Paper: Rethinking Role of Religious Conflict in Doctrine

[M-A Lagrange]

Steve

I have mouths to feed is a pretty standard human motivator even if some of the nuances change.

I'll say it's a full universalism in the Levis Strauss sense of the term. We all live on that.
My point was rather than religion will give you a color but environment will be a strong determinant in the way you build a society. At little as Montesquieu (If I do not mistake) definition of environment influence on society. Or object anthropology in some extend. Those people are managing risks and environmental insecurity. Sometime my field approach is closer to US anthropology than French one.

Mike,

An extreme example would be an all-encompassing dictatorship which ignores all external constraints - a North Korea on steroids - where one man calls all of the shots in all three rings >>> a single ring. Again, that construct would be theoretical, not real.

As usual you dragging us back to reallity. In some extend, Mugabe is close to North Korea on Steroids. What we witness is the capacity of a man to virtually control everything and when it's not working (Like the ZAPU or MDC) just manage to get them included in his machine.
Zim has changed but when I was there, military, judiciary, political powers were all in his hands openly or through underground grovernment. He even tried (and almost succeded) to get his hands on economy. Bob (Mugabe) had almost the capacity to terrorise anyone, even the vice president and the head of security departments.
But he was no religious. Or, as some may say , he was religious has he is a hardcore communist.

In the process of Nation Building as we do implement it, I see more and more room for a single ring society controled by a party and not a man.

[Steve the Planner]

For all the talk about religion and tribes, I know they were underlying factors---as were clans, families--- but if you looked at a lot of what the Kurds, for example, were focused on, it was almost purely political/administrative in nature---shifting political and voter balance one nahia at a time.

That conveys a very sophisticated and highly directed administrative and political understanding.

What were the reactionaries doing? Mostly focused on disruption of economic and infrastructure systems.

Was their affiliation and focus religious in nature? No. It was administrative/political.

By contrast, I am trying to follow the events in the many Afghanistans to understand the nature and purpose of the different actors.

At the risk of over simplification:

At present, the national government seems to be focused on controlling the structure and direction of international aid flows, and does so with support/cooperation of drug manufacturing/distribution systems; which have grown to become some of the largest in the world. I'm not reading a lot of religious zeal behind that.

A lot of knowledgeable people have described the various opponents as (1) competing sets of organized opposition whose internal differences are not marked by religion; (2.) an overall diminished focus on harsh religion (Sharia) to the extent that it reduced public support; and (3.) an overall and very sharply focused administrative/political purpose, including the targeting of elections, the appointment of shadow governments, and the "exercise" of power in areas like RoL, security assurance, and economic activity flows.

OK, Mullah Omar has, behind all this, a religious intent, but the focus, ways and means, all seem overwhelmingly driven by administrative/political purpose.

If I was just a dumb political strategist, I would think about what I can control, and what isn't worth the effort right now.

Leaving the central government and its drug systems aside for a moment, can I, through intimidation and asymetrical efforts, gain credible administrative/political control in other areas?

If I launch a "nationwide campaign," say through shadow government, can i define the scope of my support in different areas, and, from that, develop the next plan for, say, a spring push to consolidate gains?

If I avoid the central cities, but establish sufficient functional control of regions, corridors, etc..., do I have everything I need at this stage, to lay the foundation for the next?

Maybe also, through skillful negotiation and profitable business arrangements, I can prosperously co-op the drug folks, and/or partner with them so we can all work together (even if my religious convictions abhor drugs)?

One of my big assets, unlike my opponents, is that I can pop-up at will (since I am not burdened by their administrative/political/security baggage, and, I have no regard for the "democratic" effort to win their hearts and minds. If my stick is big enough (civilian deaths), they will side with me out of fear vs. free choice (Who cares?).

Besides, I am a stateless person anyway, as my Pashtun lands (the real Afghanistan) were long ago, and arbitrarily carved up by the big powers who play the big game over our heads (Who cares about their versions of nations and power structures anyway?).

Moreover, the arbitrary national lines are a substantial asset to my operational strengths as my associations, allegiances and lines of operation are beyond them, while they pose major constraints on my opponents.

Despite my religious opposition to these technically sophisticated and amoral foreigners, I will also use technology where ever I can if it works for me. Streaming video, pop music, Drone feeds, GoogleEarth, etc...

But, because I am much more like one of the people, it is very easy to use their backwardness and distrust of foreigners and new things as a wedge between us. I'll even pull out the Quran card if I have to, and blame the peoples' deaths on the inevitable and holy struggle against the infidel foreigners. (It seems to work well).

XXXX

Again, a great generalization that could be 180 degrees different in any particular place, but, like Iraq, I see a great deal of administrative/political purpose, and not a lot of religion going on.

Now, if I was serious about undermining that, I would not have religious intents, just a huge respect for the role of religion in those people's lives, and try to fit my efforts into their frameworks and narratives.

But my focus would be the same as theirs--administrative/political/economic. And max out the use of technology and education.

Two bits on religion in this conflict.

