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talkpoliticsNo "Political Extremism, Hate Groups & Fringe Ideologies" week would be complete without some discussion about Osama bin Laden. I've been doing some reading on the Middle East lately, so I'm posting five fun facts about him. Actually, they're not quite facts, they're my own meandering editorials based on what I've read. And they're not quite fun. But there are five of them.
1. Osama bin Laden ended the Cold War : Well, not really. The Soviets ended the Cold War with their incompetent failure. But among the contributors who are given disproportionate credit for ending the Cold War, (Ronald Reagan, Pope John Paul II, Lech Walesa, Sylvester Stallone, etc.) bin Laden had one of the most convincing claims: As a fund raiser and mouthpiece for the Mujahideen, he represented a rag-tag fugitive fleet that had stalled a Soviet invading force in Afghanistan, costing the USSR more Rubles than they could afford. The Mujahideen, with nothing but good tactics and the will of Allah, had defeated the Soviet empire. It's a very convincing story – especially among those who didn’t know that America was covertly supplying the Mujahideen with weapons, communications equipment, and training. It's a powerful enough story to convince young men to join his base network. ("Al Quieda" is the Arabic word for "The Base") Claiming victory over the commies made bin Laden a global player.
2. Osama bin Laden didn't hate our freedom: When George Bush said that he hated our freedom, it sounded silly. But to Bush's credit, bin Laden's reasons for 9/11 were much sillier. He was opposed to American forces stationed in Saudi Arabia. Those forces were there at the invitation of the Saudi government, with the duty to defend the country from the threat of an Iraqi invasion. Officially, Osama's beef was that no non-Muslims should be 'occupying' Arabia, (Source - 1996 Fatwa) which was a position based on a very radical interpretation of a quotation attributed to Mohammed saying that non-Muslims shouldn't be fopping around Arabia. This was an extremely radical viewpoint that most Muslims did not share and they mostly ignored his fatwa. So, to sweeten the deal, bin Laden issued a second fatwa that covered the more popular reasons to hate the West: Israel, oil rights, Chavs, people who sling their pants down low so that their boxer shorts hang out, etc.
Personally, I don’t think the first fatwa was entirely religiously motivated. When Saudi Arabia started looking for protection from Iraqi aggression, bin Laden applied for the job. But the Saudis turned his Mujahideen service down in favor of the US Armed forces. Were the 9/11 attacks carried out because bin Laden felt jilted? Certainly, that could be a part of it. But bin Laden's main target of the World Trade Center speaks volumes about his real motivations: ever since his college days, bin Laden has been extremely opposed to global business. (Source) Remember, those towers were his target during the Clinton era too - and the Pentagon wasn't. Bin Laden is the most violent free trade protester in the world.
3. Osama bin Laden is a stain on the Islamic religion: ObL's most historic contribution to Islam has been his justification that innocent women and children are legitimate targets of jihad. This is a rat-bastard move of biblical proportions, and it goes directly against traditional Shari'a reasoning. Quoth the Prophet: "Struggle in the path of God. Do not cheat or commit treachery. Do not mutilate or kill women, children, or old men." (Source)
There is a traditional hiearchy to Shari'a, and bin Laden is not considered to be a mujtahid - a learned Shari'a authority who is allowed to add or change rules. Bin Laden has gone rogue from Islam, and has recruited a band of people to murder in the name of Allah. Sexual abuses by priests have been driving people away from Catholicism; can you imagine what effect murdering innocents in the name of Allah has on saner Muslims? Bin Laden has single-handedly caused what might be the biggest rift in Islam in a century.
4. Osama bin Laden is the savior of Israel: It's absolutely true. For decades, Israel has had a completely free hand in the Middle East, thanks to limitless US funding. The United States has provided this funding mostly because it has considered Israel to be a highly strategic ally. From Israel’s inception to the Reagan years, this value was due to the Cold War. But then the USSR collapsed. The money might have tapered off then, (at least to the point where Israel would have to rely on diplomacy, rather than muscle) if Carter hadn't declared a few years before that America would go to great lengths to defend its oil supply. But the Carter doctrine was getting stale, too - reliance on Middle Eastern oil has been tapering off, and will eventually end. So what happens to Israel?
Enter Osama bin Laden, a perfect super villain for the United States. Unlike the USSR, there is no chance for a negotiated peace. Leftists who had sympathy for Socialism have nothing but hate for a pseudo-religious terrorist. Anyone in the US who is far enough out of their nut to sympathize with bin Laden would be considered a terror suspect themselves, and the overwhelming majority of Americans are OK with those people being on government watch lists. And where is this super villain's main sphere of influence? Just down the street from Israel. With a couple of endless wars in the neighborhood, Israel remains a strategic ally to America. So the money keeps flowing, and Israel can continue to use its superior military to resolve disputes.
Bin Laden is famed for being anti-semitic. But he knows that Israel is one of his most important recruiting tools. As noted in #2, he wasn’t getting enough support just by campaigning to kick American troops out of Saudi Arabia. Israel has been very useful to him, and I'm sure that he knows it. He probably also knows that he single-handedly revived a lot of American interest in Israel. And I bet he's OK with that.
