How The Barbarians Convince Their Kids To Die For Allah
Kevin Toolis writes for The Daily Mail:
Farman Ulla is just 16, though he looks much younger. He is thin, malnourished and with a face scarred by acne.It is hard to believe this scrawny boy is a terrorist.
He was captured by Afghanistan intelligence agents while on a mission to detonate a bomb which would have killed himself and dozens of others in Jalalabad.
If he lost his nerve then his 'back-up' -- another boy -- would detonate the bomb for him by remote control.
It was a boy just like Farman, grinning from ear to ear as he pushed an explosive-laden wheelbarrow, who killed three Royal Marines in Helmand with his suicide bomb last week.
I've come to Kabul to this secret police headquarters to find out just how the Taliban can convince an Afghan boy to become a human bomb.
The first question I ask Farman is about death: is he not afraid of dying?
'Oh no, even before you blow yourself up the virgins come to the site of the explosion and wait for you to take you to paradise,' he says confidently, parroting his Taliban masters, who promise suicide bombers they will be rewarded with virgins for their act.
Then, chillingly, he smiles.
...'How did your bomb work?' I ask Farman. He seems confused by the question and it quickly becomes clear he doesn't really know.
'It's God's will if you live or die,' he says. Even now, after his capture, this child is confused about how he was going to die -- and who would press the button.
But then it would not be hard to fool Farman. He is illiterate, a simple peasant. I ask him if he can point out on a map where Britain is, or the U.S., or even Pakistan.
He can't. He doesn't even know the Koran. He tells me what his Taliban brainwashers told him, that the former President of Pakistan, Pervez Musharraf, is a Jew and a Christian and should therefore be killed. But when I ask him to explain what a Jew is, he has no idea.
But he does know who he hates: Westerners.
'I was told the infidels were invading our lands and doing bad things to our women. I wanted to go on the jihad to kill them.'
I ask him if he wants to kill me. 'No, not now, not here,' he says sheepishly. 'If they let me go, I'll never do another suicide attempt.'
A malnourished, undereducated, undersexed fool... There' are a lot of those in Afghanistan. Next time someone tells you about how our enemy is exotic and like nothing you've ever seen before, and you have to completely change your entire worldview to wrap your mind around the problem (and maybe trust the spy agencies and experts, too), you'll know better.
Crid [cridcridatgmail] at December 22, 2008 12:31 AM
Ever wonder why so many religions focus first, and with intensity , on making sure no one gets laid without the religion's sanction?
Answer: no better way to capture the energy of young men than to control their ability to get ass.
Spartee at December 22, 2008 7:26 AM
They have starting using mentally-ill women in Iraq a couple of months ago. I should be surprised but I am not. What can we expect from a medieval society hell-bent into destroying anything modern?
If we mix this with the current apologist mindset of the West, we will never see the end of this. We will move on but we will see more of this in the future.
Toubrouk at December 22, 2008 8:37 AM
Tooby, that's one reason why "war on terror" is such a bad description for this. In the Dubya administration's constellation of weaknesses, the inability to name things effectively looms large.
Crid [cridcridatgmail] at December 22, 2008 8:47 AM
You got it Crid. It should be called "The War Against Savagery". This title would had shock the weak-wiled in the middle-east but it would make a better sense.
Toubrouk at December 22, 2008 9:10 AM
crid, you gotta call it the war against terror... otherwise it's the war against illiterate, deluded peasants. There are many westerners who have NO idea how dangerous a person like that is, and will do everything they can to be nice to them. Sadly, even edumacating them doesn't help, families don't help, money doesn't. This seems to be a top-down problem, where you have to eliminate the upper management...
SwissArmyD at December 22, 2008 10:07 AM
On a broader note, the citation shows the inverse link between religion and reason very well.
"Next time someone tells you about how our enemy is exotic and like nothing you've ever seen before, and you have to completely change your entire worldview to wrap your mind around the problem (and maybe trust the spy agencies and experts, too), you'll know better."
But, isn't this guy the "something" we haven't seen before?
The public doesn't believe the Kamikaze existed. You can tell them, but I think they don't believe it.
A warning against "spy agencies and experts" is always appropriate, but simply denying that they have anything right isn't; the warning is best applied to always check what the agent's goals are, and see if they match yours.
Radwaste at December 22, 2008 10:27 AM
> otherwise it's the war against
> illiterate, deluded peasants
I'm cool with that, as long as it's war that will protect us from murderous conduct. If you plan on murdering people, being dim and foolish and disenfranchised isn't an excuse.
> The public doesn't believe the Kamikaze
> existed. You can tell them, but I think
> they don't believe it
I distrust all worldviews constructed on a foundation of worry about what the little people are thinking. It's work enough to keep my own observations in order (see the concluding sentence). When small-minded people, average Joes, or once-per-millennium geniuses present mistaken perceptions, I'll be happy to correct each of them in turn and in the moment. There's no need to anticipate trouble on anyone's behalf.
> always check what the agent's
> goals are, and see if they
> match yours
Goal #1: Extend the necessity of having an Agency.
Bzzt! No go!
Well now... That was easy enough, wuzzenit?
Crid [cridcridatgmail] at December 22, 2008 4:14 PM
"I'm cool with that, as long as it's war that will protect us from murderous conduct." Crid
yeah me too, I was just speaking from a PR point of view... it's a tough sell to the people that think if you are nice to the world, the world is nice back. It's just that sometimes it isn't, and they can't believe it...
SwissArmyD at December 22, 2008 7:30 PM
"I distrust all worldviews constructed on a foundation of worry about what the little people are thinking."
Hey, they'er an integral part of any power struggle. How do you avoid them?
And although any agency's first goal is to preserve itself, its other actions still have to be evaluated for congruency with your goals. You wouldn't want to be a single-issue voter, would you?
Radwaste at December 22, 2008 8:43 PM
> they'er an integral part of
> any power struggle
What are? What "they" are "an integral part of any power struggle"? And which particular power struggle do you have on your mind?
You, and Amy, and many many others, have this idea that you're qualitatively different from other people... So that if some supernaturally righteous force (God, maybe) came out of the sky to officially designate who was who and what was what on this planet, you're certain that you'd be put in charge of an important committee. (Corner office, designated parking, franking privileges, all that stuff.) This is so obvious to you that you think it's obvious to everyone else, too. You don't just think others happen to be wrong, you think they can't be more right than you are.
> You wouldn't want to be a single-
> issue voter, would you?
Why not? It ain't about being a single-issue voter, it's about having standards. Spy agencies are completely incongruent with a righteous, decent America.
You can believe in the the spy agencies and secret international intelligence actions if you want to... But if you do, you must never complain about Abu Gharaib or Guantanamo.
Personally, I want to complain about those places a lot.
Crid [cridcridatgmail] at December 22, 2008 11:08 PM
Sorry, here's the link of our spooks doing their part to make America proud and beloved.
Crid [cridcridatgmail] at December 22, 2008 11:09 PM
It's very simple how they convince the kids to die. Leave poverty, learn skills, get a job afterward and have your college paid for. I heard one young black man explain all of this to a friend of his in a bus a few years before 9/11.
Don at December 23, 2008 11:18 AM
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