Washington's Prolonged War against terrorrism and the new Atlantic Alliance

Here are some of the talking points as reported by Le Monde on a meeting where US general Kimmit explains and promotes the Prolonged War (Guerre Longue) to the personnel of the coalition at the Centcom in Florida.

The Concept: A Prolonged War is defined by the defeat of Al-Qaida and its associates and will continue after the stabilization of Afghanistan and Iraq.

Sophia's comment: This will be a neverending war because the war against Al-Qaida not only did not weaken Al-Qaida but is producing a lot of what general Kimmit calls 'associates'. As conceived by Washington, the war against Al-Qaida is a casus belli to put the entire world in a state of prolonged war. Terrorrism is not fought with big armies, military alliances and invasions of countries, terrorrism is best fought with intelligence. But intelligence for Washington is becoming a mean to create legitimisations for the invasions and not a tool to fight terrorrism.

The means
As the stabilization of Afghanistan and Iraq is nowhere in sight, Washington will rely more and more on NATO as it is doing in Afghanistan and will try to integrate coalition personnel and officers to its own Central Command staff to start other wars. It will necessitate the reduction of hierarchy levels between the Centcom and the secretary of state. It will rely on other means than military, the internet ???

Sophia's comment: Yes lets get rid of all the bureaucracy to speed things up like fabricating intelligence and propaganda, giving contracts to our friends at Halliburton and make disasters and civil wars in invaded countries look like perfect success. After the invasion, coalition forces will do the dirty job of making sure the mess we started will keep going on. As for the internet, the general was not explicit but he clearly want to look at other means than military, it could have been something else after all, the point is to find other means and right now he does not have the slightest idea.

Questions, précisions, dissent and some more bureaucracy
Jordanian general Alkhass Nart asks what 'Prolonged' means: 10 years, 100 years ?
The Tampa Centcom center for the war in Afghanistan and Iraq could eventually become the center for the War on Terrorrism everywhere in the world and general Gerald Minetti would like officers of the coalition forces to support not only the Centcom in Florida for the planning of the operations but also all the regional commands everywhere in the world.
European officers are reserved. They never saw the plans and the details for this Prolonged War and Danish general Falk Portved, who seems to have understood more than others what the Americans are saying, declares that he and other coalition officers never contemplated that the 'village' of the coalition in Tampa could become a new Atlantic Alliance. In the waiting of a final acceptance from its allies, Washington is moving the officers from barracks to permanent buildings hoping to create a 'situation on the ground' to facilitate its Prolonged War while their countries of origin are actually sending them on transitory assignements not more than one month.

Sophia's comment: general Alkhass is either an anxious person or a philosopher wanting to clarify the concept. By regularly briefing visiting officers from coalition countries on the concept of Prolonged War in a friendly atmosphere and by moving them fron transitory barracks to permanent buildings, Washington is hoping that colaition countries will eventually understand and accept to enroll in its Prolonged War. After all, even if the concept is far from being clear and even if there are no clear planning, Prolonged War against terrorrism will make its way among coalition countries because these countries have no international vision and no clear plans either for the actual political transformations of the world. Eventually also, even a vague concept, will make its way in the minds by virtue of repetition. Even a donkey* can learn from repetition, goes an Arab saying (please if someone have a better translation of the saying, send it to me).
*A donkey is considered as the dumbest of all animals in most of the arab world.

Update: Haaretz has this interesting report on washington's long war against what haaretz calls 'international terror'