Posted on 09/30/2001 9:31:07 AM PDT by annalex
Two characteristics of the militant Arab threat to our country need to be kept in mind: it is cosmopolitan inside the world of Islam, and it has deep roots everywhere in that world. In this paper we will examine those characteristic and draw conclusions that will allow us to define the proper strategic and political goals of the war. Defense of Liberty: The Contours of Victory
By Annalex
The diverse character of what is collectively known as militant Islam is remarkable. It ranges from deep religious convictions of Muslim scholars such as the late Ayatollah Khomeini, and from atavistic social practices of the Taliban, to the ragtag guerilla armies of Chechnya and the PLO, the elite Iraqi regulars, and to the respectable doctor's offices in Cairo. Its apparent leader Osama bin Laden is a Yemeni who grew up in privilege and wealth in Saudi Arabia and moved with ease from there to Sudan and then to Afghanistan. Bin Laden assumes the role of a religious leader alongside his undisputable credentials as a terrorist mastermind, and indeed seems to be a devout man leading an ascetic lifestyle. Yassir Arafat, on the other hand, apparently enjoys his secular status of a de-facto head of state, conferred onto him by the Western appeasers. Saddam Hussein, of course is a head of state -- the most secularized one in the Arab world. Osama's illiterate foot soldiers are recruited from the least accessible barren plateaus of Afghanistan, while his suicidal strike force had followed a seemingly assimilated American immigrant middle class track through engineering colleges and flight schools.
At the same time, a parallel Arab universe exists both in the Middle East and in American immigration circles. They are laborers and peasants, shopkeepers and doctors, who maintain a rational economic life, obey the law of the land, pray to Mecca as required, and have no intention of bombing anything. To borrow the American demographic term from the Clinton era, they are soccer Muslims: middle class for their locale, driven by petty economic concerns, philistine (some even Philistine), non-ideological. While the recruits of the militant factions come entirely from this benign Muslim milieu, it would be a gross mistake to identify the entire world of Islam as militant. In fact, great tension exists between the militants and the merchants in the Muslim world, as exemplified by the multiple terrorist acts against the Egyptian tourist industry.
What are the roots of the Arab militancy?
It is tempting to accuse the Muslim religion of fostering violence against the infidels. The Koran does contain examples of Prophet Mohammed condoning violence against and deceit of infidels, that don't find a direct parallel in either the Torah or the New Testament. Nevertheless, an overwhelming number of the world's Muslims has a heightened religious awareness and do not seem to be particularly violent, and moreover, militant Islam is a new phenomenon in the modern history. In any religion, the job of the clergy is to put the messages of its scripture in proper historical context; at most, with respect to Islam, we can say that the Islamic clergy contains militant elements alongside peace-loving ones. Clearly, Islam alone cannot explain Muslim, let alone Arab, militancy. Similarly, the social factors, such as the lack of indigenous technological progress, low social mobility and political repression, although all relevant, do not provide a complete explanation, since a fertile ground for terrorism exists across many social orders in the Middle East, from medieval monarchies to semi-democratic secular governments. We have to conclude that the root of the Arab militancy is to be found at the intersection of social, cultural, and religious Arab experience. The convenient operative word here is: civilization.
Let us take a short theoretical digression. Many cultures, ideologies and traditions typically coexist in a society, either as distinct cultures carried by its individual members, or as foreign cultures that are understood by the given society, sufficiently for cultural interaction. A civilization is a conglomerate of interconnected and inter-accessible cultures, ideologies and traditions. Thus we speak of the Western Civilization, as a loosely connected system of human experiences: the cultures of Europe and the Americas, religious tolerance, secular humanism, rule of law, government by consensus, individualism and materialism. A German engineer may have little in common with a Mexican farmer, yet both cultures easily mix, for example, in California. Thus a civilization gives an individual his cultural universe; outside of that universe an individual is lost: his life has no meaning. An individual facing a foreign but civilizationally compatible culture adapts, learns the ways and the language, and lives on. An individual facing a foreign civilization feels as if he were facing invaders from the outer space. While most cherish their culture, few are prepared to die for it, but many would willingly die in what they see as an eschatological struggle between good and evil.
