Marching Toward Hell by Michael Scheuer

Author:Michael Scheuer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Free Press
Published: 2008-10-06T04:00:00+00:00

What Does It Mean for the United States?

Although geographically dispersed, the locations just discussed have several commonalities. None of the six, for example, is a direct nation-state threat to the United States. Rather it is the internal instability and rising Islamist militancy in each that poses concerns for Washington, challenging its traditional fixation on threats from nation-states.

How to cope with these problems? First, Washington must look at each with the narrow and more accurate definition of national interest captured in the idea of life-and-death issues. From this perspective, it is clear that of the six locales only two, the North Caucasus and Nigeria, meet the life-and-death standard; the former because it provides access to the FSU for Islamists seeking to procure WMD, and the latter because of the fast-growing importance of its energy resources to the U.S. economy.

Three of the locations, Thailand, Bangladesh, and Somalia, present no obvious threat to U.S. national security. That said, the risk that Washington will become involved in each is significant and already under way on a small scale in Somalia. In Thailand, Cold War–era commitments leave open a possible requirement for U.S. military support for the Bangkok regime against the growing Thai Muslim insurgency. Such a U.S. involvement would dramatically increase the anti-U.S. focus of Islamists across the Far East and would provide further validation for bin Laden’s claim that Washington intends to keep Muslims under the control of oppressive governments. U.S. interests therefore would be best served by revisiting and abrogating any commitments that could lead to U.S. military involvement in Thailand.

Washington has no treaty obligations in Bangladesh or Somalia, but antinationalist groups are certain to press for U.S. intervention, and it will be at risk of involvement to the extent that it lacks the will to resist their entreaties. As political instability and the Islamists’ ascendancy increases in each place, NGOs, human rights groups, and women’s rights groups will demand that the United States “do something.” But in neither country would U.S. involvement be wise, let alone necessary. Violent human tragedies seem certain to unfold in each place, but none of that violence will be directed against America or its interests unless we intervene. Washington should turn back the pressure from the antinationalists. If Amnesty International, or an NGO, or Franklin Graham’s Samaritan’s Purse organization wants to ride to the rescue in Bangladesh or Somalia, the U.S. government should advise them of the dangers in each and likewise warn them that if they do go into such dangerous environments they will be on their own—no U.S. military units will be coming to their aid. This must be made especially clear regarding Somalia, as antinationalist groups tend to couple Somalia, Sudan, and Darfur into a single “cause” and already have the support of Senator John McCain and several of his colleagues for sending some sort of U.S.-U.K. military force to Darfur, where no conceivable U.S. national interest is at stake.

Europe is a quandary for Americans and their government. There is nothing that the

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