RE: [Marxism] Source of Suicide Terrorism (edited)

["Austin, Andrew" <austina@xxxxxxxx>]

________________________________

From: marxism-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx on behalf of Midhurst14@xxxxxxx
Sent: Sun 7/10/2005 11:15 AM
To: marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [Marxism] Source of Suicide Terrorism (edited)

The idea that guided the anarchists of the 19th century;  that their
violence, usually by bombings, will rouse the masses to become  revolutionary 
and
throw out the reactionary leaders still dies hard.
...
Having reactionary ideas themselves; some of the opposition Wahhabi  in Saudi
Arabia, for example, believing that the earth is flat.
...
Having  demonised the ideas of Marxism, the ruling elite are now faced with
the  destructive nihilism of al Qaeda.
...
It is possible however, that the horror of the London bombings  of 7/7 will
convince the disparate al-Qaeda cells, after 18 bomb attacks,  beginning in
December 1992, of the counter productivity of such a strategy. 

I am not an expert in this, but there is a lot of misunderstanding about 
Wahhabism/Salafism in the mainstream press and academic accounts. The 
neo-conservatives have advanced something of a myth that a conspiracy is afoot 
to destroy the West, driven by Wahhabism, a fundamentalist Islamic 
countermovement fostered by the government of Saudi Arabia.  And, in any case, 
if you take a closer look I think you will find that Osama bin Laden is not a 
Salafi or Wahhabi Muslim but rather is an anti-imperialist resistance fighter 
who uses fundamentalist religion to focus the response.  

It's not nihilism at all, if by nihilism you mean the belief that nothing has 
value, especially moral or religious value.  

This is not to say that I agree with bin Ladenism, of course.  But we have to 
identify the reasons for the attacks, and these reasons have been identified in 
the most comprehensive fashion by Robert Pape: 

                Suicide terrorism is rising around the world, but the most 
common explanations do not help us understand why. Religious fanaticism does 
not explain why the world leader in suicide terrorism is the Tamil Tigers in 
Sri Lanka, a group that adheres to a Marxist/Leninist ideology, while existing 
psychological explanations have been contradicted by the widening range of 
socio-economic backgrounds of suicide terrorists. To advance our understanding 
of this growing phenomenon, this study collects the universe of suicide 
terrorist attacks worldwide from 1980 to 2001, 187 in all. In contrast to the 
existing explanations, this study shows that suicide terrorism follows a 
strategic logic, one specifically designed to coerce modern liberal democracies 
to make significant territorial concessions. Moreover, over the past two 
decades, suicide terrorism has been rising largely because terrorists have 
learned that it pays. Suicide terrorists sought to compel American and French 
military forces to abandon Lebanon in 1983, Israeli forces to leave Lebanon in 
1985, Israeli forces to quit the Gaza Strip and the West Bank in 1994 and 1995, 
the Sri Lankan government to create an independent Tamil state from 1990 on, 
and the Turkish government to grant autonomy to the Kurds in the late 1990s. In 
all but the case of Turkey, the terrorist political cause made more gains after 
the resort to suicide operations than it had before. Thus, Western democracies 
should pursue policies that teach terrorists that the lesson of the 1980s and 
1990s no longer holds, policies which in practice may have more to do with 
improving homeland security than with offensive military action.  
http://danieldrezner.com/research/guest/Pape1.pdf 
<http://danieldrezner.com/research/guest/Pape1.pdf>  

Terrorism, as defined by the West, carries a strategic logic.  And the evidence 
shows that the strategy works.  How else would the resistance get the attention 
of Western leaders?  As Fanon noted, anti-imperialist resistance tries all 
manner of ways short of violence to raise awareness of the imperialist's 
actions.  When peaceful tactics accomplish nothing, the resistance imitates the 
imperialist.  Since the imperialist understand violence, resistance violence 
gets his attention.  By targeting civilians, the resistance raises the human 
costs of imperialism.  Asymmetrical warfare by the colonized is a predictable 
consequence of colonialism.

Indeed, I predict that these attacks will continue as long as there are 
American and European boots on Arab soil.  I further predict that the targets 
of the attacks will be those countries that involve themselves in Western 
imperialist activities.  The only solution to terrorism is to deprive the 
terrorists of their motivation to attack Western targets.

Andrew


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