What is the profile of the average foreign fighter entering Iraq to fight the nascent Iraqi government and US forces? As Saudis make up the majority of those entering Iraq (about 55%) it is instructive to look at the history of the Saudi Islamists killed in Iraq. Evan Kohlmann has profiled some of the Saudis that have entered Iraq to fight against the US military. The Saudis can be roughly classified into two categories: the uninitiated and the veteran jihadis.
The uninitiated have no practical experience or training in terrorist activities, but are highly motivated to fight, while the veterans are those who have fought for al Qaeda or other Islamists movements in the past, and are continuing their craftwork in Iraq.
The Uninitiated
These men have no prior experience with al Qaeda, but certainly fit the profile of those who have volunteered for jihad in the past. Many were indoctrinated in radical Islam or had idealistic notions about a struggle between Islam and the infidel, and were motivated to fight the West prior to the invasion of Iraq. A good number of these men would likely have entered the service of al Qaeda even if the United States had not invaded Iraq, just as in the past those like them volunteered to fight in Afghanistan, Philippines, Bosnia, Somalia, Chechnya, Kashmir and other jihadi combat theaters.
- Al-Qiblan, born in 1981, was from the conservative town of Buraidah in Saudi Arabia. In 2002, he began to gradually grow more fundamentalist in his religion and mix with the “young men of jihad.” Al-Qiblan grew progressively more interested in the concept of jihad and the prospect of traveling to the “battlefields of honor and dignity.”
- Bandar al-Badri was a 19-year old… According to his family and friends, he was “obsessed with jihad and only talked only jihad.” He used to frequently discuss with his parents the ongoing jihads in Afghanistan and Iraq and his mother eventually encouraged him, replying, “if you want to go, then go.”
- Ahmed al-Ghamdi developed progressively conservative religious beliefs, growing a beard and strictly following the rulings of prominent Salafist clerics.
- Abu Nour al-Najdi was a wealthy businessman with a family and children in Saudi Arabia. However, “eager to meet his creator”, he nevertheless decided to travel to Iraq seeking “combat [and] jihad…” His comrades commented that Abu Nour “loved to kill the Americans and to take his revenge.”
- Abu Anas was born an orphan and was raised by his grandfather, who “taught him the values of goodness and righteousness. He was taught to love paradise and to be courageous and persistent. He was schooled in the verses of the Jihad, O’ what a wonderful education!”
The Veterans
These are the fighters from past and present conflicts in Chechnya, Afghanistan, Bosnia and other Islamist hot spots. They are dangerous and experienced terrorists who have gone to ground in Saudi Arabia and have been flushed out of hiding to fight in Iraq.
- Majed, 28-years old, had been a longtime supporter of the mujahideen and Al-Qaida. Since 2000, he had made multiple unsuccessful attempts to travel to an ongoing jihad. When the U.S. invaded Afghanistan, he attempted to join the Taliban by leaving through Syria; however, this effort also failed.
- Fahd al-Dughailibi Al-Otaibi was the nephew of most wanted Saudi Al-Qaida suspect and terrorist ideologue Sultan Bjad Sadoun al-Otaibi.
- Faris al-Bodaywi came from a very wealthy family in Saudi Arabia; he is the cousin of the foreign mujahideen commander Nayif al-Bodaywi in Chechnya.
- Zakariya al-Salmi… According to his wife, he was an experienced mujahid and was originally a member of Al-Qaida’s network in Saudi Arabia—at least “until Allah guided him to travel to Iraq.”
- Saleh al-Fahaid… was a 23-year old Saudi national… In 1999, al-Fahaid traveled to Afghanistan in search of jihad, attending Al-Qaida’s Al-Farooq camp for “commando” training and fighting alongside the Taliban until the occupation of Kabul in late 2001. Afterwards, he traveled with other mujahideen to the city of Kandahar, and eventually returned back to Saudi Arabia. Staying only briefly in the Kingdom, al-Fahaid moved on—first to Sudan and then to Iraq…
- Badr al-Sharari (a.k.a. Abu Rahaf al-Joufi), a 27-year old Saudi national with a young daughter, first experienced jihad in Afghanistan, where he went after 9/11 seeking to “fight the Americans”—staying there for approximately six months.