[jmm99]

MA:

this:

from MA
In the process of Nation Building as we do implement it, I see more and more room for a single ring society controled by a party and not a man.

but, even in SovCom and ChiCom governance, you can distinguish between the Dip/Pol, Law and Op rings. Though the Politburo, legal system and military were all supposed to be based on Communist party principles, each had their own take on how those principles should be applied in their particular arena.

No doubt Communist principles shaped all three rings; but again those principles had to yield to reality. For example, in law, two areas were never resolved during the SovCom era: (1) International law is primarily based on nation-state interaction; whereas Marxist-Leninist theory calls for the "withering away" of the State; and (2) Russian legal history (actual) proved that the development of property law and contract law arose from individual transactions; whereas Marxist-Leninist historical theory called for a "primitive communism" in both property and contracts.

The Putin-Ivanov duo (both lawyers) dumped Marxist-Leninist theory in both of these areas, but not in others - their own synthesis, so to speak.

I certainly do agree that autocracy (whether by one person or one party) remains with us; particularly in unstable societies, because it is the quickest short-term way to get things done - and also satisfies the egos and greed of the one person or members of the one party.

An interesting fact is that a strong autocracy (with an effective state security service) is as (or slightly more) strong against insurgencies than a strong democracy. The strong autocracy can be established with a generation; a strong democracy takes generations. Since we like to see our desires implemented within our own lifetimes (not too many real futruists out there), you can see why "nation-builders" tend to autocracy.

COL Jones:

It is much easier for autocratic "nation-builders" to use religion (or other strong ideologies) in furthering their goals. As Bob says:

from BW
That the goal of my work was to delve past these environmentals and attempt to get to the pure essence of insurgency at a fundamental level; and that to my thinking at that level ideology is simply a tool requried of every insurgency, and selected for its utility in rallying the populace to the cause, while at the same time taking positions that the sitting government was either unable or unwilling to adopt. But that a wise insurgent would discard any ideology that either failed to rally the populace or that was compormised by the counterinsurgent; and pick a new one to continue on to his political ends.

I would call this "manipulation of the slogan" (rather than "manipulation of the ideology") because often the proponent of the slogan has either no real ideology; or, more important, a different underlying ideology than the slogan that is used and discarded.

E.g., Mao and the ChiComs used many slogans (in their "from the people, back to the people" agitprop campaigns). But, their brand of Marxist-Leninist ideology did not change. Dave Galula goes into this briefly in his section on "Manipulation of the Cause" (Mao is the example). John McCuen goes into more detail in many places.

I conclude, Marse Robert, that you and I use different terminology for many of the same things - which is why you drive me up a wall.

Regards

Mike

[slapout9]

The Putin-Ivanov duo (both lawyers) dumped Marxist-Leninist theory in both of these areas, but not in others - their own synthesis, so to speak.

Yep, this where I believe people are starting to get the idea of Corporate Communism. It can be powerful stuff to.....Tali-Bankster Board of Directors with Nazi CEO's

[M-A Lagrange]

Mike,

An interesting fact is that a strong autocracy (with an effective state security service) is as (or slightly more) strong against insurgencies than a strong democracy. The strong autocracy can be established with a generation; a strong democracy takes generations. Since we like to see our desires implemented within our own lifetimes (not too many real futruists out there), you can see why "nation-builders" tend to autocracy.

You are right, we are in the process of supporting and creating "sustainable dictatorship" (Have to develop the concept with a friend who created the slogan). But somehow I stay an idealist and would like to build real nations based on a real democratic process. I would say a purely political process which is neither linked with religion nor with economy (why a socialist regime could not be democratic. I said socialist in the european way, not communist).

Enlighted authocracies have been put in place in West Africa by the French in the 60 and 70 for the same reasons as USA does it nowadays in Afghanistan and Iraq. I am not sure that it was a success: look at Ivory Coast and the use of nationalisn and religion to fuel the civil war. Mugabe mantra on the Brits are colonising us convince only him in Zim... Not even talking about Darfur and the pseudo muslim/christian animist/arab/african war.

I would be even worst than you, the problem of Nation Building (the all in one solution/plug and play of COIN) is that some would like to see it happen in the duration of a presidential mandat, 2 max.
The problem is certainly there in the first place.

M-A
PS: in my job, we are not smart enough to do intelligence, we do information gazering...

[graphei]

I finally got a day off from work to read this paper (gracias to marct for e-mailing it to me) and I thought I'd just put out some of my observations as a Scholar of Religious Studies, but first a wee rant.

[rant on]
I did read the FM 3-24 not too long ago and I was somewhat surprised that religion/religious violence was glossed over. It seemed to be an awfully big disconnect- at least from my perspective. We're fighting a global religious insurgency and it gets passed by? It's one thing to say, "This is important, but it's out of the scope of our current study. Someone else with more funding needs to study it." vs "We're not sure what to do with it, because we're not really sure what it is, so we're gonna sweep it under the rug."

