This timidity translates into an inability to define war goals. Two high-level US statements from late 2001 typify the vague and ineffective declarations issued by Western Governments. Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld defined victory as establishing "an environment where we can in fact fulfil and live (our) freedoms." In contrast, Mr George W Bush announced a narrower goal, "the defeat of the global terror network" -- whatever that undefined network might be.
"Defeating terrorism" has, indeed, remained the basic war goal. By implication, terrorists are the enemy and counter-terrorism is the main response.
But observers have increasingly concluded that terrorism is just a tactic, not an enemy. Mr Bush effectively admitted this much in mid-2004, acknowledging that "We actually misnamed the war on terror." Instead, he called the war a "struggle against ideological extremists who do not believe in free societies and who happen to use terror as a weapon to try to shake the conscience of the free world".
http://newageislam.com/the-enemy-has-a-name---islamism-/islam-and-the-west/d/136
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5:48 AM
Moderate Islamist here
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