- Hadi al-Qahtani was a young Saudi national who had grown up “fooling around and not paying to” politics or religion. However, his life reportedly shifted direction “after the holy attack that demolished the foolish infidel Americans and caused many young men to awaken from their deep sleep. The actions of those 19 heroes [i.e. the 9/11 hijackers] changed the course of our Islamic nation and also awakened the entire nation, making it swell with pride…"
- Shaykh Abdallah al-Rashood… completed a degree in Shariah (Islamic Law) at the Al-Imam University in Riyadh before becoming a professor there in Shariah. In the mid-1990s, al-Rashood joined the ranks of other younger, extreme Salafist clerics in the Kingdom and quit his official post at the University. More recently, al-Rashood has served as the spiritual leader of Al-Qaida’s Committee in Saudi Arabia—issuing, among other things, several fatwahs denouncing the Saudi regime as “apostate” and “illegitimate.”
Many of the leaders and fighters killed have cultivated their skills and connection over the course of a decade or more, and are not easily replaced. The invasion and reconstruction of Iraq and the actions of regional governments have drawn them out into the open. Despite the myriad of problems with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, they have killed and captured a large share of hard core al Qaeda fighters.
In the end, the most committed and violent members of al Qaeda must be killed or captured. Leaving aside the geopolitical importance of establishing democracy in the heart of the Middle East, bringing the war to the Muslim world to expose the horrific nature of al Qaeda, the need to remove Saddam and other reasons, Iraq is as good a place as any to confront al Qaeda at this point in time. Waiting for them is the fist US military - not to be confused with the Russians or any other third world military they have confronted in the past.
While these Saudi's who were profiled are not necessarily vindictive of the greater insurgency, it's worth noting, as you did, that many of these people have militant and jihadist activities and behaviors long before the war in Iraq. These are the types that, absent of military action in Iraq, would be plotting and planning attacks or looking to wage jihad somewhere else...perhaps the American homeland.
This would appear to suggest that President Bush was at least partially correct in suggesting that the war in Iraq is distracting some of these jihadists and forcing them to fight in their own backyard, rather than export their jihad elsewhere, including the United States.
I concur and side with Grim on the Fly paper theory. Yes the enemy is drawing down on resources it can ill afford to lose, Grim is right. This is a good sign.
Happy 4th of July everyone. Please remember just what we are celebrating as our brave men and women in uniform are going into Harm’s Way to protect what we hold dear.
How to Lose a War
What more do the leftist and the MSM want?
Read More Here
Iraq is a logical destinaton for jihadists, it's close to home, Americans are there, and it's a perfect symbol for them....a red cape to a raging bull. Dealing with them there is, of course, better than dealing with them in the USA. However, one of the long term problems is dealing with the belief system that nurtures jihad. The religious teachers that preach such vileness, the texts that support the ideology, the theology itself is the root cause. I have no idea whether the teachers and follows of islam will redefine thier beliefs to weed out this destructive trait. I have seen little evidence to support the idea that any movement within the muslim world to pacify itself exists.
Reading these profiles, it becomes very obvious that these beliefs and accompanying thirst for killing are carefully nurtured in a significat segment of the population. Certainly within Saudi Arabia, and as our ongoing coverage indicates, in many other Arab/Muslim countries as well.
I have no doubt the Islamist ideology is spread widely in places such as Saudi Arabia. I wonder if meaningful research has been done to find out what percentage of those preached to actually accept the message.
Communist and fascist regimes made great efforts to indoctrinate their populations, yet a majority of the populations of the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany or current day Iran never bought into the propaganda. Is the majority of the Muslim world shrugging off the Islamist worldview of violent jihad?
One thing I find curious is that for all of the time and money invested into radicalizing the Muslim world and particularly in Saudi Arabia, only about 5,000 Saudis have actually entered Iraq to fight. This does not seem indicative of a widespread and deadly rooted ideology. Yes, many Muslims may not like the US or Western culture (even as they emulate many aspects of it) but it is one thing to express dislike, and another to actually take up arms against the US.
I do understand al Qaeda is trying to recruit a select few for their organization, but one of their overall goals is to enflame the great Muslim world to fight against the West. The paltry number of Muslims entering Iraq to fight indicates they are not very successful in creating a mass Islamist movement.
This is why defeating the insurgency in Iraq is so crucial to the ideological battle in the war. We can demonstrate al Qaeda does not have the military capability to defaet the US or the widespread support of the Muslim world, or even of the Iraqi people, to stand up to the US.
