Bell Curve The Law Talking Guy Raised by Republicans U.S. West
Well, he's kind of had it in for me ever since I accidentally ran over his dog. Actually, replace "accidentally" with "repeatedly," and replace "dog" with "son."

Thursday, July 07, 2005

What Do Islamic Fundamentalist Terrorists Want?

Hi Gang,

US West alluded to a frustrated call from a British friend that perhaps it is time to negotiate with Al Qaida et al. US West brought up the question of what Al Qaida wants. That question was one of the early subjects of debate among the Citizens that led to the creation of this blog.

I think given the tragic events in London today, it is worth revisiting the subject.

I'll get the ball rolling with my own opinion: I think there are several problems with the idea of negotiating with Al Qaida.

First, it is far from clear that there is anything we could give them - either in terms of material goods or policy changes - that would make them stop. Al Qaida's own statements refer to an existential conflict. They object to the existence of modern Western society itself, not just the policies of particular governments. It is not enough to simply depart the Middle East, they want us to stop being modern at home as well. They see our very example as corrupting their culture.
Second, who is charge? Just from a practical standpoint, who would we actually sit down with? Despite the attempts of the Bush administration to personalize the "war on terror," it is not clear that there is a hierarchy with which we could make deals.

Third, if there is no single hierarchy, perhaps there are multiple demands. For example, the group that attacked Madrid mentioned their desire to restore Muslim rule on the Iberian Peninsula. That does not seem to be a major concern for Pakistani decent terrorists operating in London or the Saudi terrorists who pulled off the attacks on 9/11/01.

Fourth, what about Israel? Do these groups just want Israel to modify its behavior? Or do they want Israel (and its Jewish citizens) to be exterminated? A casual examination of the fundamentalist rhetoric suggests that some groups at least (again, there is no single monolithic demand here) want the latter. If that is the case, is there any change in policy the U.S.A. could make that would satisfy them? That is, would any U.S. administration be likely to stand by while an Islamic fundamentalist movement attempted genocide in Israel?

So to sum up: I think the negotiation option is not workable. We don't have anyone to talk to. We don't know what they would demand if we could find someone. And there is a good chance that if we did find someone with a credible claim to represent the terrorist movement, we would be uniformly unwilling to concede to their basic demands.

This is not to say I think Bush's approach is correct either. My own preference is more in line with the policy approach commonly used in Europe (at least their international policy). That is, I favor a primary reliance on police work and diplomacy with resort to war in clear cut cases such as Afghanistan (but not Iraq).

22 comments:

Dr. Strangelove said...

The London bombing reminds us all that despite our efforts, Al Qaeda remains a potent enemy. I agree with RxR that negotiating with Al Qaeda makes no sense. There's a lot more I'll say on the subject later, but for now I am not inclined to discuss further the political implications of attacking Londoners while their blood still cries out from the ground.

Anonymous said...

I think that it worth having the broader discussion about what you do to properly address groups like Al Qaeda. I do not think that is disrespecting Londoners. And it is the same type of discussion I found myself having on 9/11. I think it honors these victims to try and use the disaster to address the underlying causes to that others might be spared.

I agree with RBR's sentiments. And I would like to consider something else as well. Why for instance has France with 5-6 million Arabs and Muslims  (many angry and disaffected) not been hit? They have plenty of reasons. They are locked in a cycle of poverty, living in ghetto-like areas. They are discriminated against by the average Frenchperson. They are living in a predominately Catholic, Western country. They are not allowed to wear a veil or have multiple wives. They are mostly required to be educated in public schools. Their mosques and schools are closely watched by French officials. Many are refugees and immigrants. And the list goes on. So why not start planting bombs in metros? Wouldn’t France be a prime place for Al Qaeda to recruit and do some serious damage in the heart of continental Europe?

Well, for one thing, the French aren’t allied with the US in Iraq. And what is one reason why that is?. The large Muslim and Arab population (of which roughly half are French citizens and mostly for Northern Afirca) in France rejected such a thing. And the French often pointed this out when they explained their reasoning. And this clues us into something else--the attempts of the French policy makers (notice I didn't say people) to develop policies that integrate Arabs and Muslims rather than ignoring or excluding them.

