The Attacks Of 9/11 As Evidence Of A Clash Of Religions - Book Report/Review Example

The Attacks Of 9/11 As Evidence Of A Clash Of Religions The 9/11 attack on the United States of America brought emerging issues among the citizen, the government, scholars and the U.S army commanders. People pondered why would a person or a group of people attack and kill so many people without a single feel of guilt. The attack left many question than answers and Wright in his book “The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11” explain the emergence of Al-Qaeda and it leaders[Law06]. Wright begins telling of a man named Sayyid Qutb, an educated who was educated in America like other young people of his time, but devoted to teaching Islamic beliefs. Wright goes father to write off Al-Qaeda head, Osama Bin laden and his partners in the establishment of a terrorist group Ayman al-Zawahiri and Muhammad Omar. In his entire book Wright expound on the man behind the 9/11 attack and the plot that Al-Qaeda leader never believed would come true. This essay critic the account as narrated by Wright and give an alternative view of what transpired before the September 11, 2001. In his book, Wright explains the personality, life and character of the jihadist movement that plotted the attack on American soil. Moreover, Wright helps people understand the ideas, faith and violent force behind Al Qaeda movement. He talk of Qutb, as a Muslim Brotherhood ideologist who confused of what to take in his life end up modelling the Modern Islamic Movement. Qutb became so radical on realizing the evil habit that American were practicing and resolved to move of out the country. He returned to Egypt where he was imprisoned by the Abdel Nasser’s regime. While in prison, Qutb would write what became the foundation thinking of Muslim militant all over the world. The prison life was so harsh for Qutb under his fellow Muslim that prompted him write ideologies of takfir. He accused his jailer of worshiping Nasser instead of God[Law06]. According to Wright, the attack on September 11, 2001 can be explained by the personality of four individual which is not true[Law06]. Wright believes that Bin laden and his accomplishes Zawahiri, together with FBI counterterrorism boss John O’Neil and his CIA counterpart Michael Scheuer behavior are to blame for the death of nearly 3000 American. Wright presents the two side of the event leading to the attack. Wright also talks of Zawahiri as a strong supporter of Islam even when he was a small boy. Zawahiri was exposed to Jihad early in his life and at one time he refused to ride a car that had Egyptian vice president. Zawahiri accused the regime at that time (1954) of killing Muslins for no apparent reason. On the other hand, Bin Laden was a pious man in his early life, but he tried not to be a prig. Instead, he devoted his life playing music instrument which he believed that served his beliefs according to Islamic faith. Moreover, Bin Laden and a group he had formed recorded and sung music about the benefit of jihad[Law06]. Through the analysis of the early life of Al-Qaeda leaders, Wright brings to light the reason behind the September, 11 2001 attacks. He argues that the demonstration of the jihad characters in young Zawahiri and Bin Laden explain the hate they had against Christian and that this is the reason for the spread of terrorism[Law06]. However, this might not be true because America do have Muslim devotee and who swore allegiance to the American philosophy. Moreover, there are other radical Islamic State that practice peaceful coexistence with other members of the society. Therefore, the Muslim fundamental beliefs are not best suited to explain the 9/11 attack. Wright does not only blame the Al-Qaeda for the killing of American, but he blame some of the U.S. official for failing to prevent an attack. He describes John O-Neill an FBI agent as a person who failed to do his duties as stipulated by the law. Wright regard O-Neill as a womanizer who loved fine cigar and Chivas Regal. Moreover, Wright tells of Michael Scheuer, a CIA official as an obsessive officer who refused to retire when the agency required him leave his duty. Scheuer failed to respond adequately to the agency required to thwart the 9/11 attack. Moreover, Wright argues that there was growing the lift between O-Neill and Scheuer and this hampered to working relation between FBI and CIA in finding intelligence that was required to protect the people. Wright argument is not concrete because the magnitude of the secrecy involved in planning the attack was so high that even the Al Qaeda leader, Osama Bin Laden and Zawahiri never spoke of it. The plan was made out of public knowledge, and the espionage of the U.S. agencies could not help stop the attack. Moreover, the attack was beyond the rational of the intelligence that the civilian airplane can be used as a weapon of mass murder[The11]. The attack was one of its kinds because the attacker used civilian as a shield to avoid being blown down before their mission was accomplished. The book tries to find why and who were the people too willing to die a painful death by driving civilian aircraft into World Trade Centre and the Twin Towers[Law06]. O-Neill having been at the helm of security at the time was one of the victims among the 3000 people killed that day. Wright demonstrates how the failure of security officers can be fatal even to their lives. As