I recently saw another article that
referred to the Islamic teachings on failure and defeat; turning back to the
pure and old ways, not embracing progressive or new ways, as we in the West
have assumed they would after being "liberated" by being defeated in
battle.
No, this is not the same as defeated
Germany or defeated Japan. Our
invasion of Iraq is vindicating proof to hardline Islamic fundamentalists
that the prophecies about the Apocalypse are being fulfilled.
There is more good reading in the current
issue of Foreign Policy online.
Check it out. -
KWC
The
American Mongols
To win the war
against terrorism, the United States must overcome the burden of
history
By Husain Haqqani in
Foreign Policy, March - April 2003 @ http://www.foreignpolicy.com
An invading army is
marching toward Baghdad-again. The last
time infidels conquered the City of Peace was in 1258, when the
Mongol horde, led by Genghis Khan's grandson Hulegu, defeated the Arab
Abbasid caliphate that had ruled for more than five centuries. And if the
ripple effects of that episode through Islam's history are any guide, the
latest invasion of Iraq will unleash a new cycle of hatred-unless the United
States can find ways to bolster the credibility of moderate Islamic
thinkers.
Saddam Hussein, who has
led Iraq's Baathist socialist regime for nearly 25 years, is no caliph. The
U.S. military has come as self-declared liberators, not as conquerors. Yet
the U.S. invasion of Iraq resonates strongly with fundamentalist Muslims
because they see Saddam's downfall-and the broader humiliation of the Arab
world at the hands of the latter-day Mongols-as righteous
punishment. Since the
13th
century, Islamic theologians have argued that military defeat at the hands
of unbelievers results when Muslims embrace pluralism and worldly
knowledge. The story is drilled
into Muslim children from Morocco to Indonesia: nearly 2 million people put
to the sword; the caliph trampled to death; and the destruction of the great
library, the House of Wisdom. The Ottoman
Empire fell in 1918 for the same reason Muslims lost Baghdad in 1258: The
rulers and their people had gone soft, approaching religion
with tolerance
and accommodation rather than viewing
civilization as divided between Islam and
infidels
The U.S.-led invasion of
secular Iraq is the
ultimate
vindication of this worldview, the capstone of a
series of
modern Muslim defeats that began with the
first Gulf
War and continued through the next decade with the Serbs' ethnic
cleansing campaigns against Muslims in Kosovo and Bosnia and Herzegovina,
the repression of Islamist groups in Algeria and Egypt, Russia's brutal
military campaign against Chechen separatists, and the defeat of the Taliban
in Afghanistan. Islamists
see these cataclysmic events as opportunities to purify Muslim
souls and to prepare for an
ideological battle with the West.
Fundamentalists believe
they have every reason to anticipate victory in this battle, because the
story of the Mongol conquest of Baghdad didn't end in 1258. The Egyptian
Mamluks were able to halt the tide of Mongol victories in the Battle of Ayn
Jalut in Palestine two years later. In less than a century, the
Mongol
conquerors themselves converted to Islam, and Islamic power
resurged in
Turkey and India after being dislodged
from the Arabian heartland. The lesson,
according to Islamists, is that even the defeat of Muslims has a place in
God's scheme for Islam's eventual supremacy in the world.
In addition to the
historical narrative, Muslim fundamentalists also have prophecies
about the apocalypse attributed to the
Prophet Mohammed to buttress their cause. These signs are described in
hadith, the sayings
of Mohammed passed down through oral tradition before being recorded at
least 100 years after his death. One hadith that has
currently captured the attention of fundamentalists is "The hour [of the
world's end] shall not occur until the Euphrates will disclose a mountain of
gold over which people will fight." The "mountain of gold" could be a
metaphor for a valuable natural resource such as oil, and "the Euphrates"
may refer to Iraq, where the river flows. Just as some Christian
fundamentalists saw the creation of the state of Israel as fulfillment of
biblical prophecy heralding the Day of Judgment, so too will
some Muslim fundamentalists interpret the U.S. occupation of Iraq as setting
the stage for the final battle between good, led by
Mahdi (the
rightly guided), and evil, represented by
Dajjal (the
deceiver).
Armed with prophecy and
history, Islamist movements see the humiliation of fellow believers as an
opportunity for mobilizing and recruiting dedicated followers. Muslims have
often resorted to asymmetric
warfare in the aftermath of military defeat. Palestinian leader
Yasir Arafat and his Fatah movement captured the imagination of young
Palestinians only after Arabs lost the Six-Day War and East Jerusalem in
1967. Islamic militancy in Kashmir can be traced to India's military victory
over Pakistan in the 1971 Bangladesh war. Revenge,
rather than willingness to compromise or submit to the victors, is the
traditional response of theologically inclined Muslims to the defeat of
Muslim armies. And for the Islamists,
this battle has no front line and is not limited to a few years, or even
decades. They think
in terms of conflict spread over generations. A call for jihad
against British rule in India, for example, resulted in an underground
movement that lasted from 1830 to the 1870s, with remnants periodically
surfacing well into the 20th century.
This fundamentalist
interpretation of Islam has failed to penetrate the thinking of most
Muslims, especially in recent times. But religious hard-liners can drive the
political agenda in Muslim countries, just as Christian and Jewish
fundamentalists have become a force to reckon with in secular nations such
as the United States. And with over 1 billion Muslims around the globe, the
swelling of the fundamentalist ranks poses serious problems for the West. If
only 1 percent of the world's Muslims accept uncompromising theology, and 10
percent of that 1 percent decide to commit themselves to a radical agenda,
the recruitment pool for al Qaeda comes to 1
million.
Suspicions about Western
intentions date back to the British, who came as friends during World War I
and ended up colonizing and dividing Arab lands. Thus, the Americans face
the difficult task of overcoming Muslim mistrust. The United
States must avoid any impulse to act as an imperial power, dictating
its superior ways to "less civilized" peoples. It should be prepared to
accept
Islamic pride and Arab nationalism as factors in the region's politics,
instead of backing
narrowly based elites to do its bidding. Patient engagement, rather than the
flaunting of military and financial power, should characterize this new
phase of U.S. intervention in the heart of the Islamic
world.
If U.S. President George
W. Bush's promises of democracy in Iraq and a Palestinian state are not kept
and if the United States fails to demand reforms in countries ruled by
authoritarian allies, the umma
(community of believers) would have new reasons
to distrust and hate. The dream of helping Muslims overcome their
fear of
modernity will then remain
unfulfilled. And the world will continue to confront new
jihads.
Husain Haqqani is a
Pakistani columnist and a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace.
Foreign Policy magazine is published by
The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington,
DC.
