If you're looking to find out what causes terrorism, particularly suicide attacks, I highly recommend Alan Krueger's book on the topic. What predicts terrorism is not education level, nor poverty, nor religion; rather, it usually has to do with ethnic conflict and, most importantly, a perceived lack of political means of redress. Islam currently ties Pakistans and Arabs together, but without Israel and America to unite them, they'd fall apart.
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And without nanny statism and child advocacy the Waco Koresh compound wouldn't have been burned down, the Oklahoma city bombing blowback wouldn't have happened. So like we should do away with the 2 former and look for leaders in Aryan nation? I think we're in a phase where the terrorist danger is more of a state sponsored nature and Krueger's book may not be spot on for that.
I have not read Krueger's book. I know he is an intelligent economist. Terrorism seems to be generated by those that are rejected. Looking at it, Qutb, Saud, Zawahiri their just another version of Lenin. But I may be wrong.
And without nanny statism and child advocacy the Waco Koresh compound wouldn't have been burned down, the Oklahoma city bombing blowback wouldn't have happened.
Is this snark?
"but without Israel and America to unite them, they'd fall apart."
Well I guess all we have to do is destroy western style democracy everywhere in the world and replace it with Sharia and our problems will be solved because no western government is going to give "political means of redress" to those who want to govern by Sharia.
but without Israel and America to unite them, they'd fall apart
Don't worry, even if the US and Israel weren't there, there's many other "unifying" forces out there for Islamists.
Like India.
And Russia.
And Greece.
And Christians in Nigeria.
And Black Sudanese.
And every other boundary of the Islamic world.
Problem: political aims are related (thought not on a 1:1 basis) with ideological aims. Conflicts arise because of percieved conflicts of interest (which often arise from ideology), and become violent when ideology dictates a need to address same.
Close. What predicts terrorism, both foreign and domestic, is the perception of the terrorist that he is a loser and a weakling. He strikes back out of resentment against his "loserhood." From Columbine to Gaza, that perception unifies all terrorists.
What predicts terrorism, both foreign and domestic, is the perception of the terrorist that he is a loser and a weakling
I don't think this would have described terrorists who espoused "propgaganda of the deed" nor the IRA or ETA more recently. A "general theory of terrorism" and "master psychological profile of terrorists" strike me as pretty barren territory.
Marc Sageman in his book Understanding Terror Networks noted that most international terrorists are well regarded in their communities; they are law abiding (not even so much as a parking ticket); and are decent family men. These people are anything but losers.
International terrorists (and leaders of terrorists) can fall into other categories, such as adrenaline junkies, assorted sociopaths who do it as a business, and those organizing terrorism for their own personal aggrandizement (hoping to become El Jefe when the dust settles).
I'm talking more about the guys who actually walk into pizza parlors wearing bomb vests, not the guys who wound them up and sent them there. Without the former, the latter aren't a problem.
perceived lack of political means of redress.
So, you mean those "horrible neocons", with their "obsession" about bringing democracy to the Middle East, actually have the one possibly successful method of fighting terrorism?
Who would have thought!
/sarcasm
According to the neocons and related species, terrorists are like a 90-lb weakling picking up a rock after being pushed to the ground and kicked in the face by a 240-lb bully. At which point the bully makes some sort of noises about 'fighting fair'.
Oddly enough, about 250 years back, the British soldiers in the colonies made the same sort of remarks about the revolutionary troops. Why, the gall of those bounders! Rather than duke it out on the field like true gentlemen, 2,000 redcoats with cannon to 70 Minutemen with hunting pieces, those cowards refused to confront their foes, sniping at the troops from concealement!!!! What pathetic weasel losers.
Uh, Revolutionary War troops did not target women and children, nor non-combatants generally. Small distinction.
How's that dissertation coming?
Uh, Revolutionary War troops did not target women and children, nor non-combatants generally. Small distinction.
How's that dissertation coming?
SoV, for your reference, it is posts like your 4:28 that cause people to (erroneously, accorinding to you) classify you as a "liberal" or "leftist" rather than a "moderate."
Most true moderates do not understand the deliberate mass-murder of civilians to constitute the moral equivalent of either individual self-defense against bullies, or the use of unconventional tactics against military targets.
