NOTE: This is not a thread about Israel, although I can see why you would be confused going on the thread title...
Preface:
- I am from the Republic of Ireland. For many years, part of my country has suffered from frequent and horrible acts of terrorism. Terrorism - the deliberate targetting of civillians in the name of a particular cause - is a heinous dishonourable brutal act of depravity that I deplore. The following is an excerpt from the Proclamation of the Republic read aloud at the steps of the GPO in Dublin during the Easter Rising of 1916:
"We place the cause of the Irish Republic under the protection of the Most High God, Whose blessing we invoke upon our arms, and we pray that no one who serves that cause will dishonour it by cowardice, inhumanity, or rapine."
- Thankfully, the terrorism in my country seems to have become somewhat of a thing of the past. A tentative peace has been achieved which looks set to last.
Some Preliminary Facts:
- A lot of Arabs do not like the USA, its government and what it stands for. A lot of them do not even like ordinary Americans, despite possibly never having even met one.
- A lot of Muslims do not like the USA, its government and what it stands for. A lot of them do not even like ordinary Americans, despite possibly never having even met one.
Why?
- The reasons are complex, many and varied. To summarise why each individual anti-American Arab or Muslim is in fact anti-American would involve a lot of generalising. I will provide a few of what I regard as the original (pre 9/11) roots drivers:
a) Since WWII and the collapse of the British, French and Russian empires the USA has aggressively pursued a policy of dabbling, to varying degrees, in the internal politics of emerging Arab and Muslim nations for financial, strategic and material gain. I would direct you towards 'A History of Modern Iran Since 1921' by Ali Ansari for one enlightening glimpse into American interference abroad. Support for Saddam in the 80s and Saudi Arabia even now are well documented. The US has exposed its lack of principles for all to see in the way it effectively turns a blind eye to brutal, undemocratic and dictatorial regimes in Saddam-era Iraq and in modern Saudi Arabia and Pakistan (to name a few). All of this makes any American promise of 'freedom', 'reconstruction' or 'liberty' hollow in the eyes of many Arabs and Muslims, I would imagine. At best they would regard any 'benevolent' US actions as overwhelmingly self-serving.
b) It is safe to say that probably more than 90% of all Arabs and Muslims see Israel as state terrorists, as do I, for the way they in which the state of Israel came about, how they have flouted international law since 1967, how they treat Palestinians like an untermensch in walled and segregated cantons akin to large scale Warsaw ghettos, how they delight in collectively punishing the people who they themselves displaced to create a home and how they now effectively administer the third holiest shrine of Islam - The Dome of the Rock. The 'Zionist Entity' as they would put it is to them the very incarnation of evil. The USA stands largely alone in the world in unflinching, illogical and unprincipled support of Israel, arming and funding it even - an apartheid state based on creed and manufactured 'democratic' majorities. Is it any wonder why lots of Arabs and Muslims might view the USA and Israel as one? Is it any wonder why they might resent the USA interfering in what they view as a regional affair? Let's face it - the USA lies more than 10,000 miles away: what business do they have interfering in the middle east?
c) Islam is not very compatible with the Western concept of 'countries', 'states' and 'nations' given that it demands total submission to the will of Allah.
Reasons a) and b) above are unfortunate as these are symptoms of past US foreign policy over which ordinary Americans have/had practically no control and in which ordinary Americans had until recently seemed to show little or no interest, concentrating instead largely on domestic affairs and economic concerns.
Terrorism:
- Terrorism is the deliberate targetting of civilians in the name of a particular cause, as previously stated.
- Fighting terrorism cannot be likened to fighting a conventional war like for instance fighting a war against Nazi Germany or Imperial Japan. The enemy in a fight against terrorism is incredibly difficult to identify. Terrorists do not show their faces. They usually don't have readily identifiable and clearly marked out 'bases' to bomb. Terrorists only attack when they know they stand a very low chance of being caught. Terrorists can bide their time: they don't need to 'invade Russia' all in one foul swoop - they can blow up a café one day and then wait three months before bombing a hospital in an entirely different part of the world, having planned it meticulously. Attacking a country that happens to contain a few or even a sizeable number of terrorists condemns all others in that country to collective punishment because conventional armies and military wings are horribly inefficient at carrying out the task of fighting terrorism. Intelligence and policing is what is required.
