Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: DogByte6RER

Hold on......here is some more from the lengthy article in "Foreign Affairs", which picks up immediately following the bit you posted:

But by the early twentieth century, after the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Enlightenment had swept over the Western world, the Muslim and Arab world was uncertain, insecure, and on the defensive. Some Muslim countries, such as Turkey, made a muscular move toward secularism. Others found themselves caught up in colonization, nascent nationalism, political oppression, and religious radicalism. Muslims began to see the sorry state of Muslim countries as symptomatic of the sorry state of Islam. Political radicals became religious radicals and vice versa.

Those in power tried to accommodate this Islamic radicalism by incorporating some of its leaders and some of its ideology. The result was nearly always disastrous. Religious radicalism was made respectable and political radicalism suppressed, and so in the minds of many, the two came together to represent the need for change. They began to think that the way to restore the confidence and stability of Islam was through a combination of religious extremism and populist politics, with the enemies becoming "the West" and those Islamic leaders who cooperated with it.

This extremism may have started with religious doctrine and thought. But soon, in offshoots of the Muslim Brotherhood, supported by Wahhabi extremists and disseminated in some of the madrasahs of the Middle East and Asia, an ideology was born and exported around the world.

On 9/11, 3,000 people were murdered. But this terrorism did not begin on the streets of New York. Many more had already died, not just in acts of terrorism against Western interests but in political insurrection and turmoil around the world. Its victims are to be found in the recent history of many lands: India, Indonesia, Kenya, Libya, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and countless more. More than 100,000 died in Algeria. In Chechnya and Kashmir, political causes that could have been resolved became brutally incapable of resolution under the pressure of terrorism. Today, in 30 or 40 countries, terrorists are plotting action loosely linked with this ideology. Although the active cadres of terrorists are relatively small, they exploit a far wider sense of alienation in the Arab and Muslim world.
snip...

http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20070101faessay86106/tony-blair/a-battle-for-global-values.html

(7 pages to this complete piece)


13 posted on 12/27/2006 8:46:40 PM PST by Vn_survivor_67-68
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies ]


BTW....this is the actual title:

A Battle for Global Values
Tony Blair
From Foreign Affairs, January/February 2007

Print Email to Colleague

Summary: The war on terrorism is not just about security or military tactics. It is a battle of values, and one that can only be won by the triumph of tolerance and liberty. Afghanistan and Iraq have been the necessary starting points of this battle. Success there, however, must be coupled with a bolder, more consistent, and more thorough application of global values, with Washington leading the way.

Tony Blair is Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.


14 posted on 12/27/2006 8:48:21 PM PST by Vn_survivor_67-68
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 13 | View Replies ]

To: Vn_survivor_67-68

Thanks for the link.


17 posted on 12/27/2006 8:53:43 PM PST by Valin (History takes time. It is not an instant thing.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 13 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson