Western insecurity

I think George W. Bush is exactly right to compare the war on terror with the wars against Nazism and Communism. But I have to ask whether his simpering, politically correct refusal to use the "C" word speaks to our society's fundamental insecurity about that in which we believe:

President Bush on Wednesday quoted the famous D-Day words of Gen. Dwight Eisenhower -- all but one of them, "crusade."

In a speech in which he likened the war on terror to the Allied struggle against the Nazis in World War II, Bush cited Eisenhower's message to U.S. troops 60 years ago but skipped a word that would have been sure to spark controversy in the Muslim world.

Entitled the "Great Crusade," Eisenhower's message urged on the troops as they prepared to storm the Normandy coast in the first Allied landing in Nazi-occupied France.

The original version went: "Soldiers, Sailors and Airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Forces: You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of a liberty-loving people everywhere march with you."

Speaking at the U.S. Air Force Academy commencement on Wednesday, Bush quoted the initial salutation and the second and third sentences but left out the part about embarking on a great crusade.

Back when he was still alive, Osama bin Laden certainly didn't worry about whether his rhetoric would offend us. And while I'm certainly not saying Bush should sink that that level, I have to wonder exactly who he's trying to mollify here. Anyone in the Muslim world who already hates America is not going to change his mind because Bush didn't say "crusade", while others may look at this and think it makes America look weak and insecure about its mission - and when you remember Osama's babbling about "strong horses" and "weak horses", that could have catastrophic consequences.

Three years after an attack that killed more people than Pearl Harbor, many Americans - and a majority of those in other Western nations, including my own - seem to be in denial about our being at war. The Islamofascists cannot defeat us militarily, but we can still defeat ourselves.

Posted by damian at June 3, 2004 06:35 AM