The diversity of cultures that produce Arab militancy, its complete intellectual impenetrability (imagine trying to reason with Osama bin Laden), its lack of concrete policy goals, the extreme, self-denying devotion of its followers all point to a hostile civilization alien to the West. Historically, we could trace the Arab militancy to the warrior culture of the Arab Caliphate. The conjecture, although not provable or falsifiable directly, can explain the militancy's virulence: we are dealing with an ancient, once great civilization in its death spasms, not almost completely supplanted by secularized and benign forms of Islam.
The worst enemy of an Islamic militant is then not the Western man, a Jew or an American; not his corrupt and dictatorial national ruler, -- it is his neighbor running a coffee shop, a car dealer, a tourist guide: a modest economic man, nominally his fellow Muslim, crossing over to the global economic network and ultimately -- to the ascending Western Civilization.
It is true that Arab militants and soccer Muslims share their local national cultures and concrete policy goals such as territorial disputes with Israel or overthrow of national government. To the extent that those goals do not take on the cosmic overtones of a civilizational struggle, -- for example, do not call for destruction of Israel or The Great Satan, -- those goals, whether we sympathize with them or not, should not be confused with the enemy as it presented itself to us on September 11. Without a doubt, Israel will be a natural benefactor of the defeat of Arab terrorism; however, the nature of the emerging war is different from any territorial dispute.
The emerging war has many historical predecessors. In its youth, the West battled the Arab Caliphate in its civilizational prime. Not that long ago a low-level ongoing conflict with an alien civilization (or civilizations) was known as colonialism. Recently, the West emerged bruised but victorious from two global battles, the World War II and the Cold War. The battle with Communism is particularly instructive in the present context, because Communism was another international in character civilization, based on a coherent and hostile to the West ethos and permeating diverse cultures. It is notable that it took a combination of military strength and efforts of our ideological allies inside the Iron Curtain to defeat world Communism. Both colonialist and the Cold War experiences will have to be revisited today in our search for the proper strategy.
Several conclusions follow from this. The enemy needs to be understood in civilizational, not merely cultural terms. Every Muslim nation has our friends and our enemies; our potentially solid allies are westernized Muslim immigrants, who are refugees from the same militant environment we are combating, as well as Muslim clerics who honestly denounce violence. That does not preclude converting the war on terrorism into a war on nations harboring terrorists, but it precludes a total war against any civilian population.
It is not possible to localize the war to any particular country or set of countries, since any Muslim country contains indigenous militant elements, and the enemy can move from country to country with ease. President Bush's formula: any nation that abets terrorism is our enemy as a nation, -- is the only logical one. Particular care needs to be taken therefore to prevent unnecessary mission creep and limit the goals of this war to elimination of terrorism across rogue nations, as opposed to merely a war on nations with which we (or Israel) may have had frictions in the past. Nor is it possible to conduct this war as a law enforcement operation aimed at the current perpetrators of violence, since new terrorists, even new terrorist networks, can emerge as soon as the old ones are apprehended. It is not possible to retaliate against a martyr, but it is possible to reduce the scope of operation of aspiring martyrs.
For the same reasons it will not be possible to limit our engagement to military means: "strike hard and get out". Any military campaign needs to be followed up by either an occupation regime, or establishment of a friendly government committed to a meaningful, from terrorism-fighting standpoint system of law enforcement. It is in our vital interest to leave the area not sooner than when a Muslim culture rooted in property rights and genuine political pluralism has a chance to withstand future recurrence of Arab militancy.
The policy advocated here has a discredited name: imperialism. At its best, imperialism means a careful management of foreign relations with multiple weaker countries, based on unabashed projection of military strength combined with its minimalist application, and on asymmetrical parent-child diplomacy. The Twentieth Century saw a hasty dismantlement of the old imperialist system and its replacement with an illusion of a one-nation-one-vote world parliament and a cabal of international corporate management organically incapable of cultural or historical insights. Now it is time for the West, in particular, for the United States, to assume leadership once more.
All rights reserved. Reproduction in full is authorized with attribution to the Free Republic and Annalex.
You are one sick turd if you think that that is all they are.
Oops, you gave yourself away again. Lets see if we can recall who the drug user is again. You are an admitted drug user. You have admitted using pot and mushrooms to muddle your already pathetic brain.
I have never used any illegal substance. So don't call me a dope head when you are the user.
Oops, you lied. I have advocated total elimination of all the people who have attacked us. I advocate no mercy for the guilty.
I would show the same to whomever tried to take my freedom away, whomever, get it son?
