// essays //
Fall 2006
Naming the Enemy
David Feith
When British and American intelligence foiled an al-Qaeda plot to blow up ten airliners over the Atlantic this past August, President Bush said that the thwarted attacks were "a stark reminder that this nation is at war with Islamic fascists."
Bush's comment, the most notable, but not the first time he had used a form of the phrase "Islamic fascists," gained much play in the media and, in turn, received support and condemnation from different pundits and organizations. In sum, the condemnation seemed louder than the support. Soon afterward, the President stopped using the phrase, reportedly in recognition of the concerns of the Muslim community.
When he originally used it, no matter whether it was calculated or an off-the-cuff reference, he clearly felt that "war on terror" would not cut it. To feel that this phrase was inadequate was not new. Though the term "war on terror" is widely used, it has also been widely criticized. Terror, critics say, is a tactic rather than an enemy entity, and to declare war on it ultimately raises difficult questions. Are all terrorists our enemy? Are only anti-American terrorists our enemy? Is the U.S. war aim to end terrorism completely? These and similar concerns have been voiced by people as diverse as liberal financier George Soros—who called it "a false metaphor" in a Wall Street Journal op-ed this summer— and conservative Senator Rick Santorum, who recently likened using the term to "saying World War II was a war on blitzkrieg."
Notably, Santorum's comment came in a speech endorsing the term "Islamic fascists." Soros likely would not give such an endorsement. While these men agree on the weakness of "war on terror," they do not seem to agree on an alternative. Defining the enemy in this war has often been an exercise in disharmony. But not all of this administration's terms used to describe the enemy have been met with loud, fair criticism.
Between "terror," which focuses vaguely on a tactic rather than an enemy body, and "Islamic fascists," a flawed analogy which some feel links Islam too sweepingly with fascistic evil, there may be characterizations which are more descriptive, of more strategic value, and less unnecessarily broad.
Officially, the Bush administration's definition of the enemy is neither "terror" nor "Islamic fascists." The 2006 National Security Strategy for Combating Terrorism, released this month, states:
[T]he principal terrorist enemy confronting the United States is a transnational movement of extremist organizations, networks, and individuals—and their state and non-state supporters—which have in common that they exploit Islam and use terrorism for ideological ends...what unites the movement is a common vision, a common set of ideas about the nature and destiny of the world, and a common goal of ushering in totalitarian rule. What unites the movement is the ideology of oppression, violence, and hate.
To say that our terrorist enemies are exploiters of Islam strikes a different chord than does labeling them "Islamic fascists." Later, the document states that "terrorists distort the idea of jihad into a call for violence and murder against those they regard as apostates or unbelievers." This has been one of the President's themes since immediately after 9/11, when he went on a deliberate campaign—speaking at the Belmont Mosque and elsewhere—to distinguish Islam as a religion from those who carry out the murder of innocents in its name.
In the February 2006 National Military Strategic Plan for the War on Terror, the Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff wrote that "violent extremism—in its various forms—is the primary threat to the United States, its allies, and interests." Extremists, the document says, murder "to advance extremist ideological purposes." Islam is first mentioned to explain that the war "is not a religious or cultural clash between Islam and the West, although our extremist enemies find it useful to characterize the war that way."
These explanations do much to guide thinking on the war at hand. Understanding that the enemy is a complex, transnational movement of organizations, people and sovereign states—what some have called a "network of networks"—is central to understanding the complex and unusual work required to defeat the enemy. By writing about the enemy's "common vision," "common set of ideas," and "ideology of oppression," these official definitions also highlight the importance of ideology in this war.
What these official definitions do not do is assign to the enemy a term or name. While the enemy is explained, the documents do not provide a succinct characterization of the enemy that can find its way into the public discourse—private citizens do not often refer to "transnational movements of x, y, z and their enablers" when discussing politics. This is a missed opportunity to frame not only the thinking of domestic American audiences but also of international Muslim ones, a vital goal in its own right. What succinct phrasing, then, can be used to describe the enemy?
"Militant Islam" and "radical Islam" are two related, common definitions used even by administration members, though it rarely emerges in official speech or writing. Those who characterize the enemy this way stress that the groups and states most threatening to the western way of life are radical, militant, claim justification from Islamic principle and openly seek to establish Islamic rule over all conquered lands.
