Bin Laden is winning. Murricah is trading massive amounts of freedom for a tiny bit of security. The UK is just as crazy.
Well, Bin Laden wasn't really tremendously interested in merely destroying America's freedom, he had real goals about actually doing things, and many if not most of those goals involved removing the Western power from the picture. His movement has not actually been doing all that well, losing ground to organizations like ISIS.
There is too strong a tendency to have things we don't like and to then ascribe them to the bad people we know. I doubt Osama Bin Laden was attempting to turn the United States into a conservative nightmare, and I can't help but think some people are projecting their own fears onto him. Everyone sees the villain they fear: Foreign theocrat out to destroy the country and it's culture or an all-too-willing boogeyman aiming to bring down the country from within by destroying their values, depending on your POV.
Besides, ISIS is not Al Qaeda (anymore at least). They both hate each other tremendously, and have different goals, methods, and resources. If this thread is about ISIS, you are a little off-topic, unless you are discussing the period before the broke apart.
Bin Laden is winning. Murricah is trading massive amounts of freedom for a tiny bit of security. The UK is just as crazy.
Oh please, the American government was becoming increasingly authoritarian before 9/11 happened, and the UK was already a disarmed surveillance state. The NSA expressed its desire to "improve" its data collection techniques long before Bin Laden began his own plans. Between Bush and Obama, Blair and Brown (and Cameron), the security bureaus have been winning all thanks to their turbanned enemy.
I've never met someone who
downplayed the importance of 9/11 in US thought.
Loud Whispers - I am not sure how you see that as not winning. they are losing just like the vietcong lost the vietnam war. sure, IS might eventually be repelled from Ramadi, which isn't exactly a small town, but a strategically and morally important city, they might kill less than their casualties and they might not succeed taking bases with american forces inside, but they are not fighting a traditional war. they are not going to go heads on against Israel, Saudi Arabia, Turkey or any of the Western powers, but they don't need to. a vastly inferior organization, both in funding and in personnel managed to take down the WTC.
IS also border Jordan and Lebanon, which are in a real danger by IS as well and they also succeed in Libya.
MonkeyHead - The west will do nothing if IS stop confining itself to the occasional rocket launch from Egypt and Gaza and really attacks israel. the U.N is a joke in everything related to Israel and Israel would be lucky if the UN won't pass a resolution that justifies IS attacks somehow, Israel is not a part of NATO and the U.S will do nothing since they won't be needed. besides, IS will operate in israel using the same tactics Hamas and Fatah do and any reaction from israel will result in the same outcry it has now when they operate against Hamas.
From what I've read, ISIS really doesn't have any interest in Israel for specifically the reason that Israel would wipe them from the face of the earth. As non-traditional as they are, they are *still* an army, and they have focused on winning their wars. They are not planning massive terrorist attacks in the US beyond the actions of lone wolves.
In fact in Syria both ISIS and Assad have been using the same strategy: Assad benefits politically if the world is forced to choose between ISIS and him, because there is no situation where the world will pick ISIS. ISIS, for their part, get to be the only opposition to Assad. Eventually this will be true with regards to Israel, but it's not anywhere close to an immediate threat. Politically, their goal is to be
the Muslim nation, after all. They want to be the one and only, the only options Muslims have if they don't support the west or the local dictator. This means they actively attack other organizations such as the Insurgents in Syria, and Hamas, because it's in their interest to give Muslims no choice.
As for winning, I don't know. I'm not on the ground and can't speculate. I don't see them having the ability to win in the long-term, because if things went totally down the drain, I'm sure someone (either the US, Iran, the Saudis, the UN
someone) would intervene. If Iraq looked like it would fall, Iran at least would move in, and I doubt Assad's allies would let him lose after all this time.