The French have maintained a very open dialogue with their Muslim community and they have been less hesitant than others to deport extremists. They have understood the complexity of the Arab community. They distinguish between Arabs, Muslims, and Islamists. They are working on getting Imams educated in France and in French rather than allowing them to be imported from the Middle East. They have encouraged the establishment of Muslim and Arab NGOs, Non-profits, and community associations that can liaise with the government without violating the notion of a secular state. And they have attempted to address some of the fundamental problems faced by the communities. They haven’t been hugely successful, but they have managed to make honest attempts.

I am not suggesting that the French have a perfect model. They are still deep seeded resentments and issues in France- the veil is just the start. But perhaps they are onto something. And if you can’t negotiate with Al Qaeda, perhaps each nation can do more internally to make Al Qaeda less attractive to potential recruits.
 

// posted by USWest

Anonymous said...

JFK said "We must never negotiate out of fear, but we must never fear to negotiate." The problem with Al Qaeda is the first statement: we would ONLY negotiate out of fear, as we perceive no good faith demands on their part which could be satisfied. Should we perceive such demands from terrorists (whether the IRA or the PLO), I think negotiation makes more sense, but only within a larger (much larger) political context.

The US military has admitted it has had talks with insurgents in Iraq. Presumaby there is some tacit understanding that they are not 100% Al Qaeda operatives, but have some quasi-legitimate local concerns that can be dealt with. But,to the extent that the US government is correct that they are all linked through Al-Zarqawi to Al Qaeda, guess what chaps: we ARE negotiating with them.

 

// posted by LTG

Anonymous said...

It would be a mistake to think that France is not the target of Islamic fundamentalist terrorists. I found this Radio Netherlands  article that quotes a Norwegian security consulting firm as identifying no fewer than five thwarted attacks against France just since 9/11/01.

Also, don't forget the numerous Islamicist terrorist attacks in France in the 1980s. So I don't think the French government has hit on anything other than a lucky patch thanks mainly to the efficacy of their intelligence services. See also this Brookings report.

And of course because of France's non-involvement in Iraq (they are deployed in Afghanistan however), there are countries higher up on Al Qaeda's shit list.  

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Dr. Strangelove said...

Sorry! I didn't intend to imply that RxR had said anything inappropriate... but I see now how my words could have been read that way. What RxR said was perfectly appropriate. I was just trying to explain why I did not feel like giving a full response yet, even though the post certainly deserves careful thought.

Anonymous said...

LTG,

The problem with JFK's quotation is he was talking about a state, the Soviet Union. In his case it made sense to negotiate because there was a number we call and know we were talking to the people in charge. Is Zarqawi in charge of the insurgency? From what I've heard there are at least three different groups in this insurgency: Al Qaeda operatives, Syrian volunteers/adventurers, and local Sunni militia types. On top of that there are also criminal gangs running around kidnapping people for money alone. Our forces in Iraq are probably negotiating with the local Sunnis.  

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

While these comments are all very interesting and are helping me learn, they still do not begin to answer the question that was asked in the first place: What do these islamic fundementalists want?

I obviously don't have the answer. To me it seems they want us out of their countries but still want our money. They want to be left alone so they can continue warring with which ever country benefits their "plans" the most at the whim of their leaders. I can't even begin to see a solution. Their guerilla-like tactics of bombing whomever they choose is impossible to contain (yet RxR said that the French have thwarted five attacks, which means they are doing something right, but also begs the questions, how many possible attacks has the U.S. stopped?).

As an idealist, I would love to see peace across the board. My Buddhist desires would like us to leave them alone, stop buying their oil and let their "economy" be limited to less spending countries. As a realist, I believe we neither option is going to happen.

Our country needs to stop consuming so much. I think that if we allowed ourselves to seek out different outlets for energy we wouldn't have to meddle in the affairs of other countries, we wouldn't need to fight for other countries, we wouldn't need to support other countries; we could take care of ourselves, lead by example and usher in a new evolved way of consuming energy....OK, I'm off my soapbox. 

// posted by Siddharthawolf

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the links to the reports, RBR. I will read them with interest.

The fact that the French were able to get good enough intelligence to thwart attacks means that they are doing something right that we are not.

The attacks in France in the mid 1990s were largely the work of Corsican separatists and Algerians who were trying to bring their bloody civil war to France ( because they held France partially responsible for their problem. I don't know enough about that to speak with authority.) Once again, they weren't your Al Qaeda type terrorists.

I pointed out in my post that they have managed to keep a dialogue open with their Arab and Muslim communities. Knowing what I know about Arab communication networks, this has proven, no doubt to be helpful. By keeping that dialogue, they are able to get information from the leaders in those communities that they wouldn't otherwise get.