In his oft-cited 1998 fatwa—a Muslim religious edict—declaring war against America, Osama bin Laden wrote: "The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies—civilians and military—is an individual duty for every Muslim." On what authority did bin Laden declare this—on his own, as a prominent mujahadeen leader? Not simply. Bin Laden asserted that this ruling to kill was God's wish: "This is in accordance with the words of Almighty God, 'fight the pagans all together as they fight you all together,' and 'fight them until there is no more tumult or oppression, and there prevail justice and faith in God.'"
Since this fatwa, bin Laden and his Sunni al-Qaeda organization have murdered "Americans and their allies" in Kenya, Tanzania, Yemen, New York, Washington, London, Madrid, Istanbul and elsewhere, in attacks they evidently believe accord with God's true word.
Elsewhere in the Muslim world, other groups share many of the same goals and tactics and hence the same status, as grave enemies of the U.S. Hezbollah, which before 9/11 was the terrorist group directly responsible for the most American deaths, is a Shiite Muslim organization. Its original manifesto states:
We are a Muslim community linked to the Muslims of the whole world by the solid doctrinal and religious connection of Islam...Our behavior is dictated to us by legal principles laid down by the light of an overall political conception defined by the leading jurist...As for our culture, it is based on the Holy Koran...
Going on their principle that "our military apparatus is not separate from our overall social fabric," Hezbollah's "behavior" has included more than 200 attacks, from kidnappings to hijackings to bombings which have altogether killed more than 800 people.
Of course, the ideology of Hezbollah cannot be separated from that of Iran, its patron state. In the same manifesto, Hezbollah declared that it is "the party of God, the vanguard of which was made victorious by God in Iran." Iran's current regime rose to power in 1979, declaring "Death to America" and supporting the 444 day-long captivity of Americans in their embassy. Considered the fruit of the first modern Islamic Revolution, Iran has since been ruled by mullahs according to a constitution which states that "all laws and regulations including civil, criminal, financial, economic, administrative, cultural, military, political or otherwise, shall be based on Islamic principles."
In 1996, the U.S. Senate found that Iran was threatening the U.S. by seeking "to acquire weapons of mass destruction and the means to deliver them" and by supporting international terrorism. The Senate also officially found that Iran "uses its diplomatic facilities and quasi-governmental institutions outside of Iran to promote acts of international terrorism and assist its nuclear, chemical, biological and missile weapons programs." Thus it would seem that, to this day, Iran flaunts international law, builds dangerous weapons and supports international terrorism in the name of Islamic revolution.
Another term put forward to name the enemy is "Jihadism." This term has support from academics such as Mary Habeck and Bassam Tibi, as well as from some politicians. Jihadism is a concrete ideology and not a vague tactic like "terror." Centered on a particular interpretation of jihad, the Jihadist ideology transcends militancy or radicalism; Jihadism states as its specific goal the violent, forceful spread of fundamentalist Islamic rule to every land. This rule acknowledges no sphere other than the religious, with elements of self-government seen as affronts to Allah's sovereignty.
Jihadists focus on some tenets of Islam without qualifying one goal out of respect for other ideals, so that, for example, Muhammad's saying that "I was ordered to fight all men until they say, 'There is no god but Allah'" is not mitigated by the Koranic teaching that "there is no coercion in religion."
While some propose using the term "Jihadism" not as a necessary replacement for, but in addition to, "militant Islam" or "radical Islam," others say that "Jihadism" actually carries a better strategic message. As one advocate of the term, Jonathan Rauch wrote, "Specifying that the war is against Jihadism—as distinct from terrorism or Islam (or Islamism, which sounds like 'Islam')—would allow the United States to confront the religious element of the problem without seeming to condemn a whole religion."
Considering what kind of messages will best play in the Muslim world is important. Messages sent from the West into the Muslim world affect a vital element of this war—the ideological. Many have pointed out, including General John Abizaid, that this war "is a battle of ideas as much as it is a military battle." Without success in the "battle of ideas," the U.S. and its allies risk running on a terrorist treadmill, seeing a new terrorist rise up for every terrorist killed or captured.
