Knowing Al-Qaeda: The Epistemology of Terrorism by Christina Hellmich & Andreas Behnke

Author:Christina Hellmich & Andreas Behnke [Hellmich, Christina & Behnke, Andreas]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781409423676
Goodreads: 15064045
Publisher: Ashgate Publishing
Published: 2012-07-01T00:00:00+00:00

The US and al-Qaeda as Constructed in America’s metrics of the GWoT

As seen above, all metrics are imperfect and dependent upon the variables chosen. Yet regardless of the gamut of methodological problems inherent in defining and generating any set of metrics, the metrics that are produced tend to reveal much more than just details of the specific phenomenon they purport to measure. In our case, it is often overlooked how the arbitrary, and often problematic, measures of success developed by the Bush administration, consciously or inadvertently, produced and reproduced very particular notions of AQ and the US within themselves. Thus, while there has been considerable discussion about the legitimacy of the GWoT and the behavior and construction of the world’s sole superpower in the discourse of the war, relatively little space has been assigned to how AQ has been constructed within the metrics used to assess America’s performance in its confrontation with transnational terrorism. Similarly, little thought has been given to how these metrics reveal a very particular kind of power projection in the international system on part of the United States. These metrics construct an unchallenged view of the ‘enemy,’ which unproblematically frames and accepts AQ as an exogenous ‘other.’ AQ thus becomes the anomaly threatening modern, tolerant, civilized societies and the world, as we know it. At the same time, these metrics clearly delineate what the United States is, what it stands for and what its rights and responsibilities are in the post-Cold War international system. Thus, methodologically flawed, bare-boned and a hindrance to any objective assessment of America’s performance in the GWoT though they may be, the metrics generated by the US government nonetheless also provide critical epistemological insights into the Bush administration’s particular construction of AQ, the world and America’s role and position within it.

Any attempt to understand how the US and AQ is framed in these metrics must first contextualize the GWoT in an understanding of the United States’ position within the international system at a given moment in history. This is because understanding and acknowledging America’s system-level hegemonic ambitions in the post-Cold War international environment explains US foreign policy under the GWoT. These ambitions also actively influence the construction of its self-identity which, in turn, shapes how the United States’ views and assesses its own performance in the fight against AQ. Strategically, the GWoT reflects America’s attempt to use its position as the world’s sole superpower to secure an unmatched position of advantage in the international system. It also represents the culmination of the neoconservative call for using force to check the emergence of potential challengers to US predominance that emerged in the period immediately after the Cold War ended. The neoconservatives argued that the new post-Cold War world order meant that traditional balance of power strategies were now not only unnecessary but also imminently unsuitable. Moreover, various observers also emphasized that ongoing system-level changes meant that the US could not remain the sole superpower in the world forever. This was America’s ‘unipolar moment’

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