Logical response
It\\\'s time for the American people to realise that suicidal terrorism isn\\\'t primarily the product of religious fanaticism, but a logical response to US imperialism. \\\"The central fact is that overwhelmingly suicide-terrorist attacks are not driven by religion as much as they are by a clear strategic objective: to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from the territory that the terrorists view as their homeland,\\\" Robert Papes, the pre-eminent US expert on suicidal terrorists, told The American Conservative Magazine in 2005. Religion, according to the author of Dying to Win: The Logic of Suicide Terrorism, only factors into suicide terrorism when the occupying power is of another confession. Say hello to the US-led invasions and occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq.
The tragedy of it all is that Osama Bin Laden bet the US would take his bait and lash out in revenge and hubris. By invading and occupying predominantly Muslim countries, undermining the rule of law through preventative detention and torture, and delivering death by drone, the US proved Bin Laden\\\'s narrative of Christian crusaders and holy war. This accomplished two necessary goals for Al Qaida: it manufactured more extremists and it economically and militarily weakened history\\\'s greatest hegemon.
Almost nine years after 9/11, the US has spent approximately a trillion dollars to fight this global \\\"war on terrorism\\\" as well as hundreds of billions of dollars of escalating expenditures on homeland security. In return, American taxpayers continue to jeopardise their economic future for an imperium few benefit from and which brings the war to American shores while simultaneously eating up cherished liberties.
The US, however, has an easy and moral way to rip out the root and make itself more secure and fiscally sound in the process. It should immediately begin to responsibly draw down its empire by withdrawing from Afghanistan and Iraq, shuttering its worldwide archipelago of military installations, and bringing home its service members. This will help dampen the allure of the extremist narrative the likes of Muttalib, Hassan, and Zazi latched onto. These men weren\\\'t born extremists, they were made extremists. The tragic irony is that the US helped Al Qaida to do it.
And because of that, we spend evermore on security but continue to feel less and less safe.
- Matthew Harwood is a writer based in Washington, DC.
(Courtesy Guardian)