Religion and the GWOT.

[grumpy old fart]

After 9/11, GWB appeared on national television with a copy of a Koran on his desk, quick to point out that we were not at war with Islam. And, of course, we were not. You can't be at war with a religion any more than you can be at war with a tactic.

We can't ignore, however, that the basis for the terrorists' war with us IS based on religion. The men commandeering the planes on 9/11 were intelligent, educated and middle class. These men, and UBL himself, have no goals other than religious ones. The men we are fighting, the movement we are facing, is not looking for anything we can actually give them (nor anything they can realistically achieve). Doesn't this need to be addressed?

All we hear is that these terrorists are but a radical fringe of true Islam. Our knee jerk reaction is to agree. Aren't all religions just about peace and love at their core?

But what if these men represent "true Islam", and the rest of the Muslim community is just a recent secularized aberrational product of the enlightenment? As has been asked many times, where are the Islamic voices and moreover, the Islamic actions in denouncing and rooting out the "small radical fringe" from their midst? Inaction, perhaps, speaks louder than silence.

Discussion?

http://oldfartravings.blogspot.com/

[maxsolomon]

1. the goals are other than religious

the restoration of the Caliphate, or the unification of all Muslims into one nation that can effectively oppose the West & the corrupting influence of Modernity, is not just a religious goal. any more than our GWOT is only a secular defense of "freedom".

you asked: "Aren't all religions just about peace and love at their core?"

No, they are not.

[grumpy old fart]

4. The restoration of the Caliphate is not a religious goal?

I'm confused by that statement.

[maxsolomon]

12. a caliphate is a government

can't it be BOTH religious & political?

[grumpy old fart]

15. Well, the caliphate is a religious government, no?

Caliph; n. A leader of an Islamic polity, regarded as a successor of Muhammad and by tradition always male.

[xchrom]

2. doesn't the fact that the majority of muslims

refrain from acting out in this fashion -- that they say the want peace -- do more than just speak for itself?

these conversations about islam are worse than useless.

and speak about a hidden violence in those who want to ''discuss''.

[grumpy old fart]

3. I honestly have an open mind on this issue, and its implications.

[xchrom]

5. saying so doesn't make it so.

the implications in your post -- what if this is the real islam -- speaks volumes.

[grumpy old fart]

7. whatever....

Jumping to conclusions from a single post says a lot too. IMO.

[xchrom]

8. then don't write stuff like that.

[grumpy old fart]

10. Look, engage the issue, not me.

I'm an atheist socialist tree hugger. Honest. read any of my 1,000+ posts on here. I'M not the issue.

[Dhalgren]

6. The occupants of the upper echelon of the US government

is just as terroristic as any OBL or Zawahiri. The GWOT is a fake and a sham; we are no more "at war" against "terrorism" than we are at "war" against "drugs" - it's all bullshit. People are going to strike out at the oppressor, if we want to solve the "terror" issue, we should stop oppressing others...

[grumpy old fart]

9. Totally agree with the first part of your post. OUR war is bogus as hell.

But this is more about the basis of THEIR war and about the 9/11 folks and UBL. The Iraq situation gets to be a real mixed bag as to who is doing the fighting and why.

[TechBear_Seattle]

11. All fanatics think theirs is the One True Religion

It is not a knee jerk reaction to agree that the terrorists are a radical fringe of Islam: it is fact. Al-Qaida, the Taliban and similar Muslim extremists are heavily financed by Saudi Arabia and the ruling House of Saud. The state religion of Saudi Arabia is a branch of Islam called Wahhabism, which is widely regarded throughout the Muslim world to be heretical. Wahhabism selectively picks and chooses from the different schools of Sharia, Islamic religious law, and is extremely legalistic in the application of Sharia. In addition to the Quran and hadith (a body of literature that is the basis of Sharia), Wahhabis draw on several other sources to define the One True Faith. Out of these other sources, Wahhabism draws it violent anti-Semitism and a profound sense of manifest destiny to eliminate all "impure doctrine" on the planet and implement, by any means necessary, a world wide Wahhabi theocracy.

Around the world, Saudi funded Islamic Centers, mosques and schools teach Wahhabism. Almost every known cell of Muslim extremists can be found based in a Saudi funded facility. Not all Saudi funded facilities are home to extremists, of course, but they all uniformly teach Wahhabi principles, including anti-Semitism and the divine command to spread the doctrine by the sword when necessary.

