[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George W. Bush (2006, Book II)]
[September 5, 2006]
[Pages 1600-1609]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]
Remarks to the Military Officers Association of America
September 5, 2006
Thank you all. Please be seated. General Hendrix, thank you for the invitation to be here. Thanks for the
kind introduction. I'm honored to stand with the men and women of the
Military Officers Association of America. I appreciate the board of
directors who are here and the leaders who have given me this platform
from which to speak. I'm proud to be here with active members of the
United States military. Thank you for your service. I'm proud to be your
Commander in Chief.
I want to--pleased also to stand with members of the diplomatic
corps, including many representing nations that have been attacked by Al
Qaida and its terrorist allies since September the 11th, 2001. Your
presence here reminds us that we're engaged in a global war against an
enemy that threatens all civilized nations. And today, the civilized
world stands together to defend our freedom; we stand together to defeat
the terrorists; and we're working to secure the peace for generations to
come.
I appreciate my Attorney General joining us today, Al
Gonzales. Thank you for being here. The
Secretary of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff, is with us. Three Members of the United States
Senate--I might say, three important Members of the United States
Senate--Senate President pro tem Ted Stevens of Alaska. Thank you for joining us, Senator--chairman of
the Appropriations Committee, Senator Thad Cochran of Mississippi; the chairman of the Armed Services
Committee, John WarnerNM/ of Virginia.
I thank Norb Ryan, as well, for his
leadership. I do appreciate all the folks that are at Walter Reed who
have joined us today. I'm going to tell the parents of our troops, we
provide great health care to those who wear the uniform. I'm proud of
those folks at Bethesda and Walter Reed--are providing you the best
possible care to help you recover from your injuries. Thank you for your
courage. Thank you
[[Page 1601]]
for joining us here today. May God bless you in your recovery.
Next week, America will mark the fifth anniversary of September the
11th, 2001, terrorist attacks. As this day approaches, it brings with it
a flood of painful memories. We remember the horror of watching planes
fly into the World Trade Center and seeing the towers collapse before
our eyes. We remember the sight of the Pentagon broken and in flames. We
remember the rescue workers who rushed into burning buildings to save
lives, knowing they might never emerge again. We remember the brave
passengers who charged the cockpit of their hijacked plane and stopped
the terrorists from reaching their target and killing more innocent
civilians. We remember the cold brutality of the enemy who inflicted
this harm on our country--an enemy whose leader, Usama bin Laden, declared the massacre of nearly 3,000 people
that day, I quote, ``an unparalleled and magnificent feat of valor,
unmatched by any in humankind before them.''
In 5 years since our Nation was attacked, Al Qaida and terrorists it
has inspired have continued to attack across the world. They've killed
the innocent in Europe and Africa and the Middle East, in central Asia
and the Far East and beyond. Most recently they attempted to strike
again in the most ambitious plot since the attacks of September the
11th, a plan to blow up passenger planes headed for America, over the
Atlantic Ocean.
Five years after our Nation was attacked, the terrorist danger
remains. We're a nation at war, and America and her allies are fighting
this war with relentless determination across the world. Together with
our coalition partners, we've removed terrorist sanctuaries, disrupted
their finances, killed and captured key operatives, broken up terrorist
cells in America and other nations, and stopped new attacks before
they're carried out. We're on the offense against the terrorists on
every battlefront, and we'll accept nothing less than complete victory.
In the 5 years since our Nation was attacked, we've also learned a
great deal about the enemy we face in this war. We've learned about them
through videos and audio recordings and letters and statements they've
posted on web sites. We've learned about them from captured enemy
documents that the terrorists have never meant for us to see. Together,
these documents and statements have given us clear insight into the mind
of our enemies: their ideology, their ambitions, and their strategy to
defeat us.
We know what the terrorists intend to do because they've told us.
