Inspired by the thread on how terrorism is sometimes justified. I put stars on the West and Muslim world for sake of brevity in the title. By the West I mean primarily the US, the UK, France, and Germany. By the Muslim world I mean those nations with predominantly Muslim populations, from Morocco to Indonesia and all the places in between.
One argument I hear regarding why Islamic terrorists commit their acts is because of the interference from the West in their countries. If this is the case, let’s list some examples of this interference. I chose the dates from the end of the Cold War through 9/11/2001. I chose the end of the Cold War as the starting point since it seems that from that point on the world as a whole was heading in the direction of greater peace and global unity until 9/11 occurred.
All that being said, what are these instances of interference? Here’s the ones I can think of of the top of my head.
Our support of Israel. The direct interference in this case would be against the people of the Palestinian Territories.
The 1991 Gulf War.
Our interference in the Somali civil war in 1992/1993.
The civil war in the former Yugoslavia. In that situation we were on the side of the predominately Muslim minority Bosnians (if I remember correctly).
Obviously there was a lot of other stuff that happened during the Cold War. Having been born in 1977 and being a westerner, maybe those things seemed like ancient history to me by 2001, but perhaps not to the people more directly involved. What I’m trying to understand is this. 1. Is Islamic terrorism mainly a reaction to imperialistic western intervention in the Muslim world? 2. If so, was it due to ongoing issues at the time of 9/11 or did OBL just set off a chain of events that wouldn’t have happened had he not been trying to settle a score based on ancient history?
Apologies for the direction this OP took. Perhaps it is better suited for great debates.
Support of (repressive) dictators and kings in the region, like Mubarak in Egypt and the Saudi Royal family. Valuing “stability” over democracy. Not sure I want to go further than that in this forum.
To attempt to limit the question to “between the end of the Cold War and …” is to defeat the purpose of the topic. The tensions in the Middle East relating to the Western World go back to well before the end of the Cold War. Indeed, one can argue that the Cold War had relatively little effect upon the Middle East and the Muslim world other than to provide a scaffold for playing powers off each other to get the best goodies.
For example, the generally accepted beginning of the terrorist attacks on the US is the bombing of the US embassy in Beirut in 1983. That’s well before the end of the Cold War. The main irritant at the time was our effort to intervene in the Lebanese Civil War as ostensible “peacekeepers”. That, of course, relates to Israel’s war with Hezbollah and it’s own efforts in Lebanon. Which goes to show that one of the main irritants that got things started was, of course, the strong support for Israel by the “West”.
Obviously, also, Iran still harbors ill feelings regarding events of the 1950s in Iran. These things go way back, sadly.
The ongoing US military presence in the Gulf, including naval base in Bahrain. Us Navy Central Command was established in 1983 and continues to this day.
Off the top of my head (and leaving aside the ones you got already), I’d go with the resistance to and against regimes like the Taliban in Afghanistan and Iran, especially in the form of embargoes or other hostility. Support of autocratic regimes in the region, especially Saudi, though not exclusively them. This last especially is seen as interfering with Muslim nationalism bent on creating a theocratic Muslim superstate that gets rid of the (European imposed) old order and national lines and allows for a new superpower in the region (of course, whether that would be Shia or Sunni is another question).
bin Laden said that he staged 9/11 at least in part because Allied soldiers set foot on Saudi Arabia during the first Gulf War. So the interference he objected to was stopping the dictator of one majority Muslim country from invading and conquering another majority Muslim country.
The other thing that the Muslims seem to object to is that we interfere with their plans to destroy Israel.
Being an American would seem to be the proper identification. The events of the post WWII are not something that a French or a W. European considers “ancient history” - this historical myopia and amensia is very American. The Algerian war is something that still echoes in the French politics now.
Of course indeed it illustrates - Algeria, Suez, the support of the dictatorships and bloody repressions.
ancient history?
