Judgment Not Included by Thomas L. Friedman - Research Paper Example

?Article Analysis: Judgment Not Included by Thomas L. Friedman. Part I: Introduction In this paper I will summarize and analyse Thomas L. Friedman’s article Judgment Not Included. The article appeared in the New York Times on April 27, 2013 and addresses the findings of investigators of the bombing that took place at the Boston Marathon. In particular, the investigators found that the motivations for the bombing were related to disapproval of the U.S. actions in Iraq in Afghanistan. Moreover, the investigation concluded that the suspects were not influenced by or involved in a foreign terrorist organization, but were rather influenced by internet websites. Part II: Summary Friedman reflects on the rationale of the Boston bomber suspects and the internet’s role in informing the rationale. According to Friedman, investigators reported that the surviving suspect indicated that he and his brother were upset about the U.S.’s invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan and that their opinions and feelings were informed by websites visited on the internet. Friedman is not surprised that the brothers were bothered by the U.S. invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan as it probably angered lots of Muslims. Friedman however, takes issue with how the two suspects chose to express their dissatisfaction. Bombing the Boston Marathon and taking the lives of individuals who have nothing to do with the official acts of the U.S. government and who may have even been Muslims is particularly disturbing when the suspects had a number of more effective and far less dangerous options open to them. To begin with, the suspects were living in the U.S. and could have organized peaceful assemblies to draw attention to their opposition to the U.S.’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In fact, they are at liberty to raise and draw attention to any issue that they might feel warrants attention. Friedman also wonders why the brothers did not chose to do something productive for Afghanistan. For instance, the brothers could have contributed to community development in Afghanistan with a view to making them less vulnerable to foreign invasion. The brothers could have obtained a higher education and repatriated to one of those Muslim states and made productive contributions to those communities. Certainly the choice that was ultimately made did nothing to help Iraq and Afghanistan nor the brothers themselves. In fact their actions did more harm than good. Friedman argues that the brothers are a small sample size, but do represent a trend among Islamic radicals. They have a tendency to use violence as an expression of their dissatisfaction with Western governments’ treatment of Muslims. In the process, they end up hurting and even killing Muslims and therefore doing more harm to Muslims than the Western states that motivated their actions in the first place. With respect to the internet’s influence on the suspects’ thinking, Friedman suggests that the internet is an entirely enigmatic invention. On the one hand it is a source of valuable information and on the other hand it is also a dangerous forum for spreading and perpetuating hatred. In this regard, hatred and important information enjoy an uneasy co-existence and unfortunately, the information highway is navigated by children and the rest of the world without supervision. The opinions and a lot of the information exchanged via the internet are uncensored and should be read and processed with caution. Moreover, our judgments should not be informed by random and uncensored opinions and expressed by strangers on the internet. Instead, our judgments should be informed by our actual social learning which begins at home and sadly, this did not happen for the Boston bombing suspects. Part III: Analysis Although Friedman’s suggestion that the Boston bombing suspects alleged acts of terror were counterproductive to their end goals, his suggestion is meaningless to terrorists. As Doran explains, in order to understand why terrorists commit acts of violence we need to ask ourselves “why do they want to provoke us?”1 Terrorism is defined as the use of violence for the purpose of creating fear. The idea is to create fear with the expectation that fear will give rise to some form of action that would accomplish that which the terrorist seeks to accomplish. The terrorist does not use violence for the express purpose of committing murder. Rather the terrorist is attempting to accomplish a more abstract goal. For example, police action could result in conflict between the state and its citizens and this would provide the terrorist with an opportunity to further its goals for a revolution. According to Doran, Al-Qaeda’s attack on the U.S. on September 11, 2001 resulted in an international military response that the was used to promote a revolution. Bin Laden used the wars that resulted from the terrorist attacks to create a rift between the Muslim community and West. Therefore, in my opinion, when Friedman argues that the attacks on the Boston Marathon were a misguided and counterproductive expression of dissatisfaction, he is misunderstanding the way that terrorist think and act. If the young men are in fact guilty of the terrorist attacks and if they are indeed polished terrorists, they are most likely the revolutionary results that Bin Laden intended when he orchestrated the September 11, 2001 attacks on the U.S. This is evidenced by the fact that the surviving suspect reportedly told U.S. authorities investigating