators Allen Ellender and Russell Long of Louisiana. His TrueSpeak Institute and TrueSpeak.org website are devoted to truth-in-history and truth-in-language in public discourse.