A history lesson
 

War on terror

Re: A history lesson
 

What I like most about this, besides the Chomsky-esque liberalism, is that it makes the point that should be obvious to everyone, that Islam, or for that matter any other religion, race, nationality, whatever does not breed terrorism and violence but rather these are the inevitable consequences of extreme social conditions; In this case and many others that means incredibly powerful forces having influence over people when they have exactly zero interest in their welfare.

See Vietnam, Korea, former Soviet-bloc Eastern Europe, Central America, Africa, inner cities in the US, Israel, Iraq et al.

Re: A history lesson
 

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Juan Cole is Professor of History at the University of Michigan

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It's worse than I thought. My God! Everything I know is wrong!

Re: A history lesson
 

Excellent post. I can remember perusing the literature of the right-wing fringe in the late 1970's and it being filled with reference to the mujahideen "freedom fighters" who's goals and aspirations were fundmanetally consistent with the finest traditions of America's, etc. It's all disappeared down the memory hole, along with U.S. support for international terrorism, which was more much more extensive and deadlier than Iraq's.

Now that Iraq's proposed constitutions abolishes freedoms that women enjoyed under Saddam, watch how the right grumbles and then ultimately capitulates to continued support for Bush's new Islamicist regime.

Re: A history lesson
 

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Everything I know is wrong!

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You have said this before (though this time you said it directly).

Re: A history lesson
 

You guys beat me to it, as I was about to post this link here myself.

I grew up as a Young Republican during the 1980's, and I remember extremely well how one of the litmus tests for "true believers" during that time was whether they supported the mujihadeen -- those "brave religious freedom fighters" -- in their battle against the Evil Communists in Afghanistan. And oh, how we praised Saint Reagan for standing up to the Evil Liberals so that the brave mujihadeen could have their guns, and their bombs, and their stinger missiles.

Now, flash forward to September 11, 2001, and suddenly every right-wing nut who supported these extremists develops instant amnesia. "Mujihadeen? Never heard of them! But did you hear about those Muslim Extremists in Afghanistan that just popped into existence out of nowhere?! Well, that's all I need to know! Let's go invade Iraq!"

To call these people ignorant of history would be far too kind. They know the history intimately -- how could they not? -- but they are utterly unwilling to take any responsibility for their own part in it. It just goes down the Memory Hole, everyone pretends it never happened, and the whole right wing propaganda machine moves on to a new list of talking points.

Anyway, it's good to remind them that not all of us have forgotten how we really got to this point.


q/q

Re: A history lesson
 

So... it's your contention that arming these people was wrong?

Re: A history lesson
 

Shameless kick.


q/q

Re: A history lesson
 

Orwell sure understood [censored] well.

Re: A history lesson
 

Having read this brings an important, very simple, but often overlooked point. Yes, we (US) gave the current group of terrorists much of their capabilities of which they turned it against us. Bad move with little or zero foresight on our part! US has been guilty of this stupidity for too many times to list throughout the 20th century. But the honorable professor makes one terrible leap beyond the collusion that the US is very guilty of, and that is to place the guilt or more succinctly, the ENTIRE blame upon the US as if the terrorist organizations are completely absolved of any crime or attrocity (equating them to mindless puppet employees of the US). This type of rhetoric smacks of the lack of logic that is prevelant in the left. The left is very good at "preaching to the choir" and this essay is no exception. Question: Although it would be very satisfying to many, do you really believe that locking up the current adminstration, all its cronies, and anyone else one might remotely link to them would END the problems in the Middle East, Asia, or South America?

Re: A history lesson
 

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But the honorable professor makes one terrible leap ... and that is to place the guilt or more succinctly, the ENTIRE blame upon the US as if the terrorist organizations are completely absolved of any crime or attrocity (equating them to mindless puppet employees of the US).