- There are many examples throughout history of how fighting terrorism with conventional military action is almost always counter-productive. When the PIRA began its terrorist campaign in Northern Ireland circa 1970 the British response - to send in the military - was their worst move in the past 50 years. On Bloody Sunday British paratroopers killed 13 innocent civilians in cold blood, some shot in the back, at a civil rights march. This caused the PIRA to balloon in size and for support for the organisation, which had up until then been limited, to rocket. For every 'accidental' death caused by the British the determination of the Catholic community in Northern Ireland stiffened further. The watchword was 'Tiocfaidh Ár Lá' : 'Our Day Will Come'. The British introduced internment - detainment without trial and even sanctioned the use of torture (Gitmo anyone?) - with a predictable response from the Catholic community: a sterner will to resist than ever. Other examples include the recent Israel-Lebanon spat where Hisb'allah abducted some Israeli soldiers, Israel responded with airstrikes and artillery on civilian targets and Hisb'allah retaliated with a barrage of missiles on civilian targets. The international image of Israel was utterly destroyed by their depraved behaviour during that conflict, the Israeli soldiers remain in the hands of Hisb'allah and many innocent Lebanese civilians, Christian and Muslim, who were or may have been ambivalent towards Israel are now seething with rage for Israel. NEVER cede the moral high ground. The outcome of the conflict was as predictable as the phases of the moon.
- Terrorism is almost impossible to eliminate. It is the easiest thing in the world to engage in. Anyone can pick up some tips off the internet, devise a bomb and blow something up - ANYONE. Unless there is a way of monitoring the thought processes of every individual on the planet it is impossible to eradicate the potential for someone to perform an act of terrorism. A soldier certainly cannot eliminate it. Intelligence officers, immigration officials and policemen can limit the extent of terrorism at best, preventing as many acts as they can garner information on and detaining any individuals who are known threats. The best thing one can do is to restrict the movement and activities of known and potential threats. If USA adopted these principles, starting with creating a watertight national border, then the terrorists half way across the world in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Afghanistan, etc. WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO ATTACK YOU! The US can't even prevent a suicide bomb attack on the Iraqi parliament building: perhaps the Atlantic Ocean might help - that could be turned into a pretty effective anti-terrorism barrier!!!
- Back to collateral damage, collective punishment, whatever you want to call it. We are in a vicious circle of media-generated USA/Islam mutual hatred (similar to Nazi/Jew media-generated hatred). The media, both in the US and in the Muslim world, generalises when it comes to reporting on each other. On Muslim TV you will see the latest Mosque bombed by US warplanes, an Arab woman clutching a dead baby, an American politician shaking an Israeli politicians hand. On US TV you will see dramatic images of people blowing themselves up in cafés, US soldiers' bodies being paraded as trophies and angry preachers chanting 'Death to America'. Both the USA and the Islamic world begin to develop a siege mentality based on these usually very limited and sporadic examples of US/Islamic acts. Each identifies the images on their screens as the stereotypical image of the other, reinforcing and augmenting the mutual dislike/hatred. Soon an American soldier becomes a child-killing mosque-burning torturer who wants to rule the entire world and a Muslim becomes a suicide-belt wearing wife-beater who wants to rule the entire world. This kind of thing led to 6 million Jews being systematically killed. This media-generated vicious cycle shifts moderates into the extremist category on a daily basis. A lack of understanding and poor information helps terrorism grow and pushes us further from relative peace on a daily basis. Every day an American decides 'Let's nuke em all' and an Arab decides 'I want Islam to rule the world and I want to sacrifice myself for Allah in the name of this cause', because of this vicious cycle - both obviously disgusting, neanderthal and deplorable attitudes.
The Neo-Conservative Movement:
- The Neo-Conservative movement is an ally of Islamic Terrorism. The evidence:
a) The Bush administration, with the full might of the US military at hand, sent a paltry number of troops to eliminate Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, a massive country, and turned their attention to smaller oil-rich Iraq without finishing the job, with vastly more troops, eventually conceding that they are 'not really bothered' with apprehending the leader of Al Qaeda, and an idol of other anti-American extremists, Osama Bin Laden. That is a some gift the Bush whitehouse bestowed upon the Islamic extremist movement.
b) By invading Iraq and abolishing all facets of the Ba'athist apparatus of government there they created a chaos in which terrorists quickly found a fertile new home and breeding ground. It is important to remember that Iraq was free from Islamic terrorism under Saddam (although he himself was a secular state terrorist), Iraq posed no threat to USA (and wouldn't have even if it did possess chemical weapons, > 10,000 miles away remember?) and that unseating Saddam meant that the suppressed Sh'ia majority, which would naturally align with the Islamic Republic of Iran, could now call the shots. Moqtada Al Sadr might as well be de facto ruler of Iraq.
c) By attempting to combat the newborn 'insurgency', a mixture of freedom fighters and plain terrorists, with conventional military action the cycle of collateral damage creating more terrorists was set firmly in motion.
d) The right wing media ratcheted up its demonisation of Muslims to keep ordinary Americans immune to the civilian death tolls it was inflicting: 'They're only Muslims after all. They'd probably kill us all in a heartbeat given have a chance.'
e) Despite report after report, some issued by the CIA, stating that the action the US was currently taking in the middle east was actually INCREASING terrorism, the neo-conservative movement saw fit to continue on the same path, in full knowledge of this information and the facft that the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan was worsening on a continuous basis.