I found Kilcullen's statement against the critics who are falling for "the propaganda of the munafiquun" to be short-sighted, and frankly ignorant. No one likes it when their baby- I mean book, gets ripped on, but such is life. If you can't handle a critique of your work by peers, then a life as an academic was not a wise choice, Doctor.

You're dealing with an enemy that is banking on your ignorance of their religion. An Intro to Islam class and a few courses on the political/ethnic realities in the Middle East isn't cutting it. There are tens of thousands of perfectly reputable scholars of Religion in this country. I know some who tried for months to get involved in HTT's and were told their degree in Religious/Islamic Studies wasn't relevant. "They" wanted Anthropologists. Now, let me be clear here. I am not saying Anthropologists are not useful in this fight (someone has to do statistics and be anal about methodology ) or that they are incapable of doing research on religion, but when Big Brother is turning away people with in depth knowledge on Islam- there is a big, big problem. Hell, if I got a call tomorrow that said, "Hey, you wanna go to Afghanistan and be on a HTT?" I'd put the Corps on hold and go.
[rant off]

Okay, now that I got that off my chest.

Lauder's article was fairly solid. One thing I didn't really agree with him on was his term "violent new religious movements". I would argue that there is nothing 'new' about these movements. They've been around for a very long time in one form or another. At one point early on when referring to Mircea Eliade on time, Lauder explains these insurgencies simmer for decades or centuries, and he is very correct. This current bout of religious violence in the Middle East has been simmering for roughly 200 years and calls of jihad have been fairly cyclical throughout. Many of these 'new' groups legitimize themselves by creating a link between their current efforts and those in the sacred, or mythologized (for those of you who dig Foucault) past. In other words, revival is a very big deal. There is this belief in Islamic thought that the best and most true Muslims existed in the first couple generations under the Rashidun (a.k.a. Rightly Guided Caliphs. The further you move away from that point in time, the more corrupt things become and the true believers must act to save the world. While all religions have some concept of this floating through, in the Abrahamic traditions periods of revival are often accompanied by violence. Ya know, gotta purge those bad influences before the Judgement Day rolls around.

One thing that I thought Lauder brought up that made me happy was the concept of the violence as an act of ritual performance (yay for Juergensmeyer). It really provides an insight into what we're up against and taps into Eliade's notion of the sacred and profane and is explained more on page 16. Defeat isn't defeat. It's a trial by God to see who is truly devout. Death isn't Death. It's a spiritual victory over the unbelievers and apostates. We're dealing with people who have totally rejected or have no concept of secularism. Treating them and this situation like just another political/ethnic insurgencies is like pouring water on a grease fire and demonstrates that we just don't get it. What happened to reading Sun Tzu's Art of War and knowing your enemy?

[jmm99]

Great minds run in the same channels - as I was thinking of the Chinese Sun guy:

Know your enemy and know yourself; in a hundred battles, you will never be defeated. When you are ignorant of the enemy but know yourself, your chances of winning or losing are equal. If ignorant both of your enemy and of yourself, you are sure to be defeated in every battle.
—Sun Tzu

before I got to the last sentence of this:

from graphei
What happened to reading Sun Tzu's Art of War and knowing your enemy?

Perhaps, more people should invest some time in the Al Qaeda Reader ?

I wouldn't be in too much hurry to rush off to war, especially this one. It will be around for a long time. And, there is always room for "scholarly" Marine officers (even though they won't admit to that - hey, PBear ). One of them (Sam Griffith) gave me and others basic introductions to Sun and Mao with his translations from the early 60s.

Regards

Mike

[Steve the Planner]

Graphei:

"I am not saying Anthropologists are not useful in this fight (someone has to do statistics and be anal about methodology ) or that they are incapable of doing research on religion, but when Big Brother is turning away people with in depth knowledge on Islam- there is a big, big problem. Hell, if I got a call tomorrow that said, "Hey, you wanna go to Afghanistan and be on a HTT?" I'd put the Corps on hold and go.
[rant off]"

Wrong. Demographers, economists, financial managers and engineers do statistics. Anthropologists do...

As you will find when you get to some field somewhere, what MG Flynn reported is correct. You will be called to some VTC where all the experts are going to answer all your questions---and they have no clue.

You will be the one making the difference (and sometimes your battle will be with US, not THEM, to make the biggest difference).

It is a very gratifying experience to do a few times, but after a while, you relish and take comfort from some of the careers' worth of experiences from some of the folks on this Board to remember that these are the "routine" challenges to be overcome in any big endeavor. (We could be havimng the same organizational discussion at Harvard Business School about corporate activities, too).

It is not about right, wrong or woulda-coulda-shoulda, but what we are doing today and tomorrow that will create the final cumulative history.

What was that speech by Gates in 2008---it is the ones who break the mold that are responsible for the biggest historical successes and defining events. (Something like that).

Steve

[graphei]

Steve, the reason I included statistics in that was based off some of the 'ideal' traits listed for members of HTTs, and applied anthro has a certain amount of number crunching involved. I'm not saying Social Scientists shouldn't have a role or that they aren't valuable, it was more of a "Think outside the bun".