An Egyptian diplomat has been abducted. Interesting development in Iraq. Could this turn the tide?
[JK: Horatio, we're having problems with HTML showing up and ruining the main page. Links need to be several words in.]
Bill:
Iran's Islamic Republic was sold to the masses as a utopian project by Khomeini. When utopias fail to materialize they lose legitimacy in the eyes of those who sincerely believed in them, as in the case of Iran.
Saudi Arabia is a different beast altogether, but as John Derbyshire once noted, if Wahhabism is so universally popular there then why does it require such an oppressive police state to maintain?
"Russia or any other third-world military..."
Oh schadenfreude, Oh schadenfreude,
How lovely our reaction...
:)
Bill,
I agree that efforts to get large numbers of people to rise up against and fight against the West has failed to materialize. What does appear to have happened is that the masses of people in the Muslim world have not spoken out forcefully and unequivocally against AQ. The failure to do so suggests to me that (1) either there is widespread but unspoken support for AQ and its aims or (2) there is no such support but rather a willingness, to paraphrase OBL, to back whoever appears to be the "strong horse" at any given moment. If its the former, the GWOT will be a generational conflict and will require an intense ideological, as well as military conflict. If its the latter, then an overwhelming and decisive and humiliating defeat of AQ and its surrogates, on their homefield, will have a devastating psychological impact on would-be jihadis and their luke-warm supporters, it will be the final nail in their coffin.
bringing the war to the Muslim world to expose the horrific nature of al Qaeda
I wonder, if the real enemy, the real problem is the 'horrific nature of Al Qaeda' or that of mainstream moslem teachings (backed by scriptural evidence)in the islamic faith. Also, pls note, that unlike the religious texts of Christianity or Judaism, no muslim ever quite dares to question the veracity of the koran itself for fear of a merciless death to self and retribution on family or worse (i.e. what you now have is a hate-filled misgynistic death message set in stone for eternity that will not be questioned and cannot be changed).
Unless we (of the free world, children of a judeo-christian culkture that thrives on questioning and reason) start identifying the real enemy, won't we be merely fighting the symptoms, rather than the disease itself? What's chopping off a few hydra heads when the swamp that feeds the demon continues to grow apace?
I can only hope that the folks who matter in the high halls of government, have identified the real nature of the real enemy. So far, evidence doesn't seem to bear much out.
Joe,
I apologize for my error. I don't quite understand your directions on how to avoid it in the future, though. Do you mean to set the link deeper into the comment, i.e. the thirtieth word is fine but the first or second word is not? I see you've added text to presumably address this issue.
sdh,
even if the option is #2 "a willingness, to paraphrase OBL, to back whoever appears to be the "strong horse" at any given moment", this will still be a generational conflict. Defeat in Iraq will be devastating to al Qaeda, but they will still press on in other regions where we are not able to strike at them so easily. The generational struggle will involve combating their ideology, destroying their support mechanisms (finance, madrassa, training camps, support cells in Western countries, etc.), pushing the Muslim world to accept more democratic principles and hunting the Islamists in their new safe havens.
the masses of people in the Muslim world have not spoken out
I think the unspoken problem with the fly paper fact is that the Iraqi people are the fly paper. I wonder when we say "better over there then here" that it might just piss off those who are over there. I was just wonderin'.
arasmith,
Perhaps this is why it has never been articulated as official policy?
#5 Bill Roggio
Nazi Germany is a better example, in that at least some of the beliefs promoted by the regime were native to Germans anyway. Hitler's Willing Executioners makes a convincing case that, while most Germans weren't Nazis, most were antisemites - genocidally so. They might not buy the whole Nazi package, but the more destructive stuff? Sure.
Take Qalqilya, in Shomron. They just elected (in as much as there can be an election in the PA) Hamas to rule the council. Hamas, as everyone knows, is a terrorist group dedicated to killing Jews and destroying Israel. This goes down a treat with the palestinians. However, cancelling an annual celebration which includes men and women dancing together... Not so popular. Hamas are now claiming that their decision is to protect the grass. Hamas 'men' also gunned down an unmarried couple in Gaza, despite the two being fiancees. Serious reaction to that, too.
The same situation might be playing out in Iraq, ie, the red-on-red killings. By all means, kill infidels, just don't inflict Wahhabism on us. A common rejection of Wahhabi 'social policy', if you will, does not mean a rejection of Wahhabi 'foreign policy'.