Mace:
Yes
And excepting the Ibn Saud, the support of the dictatorial repressive faux-secularist governments, that gave the modern secularism a bad name - and changed the popular support from these governments - the wide secualrism of the 1950s, the 1960s even into the early 1970s, into a growing rejection.
I have mentioned this many times.
Has also impact, but more among the East.
Perhaps American conservatives may one day update their world understanding from 1975-1985 where it is frozen and stop repeating robotically outdated things no longer true and never quite true as they thought they were.
Among the Al Qaeda sympathizers, the Takfir oriented Salafists, it was not a thing that otherwise was too important.
Although going to war over the very despised Kuwaitis with their horrible abusive reputation towards the “guest workers” was not a great winner given the silly rhetoric the Americans always use in their “freedom” fighting.
the frank power colonialism of the british was more honest, less self decieving
This sounds a lot like ‘Muslims haven’t really tried to destroy Israel in over 40 years. What are you complaining about? Get over it already!’ and it seems especially odd in a post that also proclaimed this about the 55-year-old Algerian War:
No it sounds like ": it is stupid to make this statement in the present tense about the Muslims when
(1) The Arab states have not only not launched any war against the Israel since 1973, and the promotion of warlike stance towards the Israel functionally disappeared by the early 1990s.
(2) The Arab states over 20 years ago have offered the peace plans and no Arab state has had anything but a defensive attitude, and most neighbors have the peace with the Israel.
(3) It is both a Palestinian Christian and Palestinian Muslim position that long rejected the state of Israel - hardly the Muslim point of view alone although the American christians do like to white-wash away the Arab christians position on this subject, only liking to use them as tools when useful
(4) the majority of the Muslim world by the Population has had absolutely ZERO effort in aggression or war to destroy the Israel, not since the inception, and aside from the legitimate objection to the occupation, takes basically no particular action on the subject of “destroying” the Israeli state, even in rhetoric - except the Iranian state it is noted.
No it is not especially odd since I cited the Algerian War in the context of the French politics and the OP’s strange American historical amenisia - and I noted that it is still the factor in the present French politics - and I add that it is not among the Muslims I add, among the French-French who are Roman Catholics… The Front National, they are not known for having many of the Muslims among their adherants…
So now you have knee jerked so hard you have broken your nose, please go on.
Not all Islamic terrorist are the same. Al Qaeda, ISIL and the Taliban are not the same. They have different structures and different motivations. To lump them together is naïve.
Bin Laden never made a secret of his two goals. He wanted what he saw as foreign invaders to leave Muslim lands. And he wanted to replace secular governments in Muslim lands with theocratic governments.
Bin Laden’s opposition to Israel derived from the first goal. He saw the region as Muslim land and saw the Israelis as European invaders.
Keep in mind bin Laden’s original fighting had been against the Soviets who were occupying Afghanistan. He didn’t target the United States until American troops were stationed in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.
Yes, ISIS wants to have foreign invaders come to the Middle East, which is the opposite of what al Qaeda wanted. The leadership of ISIS has an apocalyptic vision; they believe that the non-Muslim armies will meet the Muslim armies in battle in the Middle East and the Muslims will defeat the non-Muslims and establish a Muslim empire.
Then America and its allies should have been rocked by terrorists from Latin America, South East Asia, and Northern Africa. The 9/11 attackers could have been Chileans (1973 coup - Sept 11).
I had indeed forgotten the IRaqi scuds, but even in this case it was not a real attempt at ‘destruction of Israel’ it was a desperate attempt, a failed attempt to get the Arab states to rally to the defense of the Regime Saddam against the coalition.
The mini city state of Hamas in Ghaza? I grant you the enclave fires rockets… and they are stupid assholes, you call that “wars”?
Okay Hamas makes war in the way the 8 year ineffectually wars against the parent.
My step daughter’s husband is from Chile. I asked him about the coup, and he has no hard feelings, indeed was barely aware of it. They are in their 20s.