In the past, when Microsoft put Linux down, the Linux community would rely upon its users to defend it in such popular open source forums as Slashdot. The Linux vendors would stay above the fray.

No more. Matthew J. Szulik, Red Hat CEO has taken off the kid gloves and come out swinging in a rebuttal to Microsoft's recent Linux putdowns.

It's not as though Szulik hasn't had provocation. In recent weeks, Microsoft big wigs have been lining up to take swings at Linux.

Doug Miller, Microsoft group product manager, opened up by saying of Linux, "there's very little value in free."

At Microsoft's January investment conference, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer proclaimed, "Linux is our enemy No. 1."

And, on Valentine's Day, Microsoft's chief of Windows, James Allchin, sent a very special valentine to Linux, proclaiming that open source is an "intellectual property destroyer," an innovation killer, and with a touch of the surreal, suggested that open source and therefore Linux, is un-American.

Szulik's exasperated response is, "There's so much FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) here, it's hard to know where to start."

But, then he does so by dividing Microsoft's arguments into three core contentions: Linux is immature; Linux threatens Microsoft's core business and open source destroys intellectual property and kills innovation.

Addressing the first issue, Szulik simply points to the market facts of life. He notes that International Data Corporation's (IDC) most recent server operating system study shows that Linux has now captured almost 30 percent of the market. And he can't resist saying though that "'blue screen of death' does not refer to Linux systems, but rather to the immature Windows products."

When it comes to Linux threatening Microsoft core's business, Szulik agrees, that's exactly what Linux is doing at the server operating system level.

From here, he moves into the high rhetoric of open source believers, "But even more dangerous, the open source model threatens the core business strategy of Microsoft domination, monopoly, total control and restricted consumer choices. History has shown that hegemonists and those who restrict freedom ultimately fail. Microsoft is on the wrong side of history."

Szulik finds Allchin's comments about open source's destruction of innovation to be "a bizarre accusation." Since then Microsoft has recast Allchin's comments, saying it's only one section of the GNU General Public License (GPL) that Allchin objects to.

To Szulik, it makes no difference. "Open source is creating tremendous intellectual property in software that is copyrighted through the GPL every day. With open source, the users own it, improve it and share it to everyone's benefit."

Indeed as far as Szulik is concerned, "I'd argue that a worldwide monopoly, enforced by business practices that a federal judge has found to be predatory and anti-competitive probably has more to do with killing innovation than anything the open source movement could ever do."

While Szulik is concerned about his business coming under attack by Microsoft, it's not because he fears failure. As he said, "It's nice to know that Linux and open source have grown so much, and moved so firmly into the mainstream of computing that Mighty Microsoft is scared." What troubles him concerns Linux and Red Hat having "to face such specious and unfounded arguments and accusations." But he also knows "which movement is on the right side. Freedom, access and individual rights always prevail in the long run."

And, so with fervour and a belief that right and history are on his side, not to mention superior technology, Szulik meets the Microsoft challenge with flags waving. Whatever else may be said about the Windows vs. Linux debate, let it never be said that it will be a dull fight between warring technocrats.

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