Heraldblog
Proud Member of the Reality Based Community
| Guestbook |
| Archives |
| Contacts |
| Subscribe |
| About |
 |
Of mugwumps and jihad
One paragraph really jumped off the page:She is frustrated that more moderate Muslims do not fight. "At all of the public events I've done to promote this book, not once have I seen a moderate Muslim stand up and look an extremist in the eye and say, 'I'm Muslim too. I disagree with your perspective. Now let's hash it out publicly.' Yes, after the event people tip-toe up to me and say, 'Thank you for what you are doing.' And there are times when I really want to say, 'Where was your support when it mattered? Not for my ego. But to show the extremists that they are not going to walk away with the show."
More and more the world is waking up to the fact that there is a civil war within Islam. I don't know that there has ever been an historical parallel to the current state of affairs. Throughout history, your typical civil war has been contained within national borders, and involved persons in the same nation or geographic region. Brits fighting Brits, Yankees killing Southerners, etc. Today we have large groups of people at odds over differing interpretations of a 1,300 year old book, and one side is making their point by killing people of other religions who don't even follow the same book.
A cynic friend of mine says that all religious wars can be distilled to one statement: my imaginary friend is better than your imaginary friend, and now I must kill you. But a religious civil war is even more absurd. This one can be summed up thusly: My imaginary friend says you can no longer listen to your imaginary friend, and if you do, I will kill you and some other people who have a different imaginary friend altogether.
A different kid of war
American culture prides itself on being a melting pot of peoples and religions and all that, and we've done a fairly good job of assimilating "the other" into our culture. But our emphasis on assimilation, and the tolerance and secular nature of American society that makes assimilation possible, blinds us to the underlying realities in The War Against Terror. Radical Islam, a political philosophy that views religion and government as inseparable, couldn't be any more foreign to the American mind. Success in the current war hinges on our leaders understanding just who we're fighting, and who we are not fighting. We are fighting Islamofascists, those illiberal jihadists who blame modernity and non-Muslims for their poverty and ignorance. We are not fighting moderate Muslims, people who embrace modernity, and education, and personal hygiene, and want nothing to do with bin Laden and the rest.
But alas, the world is not divided quite so neatly. There is a great mass of humanity that I will call Islamic mugwumps, or fence sitters, who don't much like the Islamofascists because they suck all the fun out of life, but they don't much like the West either because we have huge, efficient armies and we manufacture all the cool stuff and our women look like Angelina Jolie. So the mugwumps are not too happy when bin Laden makes all Muslims look like crazed assassins and mass murderers, but they're not terribly bothered when he makes the US look stupid, either.
But the US needs the wugwumps. Without them, we will get the "war-without-end" that Bush has promised us.
Most wars throughout history have been a game of capture the flag. Two uniformed armies beat on each other until one quits. That won't work this time. The enemy doesn't wear uniforms, or carry a flag, or even have a country. It's like fighting the Barbary Pirates, but instead of ships, the pirates all have cell phones and they dress like us. So how do we know when the war has ended? One of two ways: either we kill all the bad guys so there's no one left to fight, or we convince the wugwumps that they're better off with us than the Islamofascists. Now I don't have to burn up too many pixels to convince you that option number one is not really an option. Not unless our scientists discover some sort of "crazed religious fanatic" gene that we can manipulate into converting couscous to arsenic. So that leaves option number two: we sell ourselves. We demonstrate that Western values of religious tolerance, human rights, and pluralistic democracy offer far greater advantages than dressing women like beekeepers.
Option number two took a big hit last week with the release of photos of American soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners. The mugwumps are already skeptical that America is not in Iraq for the oil, or to eradicate Muslims, or to silence Saddam about his dealings with past US adminstrations, or any of the countless other conspiracy theories heard on the Arab street. If the US was making any progress in winning hearts and minds, it was lost when the first prison photos were published.
