The Incontestable Irrelevance Of Military Victories

General Sir David Richards, the new head of Her Majesty's Forces, has opened himself to attack.  The general delivered his view that al-Qaeda and others of the violent political Islam persuasion cannot be defeated in any meaningful sense of the word by military means in a recent interview.  If he becomes the subject of vitriol, he can at least comfort himself with the recognition that he has done nothing but tell it like it is.

Sir David has done something quite difficult for a professional soldier--admitted that military victories can be irrelevant to the solution of larger political conflicts.  As he drew a line between conventional peer-to-peer wars and the sort of asymmetrical and messy affray such as that being waged in Afghanistan, the general has simultaneously underscored the value of his assessment and limited its application appropriately.  History powerfully buttresses the accuracy of his conclusion.

The granddaddy of modern defensive insurgencies, the first war of "national liberation," also known as the War of American Independence, proves Sir David's point.  The British Army won most of the battles, losing only two of any significance, but ended up waving goodbye to the former colonies.  As has been the case in every insurgency whether defensive or offensive in nature, the military, its successes and failures, are merely tools for influencing the political will of the two real contestants--the politically articulate portions of the two opposing populations.

The American War of Independence proved the most central point regarding all insurgencies or insurgency-like asymmetrical  conflicts: The side which can spend time and accept casualties will best the side which seeks to save time and limit casualties.  Additionally, the American War of Independence demonstrated that while a side cannot kill its way to victory, the infliction of casualties without reward will exhaust the political will of the less committed side over time.

The same set of lessons was given to the US during its involvement in the Wars of the Vietnamese.  The US won the overwhelming majority of the company sized and larger engagements.  This was irrelevant over the long---to We the People, overly long--haul.  A sizable segment of the politically articulate American public lost political will to continue the effort.  As had been the case with the British nearly two centuries earlier, the American political structure packed it in, picked up our balls, and went home.

The Algerian War of Independence although more complex in its social, cultural, and racial dimensions shows the same irrelevance of mere military victory to political success.  Overlooked by too many is the simple albeit brutal fact that the French military had the insurgents on the ropes.  The combination of a new operational doctrine in the rural areas and the convincing French success in the Battle of Algiers decimated the insurgent capacity to continue effective military or paramilitary operations.  It didn't matter.  The nature of politics not only in the two antagonistic ethnic groups in Algeria but also in France conspired to offset totally any and all victories by French forces.

General Richards is of the view that the same dynamic exists with respect to al-Qaeda and the other purveyors of violent political Islam.  He is not being pessimistic when he concludes that the very best that can be expected from military means is the containment of the threat.  That is accurate, provided one adds that containment will require punitive expedition employment when a specific threat can be linked to a specific foreign location or governmental facilitator.

Al-Qaeda and the others are ideologically motivated.  Much, if not all, of their ideology is both pernicious and persuasive.  In these factors, the ideology of violent political Islam resembles its precursors of National Socialism and Marxism-Leninism.  The one was defeated by military means solely because its purveyors chose the route of peer-to-peer war as the preferred avenue to global success.  The other, which as a result more closely resembles today's violent political Islam, rejected direct aggression selecting instead indirect, proxy, and other nasty little violent expressions.

As noted in yesterday's post, al-Qaeda has opted for the death-by-a-thousand-paper-cuts method of conflict.  This means, quite simply, that military muscle is not as relevant as so many of hawkish temper have hoped.  There are roles, critical ones, for military force, but none are sovereign remedies for the threat which will be confronting us for at least another generation.

The general demonstrated his firm grip on reality when he recommended "upstream" means to combat the ongoing threat.  As the conflict is primary one of values, norms, world views, in short, ideologies, his view has great merit.  It is unfortunate that all too may policy makers and "decider guys" in the US and elsewhere in the West define "upstream" means as being economic in nature.  Spreading money as opposed to ideas per se is not the answer, rather the countries of the West must employ the full panoply of soft power mechanisms with an emphasis on education in order to head off the next generation of wannabe martyrdom seekers.