Arrasmith,
A good number of the terrorists being killed are Iraqi. One might imagine that the Kurds and the She'a applaud the fighting being done along the Euphrates. They know who lives there, they know that it is the area from which Saddam recruited his most vicious thugs and it might be supposed that if the majority had their way the Euphrates plain would be depopulated.
It can be supposed too that the Iraqi people recognize that it is very unlikely that the KSA will ever be a bosom friend to democracy in Iraq and that killing Saudi terrorists in Iraq may be just a prelude to taking the fight to the nest. Certainly they understand that the KSA secret police have access to flight manifests and the ability to ascertain who is purchasing a one way ticket to Damascus.
There is a bit too much focus on madrassas, IMO, the same Wahabbi hatred is being preached and taught in Salafist sermons and schools in Egypt. The Egytian police seem to be doing a better job in controlling the jihadis there. I would also note that the same hatred fills Palestinian textbooks paid for by the UNRC with US donations. That might be the best place to start wrt proactive measures.
Bill,
all of your points are well taken. If there is anything that I worry about regarding the GWOT, it is our ability to carry on a generational conflict, in particular, a global war against AQ and its affiliates that will span one or more decades and one or more continents. I do not question the ability of our armed forces to defeat the enemy militarily. I do, however, worry that the US public will lose interest and/or the will to sustain the battle if it is dragged out over several more years.
I worry that If we can't defeat AQ quickly, I worry that it gives them and their numerous allies and sympathizers in the West more time to make AQ's weaknesses look like strengths and their losses to look like victories.
If winning the GWOT is to be accomplished by sending to paradise some 5000-25000 jihadis a year over the next 20 (?) years, I don't know whether the US public will support it. I hope to God they do, but I wouldn't bet on it. Thanks again for such a stimulating post.
sdh,
"If there is anything that I worry about regarding the GWOT, it is our ability to carry on a generational conflict, in particular, a global war against AQ and its affiliates that will span one or more decades and one or more continents."
You are not alone in these sentiments. Our ability to maintain focus in a twilight struggle such as this will be a great test of out national character and our elected leaders.
Colt,
I am not so sure. In the example of Iraq, the insurgents are a distinct minority. The majority of the Iraqi people have rejected the insurgency, as evidenced by the election, public support of the government, enlistment into the armed forces, etc. The the government advocates the US stay to help fight them.
I wonder about a country such as Saudi Arabia. As Dan stated; "if Wahhabism is so universally popular there then why does it require such an oppressive police state to maintain?"
#19 Bill Roggio
I know - I didn't make my point very clearly.
Basically, support for jihad is not solely the territory of Wahhabi jihadists.
I wouldn't say it is universally popular, though hatred of infidels may well be. I'd venture that the main aim of the Saudi police state is to keep the House of Saud, which also means the Wahhabis, in power. The religious 'police' who enforce Wahhabi law are able to do so because of their relationship with the House of Saud.
I would also note that the migration of the veteran jihadi's to Iraq provides a bit of breathing room for the countries currently housing them. Especially those that are firmly on board with the GWoT. As other countries get on board in the GWoT it should be easier for them to concentrate, implement and fortify their policies concerning elimination of radical sects. I see this development in a positive light WRT the GWoT.
Another positive concerning this development is it decreases the pool of hardened veterans required for training and recruitment. In my view it is highly unlikely that we would see this amount of migration continue in perpetuity. When Iraq is capable of sustaining its' government and security it becomes highly probable that Iraq will begin to look at surrounding ME countries as enemies and threats to their newly acquired position. Should this be the case we could possibly be looking forward to acts of aggression by Iraq towards other ME countries where diplomacy fails.
Bill Roggio makes this point in the post:
Which seems self-evident.
And yet, it isn't, and can't be, US policy to kill any and all suspected jihadis on the battlefield, or in the cities and countrysides of Iraq and Afghanistan, or anywhere else. They get killed when they shoot at us and refuse to surrender.
Otherwise, when we are lucky, they are captured.
But "captured" jihadis turn into "detained" illegal belligerents. Bringing us back to Guantanamao, and Koran desecration, and interrogation, and torture, and denial of due process.