And we need to take their words seriously. So today I'm going to
describe, in the terrorists' own words, what they believe, what they
hope to accomplish, and how they intend to accomplish it. I'll discuss
how the enemy has adapted in the wake of our sustained offensive against
them and the threat posed by different strains of violent Islamic
radicalism. I'll explain the strategy we're pursuing to protect America
by defeating the terrorists on the battlefield and defeating their
hateful ideology in the battle of ideas.
The terrorists who attacked us on September the 11th, 2001, are men
without conscience, but they're not madmen. They kill in the name of a
clear and focused ideology, a set of beliefs that are evil but not
insane. These Al Qaida terrorists, and those who share their ideology,
are violent Sunni extremists. They're driven by a radical and perverted
vision of Islam that rejects tolerance, crushes all dissent, and
justifies the murder of innocent men, women, and children in the pursuit
of political power. They hope to establish a violent political utopia
across the Middle East, which they call a caliphate, where all would be
ruled according to their hateful ideology. Usama bin Laden has called the 9/11 attacks, in his words, ``a great
step towards the unity of Muslims and establishing the righteous
caliphate.''
This caliphate would be a totalitarian Islamic empire encompassing
all current and
[[Page 1602]]
former Muslim lands, stretching from Europe to north Africa, the Middle
East, and Southeast Asia. We know this because Al Qaida has told us.
About 2 months ago, the terrorist
Zawahiri--he's Al Qaida's second in command--declared that Al Qaida
intends to impose its rule in ``every land that was a home for Islam,
from Spain to Iraq.'' He went on to say, ``The whole world is an open
field for us.''
We know what this radical empire would look like in practice,
because we saw how the radicals imposed their ideology on the people of
Afghanistan. Under the rule of the Taliban and Al Qaida, Afghanistan was
a totalitarian nightmare, a land where women were imprisoned in their
homes; men were beaten for missing prayer meetings; girls could not go
to school; and children were forbidden the smallest pleasures, like
flying kites. Religious police roamed the streets, beating and detaining
civilians for perceived offenses. Women were publicly whipped. Summary
executions were held in Kabul's soccer stadium in front of cheering
mobs. And Afghanistan was turned into a launching pad for horrific
attacks against America and other parts of the civilized world,
including many Muslim nations.
The goal of these Sunni extremists is to remake the entire Muslim
world in their radical image. In pursuit of their imperial aims, these
extremists say there can be no compromise or dialog with those they call
infidels, a category that includes America, the world's free nations,
Jews, and all Muslims who reject their extreme vision of Islam. They
reject the possibility of peaceful coexistence with the free world.
Again, hear the words of Usama bin Laden
earlier this year: ``Death is better than living on this Earth with the
unbelievers among us.''
These radicals have declared their uncompromising hostility to
freedom. It is foolish to think that you can negotiate with them. We see
the uncompromising nature of the enemy in many captured terrorist
documents. Here are just two examples. After the liberation of
Afghanistan, coalition forces searching through a terrorist safe house
in that country found a copy of the Al Qaida charter. This charter
states that ``There will be continuing enmity until everyone believes in
Allah. We will not meet the enemy halfway. There will be no room for
dialog with them.'' Another document was found in 2000 by British police
during an antiterrorist raid in London, a grisly Al Qaida manual that
includes chapters with titles such as ``Guidelines for Beating and
Killing Hostages.'' This manual declares that their vision of Islam
``does not make a truce with unbelief, but rather confronts it.'' The
confrontation calls for ``the dialog of bullets; the ideals of
assassination, bombing, and destruction; and the diplomacy of the cannon
and machine gun,'' end quote.
Still other captured documents show Al Qaida's strategy for
infiltrating Muslim nations, establishing terrorist enclaves,
overthrowing governments, and building their totalitarian empire. We see
this strategy laid out in a captured Al Qaida document found during a
recent raid in Iraq, which describes their plans to infiltrate and to
take over Iraq's western Anbar Province. The document lays out an
elaborate Al Qaida governing structure for the region that includes an
education department, a social services department, a justice
department, and an execution unit responsible for ``sorting out, arrest,
murder, and destruction.''
