Islamic terrorists growing a conscience?

The inestimable Bill Roggio from the Long War Journal is reporting on an announcement from the Caucasus Emirate* terror group's leader Doku Umarov that directs the CE's operatives and fighters to stop deliberately attacking Russian civilians. This is progress of a sort, assuming of course that the CE's leader's order was sincerely made and that he can and will enforce it.

"Doku Umarov, the leader of the al Qaeda-linked Caucasus Emirate," says Roggio, "has ordered an end to attacks that deliberately target Russian civilians. The move is a shift in strategy after his suicide bombers deliberately attacked civilians inside Russia over the past two years, including in the capital of Moscow."

The Russian state and its political leadership, bureaucracies, military, intelligence, and police are all still considered fair game for attacks though.

* The Caucasus Emirate (Imarat Kavkaz) website.

No kidding!

From Bill Roggio at the Threat Matrix blog:"How many times do 75 percent of al Qaeda's top leaders need to be killed before the terror group is dead?" You really can't win this game of whack-a-mole like this in my opinion.

Why you shouldn't do a land war in Asia

"On the eve of the 10-year anniversary of Sept. 11, the Taliban have issued a defiant statement saying the US does not have the 'stamina' or the 'weapon of belief' to remain in the fight in Afghanistan. The Taliban also claimed that unlike the West, it possessed 'endless stamina for a long war.' " (h/t: Bill Roggio @ The Long War Journal)

As Field Marshall Bernard Law Montgomery (Lord Alamein)  noted in a 1962 speech before the English Parliament:

"The US has broken the second rule of war. That is, don't go fighting with your land army on the mainland of Asia. Rule One is don't march on Moscow. I developed these two rules myself." (Wikipedia) [emphasis added]