The War On Terror

The War On Terror is a mythology with weapons. When Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda elected themselves leaders of Islam, it defined the current position of global stupidity, leading to the present charming state of humanity’s relationship with itself. The weapons are conceptual, as well as physical. The attempt to split Islam from the rest of the human race was the real damage.

The dumbest thing done in response was to take this very cynical exercise on face value. The West knew little about Islam, and conscientiously preferred to know less about its complex and multi-faceted politics. It seemed strange to us that anyone thought we could care less, but the degree of hostility was a surprise. As far as we knew, it was nothing to do with us.

In practice, 1.4 billion people had now been told what their position in relation to the rest of the world was going to be, whether they liked it or not. The West, in its truly naïve ignorance, thought that this was how they did things over there. Eventually this incredibly simplistic level of understanding was replaced by something a bit more realistic, if not palatable.

The methodologies first tried to deal with the physical issues were understandably ad hoc, and achieved their likely results. The ideas regarding the conceptual issues were so vague that “hearts and minds” were never going to be particularly impressed. Nobody seemed to have noticed that 1.4 billion people had been ideologically hijacked.

This very simple bit of fraud could have been stopped a lot sooner with some basic facts:

1. The West isn’t particularly well informed about the rest of the world, especially religions and culture. It is absurd to assume that such esoterica is common knowledge. How do you have a conspiracy against something you barely even know exists?
2. Islam is a conservative religion, with a strong social context. It is not some sort of rest home for nutcases.
3. OBL and AQ and the others have no real status as religious entities. They’ve taken it upon themselves to claim authority. This is like some lay preacher setting himself up as Pope, and expecting all Catholics to believe it. Then others get on the bandwagon.
4. Middle Eastern politics is the original Byzantium, amplified. The preferred position for anyone, particularly real Middle Easterners, is to avoid it.
5. The important issues are poverty, Palestine, and the deadly power games. There are serious, horrible problems, and these are being exploited for local political purposes. It’s about as religious as a hamburger.
6. Terrorism is a press release by other means. The West has managed, somehow, to make all the wrong moves regarding the conceptual weapons. It has stupidly conceded the point regarding the status of Moslems, marginalizing them by definition. It has stringently avoided noting that of the 1.4 billion Moslems on Earth, very nearly all of them are diligently and deliberately not killing anyone.

This is a particularly idiotic way of trying to deal with the issues:

1. This is political, not religious. Few educated Middle Easterners, and fewer over 40, believe it, because they’ve heard it all before, many times. A few generations of verbose total failure has helped to emphasize that view.
2. Some of the people the West has so intelligently categorized with terrorists are people who can’t stand the terrorists, or anything they represent. They’ve effectively been classified heretics, criminals and worse, simply for being Moslem or Arab.
3. The people of the Islamic world could hardly be said to be benefiting from this situation. They’re getting, literally, the worst of both worlds.
4. The much touted “cultural conflict” with the West is an overblown version of the basic conservatism and cultural norms of their society. What they dislike about the West, defined, is pretty much the crap we don’t like ourselves, the tacky billboard we call a culture. The main difference is that we know from experience not to take that garbage seriously.
5. The West doesn’t know enough about the actual situations on the ground to claim prescience about the Middle East, let alone a whole global religion. Our perception is just that: ours. That doesn’t make it right, and obviously doesn’t make it effective.

What good can come of this? If the West wants to be taken seriously, it could start by shutting up on subjects it just doesn’t understand, like Islam. If this potted version of things has proved that Western views are seriously under par, it’s achieved its purpose. It’s not our business. It’s not up to us, by our own stated principles, to tell anyone what religion they should be, or who should govern them. The noisily pro-human rights position seems to have overlooked that, and it hasn’t helped our credibility.

We are supposedly egalitarian, supposedly democratic, supposedly in favor of freedom of belief, and opposed to poverty, oppression, and tyranny in any form. Tell me, exactly when have we shown anyone in the Middle East that we’re upholding those principles on their behalf? So far all we’ve shown them is that we will do some things in our own interests, if for no other reason. We talk a good fairytale. Perhaps we might try doing something about all this altruism, sometime.

