Neo-Logic
Reality Checker
We cannot sustainably fight a war on terror because terrorism is an ideological struggle using guerrilla tactics and unconventional warfare. Sooner or later, we'll come to realize that we have to fight ideas with ideas. We have to fight terrorism on the normative -- that is, to address the norms of terrorism as a standard means of address personal or ideological grievances in some areas into a taboo that is found to be as repulsive as other taboos on the individual level like child pornography, bestiality, and cannibalism. We have to back up the ideological fight not just with military application, but also with substantive means by using soft power such as opening more communication channels, helping with basics of nation building (schools and other very basic infrastructure), and using religion itself to undermine terrorism by advocating moderates and liberals to combat the extremists. Best part of all, application of soft power while cutting back on hardline military application would cost a lot less and is likely to have a much more positive long term effects.
While the military works on different methods of soft power, one that would have great impact immediately and for the long term is to invest in education. I cannot stress enough on how important schools are in terrorist prone countries. States like Afghanistan has a large population of school aged children and Yemen has over 50% of its population below 15 years of age, for example. Let's spend a few billions building schools, flood them with western and middle-eastern teachers and the necessary equipments supplies to make it all work. Get the local communities involved and invested in the education and future of their own children and they'll themselves protect and fend off terrorism at the ideological root. Don't involve the military to give terrorists a reason for striking schools and claiming to target the military presence. The repulsion factor of suicide bombings on schools that have 0 military presence or attacks on staffs that are there to help the youth will be do so much more to repulse terrorism in the local populace than we ever could with hard military power.
We made the mistake of investing billions to help the Mujahadeens fight the Russians in Afghanistan but not even a few million to help the huge population of school aged children in a war battered and failed state. Instead of helping to educate them with minimal investment, we left them to grow up to be a large population of uneducated and easily recruitable members for terrorist networks with plenty of personal and proxy grievances to go around.
We spend trillions on war efforts, but the question we should ask ourselves in the face of mounting deficits and unsustainable military spending is: would spending billions to invest in education of the same countries be more effective? After all, you attract more bees with honey than vinegar. Keep in mind this would not SOLVE terrorism because there's no such thing as a silver bullet in this topic. But I do think education would go a long way to address some of the root causes of terrorism -- xenophobia perpetuated by misperception and misunderstanding, lack of historical context, sense of personal or social identity, lack of opportunities stemming from lack of a skilled labor force to create any meaningful supplies to incite demand, etc.
Proof is in the pudding. Greg Mortenson, author of Best Selling book "Three Cups of Tea", has already been building schools to promote education in Pakistan and Afghanistan regions. So far, he's built 131 schools that are educating over 30,000 school aged children, many are females because they can become a firewall against terrorists since Jihadists first have to get permission from their mothers. He's involving the local community in the effort and they themselves are protecting the schools and fending off terrorist threats. It's been effective.
Terrorists need local support and failing that, their efforts become so much weaker. And, children need alternatives to violence. It's a win-win.
While the military works on different methods of soft power, one that would have great impact immediately and for the long term is to invest in education. I cannot stress enough on how important schools are in terrorist prone countries. States like Afghanistan has a large population of school aged children and Yemen has over 50% of its population below 15 years of age, for example. Let's spend a few billions building schools, flood them with western and middle-eastern teachers and the necessary equipments supplies to make it all work. Get the local communities involved and invested in the education and future of their own children and they'll themselves protect and fend off terrorism at the ideological root. Don't involve the military to give terrorists a reason for striking schools and claiming to target the military presence. The repulsion factor of suicide bombings on schools that have 0 military presence or attacks on staffs that are there to help the youth will be do so much more to repulse terrorism in the local populace than we ever could with hard military power.
We made the mistake of investing billions to help the Mujahadeens fight the Russians in Afghanistan but not even a few million to help the huge population of school aged children in a war battered and failed state. Instead of helping to educate them with minimal investment, we left them to grow up to be a large population of uneducated and easily recruitable members for terrorist networks with plenty of personal and proxy grievances to go around.
We spend trillions on war efforts, but the question we should ask ourselves in the face of mounting deficits and unsustainable military spending is: would spending billions to invest in education of the same countries be more effective? After all, you attract more bees with honey than vinegar. Keep in mind this would not SOLVE terrorism because there's no such thing as a silver bullet in this topic. But I do think education would go a long way to address some of the root causes of terrorism -- xenophobia perpetuated by misperception and misunderstanding, lack of historical context, sense of personal or social identity, lack of opportunities stemming from lack of a skilled labor force to create any meaningful supplies to incite demand, etc.
Proof is in the pudding. Greg Mortenson, author of Best Selling book "Three Cups of Tea", has already been building schools to promote education in Pakistan and Afghanistan regions. So far, he's built 131 schools that are educating over 30,000 school aged children, many are females because they can become a firewall against terrorists since Jihadists first have to get permission from their mothers. He's involving the local community in the effort and they themselves are protecting the schools and fending off terrorist threats. It's been effective.
Terrorists need local support and failing that, their efforts become so much weaker. And, children need alternatives to violence. It's a win-win.
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