We have tried it here and with what success, I don't know. But you don't make inroads into your local immigrant population by using words like "crusade" and "access of evil" and then arresting people randomly in Dearborn for the color of their skin.

Dr. Strangelove, I respect your reasons for holding back. You are correct to let things simmer down before addressing them. I look forward to reading your comments when you are ready to post them.

LTG: I would be good to open a dialogue with the perpetrators of such attacks if we only knew with whom and how to speak. RBR and I were talking last night about how weird it is to be saying that the IRA and the Basque Separatists were "good terrorist organizations" because at least they had leaders and a clear agenda while groups like Al Qaeda were "bad terrorist organizations" because they have no such thing. I think we understand why we say this, but is definitely shows who Al Qaeda is in an entirely different league. It a loosely affiliated set of autonomous groups. There is no central command. We destroyed that when we hit Afghanistan. Think of it like an ant hill that has been knocked over. The ants have dispersed all over.
 

// posted by USWest

Anonymous said...

I disagree with RBR that a "state" is fundamentally different from any other group or institution with power. Negotiating with a state, or with the IRA, with IBM, or with Al Qaeda is all the same. JFK was referring to a state at the time, but there's nothing in his quote (nor in logic) that limits his reasoning only to institutions that are called states.

That being said, some negotiating partners have more ability to make deals than others. If Al Qaeda lacks any central authority, then obviously one cannot negotiate with any such authority. States are also not all alike, negotiating with the US government is more difficult than negotiating with, say, a dictatorship, because the President cannot guarantee ratification. Nor does a President have the same breadth of authority to negotiate because of his party. RBR knows all about this stuff, better than I do.

JFK's point is still right. The question is how can we *not* be "negotiating out of fear" if we deal with a terrorist group? How else does one negotiate with anyone, except out of fear: answer, when they have a set of demands that includes some legitimate or reasonable demands - i.e, where some compromise is possible. There is no compromise with Al Qaeda. What it wants, our destruction, we cannot give. We have nothing else it wants.

It would be a different matter if all these attacks were made with a specific political goal in mind that, when satisfied, would remove the threat of more attacks (e.g., US out of Iraq).  

// posted by LTG

Dr. Strangelove said...

When we talk about negotiating possiblities, we should distinguish between insurgents (or rebels) and terrorists (this distinction well pre-dates Operation Iraqi Freedom).

1. Insurgents attack the state; their targets are the military, police, and infrastructure. Terrorists attack the people; killing/kidnapping civilians, non-military government officials, and releasing biochemical threats.

2. The tactical goal of insurgent attacks is to cause direct economic and physical damage to the state and its enterprises. They directly attack what they wish to be destroyed. The tactical goal of terrorists is to cause fear, panic, mass hysteria among the people. The broad strategic goals may be the same, however--for example, the IRA has functioned as both a terrorist and insurgent organization. And the (indirect) strategic purpose for causing fear in the populace may be so they pressure their government (terrorism is particularly designed to wound democratic societies.)

For those of us who think war can be "legitimate" in a way that terrorism can never be, this distinction makes sense--and thus negotiating with insurgents would not be wholly inconsistent with a policy of never negotiating with terrorists. But those who see no distinction between war and other forms of political violence must fall back on more practical issues (e.g., is there really anyone with whom we can negotiate in a decentralized organization like Al Qaeda?) to decide what is appropriate.

It is appropriate for the US to amend its foreign policy to improve our relations with the Islamic world--something we should be doing regardless of what Al Qaeda does. But I do not accept Bush's idea that Al Qaeda is at war with the United States. They do not fit the oldder sense of "war" that some of us believe can still be legitimate. The members of Al Qaeda are a criminals, not soldiers--and I will not negotiate with the people who planned 9/11, 3/11, and now 7/7, as I would not negotiate with a serial killer to encourage him to stop killing. Such evil people must be captured and brought to justice--and I think that's really all there is to it.

Anonymous said...

I agree with LTG that many organizations can be dealt with in good faith. He mentions several multinational corporations as examples. However, those examples are all just as different from Al Qaeda as they are from a state. I am still far from convinced that it would do any good to negotiate with a movement as diverse, disorganized and beset by faction as what we call Al Qaeda.

Nogotiating with some local leaders in the Sunni Triangle would be a totaly different case. In that situation I think negotiation could work. 

