Why I Challenge Islamaphobic Claims on Social Media

This afternoon I spent a good deal of time challenging a statement made by a friend on Facebook that "The majority of Muslims in the world believe in Sharia law and want it imposed on the world." Although it was fairly easy to show that his claim was a "hasty generalization," the discussion didn't permit an explanation of why I take issue with fallacious Islamaphobic rhetoric. I thought it would be a good topic for a blog post. 

It is not disputed that we are in a conflict with radical elements of Islam, nor is it disputed that they consider us their enemy. These are real issues. But what are our objectives in dealing with this conflict? And what are their objectives? What strategies should we use to achieve our objectives? What is their strategy?

Our Objectives

We have two principal objectives: 1.) Eliminate domestic terrorism here in the US and elsewhere; and 2.) avoid a long, protracted ground war that we may not be able to win. 

We also have several secondary objective to consider: 

• We need to minimize any military, political or economic advantage those that consider us as enemies and want to harm us may have.
• We want to maximize our military, political and economic advantages.
• We want to minimize wasting of resources 
• We want to create a stable political and economic situation in the Middle East; preferably one in which our economic interests are protected.

The Radical Islamic Objectives

It would be too easy to say that the enemies' objectives are to impose Islam on the rest of the world. This may be the case, but most wars are fought for economic  and purely political reasons, and I don't think the current situation is any different. Most of radical Islam is already in areas where Islam is dominant, so we can probably rule out seeking political control, although the situation in Syria mitigates this argument. That conflict is between different factions of Islam - Sunni vs Shi'a - not directed toward the west. (Compare this to the religious wars within Christianity starting in the 15th century between Catholics and Protestants.) A similar argument applies with regard to economic resources. These are Islamic factions attempting to take control of resources from other Islamic factions. The exception here is Israel, which is an economic power in the area. 

There are, however, several strategic objectives that the radical Islamic factions could be pursuing with regard to the west: 

• Weaken our support for Israel or the Islamic factions opposing them.
• Weaken us economically to prevent us interfering with their plans.
• Use the enmity as a recruiting tool to swell their rankes
• Draw us into a protracted ground war where they have significant military advantages.
• Tie up our economic and political resources around domestic security, impairing our ability to play on the larger stage.

The Playing Field

There are an estimated 1.5 billion Muslims in the world, with about 20% (300,000,000) of them radicalized. That's more than the entire population of the US, but it leaves 1.2 Billion Muslims non-aligned. The radicals have demonstrated that they are willing and capable of non-traditional warfare. They fight in their own countries with guerrilla tactics and use terrorism abroad. They are also capable of playing on public opinion and using propaganda to their advantage. As we have discovered in Iraq and Afghanistan, we can quickly invade and take over a country, but occupation is difficult to impossible, and very costly. The radicals have learned from that tactics Washington and the militias used against the British in the Revolutionary War, and that Ho Chi Minh used against us in Viet Nam. 

The United States has the most powerful conventional military in recorded history, but that military is nigh useless an occupation in a country where we do not have the support of the general population. going in to a country like Iraq, Afghanistan or Syria puts our forces at risk of guerrilla tactics and requires immense amounts of resources to maintain supply lines, etc. Without the support of the local population, we cannot possibly win on the ground. Meanwhile, using our powerful military at a distance provides the other side with propaganda opportunities with claims of collateral damages to civilians. 

In play here are the hearts and minds of the 1.2 billion non-aligned Muslims. The radicals would like to radicalize as many of them as they can. We, obviously, need to prevent that, and to the extent possible, move them in the other direction.

Strategies

Part of the radicals strategy is to make westerners, and Americans in particular, look like enemies to those unaligned Muslims. They have two ways of doing this: The first is to use simple propaganda techniques to paint a picture of us as "the Great Satan." This works, but it isn't their most effective tool.

A much more effective tool is to manipulate us in to behaving like the Great Satan. They perpetrate a terrorist attack. This does immediate damage, but it also inflames us. In our anger we react by vilifying all of Islam; declaring them all to be our enemy. We mistreat, ostracize and discriminate against the non-aligned. In doing so, we unwittingly play into the radical's hands. Those we mistreat without just cause now have less reason to trust us and more reason to believe that we are the Great Satan. The ranks of the radicals swells and creates a bigger advantage for them. 

This is not the strategy we want to follow. Obviously.

A much better strategy is to clearly define our enemy as the radical factions as our enemy while doing everything we can to show the 1.2 billion that we are their friends and that we can be  trusted. When the radicals strike, we blame the radicals, not all of Islam. When they accuse us of things that vilify us, we respond with measured responses, we examine their charges and adjust our position toward the 1.2 billion as necessary to actually be their friend. We help those that need it, especially including those divisions within Islam that the radicals are also attacking. We provide help for refugees. Etc. I think you get the idea by now. We do everything we can to prevent creating more radicals, and everything we can to befriend those that are neutral or opposed to the radicals. We treat them fairly and equitably.