According to Sunni and Shi`a religious leaders -- who represent more than 80% of the world's Muslims -- Wahhabism is heresy, and the doctrines they propound and the terrorist acts they encourage and sponsor are contrary to the Word of God and the teachings of Mohammad. Since it first appeared in the mid 18th century, Wahhabism has been condemend. When it comes to defining who is and who is not a member of a group, I am inclined to accept the judgement of the group members. The terrorists have nothing to do with "true Islam."

[grumpy old fart]

13. I know all that, and thank you for restating these facts. However,

Why can't the "vast majority" do anything about this small "radical fringe"? Is all the power with this small heretical group?

[dusmcj]

14. it's based on culture, not religion

The Enlightenment is as offensive to the tribal societies of nations that happen to be Muslim as it was to the hierarchical societies of Europe in the time of absolute monarchs and the divine right of kings. What do you mean, I can't worship another human being and displace my own responsibilities for my life onto them in return for surrendering the rest of my autonomy to them too ?

We here in the west have of course not gotten over this problem or eliminated this conflict from our own societies either, it's just that because the most recent Enlightenment happened on our shores, it's worn off less than among the Muslims, where theirs happened about 1000 years ago. What calls itself cultural warfare here in the US is precisely this conflict, between the forces of indolence, reaction and reduction, represented by American conservatives, and the impulse to progress and advancement, represented occasionally by the Democratic Party (these days; they used to do a more consistently better job of it) along with assorted demographics with assorted labels. It's vital to ignore the labels; what calls itself 'progressive' here is frequently as unimaginative and reactionary as anything the GOP has been able to produce.

ultimately, man is a lazy piece of crap who will seek the line of least resistance to meeting his survival needs, along with the occasional drunken binge and piece of ass. Unless some weirdo or other unleashes a meme into the collective discourse which reminds him that with a little discipline he can use his formidable resources to achieve a lot more than the occasional cheap thrill and bowl of gruel. Corruptocracies of the kind which are flowering both here and in the mideast currently grow when the cultural growing cycle is in its dormant stage, and peoples are living off past achievements. Religion here is just the tail on the cultural dog. Particularly in religions that emphasize integration into all aspects of daily life, like evangelical American pseudo-christians and Islamic fundmentalists, if I think about what direction God wants me to wipe my ass in, that is not a religious activity governing an aspect of secular life, that is secular life which is informed by a checklist labeled 'religion'. It's culture, which is the oldest basis for conflict there is.

Frankly, I think the aims are common - to dispose of the socioeconomic current which would have us trade profit among few for mediocrity for the many, and remember that the good of the people is frequently not served by the most profitable path.

Tangibly, Al Qaeda has so much as said they don't give a damn about our religion, rather, they don't want us on their soil and depositing McDonalds and Britney Spears (a nice girl though she is) on their front lawn (well...) like turds from a roaming dog. The fruits of civilization they don't quite qualify for after all...

[grumpy old fart]

16. Excellent stuff. Humor is often the best foil.

Gotta agree that religious practice in the West is usually just living a "secular life which is informed by a checklist labeled 'religion'" Our religions are no threat to them. Even the Pat Robertson kind.

What we have from the Burka boys is indeed a war against the infiltration of our overall McCulture, at least as far as I can tell. Of course, what they define as western culture can get pretty extreme. Like education and treating women better than chattel.

[dusmcj]

17. at their worst, they're defending a power status quo

a slightly different one than we are, but not by much. I think it goes something like this:

whitey's oppressing us.
whitey's extracting our oil and we're not getting enough of the money.
besides, he insists on sticking around to make sure we keep extracting the oil.
we were great once.
it's good to be da sheik, look, he has chicks and fighter planes and Benzes and gets to drink booze
behind closed doors.
Americans kick our ass every time, our boys can't get any.
we'd like to have sex but can't cause there's always someone there to kick our ass when we look at their sister.
I'd kick anyone's ass who looked at my sister.
Americans get to have more sex than we do and we're jealous.
I want to be the man like the sheik. He's not really the man cause he has to kiss the Americans' ass, but he's more of the man than I am.
Islam makes me feel good.
Islam was what made us great once. We kicked whitey's ass and could be proud.
Islam can make us great again. We can feel proud again. If we all kill ourselves, we can beat whitey (oops, these people invented algebra. Now they need a logic refresher.)
Islam is a way by which we can be the man.
You, bitches, put those bags back over your heads. At least I'm the man here in my own, I mean my father's house. Respect my authorit-tie.
Islam tells me all I need to know (the Bible has an answer for everything). Education is unnecessary.
It is better to be strong and proud than to be weak and intelligent.
Because of my sense of inadequacy I must maintain a mask of strength and aggression. (Wow, which one am I talking about, the US or the Muslims ?)

