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Originally Posted by Digipimp
It's pretty simple if you attack military and police targets you are not a terrorists, terrorists attack civilian targets so as to cause terror, hence the name terrorist.
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Okay, I've seen the term 'by definition' bandied around here in a usage pattern that's just not appropriate. The pedant in me screams out for satisfaction.
Terrorism, by definition, is:
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Originally Posted by American Heritage Dictionary
Terrorism - The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons.
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Nothing in the definition has anything to do with civilians, or civilian targets. You can be a terrorist and dedicate yourself entirely to sabotaging military supply lines, for instance.
Of course, it's typically a very very effective tactic to target civilian populations, because they're often the ones which are dually most pliable and with the power base to affect the governments over them (elected or otherwise).
That said, I would say that there's obviously a deliberate attempt to obscure the meaning of the word INSURGENT, and to equate it with TERRORIST. For what it's worth, absorbing or discrediting various words is an age-old means of propoganda and widespread attitude modification. Look at what the rightwing reactionaries have done to the word 'liberal' over the last couple decades.
Getting back to the original point of the post... I suspect the vast, vast majority of these attacks are from local people who've suffered personal losses at the ham-fisted and oblivious occupation. If my wife had been gunned down because she didn't hit the brakes fast enough when going up to a checkpoint while on the way back from the store with milk, not only would I try to kill as many of the bastards I could, I would do so in the most painful, degrading, dehumanizing way possible... preferably with as many people watching as possible. It wouldn't bring the singular love of my life back into this world, but my all-consuming hate would certainly focus every talent and energy I possess to a burning juggernaut of destruction. Killing the ones responsible wouldn't be enough; I'd need to kill them, their family, friends, former roommates, pets, and anyone who looked even remotely like them. Their screams of pain and death rattles would be my lullaby, the haunted look in their eyes as realization of their mortality arrived would be my bliss.
... and that, my friends, is how an insurgent is born. You better believe that many of those insurgents will eventually become terrorists. Defending a ruined home is pointless when everything you ever had is lost, the only remaining purpose is retribution and vengeance. Sun Tzu knew this thousands of years ago:
When you surround an army, leave an outlet free. Do not press a desperate foe too hard.
Now look at the 'elections' in this context. Anyone who's been paying attention over there knows that elections are, on the surface, a rediculous PR stunt at best, particularly when what was anticipated is coming to pass: Shi'ite rising, with ties to khomenist iran if not outright backing. However, for many people there, these elections may be that 'ray of hope' which is keeping the insurgency (which is currently still relatively minor for a country of tens of millions) from turning into popular uprising.
Ah well, enough late night ramblings for me.