he tries to unravel the origin of Al Qaeda, Wright narrate of the interview of a Sudanese informer, Jamalal-Fadl, who had stolen $100,000 from bin Laden and run away. Fadl claimed to have worked for bin Laden in Sudan and was the first person to given information of the existence of a terrorist unit called al Qaeda. FBI agent Dan Coleman on his effort to find cells of terrorism found out that al Qaeda had almost inflated the whole world from Asia, Middle East, South America, and Africa and even in America. By the time the American was hearing of the terror group, it had 93 members who had close associate within American[Law06]. Wright wonders why the group has a great hatred to the American as they vowed to attack American wherever they existed. Osama bin Laden would say that ‘the terror of death would find you even in the looming of your towers.’ Wright argues that many Muslims countries have so many problem that lead it young generation into jihad. He says that the most significant drive into radicalism is despair. Moreover, Wright argues that there are ‘many roads to despair’[Law10]. According to Wright, the formation of the al Qaeda was as a result of a small group being desperate of the ruling class and the treatment of Muslim. Bin Laden and Zawahiri viewed the authority in Saudi Arabia and Egypt as authorities and insensitive to the Muslim belief. They, therefore, learned to hate their government and all the allies that they engaged in including the American government. The Koran prohibits suicide, and it is also a taboo for Muslim to commit suicide. Therefore, Zawahiri on found a better way of promising desperate people a ‘highway to heaven’ through suicide bombing[Law06]. He argued that once you die for a bigger goal of Muslim beliefs, one is assured of paradise. Therefore, these are the fundamental that shaped al Qaeda, but angered the rest of the Muslim community because the terrorist did not spare Muslim either. However, Wright may have erred in this as most of the jihad have been found to be people with good health and from well up family. Therefore, there is more than despair for young people to join al Qaeda to fight Americans. One of the guiding principles of al Qaeda is humility and humiliation. The Muslim religion praises and advocate it follower to practice humility. However, al Qaeda leaders were known to exhibit both humiliation and humility as the same time. The like of bin Laden and Zawahiri hated the western influence that threatened Islamic culture and religion. Therefore, to avoid Western values, Christianity religion and political dictates al Qaeda was determined to humiliate American and its Western allies. However, the sheer hate of American might be as a result of an attempt to create a common enemy among the Muslims and thus unite them to forge a common agenda in the global economy. Nevertheless, this failed to work for al Qaeda because almost all Muslim authority rejected the group activities. For example, Zawahiri was accused of assassinating Anwar Sadat in 1981 with the aim of establishing an Islamic state[Law06]. The political unrest in Egypt lead to the formation of one of the most dangerous terror group in the world, al Qaeda. Though Wright does not bring it out and blames personality as the driving force toward the 9/11, Kibble argues that the religious motivation is to blame[Kib02]. He outlines the instruction given to the hijackers of plane that attack American building on September 11, 2001 as religious instructions. The manual demanded the hijackers to pray once they entered into the plane. For example, the manual said ‘you should pray; you should fast. You should ask God for guidance; you should ask God for help……Read the Koran’[Kib02]. This demonstrates that the attacker were fulfilling their religious beliefs. Moreover, bin Laden developed hatred for America during the Gulf War. The American troop joined other Muslim countries in the Middle East to fight off Iraq troop from Kuwait[Kib02]. The War required the American to establish a military base in the region, and they had secure Saudi Arabia because the country enjoyed a close relationship with Washington government. For this reason bin Laden accused American of stepping into a Muslim country, the holy city Mohammed was born and raised. According to Islam, Mecca is a holy city for Muslims alone and non-Christian are not around to enter[Kib02]. Therefore, it is out of this religious belief that bin Laden developed anti-Western sentiment[Kib02]. According to Kibble, Samuel Huntington in his 1993 essay suggested that the post-Cold War would be prompted by the difference in culture all over the world[Kib02]. Huntington argued that Muslim, Japanese, Western, Hindu, Latin America and possibly Africa would advance conflict and replace the old political ideologies and boundary conflicts[Kib02]. According to Kibble, Huntington explained that the Western concepts, beliefs and values differ significantly with the fundamentally of other civilizations. In the essay, Huntington, therefore, argue that a crash of civilization would be inevitable given American expansionism of it ideologies in the world. Therefore, the 9/11 attack was not a personality problem and the failure of the CIA and FBI, but might be a crash of civilization as suggested by Kibble[Kib02]. The model of Wright analysis of the reason for the 9/11 is good, but it is not sufficient. The interviews of more than six hundred people