It is not about right, wrong or woulda-coulda-shoulda, but what we are doing today and tomorrow that will create the final cumulative history.

What good is today and tomorrow if we can't see beyond yesterday?

Mike- The frustration that my colleagues and I feel is this: we're the missing piece of the puzzle, but they have deemed us 'irrelevant'.

Cheers,

Graphei

[Steve the Planner]

I was at a CNP roundtable on PRTs on Monday.

The presenter from the State Department's S/CRS was explaining about the "fuzzy" and evolving approach to PRTs by State. He explained that for Afghanistan, they had recruited every possible civilian available, were peaked out, and running full, but that the folks they deploy typically take six months to get up to speed.

The congressional aides were criticizing that approach as ineffective, and there were several in-your-face HASC type aides with knives drawn (and bloody) about nation-building stuff in general.

I asked a dumb question about staffing. Why, unlike Iraq where they recruited subject matter experts, had they limited themselves to governance generalists with foreign policy/poli sci backgrounds when the issues were subject matter-based?

If the folks they were hiring and deploying were taking six months to become productive (on a six month or one year tour), why not recruit/deploy people who were skilled and properly deployed/supported to become more effective, faster? Why not train them more stateside so they were ready to be more productive when they hit the ground?

All I could think about was the burden, security and logistics resulting from that deployment strategy, and how, after 2 years and some $100 million, S/CRS has, to date, produced only a new bureaucracy further staffed by non-professionals, and has on its guidon only a few scattered short-term exercises.

All of that, of course, became irrelevant with Haiti, which S/CRS is intended to be optimized for (Tsumanis, etc..). Within hours, though, General Honore was on the tube, and it was clear that the military needed to take over.

S/CRS's final exam probably started with Haiti. If they aren't the be-all-end-all in that crisis, and the military (again) has to do it all (again), their future is on the line at Congress (like HT).

Of course, one of the main reasons for keeping State out of post-conflict reconstruction would be that they have an important role in those Tsunamis and Earthquakes, and you can't just set aside a war to chase another crisis in another place. What are they going to do, reassign their Afghan staff to Haiti? Will it take them six months to become effective?

Unfortunately, like post-conflict reconstruction, Human Terrain is an important part of the toolkit. But these backoffice bureaucracies have a lot of obstacles between what they are doing and what is needed.

Steve

[jmm99]

If this is Plan A and it is blocked (your judgment call):

from graphei
The frustration that my colleagues and I feel is this: we're the missing piece of the puzzle, but they have deemed us 'irrelevant'.

then you go to Plan B, etc.

BTW: IMO - AQ is waging unconventional warfare vs us (US) and others on a global scale; in which, AQ support to insurgencies in various countries is only one of its tools. It is not a "global insurgency" (nor can that construct exist until we have a global government ).

Best

Mike

[marct]

Hi Graphei,

I finally got a day off from work to read this paper (gracias to marct for e-mailing it to me) and I thought I'd just put out some of my observations as a Scholar of Religious Studies, but first a wee rant.

Oooh! We get to RANT?!?! (too bad there's no "evil grin")

I did read the FM 3-24 not too long ago and I was somewhat surprised that religion/religious violence was glossed over. It seemed to be an awfully big disconnect- at least from my perspective. We're fighting a global religious insurgency and it gets passed by? It's one thing to say, "This is important, but it's out of the scope of our current study. Someone else with more funding needs to study it." vs "We're not sure what to do with it, because we're not really sure what it is, so we're gonna sweep it under the rug."

You should have seen my comments on another piece of draft doctrine on how they defined "religion". All I can say is that the level of ignorance of religious studies is deafening.

You're dealing with an enemy that is banking on your ignorance of their religion. An Intro to Islam class and a few courses on the political/ethnic realities in the Middle East isn't cutting it.

Yup. Personally, I don't think there's much chance of understanding even 5% of the symbolic motivation unless you have at the minimum read al-Ghazali (who crops up in the weirdest places!).

There are tens of thousands of perfectly reputable scholars of Religion in this country. I know some who tried for months to get involved in HTT's and were told their degree in Religious/Islamic Studies wasn't relevant.

Well, don't you folks just sit around reading moldy scrolls ?!?! Yeah, I know what you mean.

"They" wanted Anthropologists. Now, let me be clear here. I am not saying Anthropologists are not useful in this fight (someone has to do statistics and be anal about methodology ) or that they are incapable of doing research on religion, but when Big Brother is turning away people with in depth knowledge on Islam- there is a big, big problem. Hell, if I got a call tomorrow that said, "Hey, you wanna go to Afghanistan and be on a HTT?" I'd put the Corps on hold and go.

First, we don't do statistics - that's what MA sociologists are for . That being said, the "we" I was referring to is cultural Anthropologists, and there actually aren't that many in the HTS. This, BTW, isn't a slam at the HTS, it's a slam at the hiring policies which, IMHO, are .... well, I can't say that in a public forum.

Lauder's article was fairly solid. One thing I didn't really agree with him on was his term "violent new religious movements". I would argue that there is nothing 'new' about these movements. They've been around for a very long time in one form or another.

