What is the Goal of the Terrorists?

[pdmike]

What is the end goal of the terrorists who are beheading innocent civilians? What are they trying to accomplish?

They have beheaded an American, a South Korean and are now threatening to do the same to three Turks. Each time, I hear vague claims about wanting "prisoners released." I don't buy it.

Is it simply that they are trying to scare other countries (particularly ours) out of their area of the world (the Middle East)?
I haven't heard any "withdraw your forces or we will behead someone" demands being made.

What's up with these people? Why are they doing this?

pdmike

[Aidoneus]

1. define "innocent civilians"

first..

[oceanpoetry]

4. and define "terrorists" as well ...

n/t

[Aidoneus]

8. that too

[VOX]

29. Yes! "The Terrorists" -- who/what the hell are "The Terrorists???"

I overhear this phrase in public frequently -- "I hope the terrorists don't, blah blah..." And I always wonder, just who in the hell are they talking about?

Do "the terrorists" have a country, a flag, an ideology? Are they here or there? Are they a tightly-knit network (and "affirmed" by Faux News) or a number of self-proclaimed groups with only a very tenuous connection, or none at all?

I do believe that, because of the manner in which the U.S. has conducted itself in world affairs for the last 50+ years, there are indeed some individuals who would like to have the U.S. taken out. But who exactly are these individuals? Who funds them? What are the current/former American ties to them, if any?

Ultimately, "the terrorists" make the ideal enemy for an authoritarian administration -- an enemy that is like smoke -- omnipresent and impossible to pursue and capture, but certainly good enough to be used to put fear into the controlled populace.

[k in IA]

5. Whose head is it OK to chop off?

[jobycom]

20. Ask Bush

He seems to think a few thousand chopped or exploded heads is a good thing.

Funny thing, but most people don't like occupation. They fight back. And often, they fight back the way the occupiers fought.

We created tens of thousands of dead civilians, including children. Do you think these attackers see themselves as evil, or do you think they believe they are avenging their own dead? How many of these hooded figures do you suppose are now widowers, or orphans, or bereived parents, because of us?

If we were conquered by Iraq, would we be happy that they were forcing an Islamic government on us while killing our kids? What would you do if someone killed your child and told you it was for your own good?

Right and wrong are not the issues here. Reality is. Both sides are doing the same thing.

[Trillo]

2. My guess is vengeance, violent revenge. nt

[matcom]

3. 4 more years in the White House

eom

[Junkdrawer]

14. al Qaeda: "WE WANT BUSH TO WIN"

The statement said it supported U.S. President George W. Bush in his reelection campaign, and would prefer him to win in November rather than the Democratic candidate John Kerry, as it was not possible to find a leader "more foolish than you (Bush), who deals with matters by force rather than with wisdom."

In comments addressed to Bush, the group said:

"Kerry will kill our nation while it sleeps because he and the Democrats have the cunning to embellish blasphemy and present it to the Arab and Muslim nation as civilisation."

"Because of this we desire you (Bush) to be elected."

More...

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/040317/325/eotq9.html

[progressiveBadger]

6. Revenge

for the US and these other countries invading their country, killing their sons and daughters and mothers and fathers. Violence begets violence, and this is a perfectly sick example.

[patdem]

7. Why does America put criminals death???

I say they are doing it because they are the 'enemy'?

We put criminals to death so they cannot kill anybody else?

I guess they figure supporting the invasion and the occupation is the same as killing people???

I just wish we first of all did not INVADE Iraq, but were more intelligent in deposing Sadaam...but we are there...and secondly I wish we did not TORTURE prisoners......

My mother used to say...wish in one hand and shit in the other and see which one fills up faster!!!

[Canuckistanian]

9. It's a very simple explanation

And one all of the freeps, confederate flag wavers and neocons can understand.