the Boston Marathon bombings that he and his brother were motivated to launch the attacks because they were unhappy with the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. As it is, these wars were the military responses to the terrorist attacks on the U.S. and are no doubt the suspects bombing of the Boston Marathon are the kinds of revolutionary responses that Bin Laden intended. Friedman also points out the futility of killing innocent individuals who had nothing to do with the U.S.’s decision to go to war against Afghanistan and Iraq. According to Forrest, this might even be confusing to terrorists and Muslims in general. This is because Islam prohibits bringing harm to innocent children, women and other innocent civilians. However, bin Laden explains the loophole through which Muslim terrorists might escape liability pursuant to Islamic principles and values. According to bin Laden, Americans are not innocent since they elect the officials who commit crimes against Muslims. Moreover, Americans are complicit because they pay taxes and are able to join the military of their own free will and “this is why the American people are not innocent” and are “active members in all these crimes”.2 Absent in bin Laden’s explanation are justifications for killing Muslims and young persons who are not old enough to vote or pay taxes and cannot join the military. Obviously, American Muslims are fair targets since they vote in the U.S., pay U.S. taxes and are eligible for military services. But what of non-American Muslims who are killed by terrorists attacks abroad? In this regard, Friedman’s observation that Muslims are killed by terrorist attacks away from American soil is an irrefutable fact that bin Laden did not defend. Bin Laden did in fact address the issue of Muslims at a later date when he stated that Muslims could be killed for the purpose of for the purpose of safeguarding against interruption the holy war (jihad). Bin Laden noted that several times in the past it was necessary to call off mission in order to save Muslim lives. However, while al-Qaeda takes every precaution to avoid killing Muslims, it will happen at times and al-Qaeda’s missions must not be sacrificed in favor of saving Muslims. Bergen makes the connection between the Boston Marathon bombing and bin Laden’s legacy and ideology. For bin Laden Muslims have a responsibility to defend Islam from the invasions and attacks on Muslims by Western powers. In this regard, Chechens and Russia’s war is “not a centuries – old imperialistic land grab” but instead is “a Western war against Islam.”3 According to the surviving suspect of the Boston Marathon bombing, the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are just another war by the West against Muslims. In fact, in an article published in the New York Times it was predicted that the war instigated by bin Laden would continue long after this death. However, bin Laden’s death did not spark a revolution. Regardless when bin Laden was killed by Americans he departed this world a hero, a religious symbol, and the representation of a Islamic faith which has been overrun by Westernization. Although Muslims are engaged with larger issues today and many young Muslims have difficulties recalling the September attacks on the U.S., bin Laden’s legacy and ideology will undoubtedly reach young Muslims and spark a response in one form or another. For the time being, the Arab spring speaks to a new era of political tensions for Muslims. However, hostilities toward the U.S. and its foreign policy and treatment of Israel serves as a constant reminder of bin Laden’s ideology and legacy although significantly less profound.4 The uncensored and reckless publications of hate via the internet demonstrate just how easy it is for young Muslims to be recruited. If what the young man reportedly told authorities is true, it can be argued that bin Laden’s legacy and ideology continues to resonate among young Muslims as evidenced by the Boston Marathon bombings. As Friedman suggests, the remedy for safeguarding against internet influences is to begin shaping the mind of would-be terrorists at home so as to influence their values and standards. By taking this approach I believe that it is conceivable that the potential for inadvertent and direct influences by terrorist organizations can be eliminated, if not avoided altogether. Part IV Conclusion In this paper, I summarized and analysed Judgment Not Included by Thomas L. Friedman. In analysing the article I used material derived from four publications to illustrate the strengths and weaknesses of Friedman’s article. In the analysis, I pointed out that while the killing of innocent civilians and innocent Muslims are inconsistent with common sense as Friedmen suggests, these killings are perceived as permissible by international terrorists. However, for the most part I found that much of Friedman’s arguments are supported by other authors as reported in this paper. Bibliography Bergen, Peter. “From bin Laden to Boston.” CNN National Security Analyst. April 30, 2013. http://www.cnn.com/2013/04/30/opinion/bergen-bin-ladenism (Retrieved 7 May, 2013). Doran, Michael, Scott. “Somebody Else’s Civil War.” Foreign Affairs, 81(1), (Jan – Feb, 2002) 22-42. Forest, James, J. F. Countering Terrorism and Insurgency in the 21st Century. Westport, CT: Praeger Security International, 2007. Friedman, T. L. “Judgment Not Included.” The New York Times. April 28, 2013, SR11. Shadid, Anthony and Kirkpatrick, David, D. “In Arab World, Bin Laden’s Confused Legacy.” The New York Times, May 2, 2011, F1. Read More