Yup - the Fraticelli come to mind immediately for me at least, as do the sicarii and the Zealots. There are hundreds of other examples all older than 500 years.

At one point early on when referring to Mircea Eliade on time, Lauder explains these insurgencies simmer for decades or centuries, and he is very correct. This current bout of religious violence in the Middle East has been simmering for roughly 200 years and calls of jihad have been fairly cyclical throughout. Many of these 'new' groups legitimize themselves by creating a link between their current efforts and those in the sacred, or mythologized (for those of you who dig Foucault) past. In other words, revival is a very big deal.

Personally, I dislike Foucault . Even leaving him aside, Elide's concept of in illo tempore ties in more closely with the symbolization they are using which, BTW, is why I mentioned in my email that Matt should have used the concept of Revitalization Movements. Don't need no Foucault to go there....

There is this belief in Islamic thought that the best and most true Muslims existed in the first couple generations under the Rashidun (a.k.a. Rightly Guided Caliphs. The further you move away from that point in time, the more corrupt things become and the true believers must act to save the world. While all religions have some concept of this floating through, in the Abrahamic traditions periods of revival are often accompanied by violence. Ya know, gotta purge those bad influences before the Judgement Day rolls around.

Yup, degenerationism is a key concept in all of them (including classic Marxism) followed by a radical purging leading to an inevitable salvation.

One thing that I thought Lauder brought up that made me happy was the concept of the violence as an act of ritual performance (yay for Juergensmeyer). It really provides an insight into what we're up against and taps into Eliade's notion of the sacred and profane and is explained more on page 16. Defeat isn't defeat. It's a trial by God to see who is truly devout. Death isn't Death. It's a spiritual victory over the unbelievers and apostates. We're dealing with people who have totally rejected or have no concept of secularism. Treating them and this situation like just another political/ethnic insurgencies is like pouring water on a grease fire and demonstrates that we just don't get it. What happened to reading Sun Tzu's Art of War and knowing your enemy?

We see that it a fair bit of the ethnographic literature as well. Some of it is also tied up in the concept of blood sacrifice as a way to ritually purify an event-space. Or, to put it another way

Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius

[M-A Lagrange]

Personally, I dislike Foucault .

Personnaly I don't like Foucault neither , it's borring to read and extremely not well written, even in French. But it is usefull just to explain "our" approach of security and understand what western societies are waiting from secular state in term of security.
I still think that Foucault pointed out what is the western paradigm of security.

It's a spiritual victory over the unbelievers and apostates. We're dealing with people who have totally rejected or have no concept of secularism. graphei

It's untrue. Even if I did tease JMM on that point, there is a fondation of securlar state in most of the Muslim societies I have been working in, even in Somalia: the clan.
Then I would just throw you the Al Nadha periode or muslim renaissance which had for aim, for the muslims (the Sudanese and Egyptian in first place) to accaparate the tools of the british: education.
Not being a specialis of Afghanistan I cannot tel but the the actual Muslim Brotherhood is a deviance of the first Muslim Brotherhood. Understanding the effort of people as Taliban and reducing them to a banch of men who are just martian compare to us is, I think, dangerous. It is forgetting that they know or thing they know West and in deed had a lot of contact with us. They pretty good empiric cultural anthropologists in deed.

Somali pirates have been trained by western private security societies to secure boats before turning themselves to piratrie. And when I was in Somalia, they reminded me the old fation european barbarian with their f@%$#*&! honnor.

Talking of the religion, I agree with Marct that it is difficult to understand the symbolic dimension of sef destruction acts. But I would not make it a matrix to analyse Islam but rather a very specific minority of Muslims.
Madam, I think it's time for you to go on the field and face the great big world and all its contradictions. .

[graphei]

Hi Graphei,

Oooh! We get to RANT?!?! (too bad there's no "evil grin")

You should have seen my comments on another piece of draft doctrine on how they defined "religion". All I can say is that the level of ignorance of religious studies is deafening.

Please don't tell me it involved the words 'worldview' or 'life philosophy'.

Personally, I don't think there's much chance of understanding even 5% of the symbolic motivation unless you have at the minimum read al-Ghazali (who crops up in the weirdest places!).

Ghazali does crop up in weird places and I think it's because of his sufi-ness. There is a very big part of me that thinks this current snafu is a ripple from the Ash'ariyaa/Mu'tazila debacle, the gates of ijtihad being declared 'closed' and no one reading Ibn Rushd because they all fell in love with al-Ghazali.

Well, don't you folks just sit around reading moldy scrolls ?!?!

Nope, we lick them and stick them on our foreheads. Mold induced osmosis/hallucinations are all the rage.

First, we don't do statistics - that's what MA sociologists are for . That being said, the "we" I was referring to is cultural Anthropologists, and there actually aren't that many in the HTS. This, BTW, isn't a slam at the HTS, it's a slam at the hiring policies which, IMHO, are .... well, I can't say that in a public forum.

Then please tell me what on God's green Earth applied anthropology is! My hunch is that it's the bastard child of anthropology and sociology...