Scent of Violets wrote: Oddly enough, about 250 years back, the British soldiers in the colonies made the same sort of remarks about the revolutionary troops. Why, the gall of those bounders! Rather than duke it out on the field like true gentlemen, 2,000 redcoats with cannon to 70 Minutemen with hunting pieces, those cowards refused to confront their foes, sniping at the troops from concealement!!!!
Given that the Minutemen were ostensibly seeking a life of freedom from an ongoing foreign fealty, and some sort of fair and representative government in place of said fealty, I don't think your summary is quite covering all the angles.
Right, Greg. Because, thus far, our efforts to democratize the middle east has proven to be an unmitigated success with nearly no cost or consequence. /rolls eyes
Let's suppose that Iraq ends us being exactly what all the neocons are hoping for: a successful and stable democratic republic. By the time we reach that goal, how much resources will we have spent getting it to that point in dollars, lives, manpower and resources?
Now let's imagine taking that methodology and trying to extend it to every other middle-eastern country that's producing terrorists (skipping over the minor issue that a lot of those countries are our allies).
Just how much of this do you think we can do before we bankrupt ourselves into oblivion?
The neocon dream really is a moral crusade becuase nothing short of zealotry could even contemplate trying to put our country through that sort of financial and human grinder.
And before you come back with the canard that all the other countries will just naturally fall into a democratic state once Iraq gets on its feet. By this point, I think that we can put that fantasy in the same box as the one where we put the theory that we'd be greeted with flowers and hugs.
If it succeeds, it will have been cheap by historical standards. We took heavier casualties on D-Day than we have so far in Iraq. Dollars and resources can easily be made up; lives are the only measure worth worrying about.
Straw man. You've unconscionably sharpened the point. No one thought that other countries would "naturally fall" into democracy, but rather that a prosperous democratic state would destabilize neighboring failed autocratic states. Why else would the DDR/USSR build the Berlin Wall?
Will it happen in the Middle East? Maybe, perhaps probably, not. But it's worth a shot.
Indeed, a small distinction. Especially since the U.S. has killed thousands of innocents, and has held, tortured, and killed innocent people.
But that wasn't the point I was trying to make.
How's that burrowing parasite thing coming with you, Occam? Or should I say Harold?
But that wasn't the point I was trying to make.
Ok. What was?
And of course, I neither said nor implied that it was. If you think I have, quote where I said any such thing.
The point, of course is that one side is much stronger, much more powerful in a conventional sense. Not being idiots - or particularly moral, for that matter - they will always do everything in their power to make sure that any conflict happens on those terms that give them overwhelming superiority. The weaker guys, not being idiots - or particularly moral for that matter - will try to avoid that type of conflict and resort to means that give them some sort of parity. And of course, not being idiots - or particularly moral, for that matter - the stronger guys will denounce these tactics as being underhanded, immoral, etc.
Here's a hypothetical, you live in a small village that is being attacked by bandits. They have swords, petards, even muskets. You you scythes, hoes and a few blacksmith tools. And for every able-bodied man the village can muster, the bandits can field two. Things look pretty grim, until a scouting party comes back with the bandit leader's two wives and six children - two of them sons, and the eldest absent from the conflict of the day only because he had been wounded the week before.
You explain to the bandit chief that unless he withdraws, you will kill his family. He calls you a bunch of animals, uncivilized, stinking and cowardly, threatening as you are women and 'children', all of them 'innocent'. Release them and fight like men, you terrorists!
According to you, the villagers really are acting like terrorists, yes? They're not resisting by any means possible, they are just morally depraved, plain and simple.
Oh, and by the way, what do you think of the U.S. torturing and killing innocent people? I suppose that's one of those distasteful, very regrettable things that nevertheless have to be done - can't make an omelette without breaking eggs, right?
Harold??
War is a coarsening business: if you believe that the "Revolutionary War" was won by saints, try Hugh Bicheno's "Rebels and Redcoats: The American Revolutionary War".
Scent of Violets @4:28 comment has some validity, even if the comparison to Minutemen/British is circumstantially different.
Terrorism comes from having an idea you won't let go of, being unwilling to compromise, while lacking the power to implement or impose it. You combine that with the educated or smarter "idea men" using their less educated and unemployed brethren as the foot soldiers and you have what we have today.