According to their public statements, countries that have--they have
targeted stretch from the Middle East to Africa to Southeast Asia.
Through this strategy, Al Qaida and its allies intend to create
numerous, decentralized operating bases across the world, from which
they can plan new attacks and advance their vision of a unified,
totalitarian Islamic state that can confront and, eventually, destroy
the free world.
These violent extremists know that to realize this vision, they must
first drive out the main obstacle that stands in their way--the United
States of America. According
[[Page 1603]]
to Al Qaida, their strategy to defeat America has two parts. First,
they're waging a campaign of terror across the world. They're targeting
our forces abroad, hoping that the American people will grow tired of
casualties and give up the fight. And they're targeting America's
financial centers and economic infrastructure at home, hoping to
terrorize us and cause our economy to collapse.
Bin Laden calls this his ``bleed-until-
bankruptcy plan,'' end quote. And he cited the attacks of 9/11 as
evidence that such a plan can succeed. With the 9/11 attacks, Usama bin
Laden says, ``Al Qaida spent $500,000 on the event, while America lost--
according to the lowest estimate--$500 billion,'' meaning that every
dollar of Al Qaida defeated a million dollars of America. Bin Laden
concludes from this experience that ``America is definitely a great
power, with unbelievable military strength and a vibrant economy, but
all these have been built on a very weak and hollow foundation.'' He
went on to say, ``Therefore, it is very easy to target the flimsy base
and concentrate on their weak points, and even if we're able to target
one-tenth of these weak points, we will be able to crush and destroy
them.''
Secondly, along with this campaign of terror, the enemy has a
propaganda strategy. Usama bin Laden laid
out this strategy in a letter to the Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, that coalition forces uncovered in Afghanistan in
2002. In it bin Laden says that Al Qaida intends to launch, in his
words, ``a media campaign to create a wedge between the American people
and their Government.'' This media campaign, bin Laden says, will send
the American people a number of messages, including ``that their
Government will bring them more losses, in finances and casualties.''
And he goes on to say that ``They are being sacrificed to serve the big
investors, especially the Jews.'' Bin Laden says that by delivering
these messages, Al Qaida ``aims at creating pressure from the American
people on the American Government to stop their campaign against
Afghanistan.''
Bin Laden and his allies are absolutely
convinced they can succeed in forcing America to retreat and causing our
economic collapse. They believe our Nation is weak and decadent and
lacking in patience and resolve. And they're wrong. Usama bin Laden has
written that the ``defeat of American forces in Beirut in 1983 is proof
America does not have the stomach to stay in the fight.'' He's declared
that ``In Somalia, the United States pulled out, trailing
disappointment, defeat, and failure behind it.'' And last year, the
terrorist Zawahiri declared that
Americans ``know better than others that there is no hope in victory.
The Vietnam specter is closing every outlet.''
These terrorists hope to drive America and our coalition out of
Afghanistan so they can restore the safe haven they lost when coalition
forces drove them out 5 years ago. But they've made clear that the most
important front in their struggle against America is Iraq, the nation
bin Laden has declared the ``capital of the
caliphate.'' Hear the words of bin Laden: ``I now address the whole
Islamic nation: Listen and understand. The most serious issue today for
the whole world is this third world war that is raging in Iraq.'' He
calls it ``a war of destiny between infidelity and Islam.'' He says,
``The whole world is watching this war,'' and that it will end in
``victory and glory or misery and humiliation.'' For Al Qaida, Iraq is
not a distraction from their war on America; it is the central
battlefield where the outcome of this struggle will be decided.
Here is what Al Qaida says they will do if they succeed in driving
us out of Iraq. The terrorist Zawahiri
has said that Al Qaida will proceed with ``several incremental goals.
The first stage: Expel the Americans from Iraq. The second stage:
Establish an Islamic authority or emirate, then develop it and support
it until it achieves
[[Page 1604]]
the level of caliphate. The third stage: Extend the jihad wave to the
secular countries neighboring Iraq. And the fourth stage: The clash with
Israel.''