The power and appeal of Western values, norms, world views, and ideas should never be underestimated.  Nor should they be deprecated as is so often the case by members of the assorted national "elites."  As was seen in the long running conflict with the ideas and institutions of Marxism-Leninism, the potency of the West intellectually, culturally, politically was enough to spell finish to both the Cold War and Soviet Communism.

Bombs and bullets are far more inherently limited in their effect than are words and ideas.  It may be rare, but it is more than simply welcome to read a correct appreciation made by a very experienced and quite senior military commander.  Hail, Britannia!

The Universal Argument Is All About, "Who Is In Charge Here?"

Both the results of the midterm election and the confused subtexts brought out in the assorted exit and other polls shows that if there is one unifying theme defining American political discourse today it is the matter of who is or should be in charge of power in the US.

The opponents are well defined.  On the one hand is the self-defined elite, the hoi oligoi of academia, media, and politics with a firm belief in its education and status conferred right to rule (for the good of all, of course.)  On the other is the rest of us, the hoi polloi who lack the arrogance, the utterly delusional sense of self entitlement, the prideful certainty that we are so competent, so blessed by wisdom that we can run anyone's life other than our own.

In this conflict as in the confusion over what government is all about, We the People are  no different from our fellow members of the Order of the Belly Button in Europe.  The same conflict has been extant and growing over there for some years.  Most recently it has culminated--as it has here--in a lurch away from the wholesale commitment to social democracy with its firm conviction that the government is the fountainhead of equality, justice, and security.  As in the US the assorted elites of Europe have been outraged, horrified by the notion that the ungrateful "masses" so repeatedly celebrated in the abstract by the elites have turned the worm against their presumed benefactors.

At root in both Europe and the US, the issue in play is the same.  Who will exercise political authority, that is power over the lives, the choices, the values, the beliefs of the individual citizen?  The short answer, apparent right now, is the citizenry generally in both the US and Western Europe no longer trusts the ability or the motives of the central government and those who closely identify with the central government be they politicians, academics, journalists, pundits, labor leaders, and the rest of the elite legion.

As the line in an old TV ad had it, "Please, mother, I'd rather do it myself."

The contest for power pitting supporters of the state against those who desire (demand?) that the state be either limited or shrunk has been raised in profile and embittered in tone by the exigencies of the great budget crunch.  The crunch would have come sooner or later and is in no way directly dependent upon the effects of the Great Recession.  The crunch is the product of the cold equations of population demographics pure and simple.  But the impact of the Great Recession on national bottom lines accelerated the pace of events, sped up the coming of the crunch.

The rapid coming and blooming of the budget crunch assured that people in the US and Western Europe had the impetus to bring an almost subterranean debate over the nature, role, and extent of governmental authority into the open.  For the moment at least, the Big State is on the defensive, but it is far from becoming an endangered species.

One reason for this is the distrust of international aggregates such as the European Union or the UN is far, far greater among the hoi polloi than with the hoi ollogoi.  There is and has been for many years a belief dear to the hearts of elites here and in Europe that the day of the nation-state was over.  To most of the elite the demise of the nation-state was an unmitigated good.  The complete antipathy held for the nation-state was equaled by a passionate affection for multi-national institutions whether the various precursors to the EU, the UN or, closer to us in the States, the Organization of American States.

All multi-national institutions but particularly the UN were wildly applauded and supported by all members in good standing of the elite here and abroad.  In the US the fact that Uncle Sam was often the designated whipping boy of the globe was seen as a sign of the UN's legitimacy.  How could any body in which the countries of the world had an equal voice be mistaken?

We the People have been reluctant in the extreme to embrace the notion that the US was the source of all global evil, all the problems, inequities, and injustices of the human race.  Few of the hoi polloi have been eager to accept the "We are bad" and "Blame America first" slogans of the elite in its exaltation of the UN or other multi-national bodies.

One reason for this as well as for the innate distrust of multi-national bodies is the intuitive understanding within We the People and our counterparts in Europe that not all people, not all cultures, not all countries have identical or even compatible norms, values, imperatives, and goals.  Regardless of the propaganda offered by the elites, there is and has been a pervasive belief that not all people, not all cultures, not all societies, not all countries are fundamentally interchangeable parts of some mythical human whole.