Western armies are exceedingly difficult to fight even if you have the tools. They are well trained even though every now and then an effort against them works on some marginal level.
But hitting civilians gives you more attention around the world, causes more political concern, and is just easier to do (less cost in manpower and money when resources are limited to begin with).
When you are weak, you fight dirty and that ought not to be particularly surprising, nor does it make a population uniquely distinct in their evil doing abilities.
According to you, the villagers really are acting like terrorists, yes? They're not resisting by any means possible, they are just morally depraved, plain and simple.
What are you, the Random Strawman Analogy Generator? Funny how you continue to spade up these examples of noble resistance to criminal tyranny with at least some moderated respect of non-combatant life, when that has no substantive bearing to the types of real-world situations under discussion. Are your arguments that weak?
I neither said nor implied that it was. If you think I have, quote where I said any such thing.
Oh, here we go with the hyperprecise linguistics from the king of putting words in people's mouths. Next time I'll put everything in single quotes to make it OK. You picked your analogies, and they were lousy ones, given that nobody really thinks its wrong to threaten a bully with physical harm, or to snipe at soldiers in uniform on a battlefield from behind cover. But OK, you didn't literally say they were morally equivalent to murdering civilians en masse. I concede.
According to you, the villagers really are acting like terrorists, yes? They're not resisting by any means possible, they are just morally depraved, plain and simple.
That is in fact a difficult moral question, given that, while kidnapping is wrong, from a utilitarian stand point, allowing the bandits to win in a conventional battle would result in near-certain blooshed and widespread rape, etc. I'm inclined to side with the villagers, but mostly on the grounds that it's wrong to be a bandit. That is, they are resisting a big evil with a smaller one, and as such behaving morally (provided they don't torture or maim their hostages beyond what is necessary for restraint). If the "villagers" were bandits in their mountain redoubt, and the "bandits" were professionally disciplined soldiers seeking to enforce the law and end their criminal enterprise, I'd rule against the villagers.
So OK, let's concede that sometimes big evils can morally be resisted by smaller ones. What is the terrible, terrible, evil resisted by the 9/11, 3/11, or 7/7 attacks? What horrible fate was to befall Bali that the plucky little nightclub bombers prevented? Indeed, what horrors await Iraq under the Maliki regime which are greater than car bombs in marketplaces? Can I safely say that these are not examples of a large evil being prevented by a small one, but simply examples of evil on varying scales without anything resemble a justification? (Or worse, evils on a relatively small scale perpetrated in the service of a greater evil, i.e. the imposition of a brutal theocratic regime)
Oh, and by the way, what do you think of the U.S. torturing and killing innocent people?
As I've said before, I'm opposed to torturing guilty people. And while I certainly don't favor killing innocents, I do recognize a moral difference between accidental and deliberate killing.
BINGO. And more elegantly put. And yet, we see the usual neocon cabal who just don't get it, who think this is completely mysterious and unanticipated type of behaviour. Or at least, they say they don't.
Thanks for admitting I'm right, Mousey :-)
Er, no. I don't think you read what I wrote. I said that the _bully_ thinks it's unfair if you pick up a rock, even though he's much bigger than you. I said that the _British_Troops_ thought the Americans weren't playing cricket, because they insisted on hiding and sniping, rather than coming out and being shot like men.
In re the bully, something like this actually happened to me. Rather large guy came at me on the diamond, despite repeated warnings to stay away, I picked up a bat which happened to be handy and got him whickety-whack across the shins. Whereupon he commenced to roll upon the ground, moaning something about me being a 'pussy', and to drop the bat and fight fair. I did, he started to jump to his feet, calling me a _f_dumbass, and when he was halfway up I kicked him right above his left eye with my steel-toed workboot. He didn't get up for a while.
Needless to say, _his_ story the next day was that I was a coward, and that I 'used weapons', and 'he was going to see that I got what I deserved'. Yeah, I was the bad guy. And of course, if I had gone mano-a-mano, I would have got the snot kicked out of me, and people would have come up and said that to my face, like it somehow had made me a lesser person, the girls would have giggled, etc.