Bottom Line:
- You can call me an ally of terror if it pleases you but the fact of the matter is I abhorr terrorism. The true allies of terror are the Neo-Conservative movement and those who support it: every action they take seems to breed terrorism. Bali - 7/7 - Madrid Metro - every day in Iraq - every day in Afghanistan. Bush and his cohorts are helping the terrorists to spread their sick ethos across the world by doing everything that the terrorists could possibly want to augment their ability to recruit. By driving a wedge between the West and Islam in the media and charging around the middle east like a loose cannon they have successfully created the environment in which fringe extremist groups have grown in size, influence, ability (Iraq/Afghanistan=training ground) and power.
- What is so sad is that terrorism in USA could have been prevented by implementing Israeli domestic security doctrine. Despite being bombarded by enemies within and without acts of terrorism have become few and far between. Why? BORDER CONTROLS, INTELLIGENCE, POLICING. Beyond their own recognised borders Israel are animals but they know how to prevent terrorism within their recognised borders (Lebanon conflict stupidity aside).
- The Neo-Cons have been in control of the presidency, congress and senate for the vast majority of the time elapsed since 9/11. The blame for their failed actions lie squarely at their own feet. There are no excuses. Their was no threat of any policy they adopted not making it through either house. In Bush's second term he didn't have to care about public opinion - he could do whatever he wanted in a largely consequence free environment: opinion polls are meaningless when it comes to policy-making for an outgoing president. His actions are his own and the blame attached to their failure is his own also.
- Neo-Conservatives: I largely blame YOU for the surge in terrorism on this planet. Pull your heads out of your fucking arses.
Epilogue:
Lowing need not address me directly in any replies.
Preface:
- I am from the Republic of Ireland. For many years, part of my country has suffered from frequent and horrible acts of terrorism. Terrorism - the deliberate targetting of civillians in the name of a particular cause - is a heinous dishonourable brutal act of depravity that I deplore. The following is an excerpt from the Proclamation of the Republic read aloud at the steps of the GPO in Dublin during the Easter Rising of 1916:
"We place the cause of the Irish Republic under the protection of the Most High God, Whose blessing we invoke upon our arms, and we pray that no one who serves that cause will dishonour it by cowardice, inhumanity, or rapine."
- Thankfully, the terrorism in my country seems to have become somewhat of a thing of the past. A tentative peace has been achieved which looks set to last.
Some Preliminary Facts:
- A lot of Arabs do not like the USA, its government and what it stands for. A lot of them do not even like ordinary Americans, despite possibly never having even met one.
- A lot of Muslims do not like the USA, its government and what it stands for. A lot of them do not even like ordinary Americans, despite possibly never having even met one.
Why?
- The reasons are complex, many and varied. To summarise why each individual anti-American Arab or Muslim is in fact anti-American would involve a lot of generalising. I will provide a few of what I regard as the original (pre 9/11) roots drivers:
a) Since WWII and the collapse of the British, French and Russian empires the USA has aggressively pursued a policy of dabbling, to varying degrees, in the internal politics of emerging Arab and Muslim nations for financial, strategic and material gain. I would direct you towards 'A History of Modern Iran Since 1921' by Ali Ansari for one enlightening glimpse into American interference abroad. Support for Saddam in the 80s and Saudi Arabia even now are well documented. The US has exposed its lack of principles for all to see in the way it effectively turns a blind eye to brutal, undemocratic and dictatorial regimes in Saddam-era Iraq and in modern Saudi Arabia and Pakistan (to name a few). All of this makes any American promise of 'freedom', 'reconstruction' or 'liberty' hollow in the eyes of many Arabs and Muslims, I would imagine. At best they would regard any 'benevolent' US actions as overwhelmingly self-serving.
