War Words
A lexicon.

By Victor Davis Hanson, author most recently of Carnage and Culture: Landmark Battles in the Rise of Western Power.
January 4, 2002 8:20 a.m.

n every war, the first casualty is often vocabulary, as the distance between the reality we experience and the words we hear widens. So we see the fragility of language in the present war against terrorism — as Americans have had to amend their lexicon, ignore what they are told, and trust instead to what they see and hear.

Afghan: it's not just your granny's wool blanket

Al Jazeera: el sleezera

Allies: former friends with $3 billion in U.S. aid (see friends)

Al Qaeda: Saruman to Saddam's Sauron

Arafat: in his 11th hour always slips into English

Article Five: NATO's Apocrypha

B-52: an old 1950s rerun that the Taliban somehow missed

Bunker Busters: the name suggests a mix between Saturday morning cartoons and the Apocalypse; see Daisy-cutters

Burqa: would be outlawed as cruel and unusual prison garb by any U.S. court

"But": in the Middle East, this conjunction follows expressions of false sympathy and precedes empty threats

Carriers: if spotted offshore in groups of two or more — flee!

CNN: commentary — Not News

Coalition: a slander against the prefix "-co"

Cruise Missile: suddenly more irrelevant than indispensable

Crusade: as taboo a word as jihad is not

Crusades: in Middle Eastern time reckoning: 1st (1947); 2nd (1956); 3rd (1967); 4th (1973)

Daisy-cutter: a nuke without the fallout and mushroom

"Democracy": no word for it in the languages of the Middle East, though five and more exist for female veil

Durban: when used with Kyoto means nothing, but reveals everything

Enemies: their status each week is calibrated by the accuracy of bombing coupled with the quantity of aid

Envy: a word relevant to almost every aspect of the present crisis, although never employed in sophisticated conversation

Europe: Nestor of Homer's Iliad

Friends: former neutrals with $2 billion in U.S. aid (see neutrals)

Fundamentalist: seeks to reform the brutality of Middle Eastern autocracy with the brutality of Islamic theocracy

Geraldo: beware of entertainers with one name

Hamas: needs only Himmler's uniforms and catchy initials

House arrest: on the West Bank and in Pakistan entails loss of VCR privileges

Iran: should hope that those yokel Americans don't mix up their "n's" and "q's"

"Islamophobia": mostly a cover for anti-Semitism

Israel: quite obviously the sole cause of poverty, illiteracy, and misery among a billion Muslims

Jesse Jackson: get ready for war when the U.S. government says it has "no objections" to his next planned trip overseas

Jihad: more often directed at unarmed civilians in peacetime than against soldiers in war

Lebanon: terrorism's Wall Street

"Let's Roll": an American fatwa

"links to": at first always denied publicly, later quietly confirmed

madrassa: similar to a doctoral program in Comp. Lit.

"matter of national security": the "matter of" gives the game away.

Military tribunals: feared more by American professors than by al Qaeda terrorists

"Misspoke": got it right the first time

"Moderate" governments: abettors of, rather participants in, terrorism

Mullah Omar: Falstaff as psychopath

NATO: Not an Alliance, Treaty, or Organization

Neutrals: former enemies with $1 billion in U.S. aid

OBL: you know you're toast when American bureaucrats give you an acronym

Osama bin Laden: get Tony Robbins, pronto!

Pakistan: a mosquito buzzing in and out of the mouths of tigers

President Musharraf: see no, hear no, speak no evil

Profiling: can be done to, but not by, Americans

Ramadan: a holy month when Muslims should be allowed to shoot at, but not be shot at by, the Infidel

"Republic of ------": outside the West, means no elections

Royal Family: drop "royal" and for oil, imagine drugs — and then its size, nature, and organization suddenly become comprehensible to Americans

Saudi Arabia: a valued ally whose citizens butcher thousands of Americans, whose royal family funds worldwide terrorism, and whose government seeks to disrupt the economy of the United States in exchange for being defended by American troops

Security Check: postponement without protection

"Some sources report…": "My ill-informed opinion is…"

Special Forces: most prefer not to know what the "special" means

State Department: drops its own wrong policies as quickly as it adopts right ones from others

Taliban: cross between the SS and the Marx brothers

"Terrorist": if heard in any sentence starting "one man's …." , a waste of time to listen further

Terrorism: the mall and arcade for the young and restless of the Middle East

"There is no connection between…": always means there is

Tora Bora: really is an island of sorts surrounded by a sea of Predators and SEALS

U.N.: few united, fewer still nations

Unilateralism: an intended slur that is sure praise