Why anyone would think the bully would have said anything different, why _you_ think he would have said something different, Rob, is beyond me.
Careful there, you're not sounding moderate at all!
Oh, those are all completely different discussions, each and every single instance, and others not mentioned as well. My point is that labeling people and the way they push back as 'terrorist' is emotive, stupid, and counter-productive. It's designed to do nothing _but_ shut up dissenters and shut off any productive discussion.
When you are weak, you fight dirty
Sure. That doesn't make it right or good to fight dirty, or mean that criticizing the weak for fighting dirty (which is apparently what "neocons," but not exquisitely rational moderates, do) is somehow out of bounds.
Uh, Rob? You've also said that it probably wasn't a good idea to have these sorts of torture questions go to trial. You do remember that, right?
Don't you find the two positions the least bit . . . inconsistent? Or is this where we just throw up our hands and say it's a shame we can't get to the bottom of this, it wouldn't be good for America right now, would be 'too divisive', and then go on about what a twisted mofo Terrorist Dude is?
I said that the _bully_ thinks it's unfair if you pick up a rock, even though he's much bigger than you.
Sure, and I suspect that most of us agree that the bully is wrong, and that picking up a rock or a bat when personally threatened is perfectly fair. Ditto the gentleman British officers who resented getting shot by rag-tag militiamen. Boo-hoo, sorry you overpaid for your commission.
However, in the context of this discussion, the "bully" is the United States, and the "weakling" is a variety of, yes, "terrorists" whose attacks (outside of Iraq and Israel, which cases require special discussion) have nothing whatsoever to do with defending themselves, their families, or even their countries from anything the US is doing to harm them.
So a proper analogy would probably be a 90-lb weakling from the distant suburbs who shoots the police chief in the major city center, on grounds that a couple of his officers live in the same town as the weakling. It's not "fighting dirty"; it's hardly "fighting" at all; it's just killing for no good reason.
I think the police chief, despite his much greater personal power and the ability to defeat the weakling in a "fair" fight involving the SWAT team, is justified in complaining about getting shot. Right?
Er, you know Rob, someday I'll get you trained up to where you respond to what I actually say, instead of what you think I've said.
And I have not suggested that criticizing the weak for fighting dirty is out of bounds. Again, go and see for yourself. What I will suggest is that if you exclusively criticize the weak for fighting dirty, and you don't criticize at all the strong for whatever part in the fighting that they may have had, in fact, try to brush that off as 'irrelevant', I'll laugh in your face for being partisan weakling, as well as for being totally disreputable, and having no authority to make moral pronouncements to anyone.
"You're a horrible, horrible person who should be jailed for kicking him the way you did. No, we're not talking about what he did, we're talking about what you did, don't try to change the subject. And if you mention one more time that tried to cold-cock you from behind with a 2x4, I'm going to get really, really mad."
Are we clear on the concept now?
Are you starting to get the idea that I take a very dim view towards war in general?
Don't you find the two positions the least bit . . . inconsistent?
Yes, somewhat. Such are the contradictions of my unfathomable mind.
Seriously, it's possible to think that something is wrong without thinking that it should be illegal, or to think that something is/should be illegal without thinking that a specific person should face prosecution, or to think that there are better ways to deal with a problem then to have a criminal trial, or to think that a criminal trial is a bad idea under current political conditions, etc.
I should point out that I differ from you in that I regard hypocrisy as a venial sin, at worst, and an immutable feature of the human condition.
someday I'll get you trained up to where you respond to what I actually say, instead of what you think I've said.
I'm willing to try, if you're willing to extend the same courtesy to me, Mr. "'partisan witch hunt'"
But do understand that, unlike in a proof, context matters, and also that directly saying what you mean ("The weak fight dirty") is less prone to misinterpretation than elliptical analogies offered without explanation.
Um, maybe I'm missing something here, but I _am_ thinking of Iraq and Israel. In fact, Megan has made an implicit reference at the top:
As to this:
And in those cases where that was the best analogy, I'd agree with you 100%. Fair enough?
I _am_ thinking of Iraq and Israel
Ah, well, that clears things up a little then.
And in those cases where that was the best analogy, I'd agree with you 100%.
