11-06-2003, 10:31 AM
Methinks the US is making more out of this than they should. As far as Muslims fighting Muslims is concerned, we must remember that throughout history Muslims have fought Muslims more often than not. Even in India Babar fought against Ibrahim Lodi to capture the the throne of Dilli and when Tamerlang destroyed Dilli a hundred and thirty years prior to Babar, it was a Tughlak sultan who was on the throne who genuflected before him. The Moghals were constantly fighting against their co-religionists in Central Asia and Afghanistan( to regain their ancestral homeland ) almost throughout the entire 200 years of their reign And recently when Bush senior put together a coalition in 1991 it was primarily composed of Muslim nations.
[url="http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A50998-2003Nov1?language=printer"]http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A...anguage=printer[/url]
Muslim Troops' Loyalty a Delicate Question
Military's Religious Tolerance May Have Aided Infiltrators, Led to Complacency
By John Mintz and Gregory L. Vistica
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, November 2, 2003; Page A10
Just after the 1991 Persian Gulf War against Iraq, huge tents were erected in Saudi Arabia near the barracks of U.S. military personnel. Inside, day and night, Saudi imams sent by their government lectured the GIs about Islam and made aggressive pitches to convert them.
Saudi officials had promised that the discussions would touch only on Arab culture. But within months, about 1,000 soldiers, and perhaps as many as 3,000, converted to Islam -- the largest surge of Muslims ever into the U.S. armed forces.
"It was quite aggressive," said David Peterson, then the military's top chaplain in the region. In retrospect, he said, there was reason for concern that foreign clerics had gained influence over the troops, but military officials were slow to grasp the implications, he said.
Twelve years later, with three Muslim employees at the Guantanamo Bay prison accused of security breaches, some U.S. military officials are again wondering whether they have been inattentive to outside influences on the small community of Muslims in the armed forces. But even asking that question is a delicate matter for an institution that has long embraced tolerance of all faiths.
Some military officials believe that the al Qaeda terrorist network is trying to recruit Muslim members of the U.S. armed services and contractors who work with them. Other officers have expressed fears that some Muslim soldiers, sailors and airmen might one day decline to take up arms against fellow Muslims.
Air Force Gen. Ralph Eberhart, head of the U.S. Northern Command, the military's homeland defense unit, said terrorists who try to penetrate the U.S. military by playing on religious or ethnic identities will fail "99.9 percent of the time, with as many 9s as you can add."
Even so, Eberhart said, "there's no doubt in my mind there's an effort [by al Qaeda and other terrorists] to turn our people." Some in the military might be exploitable by terrorists or demagogues because, like other people, they "have sympathies for other causes or nations," he said.
"I'm concerned, and I know others [in the military] are concerned" that foreign extremists might have engineered the security breaches at Guantanamo Bay, the U.S. Navy detention facility in Cuba where about 660 alleged al Qaeda and Taliban fighters are held, he said.
Military sociologist Charles Moskos is traveling to Iraq this month to poll troops about morale issues. He plans to ask whether Muslim soldiers seem to have their hearts in fighting fellow Muslims, and whether the troops trust Muslims in their ranks...
[url="http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A50998-2003Nov1?language=printer"]http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A...anguage=printer[/url]
Muslim Troops' Loyalty a Delicate Question
Military's Religious Tolerance May Have Aided Infiltrators, Led to Complacency
By John Mintz and Gregory L. Vistica
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, November 2, 2003; Page A10
Just after the 1991 Persian Gulf War against Iraq, huge tents were erected in Saudi Arabia near the barracks of U.S. military personnel. Inside, day and night, Saudi imams sent by their government lectured the GIs about Islam and made aggressive pitches to convert them.
Saudi officials had promised that the discussions would touch only on Arab culture. But within months, about 1,000 soldiers, and perhaps as many as 3,000, converted to Islam -- the largest surge of Muslims ever into the U.S. armed forces.
"It was quite aggressive," said David Peterson, then the military's top chaplain in the region. In retrospect, he said, there was reason for concern that foreign clerics had gained influence over the troops, but military officials were slow to grasp the implications, he said.
Twelve years later, with three Muslim employees at the Guantanamo Bay prison accused of security breaches, some U.S. military officials are again wondering whether they have been inattentive to outside influences on the small community of Muslims in the armed forces. But even asking that question is a delicate matter for an institution that has long embraced tolerance of all faiths.
Some military officials believe that the al Qaeda terrorist network is trying to recruit Muslim members of the U.S. armed services and contractors who work with them. Other officers have expressed fears that some Muslim soldiers, sailors and airmen might one day decline to take up arms against fellow Muslims.
Air Force Gen. Ralph Eberhart, head of the U.S. Northern Command, the military's homeland defense unit, said terrorists who try to penetrate the U.S. military by playing on religious or ethnic identities will fail "99.9 percent of the time, with as many 9s as you can add."
Even so, Eberhart said, "there's no doubt in my mind there's an effort [by al Qaeda and other terrorists] to turn our people." Some in the military might be exploitable by terrorists or demagogues because, like other people, they "have sympathies for other causes or nations," he said.
"I'm concerned, and I know others [in the military] are concerned" that foreign extremists might have engineered the security breaches at Guantanamo Bay, the U.S. Navy detention facility in Cuba where about 660 alleged al Qaeda and Taliban fighters are held, he said.
Military sociologist Charles Moskos is traveling to Iraq this month to poll troops about morale issues. He plans to ask whether Muslim soldiers seem to have their hearts in fighting fellow Muslims, and whether the troops trust Muslims in their ranks...