And so on and so forth. They need to do some consciousness-raising civilization-wise and society-wise. Tribes aren't exactly the latest innovation in social organization.

PS: for anyone who thinks I'm a closet racist and freeper for posting the above content, I can only offer that from both observing current Arab behavior as conveyed in noneditorial media reporting, and from opportunities to observe Arab students in college, including both rich and poor ones (early 1980's) I don't think the above is entirely off the mark, and it's certainly not slurring a race, it's observation of culture-bound behavior. Also, it's observation of Arab and Muslim behavior as lived by their public culture too frequently, not of the potential of their high culture or of the inherent traits of Islam, both of which are peers to the West.

[grumpy old fart]

18. Funny stuff, but I think you mix up the Hood and the Desert a little bit

maybe even a little of the Barrio thrown in for good measure!

[dusmcj]

19. just replace whitey with Angrez

or whatever the Arabs use(d) as a slur for the English and the Americans, and I'll suggest it's the same thing. Partly a perfectly reasonable response to a few centuries of exploitation and oppression and difficulty with overcoming the economic and cultural disadvantage arising therefrom, partly a tendency for corruption (fostered by the native ruling classes having to accomodate the occupier) which is reversible and needs to be addressed, and partly "historical loser's syndrome" just like the Serbs have it - "we were great once, then ((fill in name of foreign badass)) beat us and we haven't made it back yet. Let's restore a great empire". Makes 'em talk badass but shoot homie-style and watch videos that run more like revival meetings and Bollywood action flicks than anything else. "If you believe and have faith in your heart, you will win, it's all you need." Bull Shit.

[grumpy old fart]

20. for what it's worth, and to direct back to the original issue.....

the 9/11 boys were well educated and middle class or better. Not all of this is the little guy fighting against the oppression of "the man". Think Sam Harris and "religion gone wild". Or perhaps, religion going back to its roots.

[dusmcj]

21. the mass phenomenon is more interesting than the individuals

if it were just 20 guys breaking into the US and stealing planes and causing 9/11, it would be no different than the terrorism of 30 years ago, which was isolated extremists who deliberately worked the media in order to make a bang. That type is still there today, but they're the leadership, and they deliver DVDs they burned on their laptops to global satellite networks. This terrorism is a mass phenomenon, and to make that happen, you have to have mass support. This is the danger in Iraq, that whether it was a deliberate strategy of the Boober administration or not, the country has become a kill box for Islamowhackjobs the world over, except that the supply for the inflow consists of about half a billion people. This is a little larger than PFLP-GC, Fatah, Red Brigades or any of the other boutique children-of-the-leftist-universities terrorists of the 70s. From the old fart from Basra who shot down an Apache with his Lee-Enfield bolt action to the Falluja resident who builds and detonates an IED, this has nothing to do with religion in the sense of doctrine of the faith or deliberate practice, and everything to do with daily, lived culture. Religion is just a convenient labeled container for nationalism and tribalism, which exist in otherwise named convenient containers in most cultures on earth (including our own - 15 years ago it was "Proud to be an American, God Bless the USA" here - that was nothing other than a cultural vehicle for a demographic subgrouping). The road which says that this is all about a particularly bizarre and brutal religion is a detour and a delusion which would cost us dearly were we, particularly our policymakers and planners, to adopt it as truth.

[grumpy old fart]

22. You, perhaps, make my point...If I have a point...

"the country has become a kill box for Islamowhackjobs the world over..." and the base of those "whackjobs" is Islam. No? Yes, tribalism is also very important, but I don't think nationalism is at all, other than the nationalism associated with a caliphate. Iran, Iraq et al are not nations to which these folks feel any real allegiance. They are fictions created by western powers. The uniting forces for these folks, and potentially the whole region, is the tribe and Islam. How we expect to "manage" this region based on our notions of nation states is beyond me.

[dusmcj]

23. Iraqis (Sunnis) were very nationalist

Iraq along with Egypt and Syria was one of the significant proponents of pan-Arabism of the 50s and 60s. I see multiple factors playing here:

- Saddam was one of the crop of secular socialist "revolutionary" leaders of newly decolonized third world states in the postwar world, just like Qaddafi Duck and all the corruptocrats of Africa. So from the current secular political sphere of the last 50 years, there is a strong Moscow-Marxist influenced strain of leftist nationalism, somewhat similar to, but weaker than and less well formed than that of Ho, for example (because there was no individual leader like Ho who built and worked from a deep understanding of the liberty impulse and the role of the nation concept in realizing it).