It is this understanding that is in play with the "Clash of Civilizations" so dramatically evident today.  The CoC pits two world views which are diametrically opposed in many basic features in sharp combat over just who will be in charge of the globe in the decades to come.

It is no more xenophobic or racist or "tribal" for a person in the West to want to see the West continue to be the dominant voice in global affairs than it is to say the same of a Muslim, even an advocate of violent political Islam to wish his world view to triumph.  Rather both are seeking to answer the "who is in charge" question in the way which most benefits the personal preference, the individual loyalty.

When a Western European polity determines to ban minarets or burquas it is neither intolerance at work nor the chimera of "islamophobia."  Rather it is the right of the majority culture, the majority society acting as polity, to determine it and not the stranger in our familiar land who is in charge of today and tomorrow.  It is the assertion of a basic human social right to determine its own identity and destiny--regardless of what the self-selected elite might desire.

Banning symbols of Islamic culture is not an attack on Islam.  Actions in Switzerland, France, or even the US in no way threaten the political integrity of majority Muslim polities.  Muslims have an untrammeled right to stone women, force women into garbage sacks, lop of hands and feet of purported criminals, or engage in the other requirements of their faith--in the areas where they are in charge.

At the same time it is well within the purview of Westerners to dictate the requirements of conduct, the tests of membership in their national communities.  It is not, despite the pronouncements of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, an attack on Muslims to assert that they conform to the demands of the nation-states in which they choose to reside.  Nor is it, again regardless of the position adopted by the OIC, for the US or any other Western state to defend itself against the physical attacks mounted by Muslims who advocate violent political Islam.  Neither is it an attack against Islam qua Islam to retaliate when attacked by a Muslim.

The violent aspects of the Clash of Civilizations constitute nothing less than a war.  And, war is nothing but a means of determining just who is in charge.  The Clash, most importantly its violent component, was initiated by Muslims who are strong and fervent believers in violent political Islam.  They sought and continue to seek to be in charge not only in their own, home countries but elsewhere, everywhere if the words of such as Osama bin Laden are to be taken at face value.

We the People and our counterparts throughout the West can be grateful to the advocates of violent political Islam.  Their attacks, their mass murders, their terror has forced us to see just what is abroad in the world.  It has turned out that the danger is not  simply violent political Islam or even the add on of the intrusive Nanny state, but rather the long unchallenged ascendancy of the hoi ollogoi.

For too long we have surrendered power almost without question or protest to those who have proclaimed themselves to be "our betters."  The failure of the self-designated elites to defend our lives and territory against foreign threats gave rise to an increased unwillingness to entrust the elite with power.  As election after election in both Europe and now the US show, the non-elite, the common person, the hoi polloi has belatedly but decisively decided that it is in charge, that it has the power to control its life today and into the future.

And, that, Bucko, is a damn good thing.

Squaring Circles

In the good old days when we lived in a nice, predictable bi-polar world, the Old Guys In The Kremlin were fond of the Marxist view that it was the "internal contradictions" endemic to capitalism which would assure its destruction in the fullness of time. These folks and their ideological soulmates throughout the world were also gratified by the "historical inevitability" of capitalism's collapse.

The twin pillars of "internal contradictions" and "historical inevitability" served heroically to bolster morale in the Soviet Union and attract followers, particularly in the newly independent states which proliferated during the Sixties. There is something quite appealing about the notion that the remote, impersonal force of a deity called "history" is on your side. This appeal is reinforced by being able to convince yourself that you need do nothing to win but could rely upon "internal contradictions" to bring about the defeat of the "capitalist, imperialist camp."

There are similar ideas drifting around today. On the other side of the hill, in the venues of the advocates of armed political Islam, there is a constant refrain to the effect that Islam is destined to win over the "infidels" of the West, the "apostate" regimes which govern in so many Muslim majority states, and, last but certainly not least, "the Zionist entity." There is and has been much spewing of quite overwrought rhetoric to the effect that should there be enough men who desire martyrdom, Allah will crown their expressions of faith with total victory over all of us in the "House of War."

