Transcript: Bush Casts War on Terrorism in Historic Terms

And like the aggressive ideologies that rose up in the early 1900s, our enemies have clearly and proudly stated their intentions. Here are the words of Al Qaida's self-described military spokesman in Europe, on a tape claiming responsibility for the Madrid bombings.

He said, "We choose death, while you choose life. If you do not stop your injustices, more and more blood will flow, and these attacks will seem very small compared to what can occur, and what you call terrorism."

Here are the words of another Al Qaida spokesman, Suleiman Abu Gaith (ph). Last year in an article published on an Al Qaida Web site, he said, quote, "We have the right to kill 4 million Americans, 2 million of them children and to exile twice as many and wound and cripple hundreds of thousands.

BUSH: "Furthermore, it is our right to fight them with chemical and biological weapons."

In all these threats we hear the echoes of other enemies in other times: that same swagger and demented logic of the fanatic.

Like their kind in the past, these murderers have left scars and suffering. And like their kind in the past, they will flame and fail and suffer defeat by free men and women.

(APPLAUSE)

The enemies of freedom are opposed by a great and growing alliance. Nations that won the Cold War, nations once behind an iron curtain, and nations on every continent see this threat clearly.

We're cooperating at every level of our military, law enforcement and intelligence to meet the danger. The war on terror is civilization's fight. And as in the struggles of the last century, civilized nations are waging this fight together.

The terrorists of our day are in some ways unlike the enemies of the past. The terrorist ideology has not yet taken control of a great power like Germany or the Soviet Union.

And so the terrorists have adopted a strategy different from the gathering of vast and standing armies. They seek instead to demoralize free nations with dramatic acts of murder. They seek to wear down our resolve and will by killing the innocent and spreading fear and anarchy.

BUSH: And they seek weapons of mass destruction so they can threaten or attack even the most powerful nations.

Fighting this kind of enemy is the complex mission that will require all your skill and resourcefulness.

Our enemies have no capital or nation-state to defend. They share a vision and operate as a network of dozens of violent extremist groups around the world, striking separately and in concert.

Al Qaida is the vanguard of these loosely affiliated groups and we estimate that over the years many thousands of recruits have passed through its training camps.

Al Qaida has been wounded by losing nearly two-thirds of its known leadership and most of its important sanctuaries, yet many of the terrorists it trained are still active in hidden cells or in other groups.

Home-grown extremists, incited by Al Qaida's example, are at work in many nations. And since September the 11th, we've seen terrorist violence in an arc from Morocco to Spain to Turkey to Russia to Uzbekistan to Pakistan to India to Thailand to Indonesia.

Yet the center of the conflict, the platform for their global expansion, the region they seek to remake in their image is the broader Middle East. Just as events in Europe determined the outcome of the Cold War, events in the Middle East will set the course of our current struggle.

If that region is abandoned to dictators and terrorists, it will be a constant source of violence and alarm, exporting killers of increasing destructive power to attack America and other free nations.

If that region grows in democracy and prosperity and hope, the terrorist movement will lose its sponsors, lose its recruits and lose the festering grievances that keep terrorists in business.

The stakes of this struggle are high. The security and peace of our country are at stake. And success in this struggle is our only option.

(APPLAUSE)

BUSH: This is the great challenge of our time, the storm in which we fly.

History is once again witnessing a great clash.

This is not a clash of civilizations. The civilization of Islam, with its humane traditions of learning and tolerance, has no place for this violent sect of killers and aspiring tyrants.

This is not a clash of religions. The faith of Islam teaches moral responsibility that ennobles men and women and forbids the shedding of innocent blood.

Instead, this is a clash of political visions.

In the terrorist vision of the world, the Middle East must fall under the rule of radical governments, moderate Arab states must be overthrown, nonbelievers must be expelled from Muslim lands and the harshest practice of extremist rule must be universally enforced. In this vision, books are burned, terrorists are sheltered, women are whipped and children are schooled in hatred and murder and suicide.

Our vision is completely different. We believe that every person has a right to think and pray and live in obedience to God and conscience, not in frightened submission to despots.

(APPLAUSE)

We believe that societies find their greatness by encouraging the creative gifts of their people, not in controlling their lives and feeding their resentments. And we have confidence that people share this vision of dignity and freedom in every culture because liberty is not the invention of Western culture, liberty is the deepest need and hope of all humanity.

(APPLAUSE)

BUSH: The vast majority of men and women in Muslim societies reject the domination of extremists like Osama bin Laden. They're looking to the world's free nations to support them in their struggle against a violent minority who want to impose a future of darkness across the Middle East.