The coordinated attacks in Paris on Friday the 13th have become the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back in a way that similar, but less emotive, assaults on a Russian airliner in Egypt’s Sinai, in Beirut, and earlier in Chattanooga, TN, Garland TX, several sets of knife-wielders in the People’s Republic of China, as well as the attack at the Paris offices of satirical publication Charlie Hebdo did not. News outlets, political pundits, and world leaders of all political persuasion are now pondering, what should be done to make the world safer in the face of the persistent and increasingly more alarming nature of radical jihadist terror.
I have been trying to get my head around all this, and clarify my own thinking. My fundamental biases were formed in the late ‘60s: anti-war, skeptical of police and other authority, tolerant of multiple beliefs, world views. But I find myself unwilling to accept a world in which such attacks are simply accepted as a normal risk of modern life, like death by auto. I don’t want to see a vengeful, ineffectual backlash, but I do want to see a change in how the world approaches this challenge, one which recognizes geopolitical realities as well the goal of harmonious living among the vast variety which makes up the human family.
Here’s where I stand at this point in time.
Radical, jihadist terror and its current, most dangerous incarnation, ISIS, are global and regional problems, and the responses must be both global and regional.
Searching for “terror acts in 2015” produces frightening lists of hundreds of massacres fulfilled or attempted. The vast majority occur in an arc which encompasses the Muslim world, from north and west Africa, through the middle east and south Asia, to the Philippines and Indonesia. But scattered among them are horrors in Europe, the US, and the Far East. Latin America seems immune from this type of violence, but only because the list makers (who may have an anti-Islam bias) do not include those particular brands of revolutionaries and drug runners.
Until this year, jihadist terror acts outside of the Middle East were on a low simmer. Citizens of the NATO countries and their neighbors seemed willing to live with some inconvenience – airport security theatre, the potential of intrusive government surveillance of digital communication – more than they were willing to engage in active combat at the source, in those Muslim countries which are spawning attacks. But this year, several things have changed. ISIS has gained allegiance outside of its Mesopotamian homeland of Syria and Iraq. Groups in Libya, Nigeria, and Yemen now see themselves as allies if not members of the self-declared caliphate. Small cells of jihadists have appeared in Europe, and probably in the US as well. And, of course, attacks in Beirut, Sharm El-Sheik, and Paris in the past month have focused attention of the nature and size of the threat. It’s probably only a matter of time before the Uighur in northwest China declare themselves as part of ISIS.
The recent reflexive response of France to death in its homeland is similar to how the US responded in the late ‘90s to attacks on its embassies in east Africa, and the bombing of the USS Cole – a desire on the part of leadership (Hollande, Wm Clinton) to be seen as doing something, however ineffectual it might actually be. Reaction advanced after the 9-11-01 incidents. The US, with full support from NATO allies and even aquiescence from Russia and Iran, planned and began to execute of clear mission to eliminate terrorist training camps in Afghanistan, and the Taliban government which supported them. But that strategy came off the tracks when US leadership conflated the need to root out sources of terrorism with a desire to exert more US hegemony over a region they saw as vital to our national interest – the oil-producing Middle East. Despite the distraction, terrorism in NATO was kept at an “acceptable” level. By sending troops into the heartland of Islam, it appeared that the activity of suicide bombers and other mass killers of a jihadists bent were being bottled up (safely, from our point of view) in their own territory.
But they have escaped the cage, and are now leaking back into our consciousness. The Paris attacks seem to have been a tipping point – people around the world seem to be less and less willing to accept the potential of sudden random death while enjoying life. Leaders of the affected countries include a wide range of interests and state models. While there are many real disagreements among the major nations of the world, the vast majority of earth’s population live in countries where their leadership views at least their safety as worthy of attention. This is not the 20th century, when state-sponsored terrorism included starvation in the Soviet Union and China, mass mechanized murder in Germany, unthinking colonial wars.
(To Be Cont’d)
Al, very thoughtful. I look forward to seeing where you are going with this discussion. Your comment regarding “clarifying my own thinking” is really key. I don’t think I have, and I am sure most Americans have not. The logic for banning admission of refugees makes as much sense to me as admitting them. It all comes down to where your heart is.
Acts of terror have made all of us far more numb than we are willing to admit, even to ourselves. One thing I am sure of is that the quick response to the bombing with a very successful raid and the stepped up air attacks will force the terrorists to act sooner and with more force than anyone expects.