Current Events > Real Talk: Terrorism in Europe will only get worse as ISIS fighters return home.

(+) Yeah! (+)

80/80

Let's take a long view. When does Islamist-inspired terrorism spike? Start here:





Note on the chart the two times Islamist-inspired terror attacks on Europe spiked: 2004 and 2015. The 2004 spike came a year after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which gave Jihadists (a) somewhere to operate; and (b) grievances to exploit.

Point: Terrorists exploit instability. The moment you give them a place to operate out of, and grievances to exploit, they oblige. (This is also why it's important for us not to abandon Afghanistan, and why the Trump Administration was right to keep troops there to mow the lawn.)

Now, there's a direct link between the 2004 spike and the 2015 spike. The terror groups that existed post 2003 are the same ones active today. What we call the Islamic State used to be called al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQAI) before it changed its name and rebranded. The 2015 spike came a year after ISIS's 2014 "Caliphate" declaration, which came on the back of the unraveling of Syria.

The often forgotten story is that between 2006 and 2014, there were far fewer successful terror attacks in Europe. Check it out again.





George W. Bush's Iraq "surge," plus working with Iraqi Sunni tribes (the "Anbar Awakening"), had crippled Jihadists in Iraq and denied them a haven by 2007/8. When Barack Obama had Bin Laden killed in May 2011, Jihadism had hit a low point ideologically and operationally. So the question is, what happened that resuscitated an almost-dead Jihadist terror threat? Was it ideology that resuscitated Jihadism? Was it religion? No -- ideology and religion are constants. What resuscitated them was the Syrian conflict.

It is impossible to honestly disconnect the current Jihadist wave from the fact that the world has largely stood by and allowed Syria to go to hell. The fact that terrorists struck London cannot be disconnected from the fact that the Syrian wound has been bleeding for six years. Countering poisonous ideologies is important, but we have to realize ideas don't exist in a vacuum... And we have to understand that we aren't separate. A wound on the face of our earth has become infected, and that infection affects us all.

Absent areas of instability where terrorists can find safe haven, terror incidents will still happen, but not nearly as bad... The existence of terror safe havens provides inspiration, operational support, and training. As the war against ISIS winds down, we are facing a perfect storm, for four reasons:

1. As ISIS loses its caliphate (devolving from a nation state back into a terrorist organization), there will be most pressure for them to show their presence, and hence more focus on external attacks.

2. Fighters will begin trickling back from the Islamic State to their native countries. There's no upside here: put them in jail, and they become spiritual leaders who'll convert followers from within the prison population; put them on the streets, and they'll become active again. (This is why Britain/France are trying to kill them all over there, instead of allowing them to come back.)

3. With no caliphate to "build," ISIS isn't recruiting "entrepeneurs" anymore, but crazy nutcases bent on suicide bombing, not "building a caliphate."

4. All of this happens at a time when anti-Muslim right-wing extremism is on the rise, making it even worse for everyone. Anti-Muslimism works to the Islamists' benefit; ostracizing and otherizing Muslims only serves to isolate, alienate, and drive impressionable youths towards terrorism.





Therefore, a perfect storm is coming... Be ready for it. Don't be surprised when it arrives.

On that last graph, it says June 28, 2015 when it should be 2014. FYI.
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Peter_Griffin33 posted...

On that last graph, it says June 28, 2015 when it should be 2014. FYI.

ty

This OP is too good for CE
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-Gavirulax- posted...

One of the few times I agree with TC almost entirely.

I think you and I agree on a lot. The difference is, in discussions of religion, you treat Islam as a unified monolith, while I think it's dishonest not to examine the texture.

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Who committed all of those terrorist attacks in the 70s and 80s?

Edit:

Google search indicates a variety of separatist groups.
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And?

Tag will read later
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Band?
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So what you are trying to say is that America needs to go in there and destroy all the terrorists again

Also, is it like impossible for a Muslim democracy to not get usurped instantly? It would really really help fight global terrorism imo if there were a face to Muslim democracy for modern Muslims to rally behind and emulate.
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Callixtus posted...

Who committed all of those terrorist attacks in the 70s and 80s?

Edit:

Google search indicates a variety of separatist groups.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Italy_(1970s-1980s)
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The spikes are the result of two individual attacks, not a trend.

josifrees posted...

Also, is it like impossible for a Muslim democracy to not get usurped instantly? It would really really help fight global terrorism imo if there were a face to Muslim democracy for modern Muslims to rally behind and emulate.