This sort of thinking characterizes "theological inevitability," which is the Islamist's version of the Marxist dictum. If anything, the "theological inevitability" is more comforting, more motivating, more potent than was the Communist invocation of "history." Even leaving aside the proposition of seventy-two soulless virgins awaiting every incoming martyr, the idea of committing an action heartily approved by the deity has a power for True Believers which those of us who are not given to such unqualified zeal can scarcely comprehend.

OK, Geek, enough of these hosannas to fundamentalist Islam, you did write something about "internal contradictions," go somewhere with it.

Sure thing, bucko. Last time around it was the opposition which was convinced that we in the West (and particularly the US) were so riddled by the termites of contradictions that our basic economic, social, and political structures would inevitably collapse, hollowed from within. This time the internal contradictions exist as an Achilles' heel for the adherents of political Islam.

For the best part of five generations now, Islamic society, more particularly the Islamic polity, has been at odds with itself--and with basic features in the divinely given Koran. On more than a few occasions the being at odds has reached, and continues to reach, the level of a very deadly internecine war. At issue has been alternative understandings of the substance of the Koran, the Hadith (what the Prophet said,) the Sunnah (what the Prophet did and how he lived,) as well as both classic and contemporary Islamic jurisprudence. Also in play have been differing interpretations of how best to meld Islam with the realities of the contemporary world.

All of these issues bedeviled Christianity. Wars were fought. Martyrs were made in wholesale lots. It took centuries but most of the issues were settled, at least to the degree necessary to assure a high measure of social and political cohesiveness. Arguably, the only reason Judaism was spared a similar set of bloodletting fissions was the consolidation forced upon the religion by prejudice and persecution.

Islam is a late comer to the "internal contradiction" game. The heavy hand of convention, of tradition, suppressed the emergence of contradictions. The expansionist nature of Islam whether by the sword or by the slow infiltration and persuasion of the tarikas (brotherhoods) did the same. There was always the safety valve of expansion to offset the pressures of contradictions.

In recent generations, and, in particular, the years following World War II which saw the number of independent Muslim majority states go from four to almost sixty, have been the years during which the internal contradictions of Islam have become more deeply divisive and high profile. It is impossible for anyone, Muslim or not, to overlook the passionately held and massively differing views regarding what Islam is all about and how it relates positively to the realities of contemporary life.

Time to consider some of these. The roster intentionally omits the deep differences of belief and practice which pit Sunni against Shia or which relegate to the margins "minor" faith communities within Islam--which group now includes the large and in time past influential Sufis.

The most basic internal contradiction is that of the proclaimed universality of the Muslim umma (the community of believers) and national identity. In principle, loyalty of the Muslim to Muslim sort takes precedence over loyalty to any given nation, tribe, or leader. In practice, the tension has normally been resolved in favor of the latter. Leader, nation, tribe all nudge religion to the side should push come to shove--which is inevitable.

Mohammad came to receive his revelations in the context of a society deeply riven by tribal loyalties. In order to survive, Islam had to deprecate loyalty to the local. The Prophet and his successors had no option other than to exalt the religious identity over all others.

To this end not only was the concept of the Brotherhood of all Muslims central to the belief system but other aspects by which people differentiated themselves were downplayed. An example is the primacy of Arabic over other languages. Another is the insistence down to the present that the concept of the nation-state, like that of borders separating nation-states, is an invention of the Western infidels.

In practice, both national and tribal identities have prevailed. So also have local languages in all usages beyond the sacred, the theological. Even the practice of the haj, which makes the global nature of Islamic congregations most manifest, has not served to erode national, local, or tribal identities for most Muslims. This unpleasant truth has been recognized and deplored repeatedly by leaders of political Islam oriented groups both non-violent and violent.