The day you personally show up to take my freedoms away you will find out what kind of a pu$$y I am.
When I was a dope head in high school, I was a Libertarian as you. I thought that government was just spoiling my fun. I thought that everyone should just get along.
I am a man now, and it is quite obvious that force is a quite necessary thing in dealing with other nations such as Afghanistan. I probably thought "live and let live" as you do, thinking that they would not bother us if we didn't them. That is asinine. They detest our culture, our religion and what we stand for. The Taliban is the new Nazis of today. More people within the Muslim faith think the same way the Taliban does than you want to admit, and by simply ignoring them with your noninterference ideals would be suicide. They care not about our size and power as they have shown. They will fight us and anyone else that opposes their tyranny till the end.
You sit there and defend it, in the name of liberty, as if they have a right to impose their religion on others and take lives in the name of it. Or are you just selfish and do not wish that anyone's rights are defended except Americans?
Therein is your position. The Taliban threatens not your freedom, so screw everyone else huh? Afgans can die for all you care. And they will, without our help.
You were never a libertarian, you were a dope head libertine. Big difference.
I am a man now,
That is a rather poor joke. Don't flatter yourself. You think like a child, you act like a child, you are a boy. And you are either stupid or evil, perhaps both.
and it is quite obvious that force is a quite necessary thing in dealing with other nations such as Afghanistan. I probably thought "live and let live" as you do, thinking that they would not bother us if we didn't them. That is asinine. They detest our culture, our religion and what we stand for. The Taliban is the new Nazis of today. More people within the Muslim faith think the same way the Taliban does than you want to admit, and by simply ignoring them with your noninterference ideals would be suicide. They care not about our size and power as they have shown. They will fight us and anyone else that opposes their tyranny till the end. You sit there and defend it, in the name of liberty, as if they have a right to impose their religion on others and take lives in the name of it. Or are you just selfish and do not wish that anyone's rights are defended except Americans?
All of this is a straw man lie that you just made up. It won't work, people see you for what you are, a liar and a drug using hypocrit.
Lie? You think the Taliban are just decent Arabs that wish liberty for everyone do ya? I think everyone sees your blind loyalty to ideals, rather than common sense and decency.
Just as the Taliban allows people to die under it's rule, because of it's incompetency they would also die under your anarchy.
Please cite the posts where I have said anything that you have attributed to me. You are a liar.
ABSOLUTELY.
For example, if the government has a law against religious prosletyzing in their country and our citizens knowingly break that law, we should not intercede no matter what the penalty. That's respect for sovereignty, isn't it? That is defending our country, isn't it?
Why does that seem so difficult?
Wow what condemnation. They saw through people's throats in soccer stadiums, and you are saying that I am more dangerous because I wish to defend our nation, and look out for our best interests.
We then disagree on terms. I hardly consider such a government to be a puppet. A policy such as I described is, as far as I am concerned, applicable with ANY government. Would you call France, or Britain puppet governments? How about Russia? Do you really believe them so capable as to prevent our conducting a sanction on their soil? Websters defines "puppet" as, "a person whose actions are controlled by another." By no means am I saying that my proposed policy controls the government of Afganistan, nor should it.
Quod erat demonstratum? ;-)
Agreed.
-Work with Mossad to seek out and terminate the leadership of these organizations;
No way. The first one is sufficient. This was an attack on America, not Israel.
-Locate training facilities, germ and chem war plants--and destroy them utterly. Whatever it takes. Sometimes it will take a lot--see Libya's hardened and subterranean poison-gas plant.
Right ON!!!
We also need to take immediate and agressive action to purge our country of enemy aliens.
This is more delicate. I propose developing means within the community of naturalized Arab ex-patriots to turn in their criminal brethren. I do not see alienating them as a positive development. Patriotism and integrity should be rewarded in this country. We might just get more of it.
FReegards, C_O
This is what I said in post number 104. Oops, you lied. I have advocated total elimination of all the people who have attacked us. I advocate no mercy for the guilty. That was prior to you lying about my position and accusing me of defending the Taliban.
you are saying that I am more dangerous because I wish to defend our nation, and look out for our best interests.