When most people think of the U.S. fighting in a battle of ideas, they think of a battle between the U.S. and its detractors, and about the influence our actions and public messahges can have on the way people around the world percieve us. While this is of course a crucial aspect of public policy, many, among them members of the U.S. administration, argue that the battle of ideas is not as much about beaming positive messages into the Muslim world from the U.S. as it is about a war of ideas among Muslims—between moderates and radicals. As the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staffs said, this war "in many senses is an ideological civil war" which places "Islamic moderates against their hard-line, extremist co-believers." Construed this way, America is an outsider in the Battle of Ideas. Our ideas, then, should be directed not against jihadists, but should be formulated to enable us to gain the recognition of the moderate forces within the Muslim world. These moderates, as Muslims themselves, can more credibly use the language of Islam to oppose Jihadism, radicalism and militancy. In defining our enemy, then, Americans must take care not to alienate these moderates.
This is not to say that American rhetoric should not be strategically designed to reach the Muslim masses. Today, a powerful idea on the Muslim street is the charge that America views all Muslims as its enemy. Though false, this idea is spread in successful propaganda campaigns by hostile states and groups. Not only is the American enemy not Islam as a whole, but the overwhelming majority of Muslims worldwide are targets of the same enemy we are. Al-Qaeda and similar groups seek to destroy not only America, but all states not following the strictest Islamic law. This includes predominately Muslim countries such as India, Indonesia and the Philippines, all of which have been targets of brutal terrorism. Just last month, bomb blasts in Malegaon, India specifically targeted Muslims on the day of a Muslim festival. Those terrorists who target Americans and their fellow Muslims make up a tiny portion of the Muslim world. But they are spread out, well-connected and difficult to choke off. America's ability to defeat them will be either greatly enhanced or weakened by whether the rest of the Muslim world realizes that we face a common foe and helps in our struggle to defeat it. A more precise definition of the enemy—one which disarms the claim put forward by our actual enemies that we seek to destroy all of Islam—can make this more clear to those on the Muslim street.
Naming the enemy has strategic implications on the home front as well. Unlike in the conventional state versus state wars of the past, this war's victories may be both subtle and spread over long periods of time. President Bush has compared this war to the decades-long struggle with Communism. As such, patience and perspective are especially important in the direction of this conflict. American attitudes toward the war are affected by our perception of our enemy. Vague or inconsistent naming and description of the enemy may make public perception of the enemy—and of the stakes of this war—unclear and insubstantial.
A missed opportunity to name the enemy has deeper implications than mere semantics. Whether "radical Islam," "militant Islam," "Jihadism" or related terminologies are used, the American war effort is better served by the widespread acceptance and use of a definition clearer and more strategic than "terror" or "terrorists."
Bush's comment, the most notable, but not the first time he had used a form of the phrase "Islamic fascists," gained much play in the media and, in turn, received support and condemnation from different pundits and organizations. In sum, the condemnation seemed louder than the support. Soon afterward, the President stopped using the phrase, reportedly in recognition of the concerns of the Muslim community.
When he originally used it, no matter whether it was calculated or an off-the-cuff reference, he clearly felt that "war on terror" would not cut it. To feel that this phrase was inadequate was not new. Though the term "war on terror" is widely used, it has also been widely criticized. Terror, critics say, is a tactic rather than an enemy entity, and to declare war on it ultimately raises difficult questions. Are all terrorists our enemy? Are only anti-American terrorists our enemy? Is the U.S. war aim to end terrorism completely? These and similar concerns have been voiced by people as diverse as liberal financier George Soros—who called it "a false metaphor" in a Wall Street Journal op-ed this summer— and conservative Senator Rick Santorum, who recently likened using the term to "saying World War II was a war on blitzkrieg."
Notably, Santorum's comment came in a speech endorsing the term "Islamic fascists." Soros likely would not give such an endorsement. While these men agree on the weakness of "war on terror," they do not seem to agree on an alternative. Defining the enemy in this war has often been an exercise in disharmony. But not all of this administration's terms used to describe the enemy have been met with loud, fair criticism.
Between "terror," which focuses vaguely on a tactic rather than an enemy body, and "Islamic fascists," a flawed analogy which some feel links Islam too sweepingly with fascistic evil, there may be characterizations which are more descriptive, of more strategic value, and less unnecessarily broad.
Officially, the Bush administration's definition of the enemy is neither "terror" nor "Islamic fascists." The 2006 National Security Strategy for Combating Terrorism, released this month, states:
[T]he principal terrorist enemy confronting the United States is a transnational movement of extremist organizations, networks, and individuals—and their state and non-state supporters—which have in common that they exploit Islam and use terrorism for ideological ends...what unites the movement is a common vision, a common set of ideas about the nature and destiny of the world, and a common goal of ushering in totalitarian rule. What unites the movement is the ideology of oppression, violence, and hate.
