SOP: All the Islamic culture we need to understand is that it's real clumsy to behead a guy with a dull knife. Makes you look slow and weak. And to bore the poor guy with a 4 minute diatribe in a language he couldn't even understand....

Well sure, man...people who lack a vast modern arsenal of nuclear weapons, B-52 squadrons, F-18s, aircraft carriers, and other such expensive killing machines are definitely "slow and weak" in terms of modern military striking power...which is why they do all they can by striking back in a far more primitive fashion at any individual Americans who are reachable. American Indians used to do the same sort of thing in wartime, not having gatling guns and artillery squads at their disposal. It's brutal, graphic, and ugly...but so is blowing up a house with a cruise missile.

As for the 4 minute diatribe, I suspect that was more for the benefit of other Iraqi and Arab listeners than for the poor guy who got his head cut off.

It isn't all about us, you see. It's their country, not ours.