These evil men know that a fundamental threat to their aspirations
is a democratic Iraq that can govern itself, sustain itself, and defend
itself. They know that given a choice, the Iraqi people will never
choose to live in the totalitarian state the extremists hope to
establish. And that is why we must not and we will not give the enemy
victory in Iraq by deserting the Iraqi people.
Last year, the terrorist Zarqawi declared in a message posted on the
Internet that democracy ``is the essence of infidelity and deviation
from the right path.'' The Iraqi people disagree. Last December, nearly
12 million Iraqis from every ethnic and religious community turned out
to vote in their country's third free election in less than a year. Iraq
now has a unity government that represents Iraq's diverse population,
and Al Qaida's top commander in Iraq breathed his last breath.
Despite these strategic setbacks, the enemy will continue to fight
freedom's advance in Iraq, because they understand the stakes in this
war. Again, hear the words of bin Laden in a
message to the American people earlier this year. He says, ``The war is
for you or for us to win. If we win it, it means your defeat and
disgrace forever.''
Now, I know some of our country hear the terrorists' words and hope
that they will not or cannot do what they say. History teaches that
underestimating the words of evil and ambitious men is a terrible
mistake. In the early 1900s, an exiled lawyer in Europe published a
pamphlet called ``What Is To Be Done?''--in which he laid out his plan
to launch a Communist revolution in Russia. The world did not heed
Lenin's words and paid a terrible price. The Soviet Empire he
established killed tens of millions and brought the world to the brink
of thermonuclear war. In the 1920s, a failed Austrian painter published
a book in which he explained his intention to build an Aryan super-state
in Germany and take revenge on Europe and eradicate the Jews. The world
ignored Hitler's words and paid a terrible price. His Nazi regime killed
millions in the gas chambers and set the world aflame in war before it
was finally defeated at a terrible cost in lives.
Bin Laden and his terrorist allies have
made their intentions as clear as Lenin and Hitler before them. The
question is, will we listen? Will we pay attention to what these evil
men say? America and our coalition partners have made our choice. We're
taking the words of the enemy seriously. We're on the offensive; we will
not rest; we will not retreat; and we will not withdraw from the fight
until this threat to civilization has been removed.
Five years into this struggle, it's important to take stock of
what's been accomplished and the difficult work that remains. Al Qaida
has been weakened by our sustained offensive against them. And today, it
is harder for Al Qaida's leaders to operate freely, to move money, or to
communicate with their operatives and facilitators. Yet Al Qaida remains
dangerous and determined. Bin Laden and
Zawahiri remain in hiding in remote
regions of this world. Al Qaida continues to adapt in the face of our
global campaign against them. Increasingly, Al Qaida is taking advantage
of the Internet to disseminate propaganda and to conduct virtual
recruitment and virtual training of new terrorists. Al Qaida's leaders
no longer need to meet face to face with their operatives. They can find
new suicide bombers and facilitate new terrorist attacks without ever
laying eyes on those they're training, financing, or sending to strike
us.
As Al Qaida changes, the broader terrorist movement is also
changing, becoming more dispersed and self-directed. More and more,
we're facing threats from locally established terrorist cells that are
inspired by Al Qaida's ideology and goals but do not necessarily have
direct links to Al Qaida, such as training and funding. Some of these
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groups are made up of homegrown terrorists, militant extremists who were
born and educated in Western nations, were indoctrinated by radical
Islamists or attracted to their ideology, and joined the violent
extremist cause. These locally established cells appear to be
responsible for a number of attacks and plots, including those in Madrid
and Canada and other countries across the world.
