Terrorism: The Root Cause And What They Are Not

Some substantial part of our intellectual and political leadership wring their hands daily in frustration and anguish trying to figure out what the USA has done to make so much of the Arab/Moslem world hate us. The question upon which they focus is: how can we combat terrorism effectively unless we get at the “root causes”? And by extension: if the USA is responsible to any degree for any of these “root causes”, then shouldn’t the USA take responsibility for its roll in causing the terrorism?

This is indeed a critical question. After all, any serious intent to eradicate a major problem must ascertain the root causes of that problem. But knowing that, the terrorists have provided us with some very compelling and gut-wrenching answers that have proven convincing to many. The problem is that the terrorists’ answers are clearly what the root causes are not. If we uncritically accept these faux answers, we will be falling into the terrorists’ sly trap. If we can be gulled into dissipating our energy and shifting our focus from the first order priorities in the war against global terrorism, then the terrorists will have an easier time defeating us.

But they cannot admit to their followers, or to us, that their real motivation is their own shame and fear...

That's inciteful, but we need not worry ourselves as to why they hate us, or even whether they hate us.

The attack on 9-11 occurred from a profound lack of respect born of years of cutting and running, and a refusal to bleed to protect ourselves. Humans have never required hatred to attack others, evil generally only requires the absence of fear of consequences.

Trying to define a "root cause" is an exercise in futility. We know there are some things that do not apply.

Poverty is not a source of their dissatisfaction, nor is there any real sense of exploitation or oppression. It distills down to envy and imagined slights, neither of which the parties to whom they direct their attacks upon (the alpha contingent, the power class) are even aware. This apparently proves, in their minds, that the alpha contingent is "insensitive", and "deserves" punishment. But they do not, or will not, communicate their sense of dissatisfaction to the alpha contingent. They grumble among themselves, recharging and regenerating their own paranoia, until they burst out with some totally irrational response to what is some innocuous action or statement from the alpha contingent.

The power class may themselves be stupid, or burdened with deep-seated and entrenched fiefdoms, or grown fat with a soft underbelly of pure lard, but one thing they do well, is protect themselves with the finest twenty-four inch, cold-rolled, case hardened, high-alloy steel armor plate that money and technology can provide for them. And the ability to track back any attack to its source (or perceived source), ruthlessly exterminating the perpetrators.

There may be additional factors in the equation of Arab hatred and terrorism, such as child-rearing customs that create repressed rage,...

If you want to explore this issue further, read "The Haj" by Leon Uris. After reading it, I dispaired that there would ever be peace between Islam and the West due to the child rearing practices of the Arab culture.

The root cause of terrorism is the fact that a bunch of medieval barbarians have far to much money.

Confiscate the oil fields, give them back to Exxon, build a wall around the the rest of the region, and let them rot.

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