Personally, I dislike Foucault . Even leaving him aside, Elide's concept of in illo tempore ties in more closely with the symbolization they are using which, BTW, is why I mentioned in my email that Matt should have used the concept of Revitalization Movements. Don't need no Foucault to go there....

Interesting. It's been awhile since i've read Wallace, but a little bit of me is concerned with bring up revitalization/revival in a non-Christian context. I dragged Foucault in because of his connection between mythology and power. Otherwise, I'm lukewarm on French theorists. I'm a Gadamerian girl


Cheers,

Graphei

[graphei]

My Dear Sir, Lagrange,

I would hardly call clans in that area of the world wholly secular, either. Customs regarding kinship relations are have long been reinforced by Shari'ah throughout the Islamic world, although there can be deviance in practice along cultural lines, downplaying the role religion plays is simply not accurate

The Muslim Brotherhood in Afghanistan is an offshoot of the one in Egypt, and if my memory serves me correctly the one in Afghanistan was established to combat the Soviet invasion and the secularism of Communism, which leads me to my next point. Please allow me to clarify my statement about Islamic rejection of secularism. It is not a reductionist statement attempting to cast them as wholly Other to us. Rather, it was meant to describe the virtually universal belief among Islamists that secularism erodes the foundation and morals of an Islamic society and must be eradicated. Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, the Muslim Brotherhood and every other Islamist movement in existence is the polar opposite of secularism. They flat out reject it and compromising with secularism is considered shirk because it is compromising on Islam. When farmers in the field of Afghanistan say "I want an Islamic government and Shari'ah" that says it all. When street vendors in Egypt say "Democracy is not an Islamic concept and constitutes bid'ah" what are you going to do, tell them they're casting themselves as Other? My statement was not intended to brand them as alien, intellectually inferior, or have any other pejorative connotation. It was describing a belief that many Muslims hold. In sum, my statement was descriptive rather than normative.

Now, the statement about the matrix. The problem is that minority of Muslims are drawing from the entire framework of Islam, and how can you know what they are altering without knowing the framework and placing them in it? While I wouldn't recommend those unfamiliar with religion tinkering with such things, it's what us scholars of religion do.

I would love to go out in the 'field' and face the world with all of its contradictions, but being neither funded or independently wealthy, I did the best with what I had, took out more loans than was probably wise to, moved to London for a year, and lived with Pakistanis, Afghans, Iraqis, and Saudi Arabians, Iranians, Moroccans, Algerians, and Egyptians- among others. I cannot even begin to tell you the lessons I learned by sitting back and observing how different groups interacted with each other that flew in the face of what was written in a book. However, if there is anyone here that would take me along for the ride and fund me to do actual field research, I'd gladly dust off my boots and go.

Now, let me clarify global insurgency. The Muslim 'ummah (community) does not recognize national boundaries per se. Regardless where they came from, all were part of the dar al-Islam (lit. The House of Submission) and the greater Brotherhood and Sisterhood of Muslims. That is what al-Qaeda and other international groups attempt to tap into especially when they posit us as dar al-Harb (lit. The House of War) where jihad is permitted. While neither dar al-Islam/Harb is mentioned in the Qur'an or Hadith, both appear early on in the fiqh as Islamic rulers sought to justify their expansion theologically.

Cheers,

Graphei

[jmm99]

with this:

from graphei
Now, let me clarify global insurgency. The Muslim 'ummah (community) does not recognize national boundaries per se. Regardless where they came from, all were part of the dar al-Islam (lit. The House of Submission) and the greater Brotherhood and Sisterhood of Muslims. That is what al-Qaeda and other international groups attempt to tap into especially when they posit us as dar al-Harb (lit. The House of War) where jihad is permitted. While neither dar al-Islam/Harb is mentioned in the Qur'an or Hadith, both appear early on in the fiqh as Islamic rulers sought to justify their expansion theologically.

Keep the "global" and take away "insurgency" and put it on its own special shelf as part of the toolkit.

The modern roadmap for a merger of the concepts of defensive jihad and offensive jihad began with Maududi (Jihad in Islam) in the late 1930s, setting out the need for both the political struggle (appropriately merged with religion - which is dominant) and the military struggle.

He recognized the unity of all Muslims globally as an end goal, despite the backsliding of most of them in his terms.

He also recognized the oil spot concept in using both struggles to create a Salafist governance in one area and spread out from there (not necessarily contiguously).

In his eyes, the Muslim House was corrupt and had to be restored to a pure Salafist state of affairs. To do that, a transnational effort would be needed - in effect waging unconventional warfare using many tools (including support of local insurgencies). That being successful, the Muslim military forces would include both unconventional and conventional elements

After that task is completed, the Non-Muslim House would be brought into the fold - as it is written. The military operations against it would include both unconventional and conventional forces. Victory would ensue from a juncture of the conventional forces attacking from the Muslim House and its unconventional forces operating in the non-Muslim House.

Basically, the "Comintern Plan" + a very strong input of religion.