If the American people have been attentive students to the lesson plan available at the New York Times and elsewhere, we know what we must not condone, but there's a surprising silence on what the better alternatives might be.
One implication is that domestic criminal-justice standards--or something close to them--ought to apply: "innocent until proven guilty", evidentiary rules, chain-of-custody, fruit-of-the-poison-tree, rights of the accused, trial by a jury of peers. Following this line of thought, those found "not guilty" by this standard (and most suspected belligerents necessarily will be) must be released.
In addition, the lesson plan calls for detainees to be accorded the rights of POWs under the Geneva Conventions.
Following this conventional wisdom amounts to an institutionalized catch-and-release program. I'm not yet convinced that The Resistance™ will be quick to adapt an analogous policy for detained imperialists. Pre-beheading, that is.
The more successful we are in this ongoing war on militant Islam, the more severe this issue will become. The Bush Administration has done a very poor job in devising new policies, or even in communicating how entirely inadequate the criminal-law/Geneva paradigm is for dealing with the problem of large numbers of dedicated, religiously/politically motivated, murderous detainees.
I'm sure that some in the "anti-war" opposition and in the media are untroubled by these problems--they despise what Western societies represent, and "the enemy of my enemy is my friend." That minority aside, I think that laziness explains much of the left's conventional wisdom on this point. If the subjects fit for discussion begin and end with the misdeeds of Bush and his minions, there's no need to fret about the real-world consequences of your wishes coming true.
Colt,
Understood. Persoanlly, I don't care whether they like us or not, it's when they act out on their hatred is where it becomes a problem. We're never going to win the likability war.
"Saudi Arabia is a different beast altogether, but as John Derbyshire once noted, if Wahhabism is so universally popular there then why does it require such an oppressive police state to maintain?"
Probably cause the police maintain not just Wahabism in general, but A. The particular flavor of Wahabism currently maintained by the Saudi govt and B. The actual rule of house of Saud.
There are undoubtedly many wahabists in KSA who want something more extreme (like, say the followers of AQ) and perhaps some who want something more moderate than the kingdom maintains. And certainly quite a few who like Wahabism but dont like the ruling house, with its corruption, its pleasure jaunts to Bahrain, etc. Just cause the House of Saud and some clerics have a deal going, doesnt mean everybody buys it.
If theres a huge body of antiWahabi opinion in KSA, other than among the Shia minority, I wonder why we havent heard more about it.
Typical Derbyshire, IOW.
Bill
your thoughts on todays claims that Syrian security shot up some Saddam body guards in Syria? Serious, or hot air for external consumption?
"One thing I find curious is that for all of the time and money invested into radicalizing the Muslim world and particularly in Saudi Arabia, only about 5,000 Saudis have actually entered Iraq to fight. This does not seem indicative of a widespread and deadly rooted ideology. Yes, many Muslims may not like the US or Western culture (even as they emulate many aspects of it) but it is one thing to express dislike, and another to actually take up arms against the US. "
Salafist Chickenhawks, so to speak. Its human nature NOT to want to go to another country to die, even for a cause one deeply believes in. I think this is universal, and only shows even Islamist radicals are human (aside from the small number who do go abroad for AQ - the few, the proud, the wildeyed, if you can forgive the phrase)
Im not sure this is comforting. While our IMMEDIATE concern are the guys who want to go abroad, the guys who stay home can create signicant problems - how many Saudis are fighting for AQ IN KSA, despite the Iraqi flypaper, and how many more are supporting abd protecting them? Or just turning a blind eye to them?
USMC,
I would also add that experienced fighters are being diverted to Iraq from other important theaters. We saw this in communiques last winter where Zarqawi was begging for the diversion of resources from Chechnya, Afghanistan and elsewhere. This can have a cascading effect, weakening al Qaeda's operations globally if they cannot replenish their leadership and training cadres quick enough.
RE: #11 and early links in comments...
Yes, it needs to be about the 8th word in or farther, or we have a problem. We thought we had this fixed, but it seems not. The MT tag that's supposed to strip the HTML code simply is not doing it.
liberalhawk,
I wasn't trying to downplay the the threat of al Qaeda and the jihadis who do not chose to fight. I recognized my comments could be viewed as such prior to posting. The point I was trying to make was that if US involvement in Iraq is such a radicalizing agent in the Muslim world, the reaction of the Muslim world has been less than stellar.