who has had contact or had proximity with the al Qaeda leaders does give the reason for the American attack. Moreover, the interviewees narrated their observation of the behavior and conducts of bin Laden and Zawahiri. Therefore, they may have failed to explain the drive that made the top al Qaeda chief engage in terror and more so a vehement hate for American. One of the agreed reason for the killing of American in 9/11 is the failure of the individual tasked in gathering intelligence and the immigration department. The 19 jihad that hijacked American plane on September 11, 2001 were not American and had entered the country through faked passports. According to the CIA and FBI report all of the jihadists enter America through eastern airports and used state document to board airplane on the fateful day. Therefore, for this instances I agree with Wright that Michael Scheuer and John O-Neill failed in their institutional capacity to protect the Americans[Law06]. Wright personality study of the men that could have prevented the 9/11 attack is a wrong perception to view the work of the institution as an individual responsibility. The CIA and the FBI are department learn by multifaceted individuals and thus a failure on the institution should not be blamed on their leader. Toward the end of the Cold War, the organization structures of the Federal Bureau of Investigation had weak culture, structures and incentive systems[Amy07]. Therefore, the weakness of the FBI prevented the agency to foil the many opportunities that could have prevented the 9/11 plot[Amy07]. Though unlike other authors who devoted their writing of the causes of 9/11 failed to capture the length that Wright did. His works are the most appealing and give clues on what that have not been done by intelligence organization. He describes his analysis with an authority that has not been seen there before. Wright dispels the notion that the jihad that attacked American were trained in Germany. He argues that the Jihad travelled on their volition to seek jihad training in Afghanistan. Moreover, he dispels that bin Laden was a creation of the CIA. According to Wright, the CIA did not issue aid to the Arab fighting the Soviet Union in Afghanistan[Law06]. On the relationship between al Qaeda and Iraq Ansar ul-Islam, Wright provides a false and dangerous assumption that Zawahiri and Abu al-Zarqawi established it with the help of Iraq intelligence. This is not true. According to Jason Burke, Zarqawi testified to him that Ansar ul-Islam existed before the time Zawahiri is said to have visited Iraq[Jas06]. According to Burke, Wright is so mad of refute that his book is subjected to by his critics. The account of his interview is refuted by another interviewee by another investigative journalist such as Burke. For example, one of the Iraq opposition leader argued that Wright writing on terrorism in Iraq and a link to al Qaeda is totally false. Wright argument that bin Laden was the figure that controlled al Qaeda is also challenges by many intelligence sources. According to the FBI Anwar Zawahiri, is the man that guide and control al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden was a poster boy. Zawahiri an Egyptian-born pediatrician was the man behind the 9/11 attack. He was the thinker that changed al Qaeda tactic of fighting Middle East countries that differed on their agenda. He endeared in anti-Western propaganda that had made it possible for numerous attack on U.S embassy in Kenya, Tanzania and Yemen. The Looming Tower open up an analysis of the al-Qaeda structure and the leaders behind the terrorism propaganda against the West[Law06]. The analysis is a unique, detailed life experience of Osama, bin Laden, Anwar Zawahiri, and Sayyid Qutb[Law06]. Both bin Laden and Zawahiri carry on the ideologies of Qutb after he was killed as a result of his advocacy for violence[Law06]. Wright helps people to understand the historical root of terrorism and why it has been persistence in recent years. Moreover, he shed more light on what intelligence organization has failed to do and his work offer a better proposition of American to call for better counterterrorism measures. Wright books all details the materialistic culture of American society that made Qutb hate and advocate that anti-West semantic that was taken over by al Qaeda. The book is resourceful on the way to merge the two different cultures and enhance a better coexistence of American and the Arabs all over the world. The personal characteristics of the characters in the book offer as a guide for people to observe people with similar attitude and behavior so as to avoid the emergence of more terror groups in the globe. In conclusion, one of the weaknesses of Wright book is believing that bin Laden and his close associates as replacement of all jihad in the world. He give too much attention to al Qaeda leaders and disregard other terror groups such as the Muslim brotherhood in Africa, Hezbollah and Hamas in the Middle East. However, Wright have given insufficient details of the collaboration to these terror groups with al Qaeda and whether they contributed to the 9/11 attack. References Law06: , (Wright, The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11, 2006), The11: , (The National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism, 2011), Law10: , (Wright, 2010), Kib02: , (Kibble, 2002), Amy07: , (Zegart, 2007), Jas06: , (Burke, 2006), Read More