Understanding terrorism

[jaguar]

You need to get deeper. 2 levels. Lets look at communism and socialism. Where do the activists and radicals come from? The upper middle classes, they have the time and education to understand and the money to effect extreme change, at the time, revolution. However those revolutions would never have worked without the mass support caused by inequity and lack of social mobility at the time. Today, you'll still find the vast majority of far-left activists on uni campuses but you won't be seeing revolution anytime soon, why? No popular support.

Do I need to bother drawing the parallels?

There has and always will be extremists, dangerous extremists of every colour, stripe and creed, driven by fevours as diverse as humanity itself. In general they are importent becuase they lack mass support. When you create circumstances where many turn to their cause as the answer to their plight, then you have a real problem. Thats where the "difficulties of their lives" argument stand up.

[lookout123]

But even in your examples, poverty is not the cause of the revolution, it is the honey that draws the masses to follow a leader who has never felt the sting of the supposed cause.

for poverty to truly be the cause of a communist revolution or an islamic jihadist uprising then those who are actually being oppressed would have to one day wake up and say "i don't like this anymore, who wants to follow me." what we actually see are wealthy individuals who have a vision for how they want to see the world (worker's paradise or sh'ria rule), a vision which surprise surprise puts them on top once the current system is tossed aside. these wealthy individuals exploit and deceive the very people they are affecting concern for.

putting a lamb in every pot and a suburban in every driveway won't stop this, because the leaders of the movement will just find a different fear to exploit and motivate.

so what is the solution? have a complete hands-off policy in the middle east? that would appease radar, but few others. the fact is that from it's earliest days Al Queda has maneuverd for the overthrow of middle east gov'ts for the goal of a unified Arab nation ruled by Sh'ria law. leaving them to their own devices may not be the best course of action with that in mind.

[tw]

Originally Posted by lookout123

But even in your examples, poverty is not the cause of the revolution, it is the honey that draws the masses to follow a leader who has never felt the sting of the supposed cause.

Poverty is nothing more than a symptom. Like famine, poverty is created first and foremost when the people do not even have a functioning government.

You can fix the symptoms of poverty - build infrastructure - and poverty remains. That is a conundrum that NGOs, World Bank, IMF, etc are all confronting. For even where poverty and famine have been successfully diminished (ie Uganda), corruption in government quickly reverses all the accomplishments.

Arguing poverty as a reason for conflict is bull. That assumption was long since buried by lessons of post WWII history. Poverty is only another symptom of the same problem that also creates revolution, terrorism, etc. Every attempt to solve poverty in a corrupt society has always failed. Any attempt to solve poverty without eliminating the reasons for revolution is stupidity. Learn from lessons taught by 1970s Thailand in their northern provinces. Unfortunately too many have opinions without first learning from where poverty was successfully diminished; where revolution was eliminated.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by lookout123

But even in your examples, poverty is not the cause of the revolution, it is the honey that draws the masses to follow a leader who has never felt the sting of the supposed cause.

It's the same thing. There are always revolutionary would-be leaders wandering about, but there is no revolution, because people are relatively comfortable with the system as it is. A cadre of fanatics only becomes a revolutionary force when they attract popular support.

[russotto]

Oppression is the reason for the bombings. They want more oppression and they want to be the oppressors and the 1st world stands in their way. Arguing over whether that's because 1st world governments are less oppressive or that they want to do the oppressing themselves is beside the point.

You can talk about root causes, but if the root cause is basically that they -- the terrorists -- want Western governments to act in a way that isn't acceptable to anyone else, then the root cause can't be fixed. If they won't give in either, then the only solution to the problem is removing their ability to commit these acts in the first place.

[lookout123]

then the only solution to the problem is removing their ability to commit these acts in the first place.

ok, then what does that mean? how do we do that? what extremes are we willing to go to?

[tw]

Originally Posted by russotto

... then the only solution to the problem is removing their ability to commit these acts in the first place.

Cannot be done. History demonstrates you cannot stop the problem by killing more people, embargoing their supplies, restricting their actions, or forcing a new government upon them. All those solutions only make more enemies. Problem must be identified and its root cause must be eliminated. As demonstrated earlier, even the assumptions in Lookout123's original post are intentionally distorted to only promote or disguise a failed American leadership problem. Intentionally distorted as to even blame everything on some mythical Al Qaeda.

Furthermore, after the invasion, there is a one year grace period. The invading nation only has something like one year to change things for the better. This mental midget president (using the same intellectual brainstorming from Adm Bremmer, et al) had no plans for the peace until seven months after "Mission Accomplished" was declared. Too little too late. We waited too long to solve anything. Our only solution lies in getting others to take over. Others who don't have the stigma of being ugly Americans.

Root cause, from the perspective of Americans, is that we decided to fix the region. Therefore we tried to fix a problem that was not a problem (Saddam), invented threats that did not exist (WMDs), empowered the real threat (Muslim Brotherhood), and made Americans a target (trying to force American ideals such as democracy down their throat).

Before 1 Aug 1990, America was not a target of Islamic fundamentals. What changed? It starts with the policy of intervention rather than the 'well proven by generations' policy of prevention or containment. This 'self serving' George Jr policy change caused America to become a target. Policy change is the mistake we made then and is the solution today - as our regional allies repeatedly remind us. Exercising that solution is difficult. Not difficult to execute. But difficult to get a leader with enough balls to do it.

In Vietnam, we could have left at any time. Instead we only doubled the American death count to protect a president's ego. When we finally did leave, then Vietnam was solved for the better. Leaving was the only solution for Vietnam. But self serving leaders such as Nixon did not have the balls to change an obviosly flawed policy - domino theory. Obviously the current president also does not have the balls nor intelligence. Everything for him is always so haaaarrrrdd.

[russotto]

Originally Posted by tw

Cannot be done. History demonstrates you cannot stop the problem by killing more people, embargoing their supplies, restricting their actions, or forcing a new government upon them.

Worked on Carthage. Troy, too. Also Germany after WWII. The American South. Examples abound.

All those solutions only make more enemies. Problem must be identified and its root cause must be eliminated.

And if the root cause is simply that they like killing Westerners? That they find our very infidel existence intolerable?

Others who don't have the stigma of being ugly Americans.

Or ugly Brits or ugly Spaniards or...

Before 1 Aug 1990, America was not a target of Islamic fundamentals. What changed?

Nothing, that's a false premise; Islamic fundamentalists used to take (and kill) hostages rather than blow people up.

[tw]

Originally Posted by russotto

And if the root cause is simply that they like killing Westerners? That they find our very infidel existence intolerable?

All this violence was long ongoing for hundreds of years before we decided to save them from themselves. Massacres in the name of fundamentalism and to eliminate fundamentalism occurred without even an historical footnote. Now we too are stuck in the quicksand because somehow we were going to fix something we did not even understand.

Only a misinformed fool would think Islamic Fundamentalism is only about killing westerners. Westerners were rarely a target until after 1 Aug 1990. In fact, some Islamic Fundamentalists once welcomed Americans as friends or honest brokers. What changed? Without that answer, then the whole thread started by Lookout123 will only be a waste of time.