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There is a robust
dialogue in the West concerning just causes for
declaring war (such as pre-emption and
self-defense,among others), but very little
discussion about the methods of warfare that we
(and other Westernized countries) have come to
regard as either justifiable or unconscionable.
Americans, in particular, have developed a
keen sense of what constitutes fair and unfair
behavior in conflict and war, but much like
members of any culture, Westerners seldom question their
unequivocal abhorrence for
certain behavior, such as terrorism and
hostage-taking. It is important to recognize the
difference between why we emotionally hate
terrorism, and why we are politically adverse to
it. The justifications are intertwined, just as
they are in the rest of our moral-centric
policies; but their differences should be
addressed.
Ultimately, if we do not
understand why we despise terrorism so much, then
we cannot define terrorism. If we cannot define
terrorism, we cannot define victory. If we cannot
define victory, we cannot achieve it. And finally,
if we cannot achieve victory in an ideological
war, then what good are our cultural values,
anyway? Admittedly, this last question is rather
circular, but this is precisely the point, as the
following hopes to indicate. Americans have great
difficulty framing foreign policy (and most
objectives, generally) outside the scope of values
and morals. In the case of terrorism, it is with a
rather bizarre twist of rhetoric that we have
endorsed a war whose bounds are frighteningly
limitless in every possible way.
The
boilerplate Why is terrorism regarded with
such disdain in the West? Beyond a first glance,
the answer to this question is starkly different
from its broader counterpart, "Why is violence
regarded with such disdain in the West?" Whatever
connotations violence might carry in Western (and
especially American) culture, widespread disdain
is not one of them. America is a very violent
culture, for countless reasons and through
infinite outlets. But the drastic differences
between America's regard for terrorism and for
violence point to one cultural certainty: while
violence might be the ultimate source of America's
enjoyment in competitive sports and Hollywood
adventure films, the glorification of terrorism
(especially the suicidal variety) is a serious
infraction against the collective body of American
cultural values. Young boys do not team up and
play "FBI and al-Qaeda" the way they might play
"Cops and Robbers" or "Cowboys and Indians".
Without question, al-Qaeda's attacks on
September 11, 2001, solidified the taboo of
depicting terrorists in anything but an evil
light, but terror was hardly tolerated or
exceptional before 9/11. In New York, Lebanon,
Iran, Kenya, Kuwait, Germany, Tanzania, Saudi
Arabia; on the USS Cole in the Persian Gulf and in
the skies above Scotland - these are just some of
the places Americans have been targeted by
terrorists, and all of these attacks have struck a
chord in the American psyche.
The reasons
for this are complicated, if only because
Americans seem to hate terrorism for any and every
reason they can think of - cherry picking various
principles and fusing them with others.
Granted, we have our notions of what
constitutes a worthy agenda (freedom, for example,
and tolerance), but for Americans, we believe the
necessity "war on terror" is founded on the
methods, not the agendas, of our enemies. To
start, by accusing terrorists of cowardice,
Americans reinforce their own perception that
bravery and subterfuge ("sneak attacks") are
mutually exclusive.
'They're
cowards' One grievance Americans have
returned to again and again is the bravery factor.
As most cross-cultural analyses have indicated,
Americans are known for being bold and blunt. We
stand up for ourselves. We refuse to be bullied,
and we are fervent believers in practicing what we
preach and preaching what we practice.
One
patriotic slogan regarding the Iraq war, for
instance, says of the US flag: "These colors don't
run." We like to think that we will not shy away
from a fight, that we do not make idle threats or
promises, and more broadly, that we are honest -
perhaps even to a fault. Like most cultures, we
take great pride in the bravery of our armed
forces, but when this pride is fused with our
honesty, bravery becomes inextricably tied to a
refusal to run or hide. For better or worse, our
policies do not always reflect these principles,
but few Americans view any such inconsistency as a
basis for abandoning the principles themselves.
As a result, we find terrorism detestable
because only a coward would target "innocent
civilians" instead of soldiers, or hide among
civilian populations for protection, forcing us to
bomb those populations despite our heartache from
doing so. The pejorative tones in such an
accusation are seldom questioned as anything less
than self-evident. Anyone can kill civilians, the
reasoning seems to go. "You're only going after
civilians because it's like stealing candy from a
baby." When pressed further, many Americans grow
uncomfortable when they take this line of
reasoning to its logical conclusion: namely, we
despise terrorism, in part, because there is
simply no sport in killing civilians. "Only a
coward who is afraid of a real fight would hurt
defenseless civilians." That is, in order for a
fight to be "real," its means must fair and
"legitimate".