I am saying that you are more dangerous because you advocate world domination by force. You advocate the invasion and occupation of countries and the setting up of puppet governments wherever they have a government that you don't approve of. You also advocate using force to impose your twisted, mentally ill vision of the world on citizens of this country in almost every thread in this forum. You are a liar and it is impossible to have an intelligent exchange with you because of your despicable practice of making up lies about what people said. I'll put you back on the ignore list again where you belong.
You remember the Bader Meinhoff Gang?
There is another difference, that with the French we have a cultural compatibility, so no matter how hostile to us they might become, chances are we can talk it over.
I'll remember that next time they try to collapse our currency while we are bailing them out of a post-colonial tussle.
With the Taliban govenrment there is virtually nothing we can talk over.
First of all, let's make one thing clear: the Taleban are not a government recognized by the US. That said...
What Taleban? (See? We agree!) :-)
Our relationship with the post-war (and, I expect, post-occupation) Afghani government will be primarily based on our continuing military threat to them and their obligation to root out terrorists on our behalf.
What Occupation? (See? We disagree.)
Tell me how many functioning empires (by your definition) we have left on this planet? No thank you. I am an inter-nationalist, not a globalist. A vote is meaningless unless a government can do as bidden by its citizens. There is no citizen sovereignty without national sovereignty. I prefer to concentrate upon reinstating what is left of ours. Within the constraints that limit the government or citizens of another nation from harming us or ours, let them be, no matter how barbarous they choose to be within their borders. Limitless projection of suzerainty is a means destructive to our national purpose of securing the unalienable rights of sovereign citizens. Let our example of respect for sovereignty AND unalienable rights at home be the competitive inducement (and financial means) that motivates the citizens of other nations to throw off their yokes. We can persuade; we must not coerce. (How do you conquer someone in the name of freedom?) Should that time come, we might then be able to help and they willing to accept it.
As of now, you have still to address my assertion that to project such power with our military in its present condition, in the manner as you suggest, is a pyrrhic objective in the name of a chimeral goal. It would take 5-7 YEARS to drop our domestic programs and commit our resources to national defense as you suggest even if that were a politically realistic goal (which it is obviously not). You also have yet to address my concern that to occupy Afganistan is so provocative to both Chinese and Russian interests as to drive them toward each other as a common foe against a consequently over-extended and obviously bellicose enemy.
In short, both your goal and means are IMHO disastrous policy. I want no part of them.
American government has no choice but to curb its domestic role and enhance its commitments in the Middle East. The energies of the socialist left will from now on be directed to empire maintenance overseas. It won't happen overnight, but the empire-building dynamic will be driving the political debate in the US and in Europe, just like the domestic role of government was driving the political debate since Roosevelt. The centers of imperial power, such as Russia, China, and ourselves, will be cooperating in the effort in order to avoid superpower conflicts.
No. The United States is a republic, and it's high time that it remembered that lest it become another in a long chain of exhausted empires. No, I did not support Pat Buchanan, but in many ways he was right, though he did manage to marginalize himself.
Russia is another.
An exhausted empire?
EU and China are aspiring ones.
The EU is passing a second wind after we revived them from a final bout of imperial exhaustion. Were it not for its military dependence upon the US (see republic) it would have disintigrated. China is aspiring all right and we had better drop those imperial ambitions of yours to be able to deal with it. In fact, the Spanish/Franco/British/German/AustroHungarian/Russian battles lasting over hundreds of years fits very well the model you propose!
Power abhors vacuum, and the Third World is mostly vacuum.
It sucks all right, but IMHO we are partly to blame for that, not because we didn't help, but because we (along with the EU) perpetrated the horrors I listed above in #34. We don't need third world resources enough to demand conquest, coercion, or evisceration through subtrefuge. We certainly don't need them to be cheaper by abetting war and inducing starvation.
American government has no choice but to curb its domestic role and enhance its commitments in the Middle East.
Oh really? You sound here more like an Israeli than an American here.
The energies of the socialist left will from now on be directed to empire maintenance overseas.
Excuse me, but isn't this what you were advocating?
It won't happen overnight, but the empire-building dynamic will be driving the political debate in the US and in Europe, just like the domestic role of government was driving the political debate since Roosevelt.
Don't get me started on Roosevelt, Harry Hopkins, and Cordell Hull.
The centers of imperial power, such as Russia, China, and ourselves, will be cooperating in the effort in order to avoid superpower conflicts.
A Committed tri-lateralist... dear me, I can hear it now...
Oceana has always been at war with Eastasia...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.