> CB: I don't know whether you pay much attention to what I say on this
list, but if so , you won't be surprised that I am with > the Viet Namese in
this comparison with the Taliban and al-Qaeda , who are anti-Communists and
were allies of the >Americans ( at least al-Qaeda's founders were). The
Taliban and al-Qaeda are politically reactionary.
>
> However, the issue here is nuclear warfare, and I don't think that T and Q
are suicidal just because they are reactionaries.
> So, blurting out that T and Q would not hesitate to use nuclear weapons
and would be indifferent to nuclear retaliation and >annihilation of their
own peoples is an irresponsible thing to say in the current very dangerous
circumstances. I mean it is >dangerous in the sense that it might contribute
to the American people tolerating a nuclear attack by the U.S.
I don't think they're suicidal because they're reactionary; I think they're suicidal because they're suicidal. I shouldn't have to point to the two jets that slammed into the Towers, the one that hit the Pentagon (or didn't, if you go with certain posters), and the one that crashed in Pennsylvania, do I?
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CB: The difference is between individual martyrdom and getting your whole people nuked.
You should provide a lot more proof before you jump from the willingness to die as an individual to the willingness to get your whole culture wiped out. All combat soldiers, including Western ones, are risking their own deaths, in the Durkheimian sense of suicide.
I have not seen the evidence that the Sept. 11 soldiers were suicidal with respect to their whole civilization or nation.
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Nor should I have to remind you of al-Qaeda's grand dream of a Wahabbi Islamic state that does battle with the decadent West.
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CB: You would have to be saying that that grand dream also includes the co-annihilation of the Wahabbi Islamic state in its battle with the decadent West. I think, from what I know, that it is pretty whacko to claim that the "grand dream" includes converting the American people to Islam by force. This seems an exaggerated version of Islamic fundamentalist irrationality of the type that comes out of the Bush admin.
All banter aside, I think it is very important not to make this type of leap in logic at this particular time when the real danger is the U.S. launching some kind of nuclear attack , more than the danger of an al-Qaeda nuclear attack. The U.S. is the actually existing Evil Empire, with a history of actually nuked a group of people, not to mention murdering millions of "Asians" in wars.
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No, not every member of the Taliban or al-Qaeda is suicidal (certainly not bin-Laden, alas), but this is part of the program. When you are promised Paradise when dying for the Holy Cause, what'll stop you from crashing a civilian plane into a packed building, or running into machine gun fire with no hope of survival? I trust that, like me, you are pleased to see so many reactionaries bite the dust in the previous week. No?
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CB: The destruction of the Taliban is hard not to endorse in itself. Unfortunately, it can't be taken out of its overall context, which is the U.S. Reactionary World Empire, so that a U.S. victory anywhere undermines whatever is good about the death of a few reactionaries. Recall that those reactionaries would not have been in power but for the U.S. imperial support. We can count on the U.S. replacing them with new reactionaries.