@josifrees

Focusing on short-term stability at the cost of long-term sustainability, is itself a major cause of instability. This was the error of the United States from the 1950s to the end of the Cold War, and it continues to be an error under Donald Trump.

Specifically, "stability by strongman" is a major cause of instability. Libya, Iraq, and Syria are unstable today because of the legacy of Gaddafi, Saddam, and Assad.

And yet some key western countries today want to pull out of the Middle East by allying with the arsonists.

When chicken and beef are the only two options on the menu, nobody will order fish, even if they don't particularly like chicken or beef. Ask yourself: what's on the menu of ideas in the Arab world? And who's preventing new ideas from being added to the menu?

We're spending too much time analyzing the items on the menu, instead of working on expanding the menu. (This has been my major bone of contention with @-Gavirulax-. Almost every major problem with Islam in the Middle East, the extremism and the anachronisms, are traceable to Riyadh and Tehran -- not to the Quran, which has always been his go-to.)

The solution to the Syrian refugee crisis doesn't lie in Europe, it lies in Syria. Assad is still creating refugees.

Sometimes you try to avert disaster. Other times the best course is to accept that disaster has or will happen and focus on the clean-up.

The present is unstable and unsustainable. Going back to the past is impossible. The way to the future is blocked. Something's gotta give. Holding back change won't make it go away... It'll just make sure it happens more violently. Trying to fight back the Arab Spring only created a Jihadist Winter. How much different would the Middle East be today if the dictators had allowed there to be a peaceful transition of power?

There was a peaceful transfer of power in Tunisia, and today that country is a thriving democracy.

Meanwhile, was life more stable in Libya under Gaddafi? Well, yes -- your head stays very still when a boot is pinning it to the ground. But it's not sustainable.

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Tell me if I'm wrong in assuming that the situation in the Middle East would have been far better if the US would not have left Iraq and Afghanistan so quickly. if the US wanted to do it right they would have kept their occupation, keeping a close eye on terrorism, building democracy and an identity, and the tools to compete economically. All those things are so much much cheaper than warfare and the lives lost in war are not thrown in the trash.

I agree completely about the concept of stability by strongman. It's pathetic how the US handled the post-WWII third world. The US and Europe wiped its ass with the casualties of WWII by overthrowing a global strongman in the Axis and then installing local strongmen all over the globe to contain communism. If they instead fostered democracy with that opportunity the world would be a better place.
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josifrees posted...

Tell me if I'm wrong in assuming that the situation in the Middle East would have been far better if the US would not have left Iraq and Afghanistan so quickly. if the US wanted to do it right they would have kept their occupation, keeping a close eye on terrorism, building democracy and an identity, and the tools to compete economically. All those things are so much much cheaper than warfare and the lives lost in war are not thrown in the trash.

@josifrees I think withdrawing from Iraq was a blunder. Unfortunately it's a blunder the people voted for. I proudly voted for Barack Obama, but it was a misstep of his presidency.

The Iraq War should never have occurred, especially not under the false pretenses of weapons of mass destruction. It was mishandled, and mishandled badly, and I'm afraid the United States has learned all the wrong lessons from that saga.

It isn't America's place to topple every dictatorship by military force and create power vacuums that work to the advantage of Jihadists. But where there is grassroots support for revolution, where conflicts are frozen and ethnic cleansing is underway -- where power vacuums already exist, as in Libya circa 2011, and in Syria circa 2017 -- then there's a good case to be made for intervention via international coalition.

The costs of not doing anything are higher than doing nothing. The human cost paid by the people of Syria, the refugee crisis, the terrorist campaign being waged in Europe, all can be traced back to Syria. Moreover the Islamic State was able to sweep across northern Iraq like wildfire by taking advantage of what? Not the religious extremism of the populace, but the Sunni populace's dissatisfaction with the Shiite-led government in Baghdad under al-Maliki, which had long excluded and repressed them. All of that is a consequence of the mismanagement of the Iraq War from the beginning.

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This is an interesting topic and how surprising that the usual suspects are nowhere to be seen!
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Definitely something for me to think about for the future

I'm not very knowledgeable about this but this is a good thread

I'm actually learning on CE x.x
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How many times you gonna bump bro?
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I'm glad he did. Idk how I missed it but I'm really glad I just saw it.

I wish I was more knowledgeable on the subject to have something to add. If you get a chance though I'd love to hear you write expository on it more.
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For this, liberals, we give thanks.
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