There is one respect in which the Iraqi insurgency differs considerably from that which unfolded in the Philippines. The insurrectos of the latter conflict had a clearly defined political agenda that they aggressively marketed to their fellow citizens. Rebel commanders distributed public letters arguing their case, appealing to sentiments of patriotism, nationalism, and self-sovereignty. Their message, quite simply, was that the Philippines should be ruled by Filipinos, without interference from an unelected colonial government.
Today, by contrast, it is the United States that is attempting to create an Iraq that is ruled by Iraqis, while it is insurgents who wish to reassert the tyranny of an unelected minority over the rest of their country. Perhaps this is why there is no political wing to the Iraqi insurgency; no Baathist equivalent to Emilio Aguinaldo or Ho Chi Minh; no videotaped messages left behind by the suicide bombers for broadcast on Al Jazeera. Their cause hides in the shadows; its only public manifestation is violence. Indeed, the most unusual feature of this insurgency is its steadfast refusal to articulate any set of principles before the world. Thus, in the face of such nihilistic terrorism, the United States has an ideological advantage absent in many “small wars” of our past. In the Iraqi counterinsurgency, a great deal of history remains to be written.
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