Donald Rumsfeld: “There is no question but that we’re losing” the war on terror.

[Valin]

Hugh Hewitt Show:

Hugh Hewitt

Friday, February 20, 2015

 

Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld joined me to begin today’s program. The audio and transcript should be listened to or read in their entirety, but the takeaway is the headline: We are losing the war on terror.

 

 

 

(Snip)

 

HH: What are the “known unknowns” about the Islamic State, or whatever we call ISIS/ISIL or AQAP, whatever we call it? What are the known unknowns about it?

 

DR: Well, in one of the “known unknowns,” or I guess you’d say one of the “known things that we seem not to want to know” is that it is ideological, and it has to be dealt with much more like communism was dealt with, and it is going to take a, as I said in one of my press conferences, it’ll be a long, hard slog. It’s not one of those things that’s going to end with a signing ceremony aboard the USS Missouri. It is, we know that, but I think people don’t want to admit it. * And the other thing is it takes perseverance. I mean, the Cold War took decades. And I’m afraid, you know, Lenin said the purpose of terrorism is not to kill people. It’s to terrorize them. It’s to alter their behavior. And the role of terror is to intimidate and get people to alter their behavior. Well, if we are unwilling got alter our behavior, then I think we have to recognize that you can’t defend everywhere. A terrorist can attack at any time, any place, using any technique, and it’s physically impossible to defend at every moment of the day or night in every location against every conceivable technique. And that means you have to go on the offense. If you try to defend everywhere, you defend nowhere. And so these are things that people seem not to want to come to grips with.

 

(Snip)

 

 

* Something I've been pushing for quite some time.