- tribalism is a very strong influence in the region, but exists in a matrix with other bindings, including religion, and more recently pan-Arabism and nationalism. I will claim that just as Saudi saw the emergence of a nation after WWI with the House of Saud arising out of a melange of desert tribes to create a sense of nation and a national government, so the Iraqis, who have a history of fierce resistance to colonization (the Brits and the Russians after WWI in their usual realpolitik nosepicking) became aware of a sense of a People, and wanting a nation for their people.

- the Iraqis had the experience of living in a comparatively modern secular nation state for something like 30 years, growing out of the time of pan-arabism. Certainly under Saddam, there was a modicum of modern quality of life, at least in the cities, in the realm of the practical (and with much Soviet assistance) and in the social, with some equality for women, access to education, pressure to participate in modern economic activity, etc. I.e. they have lived the life, it is not foreign to them. Of course this may be true of city dwellers and not of the peasantry, but nevertheless, this is not the Pashtun frontier, this was a third world client state of the Soviet Union. The people had the experience of the thought-mode of citizens of a nation state, and of the benefits the nation state brings.

- one of the fundamental flaws of Bush's new strategy for Iraq is in its mischaracterization of the insurgency as consisting of a marginal fringe of "rejectionists" (malcontent children who don't want to eat what's good for them ?), foreigners and disaffected Baathist privilege. This is another instance of him not listening to people who actually know how to collect and evaluate intelligence, since the CIA, IMHO very accurately, concluded sometime shortly after the invasion that we were facing a "classic insurgency" - this land is my land, and it ain't your land, and if you don't get off, I'll blow your head off. This is the same equalizer between internally competing groups which was visible in China for example during the Japanese invasion - the Nationalists had pursued the Communists almost to extinction in the 1930's, but they broke off conflict to unite in resistance against the foreign invader Japanese. Only when the foreign threat was neutralized did they return to finish their internal squabble. Iraq is interesting in that the Shia are to some extent jumping the gun, and spending a fair amount of time killing Sunnis while they also fight the Americans. So there may be a chance that internal divisions will be more significant than opposition to our occupation, and internal combatants will choose alliance with us (which the Shia have been doing to some extent, at least in the person of their moderate statesmen) as a means to vanquish their internal opponents rather than alliance within the nation to eject us. But none of this alters that fact that all parties are motivated to oppose our presence, by the simple fact of its existence - the notion of an Iraq, with borders which have been violated is a requisite for this reaction to form.

I forgot to add that: the foreigners entering Iraq are the tail on the dog of the indigenous Iraqi insurgency, whose significance Doober and Rummy are desparately (to the point of word choice) trying to minimize. So that there are two concerns here: an indigenous and I would claim nationalist insurgency which will make our assumed task of nation building and maintenance of order notably more difficult, and an influx of external radicals, which is largely incidental to the action in Iraq itself, but which has portentous implications for us in the broader war on terror. The externals are the stateless fanatics you speak of, but again, in Muslim nations which have been radicalized by what they perceive as western exploitation and injustice, the Madrassah boys are not a marginal extreme, but representatives of their people and their generation. They do not give up national affiliation by joining the jihadis, and the initial core crop of international gunslingers who united under a Muslim banner is rapidly being replaced by a cacophony of the fanatic disaffected, but also the fanatic children of their countries. This courtesy of Mr. Bush's (well, actually PNAC's) invitation to them to come visit Iraq. And they are.

I think there is a blend between the old and the new at play here, where the old mode of a pyramidal hierarchy of fealty in the secular plane from tribal sheiks to regional nobility to sultans and caliphs exists concurrently with modernist notions of secular nation states and the advantages they bring in terms of practical organization (including military) and centralization of control and resources. One question which arises is, which will dominate, moment to moment on the insurgent battlefield, and more broadly and abstractly at the level of attempts to unite competing factions and form a functioning (and as requisite reasonably strong) national government competing against very current factional motivations to have one ethnic grouping or another reign supreme. Claims that these are alien cultures which are based on fanaticism (maybe by extrapolating from observations of actual fringe groups like Al Qaeda and the Taliban ?) and which have no knowledge of nation state modernity are deeply flawed; we are all much more alike than we would like to admit at times, and the global spread of tangible and social culture has ensure that and made it irreversible.