Another contradiction which arises from the basics of Islam is that between ijtihad (independent judgement) and ijma (consensus.) This contradiction is complicated and thus worsened by the tension over when independent judgement can be made properly and disagreement over who achieves consensus--the ulema (clergy) or the society of laymen. This set of interlocking and reinforcing contradictions comes into sharpest focus over interpreting the requirements of the Koran as well as past jurisprudence.

This matter of who can interpret and to what degree interpretation is allowable has been the frontline of conflict between reformers and traditionalists, between Muslims who embrace violent political Islam and those who nail their flag to the mast of peaceful coexistence. An important symbol of this internal contradiction exists in the use of the word, jihad--does it mean the internal struggle for self-improvement in the faith or is it a reference to armed combat with the "infidels" and "apostates?"

Yet another very important internal contradiction exists in the matter of inherited monarchies. Historically Islam frowns upon inherited rule. Despite this, inherited monarchies have existed and continue to exist today as in Saudi Arabia. To a pure Muslim (which includes most if not all of today's exponents of violent political Islam), it is apostasy pure and simple that the Keeper of the Two Mosques is a king by inheritance. Kingship per se is of no importance, but kingship by virtue of birth is both important and a reason for violence.

Given the importance of Saudi Arabia and the other oil powered sheikdoms, this internal contradiction looms large in the considerations of Western decision makers. And, given the totality of Islamic jurisprudence, it is a circle which cannot be squared. The House of Saud is non-Islamic and even the bargain made between the House and the Wahhabi clergy of the Peninsula cannot change this reality and assure stability.

Then there is the matter of who has the power in an Islamic polity. Since all sovereignty rests ultimately with Allah, what is at stake here is the matter of who rules as a legitimate interpreter of the perceived will of Allah. Islam has no particular preference for any specific form of government, but it does require that the ruler be "just" as such is understood in the context of the Koran, other sacred writings, and the weight of Islamic jurisprudence. The people have the right to displace an "unjust" ruler, even violently. That, of course, leaves the question of who determines when a ruler is "unjust."

Not surprisingly, the clergy, the ulema, is of the view that only men well versed in theology and jurisprudence can do the job. This is disputed by assorted laymen who argue that determining how the will of the people mesh with the "will of Allah" is a task best suited for leaders who have the confidence of the people. In this conflict between the sacred and the profane, the victory has generally gone to the profane as has been the case repeatedly in Egypt. On the other hand, when the "sacred" win as was the case in Iran, the result can be frightfully discomfiting.

The last internal contradiction to consider (for now) is that between the implied fatalism of Islam, the "if Allah wills" sort of resignation and the demands not only of science but of life generally. Bluntly put, science is incompatible with Islam. As long as one must grant that Allah is personally responsible for the movement of each and every atom, as long as one must grant we live in a universe subject to supernatural caprice, there can be no science. There can be only the cloning, the exploitation of scientific and technological discoveries and innovations made by others.

The implications of the "will of Allah" approach to life go far beyond science. It serves to reduce humans to the status of objects, removing their capacity to be effective actors in their own drama. One result has been the conflict between reformers (and Westernizers) on the one hand and the traditionalists (once again including the majority of armed political Islamists) on the other.

Reformers and "Westernizers" have pointed to the emphasis on the power invested in the individual in both Europe and the US as the root reason these areas have not only bested the Muslim world but have dominated the globe for centuries. Their opponents whether ayatollahs in Iran, terrorists in the caves of the FATA, or the "stealth jihadists" of Muslim Brotherhood offshoots respond with claiming that emulation of any Western norms would insure that Islam ceased to be Islam.

Any of these internal contradictions can prove fatal to the "theological inevitability." Taken together they assure the advocates of violent political Islam can spill a lot of blood, most of it more innocent than not but not have any realistic chance of imposing their agenda on the rest of the world.

Therein rests the ultimate sorrow and tragedy of the war on the modern world the Islamists have started. No matter how many "martyrs" bomb their way into Paradise, no matter how many unfortunates they kill or maim, the result will be the same. They lose. They lose not simply because the rest of the world stands against them but because Islam, unlike capitalism, is termite riddled with contradictions which cannot be resolved without changing Islam beyond recognition.

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