The Logic of Suicide Terrorism
It’s the occupation, not the fundamentalism
Ron Paul for president end all foreign occupation
"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."
_________
Last month, Scott McConnell caught up with Associate Professor Robert Pape of the University of Chicago, whose book on suicide terrorism, Dying to Win, is beginning to receive wide notice. Pape has found that the most common American perceptions about who the terrorists are and what motivates them are off by a wide margin. In his office is the world’s largest database of information about suicide terrorists, rows and rows of manila folders containing articles and biographical snippets in dozens of languages compiled by Pape and teams of graduate students, a trove of data that has been sorted and analyzed and which underscores the great need for reappraising the Bush administration’s current strategy. Below are excerpts from a conversation with the man who knows more about suicide terrorists than any other American.
RP: 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.
TAC: That would seem to run contrary to a view that one heard during the American election campaign, put forth by people who favor Bush’s policy. That is, we need to fight the terrorists over there, so we don’t have to fight them here.
RP: 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.
[snip]
source:
http://www.amconmag.com/2005_07_18/article.html
thanks, truthseeker!
but I would add that not all "suicide attacks" are equal - many are simply false flags designed to serve as a pretext for severe military retaliation.
---------------------------------------
"Money" has no value - people do.
There are suicide bombers and there are remote controlled terror attacks (usually cia/mossad work).
It is the first time I hear the term "suicide terrorism". I personally (and I know that most of the Arab and Islamic world agree) do not regard a suicide bomber as a terrorist. Is it because he/she doesn't have an F-16 or an Apache that he is labeled a "terrorist"? If the Palestinians or Iraqis had an army and bombed their targets with F-16's as the US and Israel does everyday, would they be called "terrorists"? Were Japanese Kamikaze pilots terrorists??