Snipe Watson wrote:A whole lot of cheap point scoring going on on this thread.
A pox on all your houses.
This is about murdered children.
Snipe, what I would say is that, surely, what it is actually about is making sure that more children, and indeed more people, aren't murdered in the future. Whether cheap or not, the importance of the politics that surrounds these matters is probably the most important component of that.
I think what I object to so much about what Bazz is saying is that it feeds into a narrative of "us and them"; and that is exactly the sort of thing that makes radicalisation easy. I could never understand how anyone could think it a legitimate strategy to target civilians, let alone children. I can understand, however, why someone would feel incredibly angry towards a state that he or she feels he/she was unfairly excluded from, or was never a part of.
Really, I think the biggest flaw in the logic of people like Bazz is that it always implies that these acts are random, based only on hatred of "the other" and with no rational foundation. That is, of course, entirely bogus. It betrays the question about what the bomber was hoping to achieve by murdering children and killing himself; and what IS were hoping to achieve by claiming responsibility. Bazz, and other who think that way, nearly always only ask the "how" question, not the "why". I think if one only asks the former question, one can easily come up with the sorts of solutions spouted in this thread; or spouted by Trump. The "how" comes down to "Muslims"; the associated policy recommendation, therefore, also comes down to little more than "Muslims". I don't doubt Bazz's heart is actually in the right place in terms of what he'd like to achieve; but I am appalled by his strategies, not least because they are obviously counter-productive.
As for the "why"; maybe I am guilty of being an economist and assuming there is some rationality behind every action but I actually think it is quite obvious. IS is dedicated to the foundation, formation and sustainability of a 'Caliphate'. They are not, like al-Quaeda, specifically dedicated to attempts to destabilise the West. Although it's impossible to separate the history of the two groups, one should not assume IS is a simple continuation of IS. Any attack attributable to IS, or claimed by IS, must be understood in the context of how it contributes to sustaining a 'Caliphate'. So, why does attacking children in Manchester, or at least claiming an attack that killed children in Manchester help sustain a 'Caliphate'? To me, the answer is quite obvious. IS arose in places where the state lost their Weberian monopoly on the use of violence; IS requires instability; what better way to ensure future instability than attempting to invite more international actors into an already-complex conflict environment?
Russia and Turkey have already played right into IS's hands, despite directly attacking the organisation. Both have, quite deliberately, engaged in other aspects of the Syrian civil war as well. Russia, in particular, has ensured that the conflict will endure significantly longer than it otherwise would have. This should be expected - civil wars with international actors tend to be much longer than those that remain domestic(1). Ironically enough, even if one can attack IS and IS only it is impossible to believe that this doesn't have knock-on effects in the conflict. It is, after all, the Kurds who stand to gain the most territory from an IS defeat. What's going to happen to all of that Kurdish territory when there is a resolution between the Assad government and the "rebels"? I think it would take someone with a strong stomach to think that it won't lead to a second civil war... Higher intensity of violence; more competing actors; more instability; all of these things are good for IS in the long-term. IS knows this; and has specifically targeted or claimed attacks in countries with a history of interventionism in the Middle East. These terrorist attacks, therefore, seem like little more than an attempt to increase public pressure on Western governments to intervene in Syria; and to scale up action against IS.
I know this seems counter-productive in some senses. Why would an organisation invite fire on itself, after all? Ironically enough, losing could be good for IS, or whatever it becomes next, in the long-term in this context. This is, I think, what is missing in these discussions. If in defeat, IS ensure more instability in the region, then there is an even greater power vacuum for its next iteration to grow strong in. Therefore, when people like Buzz clamour for revenge in the aftermath of attacks like those in Manchester, what they are (inadvertently) doing is putting pressure on governments to act, either at home or abroad. People's perceptions change in response to terrorist attacks(2) perhaps quite understandably. Those changes in perceptions, in turn, encourage governments to act in ways they otherwise wouldn't(3). In the context of what is written above, any action based on the demands of people like Bazz feeds directly into IS' hands. It rewards them for pursuing a strategy that results in children being murdered. If it rewards them, they will continue to pursue that strategy. If they continue to pursue that strategy... Whilst, at the same time, Bazz's demands for increasing the marginalisation of Muslim communities in the UK and elsewhere will provide plenty more recruits to carry out those attacks...
In these events, it is good to pause for a moment and to reflect on the victims; it always is. But the real reflection should be on how to prevent it happening to others in the future. In the context of how counter-productive the views espoused by Bazz are, and the racism and / or xenophobia implicit in them, I find it quite easy to be rankled and offended.
Now, if this is cheap point-scoring, I am happy to admit my guilt.
(1)
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 221.x/full
(2)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/ar ... 8011000681
(3)
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 202.x/full
