War is always about "Us vs. Them" -- it always comes down to tribalism in some form. However, the sides used to be more distinct.

The sides used to be more static. More on this later. Basic idea is that this is a meme war; a war on Terror makes as much sense as a war on Coke or a war on Mondays. Memetic sides can infect population along information dispersal lines, correlated with but not parallel to tribal/cultural lines.