Foreigners, get out of our country

[Gregorian]

12. Yes. And they told us that after the '93 bombing of WTC

Leave us alone! Stop fucking with us!
Isn't it obvious? People don't enjoy killing each other. And they don't enjoy being fucked with.
Thus, terrorism. I think it's a stupid word for something I ordinarily call self defense.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

13. My spider-sense smells mining for DU-smearing material (nt)

[Gregorian]

19. I don't even know what you mean.

If I'm not smart enough to figure out what you mean, then I seriously doubt I'm mining anything. I only state what I feel. And I cannot blame them for hating America. Maybe I misunderstood what you meant by "mining". DU is a lightyear ahead of my brain. I'm just trying to catch up with you guys. :Þ

[pdmike]

24. No Mining Operation On This Side of the Mountain Anyway

Well, just put the snuffer on your spider-sense there, JCCyC - I am asking a legitimate question here. Not trying to stir anything up at all.

It really isn't all that clear to me what these folks are trying to accomplish. I gather from the majority of the posts on this thread that everyone thinks their main goal is to get us out of the ME.

All right - works for me. Thanks for the input.

pdmike

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

30. Wasn't you (nt)

[JohnLocke]

10. For the terrorists: a pan-Arab state under Sharia.

For the Iraqi guerilla fighters: foreigners out of Iraq.

[The_Casual_Observer]

11. What ever it is, you can bet it isn't what the government is

telling you it is. Usama was fairly plain spoken about his demands. The others probably are too.

[tjwash]

15. DFTFT...

...nt

[jobycom]

16. Destablization

They don't want the current American occupation/colonization to become permanent. By terrorizing/punishing those who support it, they are hoping to create friction between America and other nations. The Korean people were horrified by their own citizen being killed, for instance, and by America's inability to stop it, or our lack of concern. This creates friction between the Korean people, and the US.

Also, they are hoping for the Madrid effect, of affecting elections.

The best targets are the marginal countries, the ones where the people opposed Bush's invasion, because they will become the angriest at their leaders.

Do this enough, and who knows what you might win. They have few options. It's not like they have WMDs to fight us, or anything.

It's a successful tactic, or at least as successful as it can be. What would we do? If another country occupied America, would we smile and welcome them, or would our people take to the hills and become guerilla assassins, too? Most fictional accounts of such a takeover show us doing the same types of things.

There is also an historical precedent that uneducated Americans probably miss, but that Muslims won't. During the original Crusades, the European Christians conquered the Palestine lands with almost no resistance from the Muslims, because the Muslims were fragmented and factionalized. Often, Muslims sided with the invaders against other Muslims. For a century, there was no organized resistance, except a small group we now call the assassins. They lived in the hills around Iraq under a shadowy figure called "the Old Man in the Mountain," and came out to attack both the European occupiers and the Muslim collaborators. They attacked individually, usually by assassinating public figures, usually in suicide missions. This early terrorism freaked out the Europeans. It had little ultimate effect other than to keep things shook up until a resistance organized.

I suspect many of these groups see themselves as the new assassins, and UBL as the Old Man.

[Aidoneus]

25. the "Assassins"/etc... (long, but not as long as I could make it..)

A bit mixed up with the history there.. the "Old Man of the Mountain" was Sheikh Sinan (Rashid ud-deen), sent to Syria by Imam Hasan II of Alamut. The area of their permanent bases (there were several "false starts", as it were, due to conflict with strong atabegs at the time) was actually nearer to the Anti-Lebanon Mountain Range NW of Damascus, and later further north near the current location of Masayaf (this was were Sinan's great citadel was located due to its phsyical advantages, and his successors, similar to Hasan as-Sabah and his successors' ideal location at Alamut). He was a peer of the late period of Nuruddeen and the great liberator Salahuddeen, this being after both the advent of the crusader occupation of al-Quds and the formation of the "Assassin" movement itself (which is a long story).

