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CounterPunch
November
26, 2002
The Apocalyptic Vision of the Neo-Conservative
Ideologues
by AHMAD FARUQUI
Neo-conservative (neocon) writers in America provide
intellectual firepower to the Bush administration as it continues
to develop its national security strategy based on the doctrine
of pre-emptive war. Necons have become increasingly vocal about
an apocalyptic conflict involving the US and the Muslim world.
Norman Podhoretz, their godfather, is a former leftist who has
made an ideological U-Turn. In the September issue of Commentary,
he calls for en masse regime change in the Middle East. Podhoretz's
list of the "axis of evil" goes beyond the three countries
cited in President Bush's State of the Union speech, and includes
Egypt, Lebanon, Libya, the Palestinian National Authority, Saudi
Arabia and Syria. He wants the US to unilaterally overthrow these
regimes in the Arab world and replace them with democracies cast
in the Jeffersonian mold.
But what neocons seek is not just a political
transformation of the Muslim Middle East. Their end game is to
bring about "the long-overdue internal reform and modernization
of Islam." These ideologues recognize that such American
military intervention will provoke terrorist attacks on Americans,
both at home and abroad. But, in their view, the terrorists will
unwittingly provide the US with the pretext for even stronger
military intervention. Neocons believe that the US will emerge
triumphant in the end, provided that it shows the will to fight
the war against militant Islam to a successful conclusion, and
provided too, that it has "the stomach to impose a new political
culture on the defeated parties."
The neocons pride themselves on being
politically incorrect. Rich Lowry, editor of National Review,
notes on the magazine's web site that if terrorists from Muslim
countries detonate a "dirty bomb" in the United States,
the US should launch a nuclear attack on Islam's holiest city,
Mecca, in Saudi Arabia. Lowry justifies this outrageous proposal
by portraying it as a deterrent to terrorist attacks, believing
that Muslim militants would not want to risk the destruction
of their holiest site.
Professor Elliot Cohen is the most influential
neocon in academe. From his perch at John Hopkins, Cohen refers
to the war against terrorism by a chilling name: World War IV
(citing the Cold War as WWIII). His viewpoint is diametrically
opposed to that of the distinguished historian of war, Sir Michael
Howard, who has cautioned that the fight against terrorism is
not even a war, let alone a world war. Cohen claims America is
on the good side in this war, just like it has been in all prior
world wars, and the enemy is militant Islam, not some abstract
concept of "terrorism." In his view, Afghanistan was
merely the first campaign in WWIV, and several more are likely
to follow.
Cohen argues that the US should throw
its weight behind pro-Western and anticlerical forces in the
Muslim world, beginning with the overthrow of the theocratic
state in Iran and its replacement by a "moderate or secular"
government. He was one of the first neocons to call for an attack
on Iraq, and is not bothered by the fact that there is no credible
evidence linking Iraq with the events of September 11 or with
al-Qaida. Cohen says that while America scored a decisive victory
against the Taliban, they were not the hardest side to beat.
Noting that the US used aging B-52s to bomb the Taliban, Cohen
calls for increasing US military spending by at least $20 billion
a year, so that America can modernize its military and be capable
of taking on any and all enemies around the globe.
Daniel Pipes of the Middle East Forum
is an especially strident neocon. He opines that US academics
are trying to sugar coat the true meaning of jihad, and thereby
hide its violent and political character. In the November issue
of Commentary, he cites numerous Islamic scholars--most of them
non-Muslim--who state that jihad is confined to militarily defensive
engagements, and its primary meaning is the attainment of moral
self-improvement. This view is, of course, shared by the Islamic
Ulema throughout the world.
Pipes contends that bin Laden and jihadists
worldwide understand the meaning of jihad better than the academics,
who have merely become apologists for Islam. He alleges that
fourteen centuries of Islamic history confirm the bin Laden view,
since jihad has been used as an offensive weapon for expanding
Muslim political power. Showing his biased reading of history,
Pipes has concluded that only one out of the first 78 battles
in Islamic history was a defensive battle. When groups such as
the Council of American-Islamic Relations contend that jihad
is not a holy war, Pipes argues that they are engaged in spreading
misinformation, like the Soviets did during WWIII. He sums up
his case by saying, "jihad was part of the warp and woof
not only of pre-modern Muslim doctrine but of pre-modern Muslim
life."
Last week the neocons quietly launched
a bipartisan Committee for the Liberation of Iraq. One of its
prominent members is the 81-year old George Schulz, now a fellow
at the Hoover Institution at Stanford. Schulz served as Secretary
of State in the Reagan administration and Treasury Secretary
in the Nixon administration. Several key members of the Bush
administration have worked for him--including Dick Cheney, Paul
O'Neill and Donald Rumsfeld--while Colin Powell worked at the
National Security Council when Schulz was Secretary of State.
In a recent interview, Schulz called Saddam Hussain a menace
to peace, and said that he would be surprised if the US does
not initiate military action against Iraq by the end of January.
His words, considered "tracer fire" by US journalists,
confirm the hypothesis held by many peace activists in America
and Europe that the Bush administration will merely use UN Resolution
1441 as a cover to wage war against Iraq.
The neocons are determined to bring their
apocalyptic vision to reality at all cost. Critiquing their worldview,
Philip Stephens writes in the Financial Times that "in the
long term even a nation as uniquely powerful as the US cannot
remake the political systems at the heart of the Islamic world:
not in 30 years and probably not in 100." Stephens correctly
points out the dangers in pursuing such a myopic policy. The
Muslim world will view a string of US military attacks on Muslim
countries as the aggression of an oil-thirsty superpower on the
Muslim world, not a march to liberate people from tyranny. In
the end, the neocons noble but foolish designs will come to nothing.
Ahmad Faruqui,
an economist, is a fellow with the American Institute of International
Studies and the author of Rethinking
the National Security of Pakistan. He can be reached
at faruqui@pacbell.net
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November 23,
2002
Susan Davis
Now About
That Big Stick
Caoimhe Butterly
I Was
Shot While Escorting Jenin's School Children
Kurt Nimmo
Bush &
the Canadians
Chris Floyd
Rough Beast
Slouching
Francis Boyle
On Behalf
of Iraq's 4.5 Million Children
Dave Marsh
Spirit
in the Light
Behzad Yaghmaian
The Rebirth
of Student Protest in Iran
Mark Hand
Dr. Alterman,
I Presume
Ralph Nader
Back Alley
Loan Sharks
Elaine Cassel
The Shameful
Treatment of John Malvo
Adam Engel
& Ian Harvey
Poets'
Basement
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