5. Osama bin Laden beats Hitler: Hitler had been the perennial bad guy of the modern age, but bin Laden will soon usurp that position. Bin Laden is just so much worse. Both men caused horrible moral and physical devastation, but Hitler is more of a tumor, while bin Laden is a full-body cancer. Hitler’s regime was confined to Europe, and his main influence was on the West. Bin Laden is global. Hitler’s ideologies and command models were also local, which allowed the Allies to surgically remove them from the world. But al Quieda's ideologies and structure are virus-like, and we don't yet know how to get rid of them. If bin Laden dies, (assuming he isn’t already dead) his organization is set up to easily run without him. And if political situations change, al Quieda will still survive. Osama’s strategy of "you supply your anger, and I'll supply you with the training and a glorious death" is a moving target of an ideology. It's similar to the modern version of ETA, which used to be the Basque resistance to Franco's dictatorship, but has now become a band of armed militant lunatics. It’s scary to consider that this was the model that al Quieda started with.
As bad as Nazism was, the aftermath had some silver linings. Colonial-era notions of 'acceptable' genocide were wiped out, as genocide is now considered one of the worst international crimes. Shock over the atrocities also curbed international anti-semitism, and to a lesser degree, homophobia. Germany's de-Nazification was a phoenix-from-the-ashes story, the country remaking itself into one of the most peaceful economic powerhouses in the world. The shock of the war also made future wars in Western Europe almost unthinkable.
It may be too early to talk about Bin Laden's legacies, but the indicators right now don't look so good: Pro-Western forces are now finding torture more acceptable, and terrorism is becoming an even more attractive option for militant fringe groups. Bin Laden didn't invent terror, but he did spend billions to modernize it and make it the world's focus. Also, despite his unforgivable violation of Islamic traditions, Bin Laden has managed to ignite a what some people on both sides see as a holy war.
One fun Perception about Osama bin Laden: Bin Laden is viewed in the West as being a murderous lunatic that attacks our trains, subways, and buildings with suicide bombers. That's a pretty accurate description of him. But if I was accurate in my 5 little analyses, (and I'm sure you'll let me know if I wasn't) I think that it would be a productive effort to call him out on being the a greatly exaggerated hero of the Cold War, someone who uses religion to advance his anti-global agenda, and someone who poisons that religion with his heretical policy of murdering innocents, a savior of Israel's bully politics, and the world's (not just the West's) biggest villain. Being publicly angry with him for his damage to the West helps him recruit anti-Western militants. But I think that calling him out on his actual beliefs and impacts on the world would drive many of those militants away.
1. Osama bin Laden ended the Cold War : Well, not really. The Soviets ended the Cold War with their incompetent failure. But among the contributors who are given disproportionate credit for ending the Cold War, (Ronald Reagan, Pope John Paul II, Lech Walesa, Sylvester Stallone, etc.) bin Laden had one of the most convincing claims: As a fund raiser and mouthpiece for the Mujahideen, he represented a rag-tag fugitive fleet that had stalled a Soviet invading force in Afghanistan, costing the USSR more Rubles than they could afford. The Mujahideen, with nothing but good tactics and the will of Allah, had defeated the Soviet empire. It's a very convincing story – especially among those who didn’t know that America was covertly supplying the Mujahideen with weapons, communications equipment, and training. It's a powerful enough story to convince young men to join his base network. ("Al Quieda" is the Arabic word for "The Base") Claiming victory over the commies made bin Laden a global player.
2. Osama bin Laden didn't hate our freedom: When George Bush said that he hated our freedom, it sounded silly. But to Bush's credit, bin Laden's reasons for 9/11 were much sillier. He was opposed to American forces stationed in Saudi Arabia. Those forces were there at the invitation of the Saudi government, with the duty to defend the country from the threat of an Iraqi invasion. Officially, Osama's beef was that no non-Muslims should be 'occupying' Arabia, (Source - 1996 Fatwa) which was a position based on a very radical interpretation of a quotation attributed to Mohammed saying that non-Muslims shouldn't be fopping around Arabia. This was an extremely radical viewpoint that most Muslims did not share and they mostly ignored his fatwa. So, to sweeten the deal, bin Laden issued a second fatwa that covered the more popular reasons to hate the West: Israel, oil rights, Chavs, people who sling their pants down low so that their boxer shorts hang out, etc.
Personally, I don’t think the first fatwa was entirely religiously motivated. When Saudi Arabia started looking for protection from Iraqi aggression, bin Laden applied for the job. But the Saudis turned his Mujahideen service down in favor of the US Armed forces. Were the 9/11 attacks carried out because bin Laden felt jilted? Certainly, that could be a part of it. But bin Laden's main target of the World Trade Center speaks volumes about his real motivations: ever since his college days, bin Laden has been extremely opposed to global business. (Source) Remember, those towers were his target during the Clinton era too - and the Pentagon wasn't. Bin Laden is the most violent free trade protester in the world.