Salafist Chickenhawks. Love it! Still chuckling over that one.
re: Syrian security shot up some Saddam body guards
Just not enough information to go on. They could be involved with the insurgency, or they could have been recruiting into Syrian criminal gangs after their entry into the country. Syria certainly has every incentive to show it is 'cracking down on terrorism' but the claim these Iraqi bodyguards were terrorists or involved in the insurgency is not unreasonable.
Debka has a typically 'out-there' analysis of the Syria shooting, claiming a massacre of Damascus tourists besides the soldiers killed. Though it seems to me that, if this had happened, Assad would be on the spot to direct the international media showing how his country is a victim of terrorism.
Its also a pretty out-of-the-way area to stage a terrorist attack.
"Communist and fascist regimes made great efforts to indoctrinate their populations, yet a majority of the populations of the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany or current day Iran never bought into the propaganda."
Where did you read that?
I do understand al Qaeda is trying to recruit a select few for their organization, but one of their overall goals is to enflame the great Muslim world to fight against the West. The paltry number of Muslims entering Iraq to fight indicates they are not very successful in creating a mass Islamist movement
I think this is one of the key points Bill and something I've referenced on numerous occasions. In a region that billions of Muslims call home, the overall number of jihadist going to Iraq is minimal. We've seen nothing like the number of jihadists that were in Soviet occupied Afghanistan during the 1980s.
Opting to fight America in Iraq may end up being al Qaeda's fatal strategic blunder.
To expound:
Modern day Iran doesn't buy into the propaganda because 2/3 of the population hadn't been born at the time of the revolution so it is all increasingly alien to them. Their parents were and are much more supportive. In Germany, even before totalitarian indoctrination, the Nazis received 40% of the vote in 1932/33. It was much, much higher by the late 1930s. Similarly, in the 1930s/40s/50s I suspect you'd find a majority of Soviet citizens bought the propaganda simply because they weren't allowed to know any better, just like North Koreans today.
I don't mean to quibble too strongly, but I think it is important point not to downplay the effectiveness of indoctrination and propaganda.
Similarly, it has become an article of faith of American politicians, at least publically, that only a tiny percentage of the Islamic world supports Al Qaeda and Bin Laden. Unfortunately, I think we're fighting a much larger base of sympathizers than we're ready to acknowledge.
Bill et al
A big part of the reason more Sauds are jihaadis is socio-economics. It is not neccessarily differing reception of Qu'ranic teaching, but just having the leisure time to embrace a cause. They don't have to scratch out a living like young muslim males in the poorer Islamic States. They are given gov't stipends from oil revenues. While a lot of them are well educated, they are not highly employable in the oil industry. Employers complain about their laissez faire attitude and the neccessity for young married saudi men to take massive time off to drive their wives around, since women can't drive.
Another big player is simple machismo. I saw a Discovery Channel special on the 911 hijackers shortly after it happened. The narration included a translation from an Egyptian psychologist-- he said, "Those young men felt like dwarves, so they went looking for the tallest tower they could find."
Also, what i like to call the Jannissary Syndrome-- notice how few are married? Only one of the 19 911 hijackers was married. Eccess testosterone redirection.
Good tips for the two reports - a couple of things -
a. arrasmith illustrates a good point - If Iraq is the flypaper, wouldn't that piss you off if you are an Iraqi? It leaves a little lacking to say , on one hand, you care deeply about the welfare of Iraqis on one hand, and then on other, you've setup the country to be a killing zone in Islamist wars.
b. This shows - again - that the problems are the Saudis. Clearly I'm carping, (especially as the trending numbers look like the insurgency has maxed out its destructive capability - at least let's hope so), but after 2 1/2 years, $300 billion, and 1700 dead americans, the evidence of Saudi terrorists in Iraq NOW (and not before), and of course Bin Laden (a Saudi of course) the head of Al Queda, the lack of WMD -
why did we invade Iraq again?
c. What is being done re: Saudi wahabism?
Well, Cutler, it seems you have mistaken living under a repressive regime for actually accepting the ideology. You think if the North Korean regime disappeared the citizens would clamor for a new Dear leader? Look how fast Eastern Europe and Russia shook off Communism once they had a glimmer of sunlight. And there certainly wasn't any mass movement for the return of the Fascisti, Nazis or Imperial Japan after their defeat in WWII. These populations were indoctrinated over decades, yet in the end their people rejected the lies.
