Posted on 10/08/2006 7:11:46 AM PDT by Axhandle
September 11, 2006— In the five years since 9/11, much looking-back has been done. The problem is we haven't looked back far enough. To understand the nature of the enemy in the Middle East and to evaluate the prospects for democracy and peace, we need to extend our gaze not five years into the past, but five hundred and even five thousand.
I've spent the last four years writing two books about Alexander the Great's campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, 331-327 B.C. What has struck me in the research is the dead-ringer parallels between that ancient East-West clash and the modern ones the U.S. is fighting today — despite the fact that Alexander was pre-Christian and his enemies were pre-Islamic.
What history seems to be telling us is that the quality that most defines our Eastern adversaries, then and now, is neither religion nor extremism nor "Islamo-fascism," but something much older and more fundamental.
Tribalism
Extremist Islam is merely an overlay (and a recent one at that) atop the primal, unchanging mind-set of the East, which is tribalism, and its constituent individual, the tribesman.
Tribalism and the tribal mind-set are what the West is up against in Hezbollah, Al Qaeda, the Iraqi insurgency, the Sunni and Shiite militias, and the Taliban.
What exactly is the tribal mind-set? It derives from that most ancient of social organizations, whose virtues are obedience, fidelity, warrior pride, respect for ancestors, hostility to outsiders and willingness to lay down one's life for the cause/faith/group. The tribe's ideal leader is closer to Tony Soprano than to FDR and its social mores are more like those of Geronimo's Apaches than the city council of Scarsdale or Shepherd's Bush.
Can the tribal mind embrace democracy? Consider the contrast between the tribesman and the citizen:
A citizen is an autonomous individual. A citizen is free. A citizen possesses the capacity to evaluate the facts and prospects of his world and to make decisions guided by his own conscience, uncoerced by authority. A congress of citizens acting in free elections determines the political course of a democratic community.
A citizen prizes his freedom; therefore he grants it to others. He is willing to respect the rights of minorities within the community, so that his own rights will be shielded when he finds himself in the minority.
The tribesman doesn't see it that way. Within the fixed hierarchy of the tribe, disagreement is not dissent (and thus to be tolerated) but treachery, even heresy, which must be ruthlessly expunged. The tribe exists for itself alone. It is perpetually at war with all other tribes, even of its own race and religion.
The tribesman deals in absolutes. One is either "of blood" or not. The enemy spy can infiltrate the tribal network no more than a prison guard can worm his way into the Aryan Brotherhood. The tribe recognizes its own. It expels (or beheads) the alien. The tribe cannot be negotiated with. "Good faith" applies only within the pale, never beyond.
The tribesman does not operate by a body of civil law but by a code of honor. If he receives a wrong, he does not seek redress. He wants revenge. The taking of revenge is a virtue in tribal eyes, called badal in the Pathan code of nangwali. A man who does not take revenge is not a man. Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, and the sectarian militias of Iraq are not in the war business, they are in the revenge business. The revenge-seeker cannot be negotiated with because his intent is bound up with honor. It is an absolute.
Perhaps the most telling difference between the citizen and the tribesman lies in their views of the Other. The citizen embraces multiplicity; to him, the melting pot produces richness and cultural diversity. To the tribesman, the alien is not even given the dignity of being a human being; he is a gentile, an infidel, a demon.
The tribesman grants justice within the tribe. In his internal councils, empathy, humor and compassion may prevail. Outside the tribe? Forget it. Can Shiites really sit down with Sunnis? Will the pledges of Hezbollah or Hamas to Israel prove true?
The democratic virtues of the Enlightenment, the Rights of Man and the American Constitution are not virtues to the tribesman. They are effeminate. They lack warrior honor. "Freedom" to the tribesman means the extinction of all he and his ancestors hold dear; "democracy" and Western values are a mortal threat to the ancient and proud way of life that the tribal mind has embraced (whether Scythian nomads, Amazon warriors, or American Indians) for tens of thousands of years.
The tribesman isn't "wrong" or "evil." He just doesn't want what we're selling. We will not convert him with free elections or with SAW machine guns. To him, 9/11 is only the most recent act of badal in a clash that has been raging for more than two thousand years. We will not find the way to contest him, let alone defeat him, until we see the struggle against him within the greater context of this millenia-old, unaltering, East-West war.
Historian Steven Pressfield is the author of the just-release novel The Afghan Campaign. He has written four other historical novels including "Gates of Fire," "The War of Art," and "The Legend of Bagger Vance."
Ditto!
Are you here, too?
Begs the question, would Rush write something like this? I don't think so.
I don't either. I think Jeff was trying to imply that we're all a bunch of locksteps who can't think for ourselves..
These lefties accuse us of that and then blindly gobble up all the lies the media feeds them. Go figure.
Second, I doubt the frequent assertion that urbanization will promote democracy. In America, it is the urban centers that are controlled by machines, bosses and the maffia.
Tribalism is evidence of a lack of central control. You can trace the development of the French state from the time when Hugh Capet only controlled the Ile de Cite to the time of the Sun King who entertained the aristocracy at Versailles through a system of mutual agreements between the king and local vassals.
If you know that story, then you can understand how a national system is being developed similarly in Afghanistan and Iraq and Karsai, Maliki, and Musharref are now negotiating with recalitrant chiefs.
By that logic you also know more than George Bush about Iraq because you've been on the ground longer.
There are some Iraq war vets that are running for office but as democrats and critical of the war. Since they have been in Iraq longer than Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld then that must mean by your logic that they know much more than the executive branch about Iraq.
