Holes In Thoughts: Extremists are the enemy, but not the target

Wednesday, January 09, 2008

Extremists are the enemy, but not the target

If a Muslim extremist walked up to an average Swiss person and tried to convince them to strap a bomb to themselves and blow up some Infidels, would they do it?

Probably not. Why? That Swiss person probably has enough to eat, decent health care, and a nice place to live.

To eliminate nutcase fundamentalist extremism, you've got to eliminate as many of the extremists as possible, but they're a superhumanly determined bunch: it's going to be difficult (if not impossible, even for the U.S. military) to completely eradicate them. So you must also tackle the sympathetic ear.

So far, the U.S. has not done so; it can be argued that the Iraq invasion, our arms sales (to Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Israel, Al Qaeda/Afghanistan), and lack of humanitarian efforts have done the opposite.

Each of these people are prime targets for Al Qaeda enlistment:

Iraqi refugees that the U.S. has refused to admit past its borders,
Iranians with no hope of help from their own government,
Saudis who hate the Israelis and view the U.S. as nothing more than an oil junkie,
Sudanese who feel ignored by the world powers (and most of Africa, for that matter).

These people share two important things: hopelessness and ignorance.

Those who are susceptible to influence by extremists are hopeless and ignorant because they have nowhere to turn, often as a result of their governments not caring about them, or being incapable of caring. Consider Afghanistan's 40% unemployment rate (!): the Taliban had no reason to support their citizens because oil pays for the ruling class' lives. The U.S. government relies on taxes; it can't afford to ban women from working. The women of Afghanistan had an 86% illiteracy rate in 2003.

Imagine knowing someone who cannot read at all. The person also is homeless. Had a job but had the factory blown up, or was forced to move out of the country because of a war. The person isn't stupid, but is worried, and perhaps desperate. Now imagine how easy it would be to convince that person that a country 4,000 miles away is the cause of all your problems...

The U.S. cannot guarantee jobs for the whole planet. Nor can we feed and clothe everyone. But if not for the compliance and aid of otherwise reasonable people, Osama bin Laden, Hitler, and a thousand other despots wouldn't have done nearly as much harm.

I feel that the humanitarian efforts have been completely forgotten in our foreign policy. I’m not talking about purely financial aid – Pakistan has abused our generosity by funding army and nuclear weapons projects with our foreign aid – I mean sending in the Army Corps of Engineers to build hospitals, schools, and even mosques. It would be tough for an extremist mullah to argue the U.S. is the Great Satan if we built his home.

Have we done some of this kind of work? Yes. We budgeted $2B to do it (though only half has actually been used) – but the budgeted amount is 00.1% of the total (of ~$1.5T). That lack of balance between the carrot and the stick is one of many reasons the Iraq war isn’t going well: we’re adding frightened and ignorant troops to the ranks of our enemy.

Labels: politics

posted by Steve @ 2:12 PM

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