Roots to Terrorism

[queen-asante.livejournal.com]

Just a question (or two) for discussion:


How do we bring the guilty [terrorists] to justice without making them martyrs [to the other terrorists]?
 

How do we distinguish the terrorists from those who share their culture but not their cause?






 

Comments

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

How do we bring the guilty [terrorists] to justice without making them martyrs [to the other terrorists]?
Silly question. You can't dictate the reactions of your adversaries. So trying is futile and wrong-headed.

How do we distinguish the terrorists from those who share their culture but not their cause?
Um... by looking for the ones with bombs.

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

Yes I know, the jihadists will just stop calling people martyrs once we find our martyr-proof tactics.

[dwer.livejournal.com]

this isn't tactical, it's strategic. You're getting them confused.

[mrsilence.livejournal.com]

1. The long answer is a 500 page essay minimum, so in short, you can't control what people think. You can only influence it by your actions.

Martyrdom implies dying in the furtherance of a just cause, so not killing them where possible is probably a good start. But killing those who are trying to kill you is often not avoidable, so avoiding the creation of situations along the way to bringing them to justice that create a reasonable belief that their cause is just is another important part.

For instance, blowing up a terrorists village and killing 30 civilians in the effort to nail that one guy creates a very reasonable belief in other terrorists that they were right all along that you were the bad guy and their guy died a hero.

2. The same way we distinguish wrongdoers in all other areas: by their actions.

[policraticus.livejournal.com]

How do we bring the guilty [terrorists] to justice without making them martyrs [to the other terrorists]?

We can't and it shouldn't matter.

How do we distinguish the terrorists from those who share their culture but not their cause?

The terrorists are the ones with the ideology that embraces turning guns and bombs against civil society in order to immanentize the eschaton. The others don't.

[mrsilence.livejournal.com]

We can and it does matter.

That only describes a fraction of terrorists and includes people who never actually did or will do anything wrong.

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

If martyrdom had any sort of strict rules, it would matter, but seeing as how martyrdom can and is applied to anything, changing from thing to another will not inhibit the martyrdom complex.

[policraticus.livejournal.com]

No, really, we can't.

It describes the faction that matters most at the moment. We should be able to recognize who the enemy is, even if they don't give us cause to act against them.

[allhatnocattle.livejournal.com]

How do we bring the guilty [terrorists] to justice without making them martyrs [to the other terrorists]?

#1 Don't let them die. Capture, not kill, is key to avoid martyrdom.

#2 Avoid the death penalty. Pilgrims love long journey to see the exact place their martyr was killed.

#3 Give them a chance to apologize for their sins/crimes and show some remorse. Nobody follows a leader who says he was wrong all along.

How do we distinguish the terrorists from those who share their culture but not their cause?

How do we get to know anyone? Only by words, actions and timer do we every know anyone. And even then, your best friend might be sleeping with your wife behind your back. You never know. But generally treat people with kindness and expect they are decent human beings until they prove otherwise.

[yansirramus.livejournal.com]

1) Don't kill them. This can be difficult, especially when they're determined to die. However I think you've overestimating the power of martyrs - they're a potent symbol, yes, but there'll be many other reasons and resentments that have given rise to whatever terrorist movement you're fighting. Even if you never kill a single person, those underlying resentments will remain, and continue to swell the ranks.

(the easiest way to prevent terrorism is to raise the standard of living. When you own nothing but the clothes on your back, or when your children cry with hunger, it's easy to pick up a gun. You have nothing to lose. It's a lot harder for you or me to pick up that gun)

2) Ah, the combatant-citizen fallacy. I hear this in the media all the time, as though there's this sharp dividing line between those who fight and innocent bystanders. It's nonsense, of course. Was a housewife in WWII any less patriotic because she didn't serve in the trenches? I think your question is flawed because I don't think there is any significant difference between a fighting terrorist and his supportive community.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

1) There's no way to make them not-martyrs. People can make martyrs out of the most unlikely sorts.

2) The same way we distinguish any other group of guerrillas from the populations they hide among. What I find really, really interesting is Maoist terrorists took over Nepal in 2005 but the whole focus of the Global War on Terrorism is extremism in Arab states and in Afghanistan. Two areas of majority-Islamic societies, not even the whole deal. What we call the Global War on Terrorism should more properly be called the War Against Arab Extremism.