I hope you see how silly your logic is.
I think Jeff was trying to imply that we're all a bunch of locksteps
Obviously he's never come here! :-)
Not now. I was there 1991 and 1992. 1st Armored Div. Wished we had finished the job at that time although the left is now saying we destroyed all the WMDs during that time. I guess we might have done something good afterall.
Looks like ABC is trying to kiss-up to the libs after showing "The Path to 9/11".
Everyday here on FR there are myriad posts about how vile radical Islam is.
James Baker just recently recommended that Iraq be split into three - something I and many other Freepers have been pushing for a long time. I guess now Baker is a left winger.
Again, realizing that radical Islamists aren't ready for a US-style republic isn't some sort of out of the blue revelation - thinking people have known that forever. The same with the tribal africans.
Look how quickly new governments fail in 3rd world countries. They last for a year or so and then someone makes them self president for life.
If you guys would stop being so reactionary on this, you'd realize that we aren't calling for cutting and running. The Iraq war was needed - it's just that aftermath will require a substantial "incubation" period so that the people can get accustomed to a non-theocracy. It will take time and commitment and cutting and running would be the absolutely worst thing to do.
Well actually the worst thing to do would be to install a western style government and then leave a short time later like you guys are apparently pushing. The government would be overthrown in less than a year.
I don't care what your Democrat candidate friends think. The Washington Post, et al, can melt the softer minds, regardless of who they are.
I do know one thing. I know more about Iraq than you do. Even though you might watch and read the news and all.
'Nuff said.
Thank you for your service. You guys did a great job. You achieved the objective - getting Saddam out of Kuwait - and you did it handily. :-)
So you know more about Iraq than anyone that hasn't been physically in Iraq for three years? Have you notified James Baker of this?
Look I'm glad you're there as I sure you're representing our county well, but your logic is fallacious. Like I said, there are anti-war Iraq war veterans that have been in Iraq longer than you have. Does that make their opinion of Iraq superior to yours?
Many of the Islamogovernments speak of the "Islamic Nation" as a whole, as if the entire swath of Arab lands, all the 'Stans, Northern Africa were one big state without political boundaries. Of course, the reality of that happening assumes that all the Islamic "tribes" would agree on one branch of theology and one leader (besides Mohammed, who is busy right now). Maybe the 12th Imam, the Mahdi is who is supposed to bring them all together under one tent. As for political boundaries, ultimately Islam intends to do away with all borders when the entire world submits.
Yes, much of the middle east is dominated by tribal societies, but this is because until 100 years ago, these lands were literally wilderness. There is no economy, middle class or independent intellectual class. These things had been on the rise but reactionary Islam has gone back to work crushing them.
When Western Europe was completely dominated by religious rule and serfdom, we called this the dark ages. It took Europe hundreds of years and wars and horror to come up with the Magna Carta, the common law and the concept of individual freedom and freedom of conscience.
These concepts evolved and form the foundation of Western Civilization which has been under assault by all who wish to justify oppression and human suffering as a means to "order."
Nevertheless, people from the middle east come to the west and breath freedom and love it. Their kids, well sometimes they don't appreciate freedom the same.
This person essentially casts folks from the Middle East as lesser human beings who cannot find their way to loving freedom and justice. LAME.
That's not what I said.
I said I know more about it than you do. And I derive that from the assumptions you make. They appear to be media-driven.
I can actually understand. When I'm home on leave and start seeing the news, even I start thinking it looks like a quagmire.
But because I am here, I know better.
By the way, I've been here almost three years...probably as long or longer than those Democrat candidates were here.
Of course they do. And if they love freedom they may just have to stay here, because back at their Islamic home state freedom is the opposite of Islam. Now I'm all for freedom and democracy spreading, don't get me wrong. It's just that Islam stomps out freedom and democracy wherever it flares up. The will of the people is not allowed. If it were just a tyrannical government, it would be easier for the people to overturn the status quo but it is a theocracy, and to promote freedom there is asking for the death penalty. From God, so they think. It's a formidable impediment to the spread of freedom.
Who said it was a quagmire? Certianly not me. Maybe you are just assuming my beliefs and knowledge because you are frustrated with the general ignorance of the American people about Iraq.
I said the Iraq War was neccesary and that we should not cut and run. I explicitly stated that we should prepare to be there for a while to help incubate a western style government.
The Iraqis are not ready to enter into a full fledged US-style representative republic. They may give it a shot but it as it is too big of a leap and too soon.
We should prepare to be there for a while but if we push for greater partitioning as I believe the president will soon push then it won't be nearly as violent.
If we go straight for democracy then it will fail within a year of our departure.
There is a rather significant flip side to that. Tribalism is also fairly common in cities. I recall attempting to get gas station attendants in Baghdad to maintain order without a platoon of infantrymen doing it for them. Even when we armed them, they were still afraid to impose any type of order because they feared starting a tribal war. That was almost universal throughout much of the city.
While cities have been magnets for educated people (and/or perhaps creating educated people) they are also, as of late, losing educated people due to the fear of violence, since the educated folk are the most able to leave and resettle in a safer locale (like Kurdistan).
As for embracing capitalism and disdaining capitalists, how do we measure this or at least infer that it is happening? I thought capitalism was being embraced pretty well in 2003 when the streets were gridlocked with vendors, but this hasn't quite panned out the way that we were hoping. It's not a rhetorical question, as I openly admit that I don't know the answer - can we measure/infer this right now? If so, how?
Islam has had periods of relative freedom and enlightenment and other periods of repression. So has Christianity.
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