Saint Mo

Here, on the other hand, is the embodiment of wisdom, speaking last week:

Mo Mowlam has called on the British and American governments to open talks with Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda.... Asked if she could imagine "al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden arriving at the negotiating table," she replied: "You have to do that. If you do not you condemn large parts of the world to war forever.

"Some people couldn't conceive of Gerry Adams or Martin McGuinness getting to the table but they did."

It's easy to caricature this as an obtuse and embittered ex-ministerial idiosyncrasy, but that would be a mistake. In reality it’s a potent critique of a fallacy that Dr Mowlam once herself did much to promote at the Northern Ireland office.

Of course it’s risible to suppose that theocratic fascism can be stemmed by bilateral negotiation. When Islamist terrorists slam aeroplanes into office blocks and blow up commuter trains they are not issuing negotiable demands. They have the less abstruse goal of destroying western civilisation. Their barbarities are not a cry for help, but acts of total war. Dr Mowlam’s ironic ululation that “if you do not [talk] you condemn large parts of the world to war forever” is thus exactly wrong. The reason large parts of the world are condemned to war is that radical Islamists declare it, and will not desist till they are literally fought to the death.

But the principle of a negotiated resolution of violent conflicts is tenacious, and plausible, where a terrorist movement – IRA, ETA, FARC, arguably even Hamas – pursues less absolutist goals. Dr Mowlam’s remarks brilliantly expose its hollowness.

True, not all terrorist groups are alike. Some exemplify apocalyptic nihilism. Others might conceivably be weaned to constitutional politics, just as the old Official IRA eventually metamorphosed into the Workers’ Party. But a democratic polity cannot know in advance which terrorist groups fall into which category. The most reliable way to find out is to force the choice upon them by treating them without differentiation as if they are all inveterate and enduring enemies of civilisation.

This turns on its head the philosophy that Dr Mowlam practised in government. Instead of matching a suspension of terrorist violence with political concessions, it offers no concessions at all. Its rationale is to convince terrorists that their goals are unattainable and thus that their alternatives are to sue for peace or face extirpation. Its message is not “extend your ceasefire”, but “abandon violence irrevocably or we will hit you again and again, not to contain you but to destroy you”.

It is a myth that IRA terrorism proved impervious to such an approach. An earlier Labour Northern Ireland Secretary, Roy Mason, came to office in 1976 eschewing political initiatives and promising to roll up the IRA ‘like a tube of toothpaste’. His efforts had a devastating effect on the IRA’s operational effectiveness and precipitated a drastic reduction in terrorist activity. An earlier IRA campaign, begun in 1957, was repelled by the Irish Government by internment, among other indelicate means. Conor Cruise O’Brien, a Cabinet minister in the 1970s, later reflected, “I am convinced that if the later IRA offensive, begun in 1971, had been met with the same determination in the Republic, it too could have been brought to an early end.”

Similarly, Israel’s much-criticised assassination of the Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin continues a pragmatic policy of inflicting heavy costs on terrorist groups. That approach caused Hizbollah to reassess its use of suicide-bombing, a technique it had initiated in the early 1980s, on a straightforward calculus that it wasn’t working. Attacking Hamas directly while withdrawing unilaterally from the Gaza settlements could hardly be bettered as a pacific policy: it demonstrates seriousness about territorial accommodation while discharging the Palestinian Authority’s own treaty obligations – never observed – to crack down on terrorism.

Any peace process worthy of the name must respect the role of deterrence rather than affect to supersede it. If diplomacy has no limit then terrorists will understand it as an opportunity to gain political advantage by continuing with indiscriminate carnage. By invoking a reductio ad absurdum of negotiations with al-Qaeda, Dr Mowlam evidences a personal philosophical journey that is far advanced from her earlier espousal of the politics of the group hug. The candour of her implied self-rebuke is admirable.

Comments

[Matty]

Interestingly, I've been reading John Simpson's excellent book "A Mad World, My Masters" which features the venerable BBC journalist encountering a young Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan whilst Simpson was travelling with Mujahedin fighters covering the war in the 1980s.

Anyone who thinks Osama is a reasonable man who can be negotiated with would do well to read it.

[Damian P.]

I agree wholeheartedly, but I wouldn't lump Hamas in with politcal movements like ETA or FARC. A quick look at the Hamas Charter, with its repeated references to the 'Protocols of the Elders of Zion' and its disavowal of negotiating with the hated Jews, shows that they're a "theorcratic fasicst" movement at least as much as Al-Qaida.

[Canadian Headhunter]

Oliver, I like what you said. But, theoretically speaking, when a terrorist organization is not internal, when it represents a group outside of one's own country, isn't it simply like an enemy government with which one is at war. And, don't warring countries sometimes make peace based on mutual concessions without one side obliterating the other? This suggests that if a foreign terrorist organization is stupid and goes to war when it can actually pursue its legitimate goals through other means you can derail its violence by bringing it to the negotiating table. Of course, the problem then is that you might be setting a bad example.

[Poosh]

We could offer them France.

[Chris Lightfoot]

There's one thing I find intriguing about the latest Osama communiqué: we are repeatedly told that it would be a mark of weakness for Western governments to negotiate with al-Qaida. Nobody seems to be remarking on the fact that for al-Qaida to offer to negotiate -- no matter how absurd their terms -- demonstrates weakness on their part. Implicitly we learn that their goals have been scaled back: they no longer want to destroy all of Western civilisation, but only bits of it (for now, anyway). At last some progress in the "War on Terror"?

[edward]

As far as I know, al-Qaeda's goals, as pernicious as they are, aren't to "destroy all of Western civilisation". Osama bin Laden (who never even used the term "al-Qaeda" prior to 2003) has declared the following, relatively more "modest", goals:

1) to drive Americans and American influence out of all Muslim nations, especially Saudi Arabia;

2) destroy Israel;

3) topple pro-Western dictatorships around the Middle East;

3) unite all Muslims and establish, by force, an Islamic nation adhering to the rule of the first Caliphs.

I may be misinformed.

Best,
ed.

[Solomon]

It is the *scope* of #3 that represents the long-term problem (to say nothing of what goes on along the way - #'s 1-3).

[edward]

Sorry, I misnumbered those. Solomon, by "3", I presume you mean "4" :)

I agree, but the point is that al-Qaeda's offer to negotiate with Europe can't really be interpreted as a sign that it is "scaling back" its goals, as Chris Lightfoot argues, or that the WoT is "making progress".

[GrimReaper]

'Asked about his comments that he wanted to have the banner of Islam at 10 Downing Street, Muhammad said, “Yes, it’s my dream. I believe one day that is going to happen. Because this is my country, I like living here.”'
The long-term aim of the islamists is that a Caliph rules the whole world.

[Peter Bocking]

No this is merely a truce of Khudaybiyyah,al Qaeda are taking setbacks they need time to regain their srength.As in the historical truce ten years later they broke the truce and slaughtered their enemies.
This line also plays well with some European countries.Zapatero has been given safe conduct for his troop withdawals by Al-Sadr.
The siren voices will be urging the safe road out of danger.Then when they have got what they want the will strike us again

[SRS]

If the arms commission reports as expected that the IRA/Sein Fein still have weapons, does Mo expect Bin Laden to be given a goverment job if he promises to hide his guns??

[Mike]

We sit down with Sharon and the other Zionists, who some would regard as both theocratic and fascist.

Sad thing is I used to support Israel strongly.I now think it was a mistake ever to create the state, and think its demise may be the only realistic answer.