This is all taking shape as a complete fraud. Sure there are terrorists, thousand of people who might have the skill and commitment to blow things up in the evil Empire, but they haven't been very lucky here since 9/11 have they?
........................
This, more or less, is the argument made by "The Power of Nightmares", a BBC broadcast documentary about the un-reality of the concept of an overarching War Against Terrorism.
Episode one is viewable on line here -
<http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1002626006461047517>
And the entire series is down-loadable from the following URLs -
1.) Baby, it's cold outside (1 GB):
<http://www.archive.org/download/ThePowerOfNightmares/chapter1.mpeg>
2.) The Phantom Victory (1 GB):
<http://www.archive.org/download/ThePowerOfNightmares/chapter2.mpeg>
3.) The Shadows in the cave (1.3 GB):
<http://www.archive.org/download/ThePowerOfNightmares/chapter3.mpeg>
Intriguingly, it touches upon topics you painstakingly investigated during your review of Leo Strauss' ideas.
But it goes further; the neo-cons and the Islamic militants, it's argued, are both nihilists, obsessed with cleansing their respective societies of 'impurity' and 'selfish individualism'.
Of course, there are flaws, but I found it to be a good look into the thinking of destructive minds.
.d.
What is the brain? If you don't know the answer to that, you've forgotten how to think.
Look Around You: Episode No. 8 ...................... http://monroelab.net/blog/