Tony Blair is right...

British Prime Minister Tony Blair, March 21: (Video here)

"Here, in its most pure form, is a struggle between democracy and violence.

"We must reject the thought that somehow we are the authors of our own distress, that if only we altered this decision or that, the extremism would fade away. The only way to win is to recognize this phenomenon is a global ideology, to see all areas in which it operates as linked, and to defeat it by values and ideas set in opposition to those of the terrorists.

"The fundamental point: 'We' is not the West. 'We' are as much Muslim as Christian or Jew or Hindu. 'We' are those who believe in religious tolerance, openness to others, to democracy, liberty, and human rights administered by secular courts.

"This is not a clash between civilizations. It is a clash about civilization. It is the age-old battle between progress and reaction, between those who embrace and see opportunity in the modern world and those who reject its existence; between optimism and hope on the one hand, and pessimism and fear on the other.

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This is not a clash between civilizations.
It is a clash about civilization.

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"(The terrorists) know that if they can succeed either in Iraq or Afghanistan, or indeed in Lebanon or anywhere else wanting to go the democratic route, then the choice of a modern democratic future for the Arab or Muslim world is dealt a potentially mortal blow. Likewise if they fail, and those countries become democracies and make progress and, in the case of Iraq, prosper rapidly, then not merely is that a blow against their whole value system but it is the most effective message possible against their wretched propaganda about America, the West, the rest of the world.

"That to me is the painful irony of what is happening. They have so much clearer a sense of what is at stake. They play our own media with a shrewdness that would be the envy of many a political party. Every act of carnage adds to the death toll. But somehow it serves to indicate our responsibility for disorder rather than the act of wickedness that causes it. For us, so much of our opinion believes that what was done in Iraq in 2003 was so wrong that it is reluctant to accept what is plainly right now.

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That to me is the painful irony
of what is happening. They (terrorists)
have so much clearer a
sense of what is at stake.

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"What happens in Iraq or Afghanistan today is not just crucial for the people in those countries or even in those regions, but for our security here and round the world. It is a cause that has none of the debatable nature of the decisions to go for regime change. It is an entirely noble one - to help people in need of our help in pursuit of liberty - and a self-interested one, since in their salvation lies our own security."

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