As we continue to fight Al Qaida and these Sunni extremists inspired
by their radical ideology, we also face the threat posed by Shi'a
extremists who are learning from Al Qaida, increasing their
assertiveness, and stepping up their threats. Like the vast majority of
Sunnis, the vast majority of Shi'a across the world reject the vision of
extremists. And in Iraq, millions of Shi'a have defied terrorist threats
to vote in free elections and have shown their desire to live in
freedom. The Shi'a extremists want to deny them this right. This Shi'a
strain of Islamic radicalism is just as dangerous and just as hostile to
America and just as determined to establish its brand of hegemony across
the broader Middle East. The Shi'a extremists have achieved something
that Al Qaida has so far failed to do. In 1979, they took control of a
major power, the nation of Iran, subjugating its proud people to a
regime of tyranny and using that nation's resources to fund the spread
of terror and pursue their radical agenda.
Like Al Qaida and the Sunni extremists, the Iranian regime has clear
aims. They want to drive America out of the region, to destroy Israel,
and to dominate the broader Middle East. To achieve these aims, they are
funding and arming terrorist groups like Hizballah, which allow them to
attack Israel and America by proxy. Hizballah, the source of the current
instability in Lebanon, has killed more Americans than any terrorist
organization except Al Qaida. Unlike Al Qaida, they've not yet attacked
the American homeland. Yet they're directly responsible for the murder
of hundreds of Americans abroad. It was Hizballah that was behind the
1983 bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut that killed 241
Americans. And Saudi Hizballah was behind the 1996 bombing of Khobar
Towers in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 Americans, an attack conducted by
terrorists who we believe were working with Iranian officials.
Just as we take the words of the Sunni extremists seriously, we must
take the words of the Shi'a extremists seriously. Listen to the words of
Hizballah's leader, the terrorist Nasrallah,
who has declared his hatred of America. He says, ``Let the entire world
hear me. Our hostility to the Great Satan, America, is absolute.
Regardless of how the world has changed after 11 September, death to
America will remain our reverberating and powerful slogan. Death to
America.''
Iran's leaders, who back Hizballah, have also declared their
absolute hostility to America. Last October, Iran's President declared in a speech that some people ask--in
his words--``whether a world without the United States and Zionism can
be achieved. I say that this goal is achievable.'' Less than 3 months
ago, Iran's President declared to America and other Western powers:
``Open your eyes and see the fate of pharaoh. If you do not abandon the
path of falsehood, your doomed destiny will be annihilation.'' Less than
2 months ago, he warned, ``The anger of Muslims may reach an explosion
point soon. If such a day comes, America and the West should know that
the waves of the blast will not remain within the boundaries of our
region.'' He also delivered this message to the American people: ``If
you would like to have good relations with the Iranian nation in the
future, bow down before the greatness of the Iranian nation and
surrender. If you don't accept to do this, the Iranian nation will force
you to surrender and bow down.'' America will not bow down to tyrants.
The Iranian regime and its terrorist proxies have demonstrated their
willingness to
[[Page 1606]]
kill Americans, and now the Iranian regime is pursuing nuclear weapons.
The world is working together to prevent Iran's regime from acquiring
the tools of mass murder. The international community has made a
reasonable proposal to Iran's leaders and given them the opportunity to
set their nation on a better course. So far, Iran's leaders have
rejected this offer. Their choice is increasingly isolating the great
Iranian nation from the international community and denying the Iranian
people an opportunity for greater economic prosperity. It's time for
Iran's leader to make a different choice. And we've made our choice.
We'll continue to work closely with our allies to find a diplomatic
solution. The world's free nations will not allow Iran to develop a
nuclear weapon.
The Shi'a and Sunni extremists represent different faces of the same
threat. They draw inspiration from different sources, but both seek to
impose a dark vision of violent Islamic radicalism across the Middle
East. They oppose the advance of freedom, and they want to gain control
of weapons of mass destruction. If they succeed in undermining fragile
democracies like Iraq and drive the forces of freedom out of the region,
they will have an open field to pursue their dangerous goals. Each
strain of violent Islamic radicalism would be emboldened in their
efforts to topple moderate governments and establish terrorist safe
havens.