[Dogmudgeon]

24. Is it Religion, or something more "fundamental"?

It's interesting that no one who strongly disbelieves religion and posts in these forums ever brings up non-religious fanaticism; the main modern example of which is Communism as practiced by the recently-deceased USSR, and China. Communism has been analogized as being a religion, but Communists would deny it as strongly as, say, many of the anti-religious people here would deny their own high-powered antipathy as a quasi-religion.

There's also a lot of people who embrace religions who are devoid of this kind of crazy hatred. There are even religions that preach against belief as we define it. Islam -- the mainstream kind, not the fanatical kind -- makes the case that it is a sin (error) to "believe" something which hasn't been examined and reasoned. For over a millenium, Islam was at the forefront of scientific and technological progress, and the Islamic world developed political systems that were far superior to those of Europe at the time.

I don't think it's useful or accurate to equate religion and fanaticism, nor the idea that religion is the Anti-Science. At the base of it, there are forms of hatred, fanaticism, and irrationality that easily fit into religions, but have often found their way into other ideologies of various kinds. History is full of examples of the wide variety of ways people can find to hate other people. Tim McVeigh, for instance, claimed Atheism as his belief, or lack of it. As did Stalin and Pol Pot. The "disease" we're dealing with isn't limited to religion, or even certain religions. There ought to be some thought given to better ways of defining and describing it.

--p!

[trotsky]

25. What's fundamental is the lack of critical thinking.

An unwillingness to acknowledge reality, even when reality is telling you you're wrong.

Sometimes that goes hand-in-hand with religion. Sometimes it goes with totalitarian economic systems. And sometimes it even goes with wishful thinking about miracle cures, mythical beings, or new age ideas.

[grumpy old fart]

26. I don't "equate" religion with fanaticism,but it can be a powerful motive

Do you have any real doubt that UBL, for one, is sincere about the religious basis of his jihad? Do you have any doubt that the young men who blow themselves to pieces, do so in the assurance that they will be fucking virgins in the next instant?

[Dogmudgeon]

27. Religious motivations -- "helpful", but not required

I have only a few doubts about, say, UBL. It's possible that he's using the persona of being a pious Muslim as a cover for his political ambitions. Nonetheless, I think he's as deep into his own delusions, religious and political as are his soldiers and exploitees.

But to motivate someone to become a suicide bomber takes a lot more than just religious belief. Life in that part of the world, as part of an underclass having to obey several levels of harsh military, civil, and religious authorities, is horrendously brutal. We in the developed nations have only the smallest glimmer of an idea of what it's like. Life for a dirt-poor Muslim living in the Middle East is actively and universally painful and without hope. A reduction in suicide bombing and jihadism would require a tremendous improvement in the lives of the Muslim underclasses -- and that just isn't going to happen any time soon.

The sales pitch about fucking virgins is the icing on the cake, so to speak. In fact, I think the Afterlife Virgins are far more advertized in the USA, where we laugh at "those rag-heads" and their silly belifs with smug superiority. In reality, suicide bombing has much more complicated motives, and allows the bombers to strike a blow against an enemy in good (though twisted) conscience. Osama knows this quite well, and the leadership of al-Qaeda and the various Hezbollahs (Armies of God) and Intifadehs (Uprisings) exploit it.

Religion, of course, is a big part of this exploitation, but if today's suicide jihadis didn't have Islam to use, they would use whatever was handy. Nationalism -- perverted Patriotism -- is often a big part of this violence, too. Communism was able to motivate people to sacrifice their lives without having the promise of an afterlife. We, in our society, can scarcely imagine how self-sacrifice can exist without an afterlife, but it's possible, and it's been done. The Russian and central Asian people of the USSR who joined The Red Army and The Party often sacrificed their lives for abstractions like The Future, The Proletariat, their children, Justice, etc.

Even in America, there are people who are sufficiently crazy to sacrifice themselves for abstract causes. Tim McVeigh did not expect to live very long after his terrorist act. If you've ever read (or read about) The Turner Diaries, it is about a fictional American Nazi who sacrificed his life for his new American Führer, and captures the fanaticism of both American and the original German Nazis and Fascists. McVeigh, it should be noted, considered himself an atheist Libertarian -- like most Communists, he had a non-religion "faith". And, like most psychopaths, McVeigh did not suffer from overtly irrational behavior, beliefs, or fanaticism. He was able to coolly and mechanically plan and execute mass death.

So, my doubts come down to whether it's as simple as promising suicidally despondant people some great after-life sex, or the overall favor of a deity. Religion is a tremendous facilitator, and has enromous potential for destruction, but it's clearly not the causal factor. I have no doubts that religion is often a key culprit, but it's not essential for self-sacrificing, self-destructive fanaticism.

--p!