How is the WOT doing?

by soccerdad

Juan Cole has another fine post today.

He summarizes events in the Middle East and surrounding region for the last week.

In Baghdad, guerrillas fired Katyusha rockets into the Sheraton hotel.

In Pakistan, there was a bombing at a Shiite mosque in Sialkot, this was followed by an attack in Multan on a gathering of radical Sunni Muslims early on Thursday with a car bomb. Likely this was retaliation for the bombing in Sialkot. This may signal an escalation in the long runing conflict with Sunnis with al Qaeda ties and the radical Shiite groups backed by Iran.

In the Egyptian resort town of Taba on the border with Israel car bombs collapsed ten floors of the Hilton Hotel, as well as hitting less upscale backpacker resorts. They killed at least 35 and wounded at least 160. Israeli officials are speculating that it is the work of al Qaeda.

Juan Cole goes on to say

If we analyze these violent, destabilizing attacks, one thing becomes abundantly clear: The Bush administration is losing the war on terror. If, 3 years after September 11, Ayman al-Zawahiri can arrange for al-Qaeda to blow up yet another building, this time in Egypt, killing scores, that is a sign of failure. If an al-Qaeda-aligned group like the Army of the Prophet's Companions is permitted by the Pakistani state to gather freely in Multan, to blow up Shiite mosques, and to incur a violent Shiite counter-strike, that is a sign of failure. If radical Sunni groups, or ex-Baathists aligned with them, are able at will to fire Katyusha rockets into the Baghdad Sheraton at a time when the US has militarily occupied Iraq, that is a sign of failure.

So it would appear that the instability in the Mideast has gotten worse not better. Even so Bush/Cheney are talking about invading Iran and Syria. Prof. Cole also makes the point that Bush/Cheney are incapable of differentiating between new stateless terrorism and older forms of state terrorism. Thus their tactics don't match the problem. In addition, they don't address the real underlying motivations of al Qaeda and such groups. He also points out that OBL, Zarqawi, and other leaders are still at large, and the people who have been arrested have been captured by Pakistan.

So Prof Cole concludes:

If you were a company that brought in terror consultants to work on this problem, and after 3 years you saw the sort of results we saw on Thursday, would you really rehire them?