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

To be clear, I believe that it would be a terrible mistake to negotiate with Al Qaeda. But I do not believe this is true because they are belong to a particular category of organization, such as: (a) "terrorists" ; (b) "not a state" or ; (c) because they are "diverse, disorganized, and beset by faction." Negotiations with all such people/groups/institutions are possible, and have all been done in the past. The reasons for not negotiating with Al Qaeda are twofold: (1) we have nothing to trade; (2) neither side will accept a compromise (and stop fighting) short of total annihilation of the other. Negotiation would be futile.

Dr. Strangelove's distinction between insurgents and terrorists is fine, but many groups partake of both labels. The Haganah and the IRA are two examples that flit quickly to mind. The concern about negotiating with terrorists is the largely the fear of appeasement. Appeasement is horrible not because it results in a loss, but because it encourages the behavior that one sought to appease. The appetite grows with feeding. Where appeasement "works" (i.e., acquiescing in Soviet control of Eastern Europe) we don't call it that, because it did not lead to such increased demands. The question is, therefore, whether the group has a set of finite demands and desires a compromise. Negotiations with the IRA and PLO were able to proceed on that basis. It's the same reason we did not negotiate with Hitler, really, after appeasement failed.

By the way, I get in a lot of hot water for supporting appeasement in the 1930s, but I do. I believe that Hitler's track record at that time did NOT justify the belief that negotiation would be futile (which turned out to be true, however). At a minimum, a reasonable world leader who believed in war as a last resort could reasonably believe that granting Hitler's demands in the Fall of 1938 might satisfy him, rather than lead only to future demands. 

// posted by LTG

Dr. Strangelove said...

I already mentioned the IRA and groups that partake of both labels. Al Qaeda is not one of them.

Anonymous said...

I still contend that there are organizational characteristics that make negotiations more risky and less likely to show any progress. These characteristics are exhibited by Al Qaeda.

One cannot simply negotiate and trust that others will stick to their deals. Even organizations like states have difficulty implementing the agreements they have made in good faith because of institutional structures.

There are numerous historical examples of treaties struck by negotiating parties acting in good faith that fell apart because one party or both could not implement their obligations.

If Osama Bin Laden (by some fluke) were convinced to give up his terrorist's ways, would that mean the end of the problem? Not at all. Osama Bin Laden's legitimacy depends on his radicalism. The minute he compromises, he will lose his authority within his organization/movement. 

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

OK, we have gotten a touch off topic. We aren't talking about what the terrorists want but rather whether we should negotiate with them. As I said in my original posting for this thread, I think what the terrorists want depends on which terrorist you ask. They a wide range of demands. Morroccan terrorists (the ones that attacked Spain) want the restoration of Islamic rule in Spain. Many Pakistani terrorists want the U.S. out of Afghanistan and want to defeat India in Kashmir. Egyptian and Saudi terrorists may be primarily concerned with Israel. Bin Laden and his inner circle seem to be primarily concerned with modernity itself. Some of these demands are negotiable some aren't. Compromise on Israel or Kashmir won't satisfy Bin Laden.

There are many on the American left - especially in the pacifist tradition - that seem to believe that this is purely a matter of policy. If only we would change our policies, they would put down their bomb kits. I disagree. 

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

I agree with RBR. It isn't about policy. It is about abstractions. So even changing policy won't matter much. That doesn't mean we shouldn't change some of our policies.

In fact, thanks to RBR, I spent some time reading up on French Counter Terrorism Experiences from the Brookings (see link in the thread). The French tried to change policies, and only got a temporary reprieve from attacks in the late 1980s and early 90s. They even tried another odd, controversial, desperate, but interesting policy, of allowing known terrorists to stay in France so long as France or French interests abroad were not attacked. Thus, in the 1980s, France became this haven for terrorists and insurgents of all stripes. And this required the French to acknowledge their inability to stop terrorism, and to negotiate with some of these terrorists organizations. They got a longer reprieve, but nothing durable. They abandoned this in the early 1990s.

So based on the experiences of others and my own hunch, I don't think you get anywhere negotiating with true terrorists. You might be able to use force and policy to contain them for a while, but I think we are stuck with them as a fact of life. We need to start getting use to that. And maybe by refusing to be outraged each time they strike, they won't get such a charge (no word play intended) out of it.
 

// posted by USWest

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the report on the French experience. I was too lazy to make a full report on that Brookings report.