Imagine a world in which they were able to control governments, a
world awash with oil, and they would use oil resources to punish
industrialized nations. And they would use those resources to fuel their
radical agenda and pursue and purchase weapons of mass murder. And armed
with nuclear weapons, they would blackmail the free world and spread
their ideologies of hate and raise a mortal threat to the American
people. If we allow them to do this, if we retreat from Iraq, if we
don't uphold our duty to support those who are desirous to live in
liberty, 50 years from now, history will look back on our time with
unforgiving clarity and demand to know why we did not act.
I'm not going to allow this to happen, and no future American
President can allow it either. America did not seek this global
struggle, but we're answering history's call with confidence and a clear
strategy. Today we're releasing a document called the National Strategy
for Combating Terrorism. This is an unclassified version of the strategy
we've been pursuing since September the 11th, 2001. This strategy was
first released in February 2003; it's been updated to take into account
the changing nature of this enemy. This strategy document is posted on
the White House web site, whitehouse.gov, and I urge all Americans to
read it.
Our strategy for combating terrorism has five basic elements. First,
we're determined to prevent terrorist attacks before they occur, so
we're taking the fight to the enemy. The best way to protect America is
to stay on the offense. Since 9/11, our coalition has captured or killed
Al Qaida managers and operatives and scores of other terrorists across
the world. The enemy is living under constant pressure, and we intend to
keep it that way. And this adds to our security. When terrorists spend
their days working to avoid death or capture, it's harder for them to
plan and execute new attacks.
We're also fighting the enemy here at home. We've given our law
enforcement and intelligence professionals the tools they need to stop
the terrorists in our midst. We passed the PATRIOT Act to break down the
wall that prevented law enforcement and intelligence from sharing vital
information. We created the terrorist surveillance program to monitor
the communications between Al Qaida commanders abroad and terrorist
operatives within our borders. If Al Qaida is calling somebody in
America, we need to know why in order to stop attacks.
[[Page 1607]]
I want to thank these three Senators for working with us to give our
law enforcement and intelligence officers the tools necessary to do
their jobs. And over the last 5 years, Federal, State, and local law
enforcement have used those tools to break up terrorist cells and to
prosecute terrorist operatives and supporters in New York and Oregon and
Virginia and Texas and New Jersey and Illinois, Ohio, and other States.
By taking the battle to the terrorists and their supporters on our own
soil and across the world, we've stopped a number of Al Qaida plots.
Second, we're determined to deny weapons of mass destruction to
outlaw regimes and terrorists who would use them without hesitation.
Working with Great Britain and Pakistan and other nations, the United
States shut down the world's most dangerous nuclear trading cartel, the
A.Q. Khan network. This network had
supplied Iran and Libya and North Korea with equipment and know-how that
advanced their efforts to obtain nuclear weapons. And we launched the
Proliferation Security Initiative, a coalition of more than 70 nations
that is working together to stop shipments related to weapons of mass
destruction on land, at sea, and in the air. The greatest threat this
world faces is the danger of extremists and terrorists armed with
weapons of mass destruction, and this is a threat America cannot defeat
on her own. We applaud the determined efforts of many nations around the
world to stop the spread of these dangerous weapons. Together, we pledge
we'll continue to work together to stop the world's most dangerous men
from getting their hands on the world's most dangerous weapons.
Third, we're determined to deny terrorists the support of outlaw
regimes. After September the 11th, I laid out a clear doctrine: America
makes no distinction between those who commit acts of terror and those
that harbor and support them, because they're equally guilty of murder.
Thanks to our efforts, there are now three fewer state sponsors of
terror in the world than there were on September the 11th, 2001.
Afghanistan and Iraq have been transformed from terrorist states into
allies in the war on terror. And the nation of Libya has renounced
terrorism and given up its weapons of mass destruction programs and its
nuclear materials and equipment. Over the past 5 years, we've acted to
disrupt the flow of weapons and support from terrorist states to
terrorist networks. And we have made clear that any government that
chooses to be an ally of terror has also chosen to be an enemy of
civilization.