Anyone who downplays the seriousness of this scandal is signing onto option number one, which can be summed up in a famous Marine Corps slogan: Kill 'em all. Let God sort 'em out. That attitude, as onerous as it is, was necessary in your Dad's war, when the generals had their eye on a theatre map, and at the center of that map was a big, bright-colored stick pin that said "Berln" or "Tokyo". Your Dad's war was a war of attrition, much like a boxing match, where each side beat on each other until someone went down.
The War Against Terror is not your Dad's war. We need our allies to win this one, and that includes being nice to people who look an awful lot like the enemy. It's a huge challenge. It's something the US has never done before, and there is scarely even a vocabulary available so we can discuss it. To get through it, we will need more than bullets and bombs. We will need our liberal institutions of free speech and free inquiry. We need to lead by example, and fight by example. I am worried that Bush and Rumsfeld and the rest don't get it. Instead of openness and willingness to adapt, we are getting the same tired slogans over and over. Stay the course. We'll be there as long as it takes.
As one writer recently put it: "Being steadfast in defense of carefully considered convictions is a virtue. Being blankly incapable of distinguishing cherished hopes from disappointing facts, or of reassessing comforting doctrines in face of contrary evidence, is a crippling political vice. "
7.5.04 03:58
|
(7.5.04 08:26) I like your analysis. But we always fight the last war! The think that bugs me about this war is the method that we have chosen to make people love America. Instead of doing what we're really good at - creating brands and marketing them - we use good old Fred Flintstone technology and bash em over the head. That works up to a point, but what happens when you try that with someone your own size or larger - say China for example. We need a new doctrine! Don't kill em! Feed em. If they already have food, send em teachers. If they already have teachers, send em students. I've never met anybody in my life that wasn't my best friend after we had a knock-down drag-out fight. But as I get older, I realize that the knock-down drag-out part isn't really necessary. Thanks for the George Will quote too. Makes me feel not so alone in wishing for alternatives. "Some men see things the way they are and say 'why', I dream of things that never were and say 'why not.'" There's your liberal / converservative paradigm for ya. |
|
(8.5.04 19:26) I read the article about the lady as well. At a certain level it is very difficult for the "moderates" to stand up and be counted especially when they live in western cultures. At this point in time they are so busy defending the allegation "all muslims are terrorists" - that it is difficult for them to fight the battle for internal reform. The problem with the Americans is that they are geo-politically naive. They expect the whole world to behave like them. They probably should take a few lessons from the British on the acquisition and administration of territory. |
|
(8.5.04 21:27) It occurred to me after reading your comment, Gargi, that Americans confuse commercial and cultural success with political success. It's a bad case of "love me, love my dog." American computers, cars, software, music and movies are found in virtually every corner of the globe. Surely, there must be an invisible "American Way" that follows. It doesn't really work that way, does it? |
|
(9.5.04 18:47) I thought that it was the "good intentions" more than anything else that screws the americans in every war. If they went to fight for land or for oil they would probably do a good job on it. But the altruism that they go in with - to save the poor souls from communism or dictatorship - really hampers them. All war is ugly. if you expect your armed forces to fight like saints - they will end up dead. The Americans somehow expect their army to win without either killing or get killed. Its a dangerous attitude for any armed involvement. It's like the line from Godfather. Kay tells Tom Hagen "he's not the man i married'(on Michael Corleone). Tom replies "you would have been a widow if he was" |
|
(19.1.06 14:05) Hello, these are several links to pharm resources. http://acyclovir-blog.somee.com http://adderall-blog.somee.com http://ambien-blog.somee.com http://buy-valium-blog.somee.com Also it will help you to be healthy! http://carisoprodol-blog.somee.com http://cialis-blog.somee.com http://codeine-blog.somee.com http://didrex-blog.somee.com http://fioricet-blog.somee.com http://hgh-blog.somee.com We'll be glad to see you  http://lingerie-sexy.somee.com If it's not interesting, just delete this post and we will newer post here anything like this |