Posted by
Boris Tiraspolsky on Tuesday, April 29, 2008 1:14:24 AM
"The ideological parallel is the foundational similarity between the Cold War and the Long War. In both, the liberal West faces an adversarial ideology that is both universalist (that is: to be spread world-wide) and totalitarian (in that it seeks control over all aspects of life). In other words, the competing ideology is inherently incompatible with Western principles of pluralism and liberty. Islamism, however, will prove more difficult for the West to combat on an ideological level."
The Long War
The War on Terror, reconsidered
By Russ Gottwald
The War on Terror, or the Long War as President Bush has restyled it, shares many features of the Cold War. Both of them are, at root, ideological conflicts perceived very differently by the respective adversaries. Both sets of ideologies contain internal fissures and (to a certain degree) state sponsors of their dominant strains of thought. Both feature proxy and paramilitary campaigns, but (at least as of yet) no direct conflicts between the primary state sponsors. Finally, neither offers the possibility of a purely military victory in the vein of the triumph over Fascism; indeed, a hallmark of victory in the Long War will be that the losing ideology, rather than being truly defeated, will be marginalized the way that Marxism has been.
Continued...