I had in mind Sept. 11, on of the "provocations" for which was the presence of US troops on the Iraq-Saudi border.
You know, I've thought before that this might be one of the key differences between conservatives and the rest of us :-) Depending on the type of hypocrisy, of course. Kids might find it a bit galling to hear "do as I say, not as I do", but really, in this case, there really are two different sets of rules because the two sets of people are different. Similarly, if some citizen is constantly in my face about the necessity of 'sexual restraint', and how licentiousness leads to a general depravity, and then I find out that they've enjoyed a little illicit sex from time (at _great_ distances apart), well, I understand that the person sincerely believes what he's preaching, and that people are weak.
But if I hear someone thundering in the pulpit week after week, carrying on at length about this topic, or if some congressmen tries to get legislation passed to publicly humiliate the clients of prostitutes, and _then_ come to find out these worthies have been engaging the services of a stable of doxies, and that they are paying for their attentions with money out of the collection plate, or with one of those gold-plated latinum congressional credit cards . . . well, then I think we're moving out of venial territory, and into cardinal, in fact, have probably already broken the sound barrier when we crossed that line a few dozen miles back.
I suspect that it's because conservatives deep down believe that some people are just better than others, and that those rules really are for other people. And putting the best possible face on things, that's assuming the whole thing wasn't just a cheap con.
I'm guessing you understand then that the average Iraqi citizen might be a bit peeved at the invasion.
I suspect that it's because conservatives deep down believe that some people are just better than others, and that those rules really are for other people
This is by no means a failing of "conservatives," alone, but rather is a common failing of the "great," i.e., those with power, fame, money, etc.
Still, the problem in my mind is less the hypocrisy, and more the behavior itself. It came out a while back that Strom Thurmond had fathered a child by a black maid who worked at his house when he was 22 or so. It seemed like every news story on it mentioned that he was a segregationist. Because the problem wasn't that he had exploited a powerless woman for sex, then paid his own daughter to disappear and not ruin his political career. No, the problem was that he preached separation of the races while practicing something different.
I'm guessing you understand then that the average Iraqi citizen might be a bit peeved at the invasion.
I suppose that happless civilians in every war have been "peeved" at being ants crushed beneath the feet of warring giants. I certainly don't hold it against them.
There has been some good discussion as to what a terrorist is in this thread. However, the Americans don't seem to be able to acknowledge their own terrorist actions. Terror bombing was invented by Churchill and embraced by Americans (not Hitler - look it up). We dropped nuclear bombs on Japanese civilian populations, not military targets. Most WW2 bombing runs were conducted to terrorize the populace into capitulating. 9-11 claimed 3,000 lives. The bombing of Dresden alone claimed 300,000 civilian lives. We have no legitimacy whatsoever to accuse anyone of heinous terrorist crimes until we have atoned for our own.
Further, we do not have power to stop foreign terrorists. It's like playing whack-a-mole. What we do have power over is our own government. We cannot stop this fight from the Muslim's side, but we can review our policies that create this anger that fuels the terrorism. I am not saying that their actions are our fault. I am saying that the quickest and most moral course of action is to try to aid these countries as they choose their own courses of development and enlightenment.
Establish democracies in the Middle East! What a farce! Please recall that WE overthrew the democratically elected Iranian government in the 1950's. Palestine followed our instructions and democratically elected their government. Now they are a democratically elected terrorist state. Pakistan was a democracy before our man Pervez overthrew it in a military junta. Our strongest allies outside of Israel in that region are kingdoms. Does it get any more un-democratic than that?
For all of those government-building proponents: Can you name a single country that America has established a lasting democratic government in? I can name many that we did not succeed with: Panama (4 times) Cuba, South Vietnam, Phillipines, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Lebanon, Columbia (2 times). That's it off the top of my head. I once saw a list of around 123 governments we had established as democracies and the dates those democracies collapsed. We are horrible government builders. We do a bit better establishing dictatorships.
Back in the 1990's Bin Laden stated that it was his goal to get America to come to the Middle East because he knew he couldn't win the war on our turf. So he used OUR tactic of terror bombing both civilian and military targets. Under the brilliant leadership of George Bush we walked right into Bin Laden's trap and sent 1/3 of our military into his territory so that he could defeat us.