For a militant Shi'ite group
to summarily execute defenseless Sunnis as they
approach a makeshift roadblock in Baghdad is
completely risk-free for the militants. And, in
the eyes of Americans, precisely because such a
massacre is risk-free - precisely because the
fight is so obviously unbalanced in favor of those
with weapons - Americans are disgusted by the idea
of such a slaughter. If, on the other hand, Sunnis
and Shi'ites were evenly matched and fortified in
desert trenches - away from the "civilian"
population, and dying in roughly comparable
numbers and at comparable rates - then American
tolerance for such bloodshed far surpasses any
similar threshold in the Western world.
Upon realizing this bizarre discrepancy,
most Americans warily approach the first
rhetorical roadblock in their assault on terror:
how to reconcile our humorless attitude toward war
with our sportsmanlike, even cavalier, sense of
fairness that pervades all American competitions,
including warfare. It would seem that unless we
face an opponent who can pose a serious challenge
to our agenda, it would be immoral for us to
declare war on them, as the result would be little
more than an unsportsmanlike massacre.
In
theory, at least, we feel that we should give the
other side a chance. There must be some kind of
adventure in the struggle for power and dominance.
The assumption here is that we only declare war on
enemies that pose a threat to us, and therefore,
any enemy who poses a threat will mount a
substantial defense, and thus preclude a
slaughter.
Yet few Americans embrace such
a litmus test, if only because we resent the
suggestion that we risk our soldiers' lives to
make war more dramatic. Specifically, those
familiar with US foreign policy would insist that
Operation Desert Storm was both worthwhile and
unbalanced: everyone knew that we would decimate
the Iraqi army, and this did not reduce American
support for the war. In fact, since the end of the
Cold War, even the most cautious Americans
encouraged President Clinton to intervene only in
those conflicts where our victory was nearly
guaranteed.
This seems to point to a
double standard - that slaughters are
coincidentally tolerable to Americans only when
Americans do the slaughtering. We seem to believe
that a fight leaves the realm of a "slaughter" as
soon as the enemy picks up a weapon, but only when
that enemy is our enemy. When we speak of two
distant warring parties, the fact that both sides
have weapons does not prevent us from denouncing
the more powerful party for its immoral tactics.
Remarkably, when American troops have routed their
enemies, the explanation is often that "we were
just superior soldiers." So, does our distaste for
unfair matches only point to textbook hypocrisy -
that Americans only insist on fair fights when
their own soldiers are not on the line?
It
is tempting and logical to dismiss much of
American public discourse as hypocritical, but the
truth is often substantially more complicated, and
this case is no different. To Americans, a "fair
fight" is not a reflection of some power
differential; it is a reflection of methods. After
all, it is one thing to be an underdog defending
yourself (and dying in battle), while it is
another matter entirely to be slaughtered without
ever picking up a weapon. Yet this can only leave
us wondering about our focus on the
sport/competition factor: we define a "fair" fight
as one where both sides have weapons, and both
have chosen to engage in battle.
This gets
particularly complicated when the question of free
will - if self-defense constitutes a choice - is
introduced, but either way, what is clear is that
the means and methods of warfare matter greatly to
Americans.
'They have no
honor' Undoubtedly, any explicit mention of
a "sportsmanlike war" is bound to offend American
sensibilities, as we are accustomed to hearing
moral justifications for nearly every culturally
acceptable behavior. No one wants to think their
enjoyment of Arnold Schwarzenegger movies has
anything to do with their concept of just warfare.
And given the amount of courage it takes to die
for one's cause, it is rhetorically difficult for
us to dismiss suicide terrorists solely as
cowards.
Another moral basis for
demonizing them is needed - though still within
the framework of targeting civilians - which also
strengthens our case against non-suicidal terror.
With suicide bombers, in particular, our moral
accusations shift from a lack of courage to a lack
of honor. Terrorists, we insist, absurdly attack
civilians who have done nothing to their attackers
or their respective causes. A lack of honor
implies an inability to discipline oneself to
abide by certain rules and reject "senseless
violence". Accordingly, we
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