I still think it is possible to negotiate with some terror groups (those with stable, identifiable goals and centralized organizations) but not others (those with unstable or ambiguous goals and/or weakly institutionalized organizations). So you can negotiate with the IRA or PLO or even a group like Hezballah or Hamas but not Al Qaeda or various Eco-terrorist groups.

I think it is very telling that despite the original intent of this thread (to discuss what Islamic terrorists want), we keep drifting away to other topics. I think the reason for that is because none of us has a clue what these people want (and I wonder if really they do either).  

// posted by Raised By Republicans

Anonymous said...

Islamic terrorists of the AQ sort want to kill American and Europeans for its own sake. They want to demonstrate that they are powerful. Their religion, like all fundamentalist sects, encourages action at odds with basic human values.

To a certain extent, it is like a disease. Those who have picked up this disease, this sociopathology, can only be eliminated, arrested, or exterminated. The question then becomes how do we simultaneously contain the spread of the epidemic.

The answer is to address the root causes, to name a few: poverty and political corruption the middle east; needless American arrogance in foreign policy; the plight of the Palestinian people; the unwillingness of moderate (majority) Muslim clerics to denounce terrorism publicly and in the mosques; the willingness of the majority of the world's Muslims to secretly, and not-so-secretly, applaud the harm to innocent Westerners as "what they deserve"; torture by Americans and Israelis; European attitudes that if they lie low, the USA will take the blow, or that Europe can "tolerate" Muslim fanatics on their own soil; the refusal of Europeans, and French and Brits in particular, to admit that their idiotic imperialist policies of 1900-1960 were the cause of so much disaffection and political problems in the middle east. 

// posted by LTG

Anonymous said...

I think we do know what some of these groups want but the idea seems so silly none of us dare say it, lest we sound like crazed Republicans. They want to destroy our confidence as Western nations and our cultural dominance as . This way they hope to stop globalization and modernization a la the West and to control this process- make it happen on their terms.

In Islam, there is this idea that you are to take what is best from foreign cultures and reject what is considered bad. And so long as you and your way of life are unmolested, you live in peace with your foreign neighbors. You are, according to Islam, duty-bound to respect your neighbors ways so long as he doesn't interfere with yours. And you are not allowed in Islam to strike to first blow. However, if your foreign neighbor threatens you, your family, your community, you have a duty to defend yourself. This is the code of Islam. Now nowhere does it say that self-defense is to be violent.

There are many in the Middle East and elsewhere in the globe that look around and see their youth drinking Coke, listening to American and British rockers, watching Hollywood movies and wearing Western clothes. Rather than seeing this as progress, they see it as a form of cultural invasion, war, a threat to their communities. The West has struck their first blow. And thus, they have a duty to defend themselves, to wage jihad. And they choose to interpret that obligation in such a way as to justify violence.
They want to strike at the West, at modernization, at globalization. They want revenge for decades of colonization and theft of their national treasure.

I think LTG has hit on some of what they want dead on. But that won't end their violent actions because for many, jihad doesn't stop until the war is won. And when you start a Jihad and when you end it is entirely up to you. There is no leader, no pope-like figure to stop you. I think what these people want depends on the group. What they are doing though, is turning all of us into Israel.

There is something else that no one talks about. I think we often forget in the U.S. that for many people in the Arab world, the past is still very much alive and it is very powerful stuff.

I think, however, the subject of our discussion has to change considering that we now know that the suicide bombers were homegrown British citizens of Pakistani dissent, not outsiders from the Middle East. You can't consider motives and agendas without thinking about who these people are. I'd liken this to what you see with street gangs. They terrorize to feel powerful. They are often people who are marginalized, or who think they are, and they want to gain "respect".

 

// posted by USWest

Anonymous said...

Oh, and another thought: we have suicide bomber, too. Only they go into schools and shoot children before shooting themselves.  

// posted by USWest

Anonymous said...

I think USWest is brilliant to point out the similarity between school shootings and suicide bombers, when the perpetrators are 'homegrown' (not foreign operatives). The brilliance is the connection that both should be treated as criminal ctivity by disaffected youth whose pathologies were ignored or fostered by the community they grew up in. I prefer Waco to Oklahoma city. 

// posted by LTG

Anonymous said...

That is excatly the connection I saw. And this points to a much larger social problem. If an American Indian fells disaffected enough to shoot up his school, what is out there waiting for is among our young Hispanic, Asian, African American, and Arab youth? 

// posted by USWest