Appeasement never wins

Maybe Spain thought its troubles with terrorists were over when citizens elected a new government of appeasement.

The facts now show otherwise. So does history.

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Far from calling off the dogs, the terrorists who attacked Spain before its elections were planning to do so again. In fact, they did so again. But even more spectacular attacks were thwarted only when terrorists blew themselves up in a suicide bombing last week.

Mark my words: Spain has not seen the last of terrorism.

Why? Because the terrorists' goal was not simply to break up the coalition that liberated Iraq. The goal – long-term, anyway – is to "liberate" Spain from the infidels, to bring it back into the Dar al-Islam, the family of Muslim nations.

There's a lesson in this for the entire civilized world.

Appeasement never wins. It never accomplishes its objectives. It never succeeds in deterring aggression.

Take Israel as another example.

When the Jewish state targeted Hamas leader Sheikh Ahman Yassin for assassination, the Muslim extremists threatened massive retaliation. The conventional wisdom in the West was that this response by Israel would escalate the level of terrorism from Gaza and the Palestinian Authority.

Quite the opposite occurred. The new leader of Hamas is too busy hiding to concern himself with directing new attacks on Israel. The level of terrorist attacks on the Jewish state has declined substantially. There has not been one major terrorist attack on Israeli citizens since the Yassin killing.

Take the U.S. response to Sept. 11, 2001, as another example.

The U.S. responded massively to the attacks. We sent troops around the world – to Afghanistan to attack the source and later to Iraq to attack a supporter of worldwide Islamic terror. Many of the leaders and operational planners have been caught or killed. Others are on the run.

The result?

No more major terrorist attacks on the U.S.
This is not to say a good offense is the only defense. This is not to suggest the U.S. is safe from any future terror attacks. But it does illustrate that an offensive strategy, rather than appeasement, works.

Right now, terrorists in Iraq have taken three Japanese civilians hostage. They are threatening to kill them if Japan does not withdraw its 500 coalition troops from the country.

Once again, we see the strategy. Isolate the U.S. from the rest of the civilized world. Raise the price for fighting terrorism. Wage a psychological warfare campaign not on the battlefield, but in the homes of comfortable people who want no part of a street fight with thugs.

It's tempting to turn away from this darkness – to yield to it, to surrender to it, to pretend that if we all just mind out own business, it will leave us alone.

That's not the way evil works.

And make no mistake about it – we are fighting pure evil in Iraq, in Afghanistan and elsewhere around the world in this global fight against Islamic jihadist terror.

But there's only one way to free ourselves from this plague – to continue to take the fight to the enemy, to call their bluff and to make them feel more pain than we feel.

Not only should the U.S. continue to fight this way, we must turn our allies loose. We must learn the historical lessons of appeasement.

No war was ever won by a country fighting with one hand tied behind its back. No war was ever won fighting under the rules of politically correct engagement. No war was ever won when "allies" are trying to cut their own deals with the enemy. No war was ever won by prolonging the conflict unnecessarily.