A speech by Gingrich, the historian

[RationalThought110]

http://www.newt.org/backpage.asp?art=4815

He often has many ideas.  Did he try to implement any of them during his tenure in Congress or did he allow himself to be controlled by special-interest groups?

[RationalThought110]

I'll post this from an e-mail he's sent out:


"The Petraeus Report: What It Means and What It Doesn't Mean

I began this thought experiment yesterday in a speech at the American Enterprise Institute. Today, I'm going to talk about some of the highlights of that speech, but you can view and read it here.

Because this rethinking of the past six years is meant to make it easier to be creative about the next six years, I began my speech with a comment about the latest benchmark assessment of our national security efforts since 9/11 -- the Petraeus Report.

As I mentioned last week, the Petraeus Report is an important report. The debate over it will be an important debate.

But it is critical that the Petraeus Report be viewed in context.

It is a campaign report about a specific campaign. Iraq is a campaign in a larger war, just as Afghanistan is a campaign in a larger war.

Yet, the Petraeus Report is not a report on "the war." We are not having a debate in Washington this week about "the war."

Beyond the Petraeus Report: The Report on the Larger War

Here's how I put it in my speech yesterday:

      Beyond the Petraeus Report, we need a report on the larger war with the Irreconcilable Wing of Islam.

      This enemy is irreconcilable with the modern civilized world because its values would block any woman from being in this room, having a job, voting, being educated.

      It is irreconcilable because it cannot tolerate other religions or other lifestyles.

      It represents what some have called an "Islamo-fascist" approach to imposing its views on others, and as such, it is a mortal threat to our way of life, to freedom and to the rule of law.

      The Irreconcilable Wing of Islam has emerged as an extremist movement against not only non-Muslims but also against moderate Muslims who wish both to preserve their faith and to be a part of the modern world. This extremism has led to civil war in Algeria killing more than 100,000 Muslims. It has led to continuing violence in Lebanon, more than 2,000 killed in Thailand, the Philippines and a number of other places. It has mobilized forces outside traditional trouble spots, including recently Germany, Denmark and Great Britain. And while the vast majority of Muslims wish to be a part of the civilized world and do not want the extremists in the Irreconcilable Wing of Islam to win, the enemy's global reach, including in places like Paraguay and Venezuela, is greater than anyone might have expected a decade ago."

[RationalThought110]

"What If? Explaining the Larger War With the Irreconcilable Wing of Islam in a Novel Way

Then I built on the Reagan, Lincoln and Roosevelt models of success to ask what a realistic alternative history of the current war might look like now, six years after 9/11.

I asked my audience -- as I ask you now -- to imagine that we, as a nation, stunned by the bitter blows of the day before, now awake the day after September 11 and embark upon a different course of action.

What if, beginning Sept. 12, 2001, we had taken the following steps?

One: What if, on the morning of Sept. 12, 2001, the shocked national political leadership in both parties had understood the necessity to take a deep, long look at the Irreconcilable Wing of Islam?

Two: What if we had begun a series of bipartisan congressional hearings on the scale of terrorist financing from sources in Saudi Arabia, the degree of Iranian and Syrian support for terrorism and the various propagandizing and recruiting efforts that were underway to attract terrorists at a rate faster than we could kill or imprison them?

Three: What if the news media had begun a series of informative, in-depth explorations of the Iranian war against America and then went on to examine the goals of the various irreconcilable groups and the religious fervor with which they are willing to die for their beliefs?

Four: What if the great bureaucracies of national security and homeland security had immediately begun to place defeating the enemy above protecting their normal routine systems?

Five: What if the Office of Management and Budget had been instructed to set aside its peacetime formulas and attitudes and operate within a war-time footing to facilitate the mobilization and build up necessary to both win the war with the Irreconcilable Wing of Islam and preserve America's military and intelligence capabilities on other fronts?  "

[RationalThought110]

"An Alternative History Since 9/11: The Key Decisions for Victory

Imagine that we had asked -- and answered -- these key questions starting Sept. 12, 2001. With these realizations as a starting point, it's relatively easy to imagine how an alternative history of the last six years might have involved the following key decisions having been taken and systematically implemented.

Again, quoting from my AEI speech:

Decision No. 1 -- Defining the Enemy and Understanding the Threat: "First, in the days immediately after 9/11, senior political leaders decided that since the American people are the center of gravity in any American war, an all out effort would have to be made to educate them about the dangers (nuclear and biological attacks, large scale civilian attacks) and the motivating forces behind those dangers."

Decision No. 2 -- Establishing an Effective Homeland Defense: "Second, after 9/11, since the defense of America is the top priority, a serious and effective Department of Homeland Security was immediately established. The department was organized to address three major functions: protecting the border, preparing to recover from a nuclear event and preparing for an engineered biological attack."

Decision No. 3 -- Mobilizing Public Opinion at Home and Abroad: "Third, as the President prepared for his historic Sept. 20, 2001, speech to a joint session of Congress, it was decided that since a sound effort to defeat the terrorists would have to begin with the support of allies and world opinion, great effort was going to have to be made to mobilize and sustain world opinion and to work closely with every government willing to fight to sustain civilization and the rule of law. The lessons of World War II and the Cold War in developing both overt and covert Public Diplomacy were applied to winning this new struggle."

Decision No. 4 -- A Military Buildup and Dramatic Replacement of Outdated Institutions and Bureaucratic Processes: "Fourth, within the revised framework of strategic communications, defense and diplomacy, a major revolution in the national security capabilities of the United States was undertaken post 9/11. The national security system had been grossly under funded in the 1990s. The intelligence community had been particularly weakened and was suffering from a generation of abuse going back to the Pike and Church Committees. The military itself was preparing for the wrong wars using the wrong doctrine. The State Department had been left under funded, under staffed, under trained and under supervised "   

[Shoshana]

Thanks for posting this. I am generally a big Newt supporter.