Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Reasons for Becoming Disturbed


I originally wrote this entry on October 8, 2004, and published it on blogs.sun.com.


Today, RoboGeek (David Herron) has written some of his "Disturbing thoughts on Iraq & the war".


Frankly, I'm not sure if this is a case of being disturbed or confused. I only get disturbed when I see something that's not right. I get confused when I don't know what's right.


In any case, I posted a comment there and I'd like to quote it again here.




The main purpose of Iraq and Afghanistan invasions are strategic. Any battle with "terrorism" is of perfunctory importance since those invasions (which by themselves help bring terror to invaded populations) have nothing to do with the roots of terrorism (which are to be found elsewhere) particularly when "terrorism" is properly defined. What is more, such invasions only extend terrorism and afflict large populations with it.


In fact, there is no consistent definition of "terrorism" given by any of the last four U.S. administrations I've lived under. So, to expect a battle with "terrorism" when it has hardly been defined is not a realistic expectation. (Often, anyone opposing the will of the U.S. foreign policy is in danger of being called a terrorist.)


To understand the situation, I think it is more important to see what the real, strategic intentions of the two invasions are and what they have brought to the invaded. The moral questions are then easy to settle.


Finally, to learn more about Wahhabism, I highly recommend Hamid Algar's Wahhabism: A Critical Essay. Algar took his Ph.D. in Cambridge and has been a professor of Islamic and Near Eastern Studies in Berkeley since his mid-20s. Besides several European languages, he reads and speaks fluent Persian, Arabic and Turkish.