The Bush Administration's Re-Branding of "The War on Terror"

Did you know that the "War on Terror" is out, and that America is now fighting "The Long War?" While we were chuckling over Dick Cheney's bad aim and even-worse public relations skills, the Pentagon, yet again, renamed the conflicts American soldiers are engaged in over in Iraq and Afghanistan. But this time, it is more than just a shift in semantics. It is a shift in strategy that is taking what was originally sold to Congress as a limited battle to uncover weapons of mass destruction, and turned it into - literally - a war without end.

The latest re-branding of the war actually occurred on February 3rd, when the Pentagon presented Congress with its 20-year strategic plan called the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR). The report, which is issued every four years, was widely anticipated in Washington defense circles because it is the first post-9/11 QDR. And although America's global military role has changed dramatically since 2001, resulting in America's involvement in an increasingly unpopular war, the release of this significant document went almost entirely un-noticed by most major news outlets.

The opening sentence of the 2006 QDR says that "the United States is a nation engaged in what will be a long war," a phrase that was echoed by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in a speech to the National Press Club a day prior to the report's release. The QDR explains that the U.S. military has moved away from conventional warfare to what it calls "irregular conflicts." That is, unlike the Cold War or World Wars I and II which framed specific countries as enemies, an "irregular" war's targets are insurgents, terrorists and other non-state enemies. According to the Pentagon, the long war "may well be fought in dozens of other countries simultaneously and for many years to come."

Up until now, Americans have been led to believe that "we are winning the war on terror," (President Bush, Feb. 6, 2006 State of the Union) and that "the insurgency is in its last throes," (Dick Cheney, May 31, 2005). These were statements which suggested that there would be a clear end to the war America is currently fighting. But the QDR tosses that notion right out the window, and in fact, presents a more realistic vision of what our country and our military face in the coming decades. It also admits that the methods the military will use to fight this war "requires…unconventional and indirect approaches." In Pentagon-speak, that means spying and intelligence gathering. "Maintaining a long-term, low-visibility presence in many areas of the world where US forces do not traditionally operate will be required" is how it is phrased in the report. However, the QDR does not make it clear whether or not that includes increased spying operations on home soil.

In the past, President Bush and his advisors have very shrewdly made a show of re-branding the war, in an effort to regain lost American hearts and minds. But war, and his handling of it, continues to be a drag on the president's approval ratings. The latest Zogby International poll out this week shows Mr. Bush's approval ratings down to 37%. That's more than 30 percentage points lower than President Clinton's approval rating at the time he was impeached. Those shrinking poll numbers no doubt played a role in the decision to sneak this latest war re-branding effort under the radar, in the guise of an obscure Defense Department report. Not coincidently, the QDR came just days before the release of the Bush Administration's 2007 proposed federal budget, which included a record request for $439 billion to fund the Department of Defense.

Meantime, President Bush and his handlers have been keeping pretty quiet about the long war, choosing instead to focus their agenda on energy issues (this week), and health care (last week). The media seems to be bored with war coverage as well, choosing instead to cover Dick Cheney's misfire, questionable port security contracts, Muslim cartoon outrage and America's failure to dominate the Winter Olympics. But while both the president and the press are putting the war issue on their back burners, Americans still find it critical. In fact, this week's Zogby poll found that the war in Iraq and "the long war" (formerly known as the "war on terror") remain the top two issues for Americans.

So while the President travels around trying to focus on domestic areas of his agenda, and the press runs rabid after - whatever, Americans who really want to know where we are heading militarily need only read a copy of the QDR found on the DOD's website. Because even if you don't agree with it, at least it's better than being kept in the dark.