I'm not saying a tiny number of Muslims support al Qaeda, I'm saying it isn't as large or popular a movement as they believe it is. Nor am I downplaying propaganda and indoctrination of these repressive regimes. But nor should we overestimate them.
Not to be defeatist, because I certainly think we can win this war, but when one talks of flypaper or Iraq as a killing zone, one presupposes a finite number of terrorists to be killed. This is not the case, of course. I don't think anyone can seriously argue that after we kill this certain number of terrorists, this will all be over.
Appeasement is an ill advised strategy, and I am glad that we are projecting our power, even if I'm not glad that projection is in Iraq. But terrorism and suicide attacks are a curious thing. The middle aged terror masters manage to convince young hopeless children that the best use for their life is to blow themselves up. If someone had suggested that to me at age 17, I would have laughed in their face. But obviously, these teens do not. We've got to figure out some way to make the terror masters' entreaties to suicide totally unthinkable to act upon. Doing this will take some serious outside-the-box thinking, which sadly I don't think this administration is prepared to do.
In any case, I really do think that the best thing to happen to for our cause in years is the fact that the insurgents are targeting Arab foreign ministers. This strikes me as a truly stupid move on their part.
"Communist and fascist regimes made great efforts to indoctrinate their populations, yet a majority of the populations of the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany or current day Iran never bought into the propaganda."
That statement as written was wrong, that's all I was saying.
I did not say that they were perpetually entranced, only that during their peaks all 4 regimes had populaces that either enthusiastically supported the regime's stance or believed it because they had no other option. If you'd like you can also add the Imperial Japanese regime to the list.
I didn't confuse anything. On the other hand, I think you have confused 'oppressed' with 'englightened.' This is especially true in the North Korean case, where the sun certainly hasn't shown through yet. Nor is it a done deal in Iran.
I'll agree the "never" should have been qualified, that is a more than fair criticism. Also, I was looking more in the long term and not during a certain period of the nation's history. I would agree that there was support for these regimes at some point (in the case of the Soviets Union, Germany, and Japan, it was during a time of war, which tends to paper over many differences and plays to the nationalist feelings of the people).
You'll have clarify how I may have confused 'oppressed' with 'englightened'. I haven't said the NKs have been enlightened, however their attempts to flee the country at frightening costs demonstrates they know bad and wrong when they see it. The Iranian's rejection of the faux political process speaks volumens about their enlightenment to me, but perhaps I am overly optimistic.
Actually I'll qualify that and say at least 3 out of the 4. The USSR post-Revolution is too hard/politically complicated to accurately measure, and the post-World War II enthusiasm was pretty much foisted upon it by events outside the CP's control. So I don't know where to put that one.
"I'll agree the "never" should have been qualified, that is a more than fair criticism. Also, I was looking more in the long term and not during a certain period of the nation's history. I would agree that there was support for these regimes at some point (in the case of the Soviets Union, Germany, and Japan, it was during a time of war, which tends to paper over many differences and plays to the nationalist feelings of the people)."
Yes, I'm sorry, like I said it was a little bit of a nit pick, but I thought that it was important to note that populations DO get irrational and support stupid things. I think this is especially a danger in the Muslim world because of the severe lack of any serious introspection, something exaggerated by our own inability [for political reasons] to really criticize the wider Muslim world.
"You'll have clarify how I may have confused 'oppressed' with 'englightened'. I haven't said the NKs have been enlightened, however their attempts to flee the country at frightening costs demonstrates they know bad and wrong when they see it. The Iranian's rejection of the faux political process speaks volumens about their enlightenment to me, but perhaps I am overly optimistic."
Once again, I'm sorry, I'm a bit of a pessimist so perhaps that is why I'm so grumpy. :)
I added that for two reasons: In North Korea's case, I accidently thought you were saying that its population did not believe the DPRK's propaganda when in actuality you were saying that if it collapsed, they'd see through it. Sorry, I apologize.
In Iran's case I'm wary of declaring victory in the coming generation too quickly, because any charismatic leader or ideology could potentially reverse momentum.
Sorry for any misunderstandings. You guys are one of my favorite sites.
Cutler,
No need to apologize here, and no offense was taken. I am pleased we were able to clarify our statements and positions, and come to an understanding and in some cases an agreement.
I said this a couple of years ago:
http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/003939.php