b) It is safe to say that probably more than 90% of all Arabs and Muslims see Israel as state terrorists, as do I, for the way they in which the state of Israel came about, how they have flouted international law since 1967, how they treat Palestinians like an untermensch in walled and segregated cantons akin to large scale Warsaw ghettos, how they delight in collectively punishing the people who they themselves displaced to create a home and how they now effectively administer the third holiest shrine of Islam - The Dome of the Rock. The 'Zionist Entity' as they would put it is to them the very incarnation of evil. The USA stands largely alone in the world in unflinching, illogical and unprincipled support of Israel, arming and funding it even - an apartheid state based on creed and manufactured 'democratic' majorities. Is it any wonder why lots of Arabs and Muslims might view the USA and Israel as one? Is it any wonder why they might resent the USA interfering in what they view as a regional affair? Let's face it - the USA lies more than 10,000 miles away: what business do they have interfering in the middle east?
c) Islam is not very compatible with the Western concept of 'countries', 'states' and 'nations' given that it demands total submission to the will of Allah.
Reasons a) and b) above are unfortunate as these are symptoms of past US foreign policy over which ordinary Americans have/had practically no control and in which ordinary Americans had until recently seemed to show little or no interest, concentrating instead largely on domestic affairs and economic concerns.
Terrorism:
- Terrorism is the deliberate targetting of civilians in the name of a particular cause, as previously stated.
- Fighting terrorism cannot be likened to fighting a conventional war like for instance fighting a war against Nazi Germany or Imperial Japan. The enemy in a fight against terrorism is incredibly difficult to identify. Terrorists do not show their faces. They usually don't have readily identifiable and clearly marked out 'bases' to bomb. Terrorists only attack when they know they stand a very low chance of being caught. Terrorists can bide their time: they don't need to 'invade Russia' all in one foul swoop - they can blow up a café one day and then wait three months before bombing a hospital in an entirely different part of the world, having planned it meticulously. Attacking a country that happens to contain a few or even a sizeable number of terrorists condemns all others in that country to collective punishment because conventional armies and military wings are horribly inefficient at carrying out the task of fighting terrorism. Intelligence and policing is what is required.
- There are many examples throughout history of how fighting terrorism with conventional military action is almost always counter-productive. When the PIRA began its terrorist campaign in Northern Ireland circa 1970 the British response - to send in the military - was their worst move in the past 50 years. On Bloody Sunday British paratroopers killed 13 innocent civilians in cold blood, some shot in the back, at a civil rights march. This caused the PIRA to balloon in size and for support for the organisation, which had up until then been limited, to rocket. For every 'accidental' death caused by the British the determination of the Catholic community in Northern Ireland stiffened further. The watchword was 'Tiocfaidh Ár Lá' : 'Our Day Will Come'. The British introduced internment - detainment without trial and even sanctioned the use of torture (Gitmo anyone?) - with a predictable response from the Catholic community: a sterner will to resist than ever. Other examples include the recent Israel-Lebanon spat where Hisb'allah abducted some Israeli soldiers, Israel responded with airstrikes and artillery on civilian targets and Hisb'allah retaliated with a barrage of missiles on civilian targets. The international image of Israel was utterly destroyed by their depraved behaviour during that conflict, the Israeli soldiers remain in the hands of Hisb'allah and many innocent Lebanese civilians, Christian and Muslim, who were or may have been ambivalent towards Israel are now seething with rage for Israel. NEVER cede the moral high ground. The outcome of the conflict was as predictable as the phases of the moon.
- Terrorism is almost impossible to eliminate. It is the easiest thing in the world to engage in. Anyone can pick up some tips off the internet, devise a bomb and blow something up - ANYONE. Unless there is a way of monitoring the thought processes of every individual on the planet it is impossible to eradicate the potential for someone to perform an act of terrorism. A soldier certainly cannot eliminate it. Intelligence officers, immigration officials and policemen can limit the extent of terrorism at best, preventing as many acts as they can garner information on and detaining any individuals who are known threats. The best thing one can do is to restrict the movement and activities of known and potential threats. If USA adopted these principles, starting with creating a watertight national border, then the terrorists half way across the world in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Afghanistan, etc. WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO ATTACK YOU! The US can't even prevent a suicide bomb attack on the Iraqi parliament building: perhaps the Atlantic Ocean might help - that could be turned into a pretty effective anti-terrorism barrier!!!