Fourth, we're determined to deny terrorist networks control of any
nation or territory within a nation. So, along with our coalition and
the Iraqi Government, we'll stop the terrorists from taking control of
Iraq and establishing a new safe haven from which to attack America and
the free world. And we're working with friends and allies to deny the
terrorists the enclaves they seek to establish in ungoverned areas
across the world. By helping governments reclaim full sovereign control
over their territory, we make ourselves more secure.
Fifth, we're working to deny terrorists new recruits by defeating
their hateful ideology and spreading the hope of freedom--by spreading
the hope of freedom across the Middle East. For decades, American policy
sought to achieve peace in the Middle East by pursuing stability at the
expense of liberty. The lack of freedom in that region helped create
conditions where anger and resentment grew and radicalism thrived and
terrorists found willing recruits. And we saw the consequences on
September the 11th, when the terrorists brought death and destruction to
our country. The policy wasn't working.
The experience of September the 11th made clear, in the long run,
the only way to secure our Nation is to change the course of the Middle
East. And so America has committed its influence in the world
[[Page 1608]]
to advancing freedom and liberty and democracy as the great alternatives
to repression and radicalism. We're taking the side of democratic
leaders and moderates and reformers across the Middle East. We strongly
support the voices of tolerance and moderation in the Muslim world.
We're standing with Afghanistan's elected Government against Al Qaida
and the Taliban remnants that are trying to restore tyranny in that
country. We're standing with Lebanon's young democracy against the
foreign forces that are seeking to undermine the country's sovereignty
and independence. And we're standing with the leaders of Iraq's unity
Government as they work to defeat the enemies of freedom and chart a
more hopeful course for their people. This is why victory is so
important in Iraq. By helping freedom succeed in Iraq, we will help
America and the Middle East and the world become more secure.
During the last 5 years, we've learned a lot about this enemy. We've
learned that they're cunning and sophisticated. We've witnessed their
ability to change their methods and their tactics with deadly speed,
even as their murderous obsessions remain unchanging. We've seen that
it's the terrorists who have declared war on Muslims, slaughtering huge
numbers of innocent Muslim men and women around the world.
We know what the terrorists believe. We know what they have done,
and we know what they intend to do. And now the world's free nations
must summon the will to meet this great challenge. The road ahead is
going to be difficult, and it will require more sacrifice. Yet we can
have confidence in the outcome, because we've seen freedom conquer
tyranny and terror before. In the 20th century, free nations confronted
and defeated Nazi Germany. During the cold war, we confronted Soviet
communism, and today, Europe is whole, free, and at peace.
And now freedom is once again contending with the forces of darkness
and tyranny. This time the battle is unfolding in a new region, the
broader Middle East. This time we're not waiting for our enemies to
gather in strength. This time we're confronting them before they gain
the capacity to inflict unspeakable damage on the world, and we're
confronting their hateful ideology before it fully takes root.
We see a day when people across the Middle East have governments
that honor their dignity and unleash their creativity and count their
votes. We see a day when, across this region, citizens are allowed to
express themselves freely, women have full rights, and children are
educated and given the tools necessary to succeed in life. And we see a
day when all the nations of the Middle East are allies in the cause of
peace.
We fight for this day, because the security of our own citizens
depends on it. This is the great ideological struggle of the 21st
century, and it is the calling of our generation. All civilized nations
are bound together in this struggle between moderation and extremism. By
coming together, we will roll back this grave threat to our way of life.
We will help the people of the Middle East claim their freedom, and we
will leave a safer and more hopeful world for our children and our
grandchildren.
God bless.
Note: The President spoke at 1:15 p.m. at the Capital Hilton Hotel. In
his remarks, he referred to Gen. John W. Hendrix, USA (Ret.), chairman
of the board, and Vice Adm. Norbert R. Ryan, Jr., USN (Ret.), president,
Military Officers Association of America; President Mahmud Ahmadi-nejad
of Iran; and A.Q. Khan, former head of Pakistan's nuclear weapons
program.
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