Lets subject this to some intelligent debate (god help it). What is this statement all about, what is it's reality and purpose. And as a policy is it ever workable?

I put it to the backroom that it's empty rhetoric for three reasons:

1) Practical - Negotiation is inevitable in any contest which cannot be fought out by force alone. It is desireable from a practical political and military standpoint to war with words sometimes. Treaties are the end result of all wars that aren't genocidal colonial.

2) Political - It is merely what the American people want/expect to hear and what the politicians want/expect to say. No one really wants to committ political suicide by going against the ingrained mantra.

3) Philosophical - Because all communication is in effect negotiation. Saying "we will not negotiate" is in itself a type of negotiation. Field agents, politicians and diplomats are continuously talking and negotiating this war on terror at the fringes.

I leave it open to the floor.