To say that our terrorist enemies are exploiters of Islam strikes a different chord than does labeling them "Islamic fascists." Later, the document states that "terrorists distort the idea of jihad into a call for violence and murder against those they regard as apostates or unbelievers." This has been one of the President's themes since immediately after 9/11, when he went on a deliberate campaign—speaking at the Belmont Mosque and elsewhere—to distinguish Islam as a religion from those who carry out the murder of innocents in its name.
In the February 2006 National Military Strategic Plan for the War on Terror, the Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff wrote that "violent extremism—in its various forms—is the primary threat to the United States, its allies, and interests." Extremists, the document says, murder "to advance extremist ideological purposes." Islam is first mentioned to explain that the war "is not a religious or cultural clash between Islam and the West, although our extremist enemies find it useful to characterize the war that way."
These explanations do much to guide thinking on the war at hand. Understanding that the enemy is a complex, transnational movement of organizations, people and sovereign states—what some have called a "network of networks"—is central to understanding the complex and unusual work required to defeat the enemy. By writing about the enemy's "common vision," "common set of ideas," and "ideology of oppression," these official definitions also highlight the importance of ideology in this war.
What these official definitions do not do is assign to the enemy a term or name. While the enemy is explained, the documents do not provide a succinct characterization of the enemy that can find its way into the public discourse—private citizens do not often refer to "transnational movements of x, y, z and their enablers" when discussing politics. This is a missed opportunity to frame not only the thinking of domestic American audiences but also of international Muslim ones, a vital goal in its own right. What succinct phrasing, then, can be used to describe the enemy?
"Militant Islam" and "radical Islam" are two related, common definitions used even by administration members, though it rarely emerges in official speech or writing. Those who characterize the enemy this way stress that the groups and states most threatening to the western way of life are radical, militant, claim justification from Islamic principle and openly seek to establish Islamic rule over all conquered lands.
In his oft-cited 1998 fatwa—a Muslim religious edict—declaring war against America, Osama bin Laden wrote: "The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies—civilians and military—is an individual duty for every Muslim." On what authority did bin Laden declare this—on his own, as a prominent mujahadeen leader? Not simply. Bin Laden asserted that this ruling to kill was God's wish: "This is in accordance with the words of Almighty God, 'fight the pagans all together as they fight you all together,' and 'fight them until there is no more tumult or oppression, and there prevail justice and faith in God.'"
Since this fatwa, bin Laden and his Sunni al-Qaeda organization have murdered "Americans and their allies" in Kenya, Tanzania, Yemen, New York, Washington, London, Madrid, Istanbul and elsewhere, in attacks they evidently believe accord with God's true word.
Elsewhere in the Muslim world, other groups share many of the same goals and tactics and hence the same status, as grave enemies of the U.S. Hezbollah, which before 9/11 was the terrorist group directly responsible for the most American deaths, is a Shiite Muslim organization. Its original manifesto states:
We are a Muslim community linked to the Muslims of the whole world by the solid doctrinal and religious connection of Islam...Our behavior is dictated to us by legal principles laid down by the light of an overall political conception defined by the leading jurist...As for our culture, it is based on the Holy Koran...
Going on their principle that "our military apparatus is not separate from our overall social fabric," Hezbollah's "behavior" has included more than 200 attacks, from kidnappings to hijackings to bombings which have altogether killed more than 800 people.
Of course, the ideology of Hezbollah cannot be separated from that of Iran, its patron state. In the same manifesto, Hezbollah declared that it is "the party of God, the vanguard of which was made victorious by God in Iran." Iran's current regime rose to power in 1979, declaring "Death to America" and supporting the 444 day-long captivity of Americans in their embassy. Considered the fruit of the first modern Islamic Revolution, Iran has since been ruled by mullahs according to a constitution which states that "all laws and regulations including civil, criminal, financial, economic, administrative, cultural, military, political or otherwise, shall be based on Islamic principles."
In 1996, the U.S. Senate found that Iran was threatening the U.S. by seeking "to acquire weapons of mass destruction and the means to deliver them" and by supporting international terrorism. The Senate also officially found that Iran "uses its diplomatic facilities and quasi-governmental institutions outside of Iran to promote acts of international terrorism and assist its nuclear, chemical, biological and missile weapons programs." Thus it would seem that, to this day, Iran flaunts international law, builds dangerous weapons and supports international terrorism in the name of Islamic revolution.