Regards

Mike

[Steve the Planner]

I feel like I have learned more from the past five or so posts than I have at anything in the last month or two. The brain stretching is really valuable.

Thanks for all of you pushing each other hard.

Don't stop now.

Steve

[Bob's World]

with this:



Keep the "global" and take away "insurgency" and put it on its own special shelf as part of the toolkit.

The modern roadmap for a merger of the concepts of defensive jihad and offensive jihad began with Maududi (Jihad in Islam) in the late 1930s, setting out the need for both the political struggle (appropriately merged with religion - which is dominant) and the military struggle.

He recognized the unity of all Muslims globally as an end goal, despite the backsliding of most of them in his terms.

He also recognized the oil spot concept in using both struggles to create a Salafist governance in one area and spread out from there (not necessarily contiguously).

In his eyes, the Muslim House was corrupt and had to be restored to a pure Salafist state of affairs. To do that, a transnational effort would be needed - in effect waging unconventional warfare using many tools (including support of local insurgencies). That being successful, the Muslim military forces would include both unconventional and conventional elements

After that task is completed, the Non-Muslim House would be brought into the fold - as it is written. The military operations against it would include both unconventional and conventional forces. Victory would ensue from a juncture of the conventional forces attacking from the Muslim House and its unconventional forces operating in the non-Muslim House.

Basically, the "Comintern Plan" + a very strong input of religion.

Regards

Mike

But I also think they are not what we in the West need to obsess on.

Everytime in history that the Muslim Ummah has come together and torn apart, it has been at swordpoint. Muslim swords building the Caliphate, and Muslim Swords doing much of taking it apart as well.

This is the bright red cape that Bin Laden the Matador would love for you to fixate on and to expend your great sthength in the pursuit of, as he deals us a slow death of a 1000 cuts in the process.

Certainly people in the midldle east look at governance and states very differently than people in the West do. Certainly religion is at the core of governance in Muslim communities. Certainly Muslims seek more to be able to achieve their duty to god than their duty to self than Westerners do.

So, when Muslims seek "self-determination" it is a very different thing that they seek and different motivations that will encourage them to seek it than in the West.

What is seen as Despotism in one society may be seen as enlightened in another. To each their own.

I think the West needs to reflect on how much control we have exerted over the people and governance of the Middle East over the past few hundred years and focus our energies less on how we can keep things there as they are; but rather on how we can enable a relatively peaceful evolution to what they should be. On their terms. Sustain the Ends of our national interests, but take a long hard look at the Ways and Means that have been seen as successful over the years.

The differences in our cultures mean that "right" will look different for them than for us. That's OK.

Them thinking that we are an obstacle to them gettng to "right" is not OK.

When one's state department is more focused on developing CT and COIN capabilities than on developing effective foreign policy and diplomacy, that is a metric that you might be off course.

When the majority of one's military is not in deterrence missions and preparing for war, but is out enforcing foreign policy, that is a metric that you might be off course.

Not saying that we're off course, just that we might be...

[M-A Lagrange]

Dear Madam Graphei

First of all, do not worry; I am sure you will go on field. We all started by being academic before being field people.

My use of the words "secular state" to qualify the clan organization (mainly in Somalia) is not the proper term as per say. I agree on that. My point being that the clans, despite having a religious backbone, are a, if I can say so, a universal human organizations/societies primal level. In all places I have been to (Christian/Animist/Muslim…) have the clan as the very core root of people organization to survive. In places like Somalia or Afghanistan where the formal State (as we describe it) has failed, the clans are the same as "villages" in Liberia between 1989 and 2004 or in remote places in DRC or tribes in Chad. It is the smallest structure of human organization. (The term village is abusive also for Liberia and DRC but here I am touching the boundaries of my scholar English).
As Steve reminded us all, the basic rule is: I need to live and feed my family.
In fact, in many places, you can basically witness what I would call the Nietzschean aurora in action.
The construction of organized societies for their self preservation: the defense of the core group of the extended family or what could feet in the classical definition of an ethnic group/tribe: the people with a common ancestor or group of ancestors.
The religion role in politic in such remote places (may be am I wrong with Afghanistan) is a top up. All societies have religion (to respond to too many unsolved question, the first ones being why me and what am I doing here?) and, as Marx stated it, religion is a political body. It's all a question of power, survive but also determine what is right to wrong… Where I am, they all are Christian animist but it is Ok to kill the neighbor to stole his cows and get married. (Not sure the Catholic Church would support that.) But in order to survive and perpetrate the survival of the group, it is morally acceptable.
(Culture comparison has its limits and I accept it. All scholars' fire on me…)

In a practical approach, knowing religious leaders and their personal philosophy is helpful to understand the politic and sometime the military actions that go with. But it is not the only ingredient. Knowing the economic resources of this warlord and his family connections will most of the time be more useful, in a purely military approach. In a global approach, as in small wars per definition, knowing each gang chief religious background helps a lot to understand why he is doing so or against you and conduct diplomatic actions. But it is not enough. (See rule nb1).

