Terrorism and the "War on Terror"

To begin with the "War on Terror" is a ridiculous phrase. Terrorism is a tactic not an enemy.

terrorism
noun
The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons.

The war on terror is like the war on the infantry or the war on air attacks. So as you can see right up front those waging the "war on terror" don't know who or what they are fighting.

The American Conservative has an interview with Associate Professor Robert Pape of the University of Chicago who has written the book Dying to Win on suicide terrorism. The interview points out how little we know about terrorism and terrorists.
Who originated modern suicide bombing? The Islamic terrorists, right. No, that would be wrong.

This wealth of information creates a new picture about what is motivating suicide terrorism. Islamic fundamentalism is not as closely associated with suicide terrorism as many people think. The world leader in suicide terrorism is a group that you may not be familiar with: the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka.
This is a Marxist group, a completely secular group that draws from the Hindu families of the Tamil regions of the country. They invented the famous suicide vest for their suicide assassination of Rajiv Ghandi in May 1991. The Palestinians got the idea of the suicide vest from the Tamil Tigers.

So what motivates them? Fundamentalist religion. Wrong again.

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. From Lebanon to Sri Lanka to Chechnya to Kashmir to the West Bank, every major suicide-terrorist campaign--over 95 percent of all the incidents--has had as its central objective to compel a democratic state to withdraw.

I imagine we can figure out what motivates al-Qaeda.

Since suicide terrorism is mainly a response to foreign occupation and not Islamic fundamentalism, the use of heavy military force to transform Muslim societies over there, if you would, is only likely to increase the number of suicide terrorists coming at us.

Since 1990, the United States has stationed tens of thousands of ground troops on the Arabian Peninsula, and that is the main mobilization appeal of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda. People who make the argument that it is a good thing to have them attacking us over there are missing that suicide terrorism is not a supply-limited phenomenon where there are just a few hundred around the world willing to do it because they are religious fanatics. It is a demand-driven phenomenon. That is, it is driven by the presence of foreign forces on the territory that the terrorists view as their homeland. The operation in Iraq has stimulated suicide terrorism and has given suicide terrorism a new lease on life.

So do you still think the Iraq war has resulted in more security at home?

Osama bin Laden's speeches and sermons run 40 and 50 pages long. They begin by calling tremendous attention to the presence of tens of thousands of American combat forces on the Arabian Peninsula.

In 1996, he went on to say that there was a grand plan by the United States--that the Americans were going to use combat forces to conquer Iraq, break it into three pieces, give a piece of it to Israel so that Israel could enlarge its country, and then do the same thing to Saudi Arabia. As you can see, we are fulfilling his prediction, which is of tremendous help in his mobilization appeals.

There is much more and I suggest you go read the entire interview. As many of us have suspected 911 is a direct result of the first Gulf War and the Bush's invasion of Iraq has only fueled the fire. It's not what we are the Islamic terrorists hate, it's where we are.

Update
I have a related post over at Running Scared.

Update II
Carla at Preemptive Karma also has a great post on this topic.