Another term put forward to name the enemy is "Jihadism." This term has support from academics such as Mary Habeck and Bassam Tibi, as well as from some politicians. Jihadism is a concrete ideology and not a vague tactic like "terror." Centered on a particular interpretation of jihad, the Jihadist ideology transcends militancy or radicalism; Jihadism states as its specific goal the violent, forceful spread of fundamentalist Islamic rule to every land. This rule acknowledges no sphere other than the religious, with elements of self-government seen as affronts to Allah's sovereignty.
Jihadists focus on some tenets of Islam without qualifying one goal out of respect for other ideals, so that, for example, Muhammad's saying that "I was ordered to fight all men until they say, 'There is no god but Allah'" is not mitigated by the Koranic teaching that "there is no coercion in religion."
While some propose using the term "Jihadism" not as a necessary replacement for, but in addition to, "militant Islam" or "radical Islam," others say that "Jihadism" actually carries a better strategic message. As one advocate of the term, Jonathan Rauch wrote, "Specifying that the war is against Jihadism—as distinct from terrorism or Islam (or Islamism, which sounds like 'Islam')—would allow the United States to confront the religious element of the problem without seeming to condemn a whole religion."
Considering what kind of messages will best play in the Muslim world is important. Messages sent from the West into the Muslim world affect a vital element of this war—the ideological. Many have pointed out, including General John Abizaid, that this war "is a battle of ideas as much as it is a military battle." Without success in the "battle of ideas," the U.S. and its allies risk running on a terrorist treadmill, seeing a new terrorist rise up for every terrorist killed or captured.
When most people think of the U.S. fighting in a battle of ideas, they think of a battle between the U.S. and its detractors, and about the influence our actions and public messahges can have on the way people around the world percieve us. While this is of course a crucial aspect of public policy, many, among them members of the U.S. administration, argue that the battle of ideas is not as much about beaming positive messages into the Muslim world from the U.S. as it is about a war of ideas among Muslims—between moderates and radicals. As the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staffs said, this war "in many senses is an ideological civil war" which places "Islamic moderates against their hard-line, extremist co-believers." Construed this way, America is an outsider in the Battle of Ideas. Our ideas, then, should be directed not against jihadists, but should be formulated to enable us to gain the recognition of the moderate forces within the Muslim world. These moderates, as Muslims themselves, can more credibly use the language of Islam to oppose Jihadism, radicalism and militancy. In defining our enemy, then, Americans must take care not to alienate these moderates.
This is not to say that American rhetoric should not be strategically designed to reach the Muslim masses. Today, a powerful idea on the Muslim street is the charge that America views all Muslims as its enemy. Though false, this idea is spread in successful propaganda campaigns by hostile states and groups. Not only is the American enemy not Islam as a whole, but the overwhelming majority of Muslims worldwide are targets of the same enemy we are. Al-Qaeda and similar groups seek to destroy not only America, but all states not following the strictest Islamic law. This includes predominately Muslim countries such as India, Indonesia and the Philippines, all of which have been targets of brutal terrorism. Just last month, bomb blasts in Malegaon, India specifically targeted Muslims on the day of a Muslim festival. Those terrorists who target Americans and their fellow Muslims make up a tiny portion of the Muslim world. But they are spread out, well-connected and difficult to choke off. America's ability to defeat them will be either greatly enhanced or weakened by whether the rest of the Muslim world realizes that we face a common foe and helps in our struggle to defeat it. A more precise definition of the enemy—one which disarms the claim put forward by our actual enemies that we seek to destroy all of Islam—can make this more clear to those on the Muslim street.
Naming the enemy has strategic implications on the home front as well. Unlike in the conventional state versus state wars of the past, this war's victories may be both subtle and spread over long periods of time. President Bush has compared this war to the decades-long struggle with Communism. As such, patience and perspective are especially important in the direction of this conflict. American attitudes toward the war are affected by our perception of our enemy. Vague or inconsistent naming and description of the enemy may make public perception of the enemy—and of the stakes of this war—unclear and insubstantial.
A missed opportunity to name the enemy has deeper implications than mere semantics. Whether "radical Islam," "militant Islam," "Jihadism" or related terminologies are used, the American war effort is better served by the widespread acceptance and use of a definition clearer and more strategic than "terror" or "terrorists."
// DAVID FEITH (CC '09) is a Columbia College sophomore majoring in History.