Talking about the very complex notion of Jihad in Islam.
First, I would not translate Dar al Islam by the House of Submission (the literal translation) but by the House of God. The aim of Islam being to turn hearth into paradise, the land of God in reality. In opposition with the Christian aim that paradise is somewhere lost in the sky. (It is a little quick resume but it works by the way). The land of milk and honey is hearth after all humans have turned to Islam and Jesus comes back. (I like the farmer approach: 2 feet in the mud, simple explanations of complex intellectual stuff.)
Saying so, let's come back to the reality. Jihad is not only making war. You have the great and little Jihad. War is just part of the little Jihad. Humanitarian actions are part of the little Jihad. During Lebanon war, in 2006, I meet many Middle East guys who were on Jihad and were conducting humanitarian actions. They were performing both little and Great Jihad. Humanitarian actions were not perceived as war effort but as the duty of Muslim to help Human Being in danger (the Muslim first, Ok): this was their participation to the little Jihad. And also showing the world that Islam was all about compassion for those who suffer: this was their Great Jihad. You cannot exclude that the fact it was a war between Muslim and Israel was part of the equation but do not put it in first place of the analyze. On this, I would recommend the publications of Abdel-Rahman Ghandour.

But what I also witnessed is the political struggle between State, Saudi Arabia in first place, against "religious communities" as Hezbollah but also Sunni ones. The preservation of secular State legitimacy was high in the agenda of Middle East powers during that war.
Jihad is used as a political tool to challenge most of the secular States and basically contest the power of many autocrats in Middle East. You really have to integrate the Al Nadha ideology into the equation and also its complexities. Some apparently very radical Muslims are promoting both Burka and women education. Most of the radical Sunni organizations I have been working with are not challenging the world but challenging their national government.

In some extend, this radicalization of the opposition between secular and non secular State in Islam looks like the radicalization of the French Revolution against the Church and the King and its "Divine legitimacy". In the end, the Mullahs are a "problem" for the Checks. Power cannot be shared. So, in a military approach, you have to play on it.

Finally, knowing the enemy is a danger for most of the ideologist (on all sides). If you can understand the intellectual process of the enemy, then you start to question your legitimacy. This leads to internal chaos.

M-A
PS: keep on calling me Sir, this flater my revolutionary cultural ego

[marct]

Hi Graphei,

Please don't tell me it involved the words 'worldview' or 'life philosophy'.

Got it in one; with added linguistic implications that it was all barbnarian superstition anyway since they weren't Christian.

Ghazali does crop up in weird places and I think it's because of his sufi-ness. There is a very big part of me that thinks this current snafu is a ripple from the Ash'ariyaa/Mu'tazila debacle, the gates of ijtihad being declared 'closed' and no one reading Ibn Rushd because they all fell in love with al-Ghazali.

Could be. I remember taking a "course" on Islamic mysticism were the entire time was spent going through a single book of the ihya (the book on travel). Freakin' fascinating, although not my personal choice for mystical paths. Years later, i got into a discussion with one of my students who was Sudanese about the effects of al-Ghazali on Sudanese politics; she was stunned that I had not only heard of him, but also read most of his stuff that had been translated (my arabic reading level is slightly lower than 0).

Nope, we lick them and stick them on our foreheads. Mold induced osmosis/hallucinations are all the rage.

Ah, THAT explains Elaine Pagels !

Then please tell me what on God's green Earth applied anthropology is! My hunch is that it's the bastard child of anthropology and sociology...

Well, according to Wilson (1885), Sociology is a minor sub-discipline of Anthropology that got pretentions. More seriously, "applied Anthropology" is what we do when tenure track positions aren't available / desirable. It's a totally useless distinction that came about as a way of identifying the Anthropology that was practiced outside of the university (in theory, not practice). And, like most Anthropologists, we will grab any methodology or model that "works" and use it - after all, "Anthropology" is the science of humanity; which covers a lot of ground.

Interesting. It's been awhile since i've read Wallace, but a little bit of me is concerned with bring up revitalization/revival in a non-Christian context.

I'm not particularly worried about bringing it up in a non-Christian context. then again, most of my fieldwork for my undergrad and MA was done with modern witches, and it's pretty hard to find a more diverse group of "revivalists" . More seriously, we do find a fair number of these groups operating in non-Christian contexts even if the terms used to describe the movement are, basically, "Christian". For example, and it's one of my favorites, the Zurvanite Heresy of the 2nd-5th centuries can actually be analyzed as a revitalization movement even though it involved a major, and radical, shift from mainstream Zoroastrianism.

I dragged Foucault in because of his connection between mythology and power. Otherwise, I'm lukewarm on French theorists. I'm a Gadamerian girl

The myth that Foucault had power ? Personally, I'm convinced that every generation or so, a bunch of French grad students get together, drink way too much vin ordinaire, and proceed to come up with a theory whose sole purpose is to confuse and frustrate the gullible anglophone world; Bourbaki comes to mind....

Personally, I tend to take a "pre-modernist" approach in most things. Find something that works and play with it .

Cheers,

Marc