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He says nothing of the kind. Where are you getting this?


q/q

Re: A history lesson
 

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Question: Although it would be very satisfying to many, do you really believe that locking up the current adminstration, all its cronies, and anyone else one might remotely link to them would END the problems in the Middle East, Asia, or South America?

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So, by that rationale, since you believe that punishing those responsible won't solve the problems they created, do you contend that they shouldn't be punished at all (other than to be 'satisfying to many')?

p.s. shameless kick.

Re: A history lesson
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Question: Although it would be very satisfying to many, do you really believe that locking up the current adminstration, all its cronies, and anyone else one might remotely link to them would END the problems in the Middle East, Asia, or South America?

[/ QUOTE ]

So, by that rationale, since you believe that punishing those responsible won't solve the problems they created, do you contend that they shouldn't be punished at all (other than to be 'satisfying to many')?

p.s. shameless kick.

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You missed the point completely, whiffed, strike one. The 'sarcastic' statement I made alluded to was the tactic employed (or is it really a tactic?) by the left to bring to light root causes to the one the world's ills, that being the right. My sarcasm in the question was an unheard attempt to shed light on the fact that demonizing current or past administrations and their ilk by the left, such as in this essay, does not accomplish any real goal towards peace, which is really the end that any reasonable person wants, right? It's just BS agendizing. The left does it, so does the right. No real solutions one can sink their teeth into.
In answering your question, hell yes justice should be served. In the current political climate, do you really think the guilty will be punished? Lol!

Re: A history lesson
 

I dont agree with your assessment of the professors conclusions. I just scanned the post again and could not find it explicitly, so I am assuming that you are suggesting this is an implicit conclusion.


As a history professor he has simply looked at the current situation from a historical perspective. This is one reasonable method to investigate the root causes of the problem under study.

I see you have a relatively small number of posts. If you have been hanging around this forum you would have seen various attempts at identifying the nature of the problem. The simple minded one that jumps out after a superficial look at the events is to point to Islam and lay the blame on that religion. This is patently wrong and a study of history as Dr Cole does here bears that view up.

Now, neither I nor Dr Cole condone the use of violence, condone the misuse of Islam to ferment the violence, suggest that what they are doing is correct, honorable or reasonable but we both agree that the causes of the problem lie in the History and that our role in getting us to where we are at bears important lessons in going forward in dealing with that region. To ignore or write off the history lessons as the Left preaching to the choir is, excuse me for being blunt, ignorant -- and our leaders seem hell bent on being ignorant.

Re: A history lesson
 

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No real solutions one can sink their teeth into.

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I see the problem with the way you viewed the professors quote.

He is a professor of history, he as offered an historical perspective and that is all he has offered. In this essay he has not tried to offer any solutions and in fact offering solutions would dilute the history lesson.

The problem is that many ignore history in assessing the problem. The people in power should understand the history, the people who vote for them should understand the history -- independent of the solutions. The politics would come in who's solution you want to support -- and that is a separate game.

Re: A history lesson
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
No real solutions one can sink their teeth into.

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I see the problem with the way you viewed the professors quote.

He is a professor of history, he as offered an historical perspective and that is all he has offered. In this essay he has not tried to offer any solutions and in fact offering solutions would dilute the history lesson.

The problem is that many ignore history in assessing the problem. The people in power should understand the history, the people who vote for them should understand the history -- independent of the solutions. The politics would come in who's solution you want to support -- and that is a separate game.

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If you think reading that link is going to contribute to understanding the history, you're crazy. Also crazy is thinking that this article is not offering a political perspective on current events.

As a substantive criticism, that article totally fails to deal with, or even address, the wider context of the decision to arm the mujahideen or the positive consequences of that decision.

I just skimmed the article, but I don't really recall him explaining how giving bin Laden Stinger missiles 20 years ago has a causal connection with his people using box cutters and home-made bombs in acts of terrorism today.

Re: A history lesson
 

Of course, you are free to offer your own historical perspective of the region.