So maybe a fundamental injustice like marginalizing everyone in a particular religion isn’t such a great idea. Maybe being pig-ignorant about so much isn’t a terrific character reference to people being killed by the topics we know so little about. Maybe we should find out what we’re trying to achieve, and try gaining some deserved trust, for once. Why should they trust anyone so obviously unaware of their own position?

Iraq is a case in point. The overall idea of getting rid of Saddam Hussein didn’t cause too many tearful nights, globally. The theory of Iraq returning to the human race wasn’t such a bad idea. Maybe even having plumbing, and other innovations. The quaint notion of electricity was even raised at one point. Gee, we get inspired sometimes.

What wasn’t considered was the history, and the realities of conflicting groups. The sheer inability to see that these people had 25 years of unfinished business was bizarre. That the political climate and the regional influences were going to be playing hardball shouldn’t have been a surprise. Again, ignorance, of the most appalling kind. Worse, it took years to realize that. Add to this the healthy amount of publicity it gave to every available ambition of every group in the region, and you have the makings of yet another conceptual horror story. Hollywood couldn’t have done that.

If you’re associated with the smell, you’re the one considered to stink. It wasn’t, and isn’t, any part of our brief to be trying to “influence” that part of the world. They’re very sick of it, and from foreigners, it’s worse. Quite literally everybody with a lousy sound system is trying to run the Middle East, and the market is a bit overloaded with geniuses. Get the act together, kiddies. If you don’t know what you’re doing, don’t do it.

Meanwhile, Terror has shown its limits. It can’t win wars. It can make them a lot worse, but generally the impact is scratches and bruises. The war in Lebanon, another self serving flight into pitiful military assessments, showed how impotent it really is. Hezbollah, armed with a nice array of antiques and a few more modern things, proved once and for all it has no possible hope of beating Israel. Thousands of heavy caliber rounds did much less damage than a week on the roads anywhere on Earth. The Israelis, for their part, proved that tactical hit-and-miss is a pretty iffy way of handling anything, and a truly terrible way of making your own case. The Lebanese proved that they’re living in the wrong part of the world for peace and quiet. Or intelligent issue management.

The whole War On Terror is one big battle of the spin factories. Substance, if any, is accidental, and usually overplayed. The same fact will prove the irrefutable virtue of opposite views. Idyllic, isn’t it?

The danger is that some people really do believe their own publicity. Demagogues aren’t famous for objectivity. On all sides, including the West, the iconic “leaders” of this damn freak show have all been very conscious of their own positions, if not noticeably anything else. Integrity abounds, particularly in front of the cameras. The West has found a position, and is still looking for a way to make it credible. Perhaps taking off the blindfold would help. Al Qaeda has committed itself to this war, and would lose a lot of authority if it wasn’t seen to be more powerful and influential than anyone else. Iran has set itself up as the template for Islamic fundamentalism. With that position has come a lot of ideological baggage. The hatred of Israel, and the dogmatic position regarding the West, are the two bits of hand luggage doing the damage.

The logical extension of the positions maintained regarding Who Hates Who is real war. Not the disgusting petty crimes, or occasional major atrocities, but big league stuff. This is something Terror can’t really handle. It can sit around sniping, and bitching, but it’s out of its depth in this area.

Consider Iran with a nuclear weapon, in the course of one of its monologues on the subject of Israel. What’s the logic? Diplomacy? Sanctions? A nice game of marbles? The logic is threat assessment logic. Preemption? First strike? Instant retaliation? Sudden rise in the number of people learning to dig mass graves? Massive escalation using whatever little hobbies and knickknacks the global supply of heavily armed lunatics might have taken up recently?

Note that the rationale soon loses any real ability to do more than join the dots. The international “community” might like to try taking this seriously. There aren’t going to be any nice speeches and dinners afterwards. No Brownie points for style. You’re looking World War Three in the face, idiots.

That’s where this one trick wonder of ideological positions is going. Fewer options, and none of them good. If we must have a mythology, could we try having one where there’s some hope of survival? For anyone?