3. Osama bin Laden is a stain on the Islamic religion: ObL's most historic contribution to Islam has been his justification that innocent women and children are legitimate targets of jihad. This is a rat-bastard move of biblical proportions, and it goes directly against traditional Shari'a reasoning. Quoth the Prophet: "Struggle in the path of God. Do not cheat or commit treachery. Do not mutilate or kill women, children, or old men." (Source)
There is a traditional hiearchy to Shari'a, and bin Laden is not considered to be a mujtahid - a learned Shari'a authority who is allowed to add or change rules. Bin Laden has gone rogue from Islam, and has recruited a band of people to murder in the name of Allah. Sexual abuses by priests have been driving people away from Catholicism; can you imagine what effect murdering innocents in the name of Allah has on saner Muslims? Bin Laden has single-handedly caused what might be the biggest rift in Islam in a century.
4. Osama bin Laden is the savior of Israel: It's absolutely true. For decades, Israel has had a completely free hand in the Middle East, thanks to limitless US funding. The United States has provided this funding mostly because it has considered Israel to be a highly strategic ally. From Israel’s inception to the Reagan years, this value was due to the Cold War. But then the USSR collapsed. The money might have tapered off then, (at least to the point where Israel would have to rely on diplomacy, rather than muscle) if Carter hadn't declared a few years before that America would go to great lengths to defend its oil supply. But the Carter doctrine was getting stale, too - reliance on Middle Eastern oil has been tapering off, and will eventually end. So what happens to Israel?
Enter Osama bin Laden, a perfect super villain for the United States. Unlike the USSR, there is no chance for a negotiated peace. Leftists who had sympathy for Socialism have nothing but hate for a pseudo-religious terrorist. Anyone in the US who is far enough out of their nut to sympathize with bin Laden would be considered a terror suspect themselves, and the overwhelming majority of Americans are OK with those people being on government watch lists. And where is this super villain's main sphere of influence? Just down the street from Israel. With a couple of endless wars in the neighborhood, Israel remains a strategic ally to America. So the money keeps flowing, and Israel can continue to use its superior military to resolve disputes.
Bin Laden is famed for being anti-semitic. But he knows that Israel is one of his most important recruiting tools. As noted in #2, he wasn’t getting enough support just by campaigning to kick American troops out of Saudi Arabia. Israel has been very useful to him, and I'm sure that he knows it. He probably also knows that he single-handedly revived a lot of American interest in Israel. And I bet he's OK with that.
5. Osama bin Laden beats Hitler: Hitler had been the perennial bad guy of the modern age, but bin Laden will soon usurp that position. Bin Laden is just so much worse. Both men caused horrible moral and physical devastation, but Hitler is more of a tumor, while bin Laden is a full-body cancer. Hitler’s regime was confined to Europe, and his main influence was on the West. Bin Laden is global. Hitler’s ideologies and command models were also local, which allowed the Allies to surgically remove them from the world. But al Quieda's ideologies and structure are virus-like, and we don't yet know how to get rid of them. If bin Laden dies, (assuming he isn’t already dead) his organization is set up to easily run without him. And if political situations change, al Quieda will still survive. Osama’s strategy of "you supply your anger, and I'll supply you with the training and a glorious death" is a moving target of an ideology. It's similar to the modern version of ETA, which used to be the Basque resistance to Franco's dictatorship, but has now become a band of armed militant lunatics. It’s scary to consider that this was the model that al Quieda started with.
As bad as Nazism was, the aftermath had some silver linings. Colonial-era notions of 'acceptable' genocide were wiped out, as genocide is now considered one of the worst international crimes. Shock over the atrocities also curbed international anti-semitism, and to a lesser degree, homophobia. Germany's de-Nazification was a phoenix-from-the-ashes story, the country remaking itself into one of the most peaceful economic powerhouses in the world. The shock of the war also made future wars in Western Europe almost unthinkable.
It may be too early to talk about Bin Laden's legacies, but the indicators right now don't look so good: Pro-Western forces are now finding torture more acceptable, and terrorism is becoming an even more attractive option for militant fringe groups. Bin Laden didn't invent terror, but he did spend billions to modernize it and make it the world's focus. Also, despite his unforgivable violation of Islamic traditions, Bin Laden has managed to ignite a what some people on both sides see as a holy war.
One fun Perception about Osama bin Laden: Bin Laden is viewed in the West as being a murderous lunatic that attacks our trains, subways, and buildings with suicide bombers. That's a pretty accurate description of him. But if I was accurate in my 5 little analyses, (and I'm sure you'll let me know if I wasn't) I think that it would be a productive effort to call him out on being the a greatly exaggerated hero of the Cold War, someone who uses religion to advance his anti-global agenda, and someone who poisons that religion with his heretical policy of murdering innocents, a savior of Israel's bully politics, and the world's (not just the West's) biggest villain. Being publicly angry with him for his damage to the West helps him recruit anti-Western militants. But I think that calling him out on his actual beliefs and impacts on the world would drive many of those militants away.
(no subject)
Date: 18/6/10 20:06 (UTC)There are ways to make militant opposition to the Western world a less attractive occupation. I consider it a more meaningful endeavor to attempt to understand rather than just combat people.
(no subject)
Date: 18/6/10 20:08 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 18/6/10 21:19 (UTC)