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

1) There's no way to make them not-martyrs. People can make martyrs out of the most unlikely sorts.
Nuh-uh, I read a book once that said that war is about deception and making the enemy do what you want, therefore it is only logical to conclude that we can determine our enemy's proclivity for using martyrdom. Sheesh. It's so simple. Just don't do those things which make them use the word martyr. Christ, why didn't I think of this before?

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

We can determine it but we can't stop the psychology that makes martyrs out of people. If we look at some of the mythological Christian martyrs, from a rational perspective they're extremely unsympathetic people. The art of spin doctoring is as old as the oldest profession.

[cill-ros.livejournal.com]

It depends how you define terrorism. Wars nowadays tend to have terrorism on both sides.

[cill-ros.livejournal.com]

True, but what I suppose I meant is that it can't be argued that terrorism is an offshoot or not representative of most wars now that the era of pitched battles are over. "Small wars" or those involving counterinsurgency or urban guerilla warfare are terrorist by definition.

[root-fu.livejournal.com]

There are no martyrs, today. Its not an issue as it was in the past. The closest thing to a martyr is Che Guevara having t-shirts of his face in hot topic.

Terrorists blame everything on the west. They have a mindset where they're unable to acknowledge how they and others contribute to their own problems. If they live in Egypt or Syria and they dislike the lifestyle there -- they blame it all on Israel or America, or someone else. That's the foundation of terrorism, and all terrorists would seem to share this worldview.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Er.....you are aware of how both the USSR and the USA exploited the region for proxy wars, with Turkey, Israel, and Iran the Western proxies and the Arab states the USSR's, right? And that Iraq at least can fairly blame the USA for its problems, given we propped up Saddam, then fought his regime twice and have administered Iraq even worse than he did (and his regime was ghastly enough. The only difference in our favor is not using poison gas on rebels). Iran moreso, given we propped up Saddam against it after they overthrew our guy, the Shah, and that all our aid failed to topple it.

The various countries who've encountered the almighty Israeli Army and its fuzzy-wuzzy policies of occupation like Lebanon and the Sinai part of Egypt have no more reason to love Israel than it does to love regimes that talk about destroying all Jews. The West isn't to blame for everything there, though after Cold War meddling to say it has no responsibility at all is typical Western inability to accept that what we have, others may not want, particularly if imposed at gunpoint and Saddam Hussein and Hosni Mubarak and King Abullah of Saud are what we call democracy.

[root-fu.livejournal.com]

You're justifying a terrorist worldivew?

Whyy?

[the-rukh.livejournal.com]

If they live in Egypt or Syria and they dislike the lifestyle there -- they blame it all on Israel or America, or someone else.

ummmm. read any news lately? Thing about Arab Spring maybe catch your attention? Overthrowing their governments and all that? No?

[root-fu.livejournal.com]

Why does Al Qaeda bomb America but not Mubarak?

Would that imply a misguided sense of priority?

[harry-beast.livejournal.com]

"Bringing terrorists to justice" is a pointless exercise. The current justice system was never designed to deal with fanatical murderers and only provides terrorists with a lengthy, expensive, high profile platform to publicize their ideology, after which they either get imprisoned and serve as a rallying point for others, or (in the case of Canada), get release and are awarded millions of dollars in compensation from the government. Treat the struggle against terrorism like a war, and fight it with the aim of achieving a decisive victory.
Anyone with a terrorist culture is a terrorist. Other people who have the same language, nationality, religion, appearance or whatnot, but who aren't terrorists, are okay.

[dwer.livejournal.com]

1) Try them in the courts, and don't execute them.
2) I think the more important question is, "how do we stop terrorists without killing innocent civilians, since every time we kill innocent civilians, we create more terrorists."

[htpcl.livejournal.com]

This is an interesting topic, AND YET I urge you to read Rule #8 of this community.

Simply said: we need your opinion to be presented in the original post. It's simple. We don't expect a scientific treatise, just some words of your own. That's all.

I hope you'll do it in the future.