- Back to collateral damage, collective punishment, whatever you want to call it. We are in a vicious circle of media-generated USA/Islam mutual hatred (similar to Nazi/Jew media-generated hatred). The media, both in the US and in the Muslim world, generalises when it comes to reporting on each other. On Muslim TV you will see the latest Mosque bombed by US warplanes, an Arab woman clutching a dead baby, an American politician shaking an Israeli politicians hand. On US TV you will see dramatic images of people blowing themselves up in cafés, US soldiers' bodies being paraded as trophies and angry preachers chanting 'Death to America'. Both the USA and the Islamic world begin to develop a siege mentality based on these usually very limited and sporadic examples of US/Islamic acts. Each identifies the images on their screens as the stereotypical image of the other, reinforcing and augmenting the mutual dislike/hatred. Soon an American soldier becomes a child-killing mosque-burning torturer who wants to rule the entire world and a Muslim becomes a suicide-belt wearing wife-beater who wants to rule the entire world. This kind of thing led to 6 million Jews being systematically killed. This media-generated vicious cycle shifts moderates into the extremist category on a daily basis. A lack of understanding and poor information helps terrorism grow and pushes us further from relative peace on a daily basis. Every day an American decides 'Let's nuke em all' and an Arab decides 'I want Islam to rule the world and I want to sacrifice myself for Allah in the name of this cause', because of this vicious cycle - both obviously disgusting, neanderthal and deplorable attitudes.
The Neo-Conservative Movement:
- The Neo-Conservative movement is an ally of Islamic Terrorism. The evidence:
a) The Bush administration, with the full might of the US military at hand, sent a paltry number of troops to eliminate Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, a massive country, and turned their attention to smaller oil-rich Iraq without finishing the job, with vastly more troops, eventually conceding that they are 'not really bothered' with apprehending the leader of Al Qaeda, and an idol of other anti-American extremists, Osama Bin Laden. That is a some gift the Bush whitehouse bestowed upon the Islamic extremist movement.
b) By invading Iraq and abolishing all facets of the Ba'athist apparatus of government there they created a chaos in which terrorists quickly found a fertile new home and breeding ground. It is important to remember that Iraq was free from Islamic terrorism under Saddam (although he himself was a secular state terrorist), Iraq posed no threat to USA (and wouldn't have even if it did possess chemical weapons, > 10,000 miles away remember?) and that unseating Saddam meant that the suppressed Sh'ia majority, which would naturally align with the Islamic Republic of Iran, could now call the shots. Moqtada Al Sadr might as well be de facto ruler of Iraq.
c) By attempting to combat the newborn 'insurgency', a mixture of freedom fighters and plain terrorists, with conventional military action the cycle of collateral damage creating more terrorists was set firmly in motion.
d) The right wing media ratcheted up its demonisation of Muslims to keep ordinary Americans immune to the civilian death tolls it was inflicting: 'They're only Muslims after all. They'd probably kill us all in a heartbeat given have a chance.'
e) Despite report after report, some issued by the CIA, stating that the action the US was currently taking in the middle east was actually INCREASING terrorism, the neo-conservative movement saw fit to continue on the same path, in full knowledge of this information and the facft that the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan was worsening on a continuous basis.
Bottom Line:
- You can call me an ally of terror if it pleases you but the fact of the matter is I abhorr terrorism. The true allies of terror are the Neo-Conservative movement and those who support it: every action they take seems to breed terrorism. Bali - 7/7 - Madrid Metro - every day in Iraq - every day in Afghanistan. Bush and his cohorts are helping the terrorists to spread their sick ethos across the world by doing everything that the terrorists could possibly want to augment their ability to recruit. By driving a wedge between the West and Islam in the media and charging around the middle east like a loose cannon they have successfully created the environment in which fringe extremist groups have grown in size, influence, ability (Iraq/Afghanistan=training ground) and power.
- What is so sad is that terrorism in USA could have been prevented by implementing Israeli domestic security doctrine. Despite being bombarded by enemies within and without acts of terrorism have become few and far between. Why? BORDER CONTROLS, INTELLIGENCE, POLICING. Beyond their own recognised borders Israel are animals but they know how to prevent terrorism within their recognised borders (Lebanon conflict stupidity aside).
- The Neo-Cons have been in control of the presidency, congress and senate for the vast majority of the time elapsed since 9/11. The blame for their failed actions lie squarely at their own feet. There are no excuses. Their was no threat of any policy they adopted not making it through either house. In Bush's second term he didn't have to care about public opinion - he could do whatever he wanted in a largely consequence free environment: opinion polls are meaningless when it comes to policy-making for an outgoing president. His actions are his own and the blame attached to their failure is his own also.
- Neo-Conservatives: I largely blame YOU for the surge in terrorism on this planet. Pull your heads out of your fucking arses.
Epilogue:
Lowing need not address me directly in any replies.
Last edited by CameronPoe (2007-04-12 15:56:41)