Early resistance to the crusader occupation was scattered, but began to organize itself under Zengi. He was Atabeg, later Sultan, of Mosul who began to unify the petty atabegs and sheikhs under the single platform of removing the crusader aggressors, before being cut down in a feud between his eunuchs (short version). This path was pursued further by his successor, Nur ud-Deen, and reached its peak under the Ayyubid Sultan Yusuf Salah ud-Deen (may he come along again). As you say, much of their fight was against those hypocrites who kissed the arm they couldn't break as much as the crusader 'arms' themselves.

The "Assassins" had first in fact concentrated the bulk of their efforts towards the Fatamid and `Abbasid khilafah to establish themselves doctrinally and physically (eventually at the site of Alamut in the mountain ranges south of the Caspian, spreading out from there across much of the Iranian plateau and Syria), and most especially the Turkish Seljukid atabegs after the establishment of Alamut and other bases. There were contacts with the crusaders, of both kinds both as an 'assassin' and as scholars, but on the whole the Nizari Ismaili movement kept itself fiercely independent and not so much involved in Palestine except when the players at work had threatened their position.

I could go on forever about them, but this'll be it for now.. the early history of the movement(s) remains my favourite subject. I think that more than almost any subject, it has been confounded most of all by historians.

I have thought of the comparison between Ussamah on the one hand and Imam Hasan as-Sabah & Sheikh Sinan on the other, but there are many fatal flaws. I would think they would instead prefer the comparison to Salahuddeen, but there are flaws and inconsistancy here as well (in addition to the crowd of even modern failed aspirants of as much).

[jobycom]

28. I was compressing a bit

I didn't really mean to put the assassins in the early Crusade period, I was just trying a quick summary. But most of my studies were on the medieval European side, so what I know of the whole movement tends to be where they intersect the crusaders.

Thanks for the additional info.

No historical comparison is ever going to be perfect. I've thought of Salah ad-Din, as well. Even Abu Bakr, to some degree, though I doubt UBL would make that direct comparison. My point is that Islamic history has several figures who have had to rally recalcitrant Muslim factions to fight off occupying forces, and the terrorists will see themselves more in those terms, in terms of heroes, than in our terms, as evil killers.

[DrWeird]

17. Which innocent civilians?

I haven't heard about this.

[Jacobin]

18. Lots of reading to do, no?

"terrorists" is a word Smirky tosses around like a tennis ball to include anyone he doesn't like.

Bin Laden's group would like to take over the world and install islamic republics everywhere. I believe he calls it a caliphate. They would like the world to turn back about 600 years and make it all a lovely fundamentalist islamic shit house.

The insurgents in Iraq would like us to get our infidel asses out of their country that we illegally invaded, so that they can then have a civil war and hash out centuries of grudges amongst themselves, without the interference of infidels who do not have a clue of what they are all about.

[JohnLocke]

22. You explained it better than I did. Great post.

:thumbsup::thumbsup:

[jobycom]

23. Hate to be a historical nitpicker

But the caliphate was not a "fundamentalist islamic shit house." It was the one of the greatest periods of artistic, scientific and cultural flowering in world history. It was also one of the periods of greatest tolerance in human history. In Al-Andulus, the Muslim caliphate was so tolerant of other religions that Christians living under Muslim rule fought against the European Christians trying to "liberate" them. As European Christians were killing each other over definitions of the Incarnation or the Eucharist, Muslims, Jews and Christians were writing the most beautiful love poetry ever written, and building mosques that later inspired the Gothic movement in Europe.

I suspect that's more of the ambition of UBL. Not that he would achieve it. But understanding his goals seems somehow important.

[Aidoneus]

26. Don't 'hate' to be such..

this is the most worthwhile post in this thread, and there are and will be few contenders for that later.

Whenever I hear the line of argument, I think then that we should be so lucky to be 'turned back' to such a 'shit house'..

[sendero]

21. Finally, an easy question...

... they want us the fuck out of their country. For the life of me I don't know why so many Americans have so damn much trouble understanding that.

Let's say that, oh what the hell, France - dedided Bush* was a threat and decided to invade, kill thousands of civilians and then occupy the country. What do you suppose Americans would do to get the French out?

I hope that answers your question.

[Name removed]

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