Air Power, Insurgency and the “War on Terror” - Prof. Joel Hayward's ...

<strong>Air</strong> <strong>Power</strong> <strong>and</strong> Ethics in <strong>the</strong> Age of <strong>the</strong> Global Salafi Jihad
He describes US <strong>and</strong> western actions in <strong>the</strong> cases above as beneath even <strong>the</strong> most
ravenous of animals. He repeated <strong>the</strong> Islamic prohibition of targeting elderly men, women
<strong>and</strong> children <strong>and</strong> offered <strong>the</strong> track record of <strong>the</strong> Mujahideen in Afghanistan as proof that,
unlike western governments, Muslims respected human rights <strong>and</strong> behaved in a civilised
manner. This was at a time when Osama bin Laden was full of romantic notions of <strong>the</strong>
Soviet/Afghan conflict where naturally <strong>the</strong> Mujahideen avoided civilian casualties as <strong>the</strong>
civilians were <strong>the</strong>ir own people. Osama bin Laden rejected <strong>the</strong> charge of terrorism in <strong>the</strong>
following manner:
As for <strong>the</strong>ir accusations of terrorising <strong>the</strong> innocent, <strong>the</strong> children, <strong>and</strong>
<strong>the</strong> women, <strong>the</strong>se are in <strong>the</strong> category “accusing o<strong>the</strong>rs with <strong>the</strong>ir own
affliction in order to fool <strong>the</strong> masses.” The evidence overwhelmingly
shows America <strong>and</strong> Israel killing <strong>the</strong> weaker men, women, <strong>and</strong>
children in <strong>the</strong> Muslim world <strong>and</strong> elsewhere. 424
Forced with <strong>the</strong> strategic reality of having virtually no US forces to attack on <strong>the</strong> ground in
Afghanistan <strong>and</strong> recognizing that he needed to do something spectacular to provoke <strong>the</strong>
US into invading a Muslim country, bin Laden’s ethical principles had to be re-interpreted.
The 9/11 attacks killed nearly three thous<strong>and</strong> civilians, including women, children <strong>and</strong> <strong>the</strong>
elderly. Only after <strong>the</strong> attacks <strong>and</strong> after considerable criticism within Muslim circles, did
Al Qaeda provide an ethical explanation for its actions. It argued that, as <strong>the</strong> US was a
democratic country <strong>and</strong> as all citizens were able to vote, <strong>the</strong>y were vicariously responsible
for <strong>the</strong>ir Government’s actions <strong>and</strong>, as <strong>the</strong>ir Government was responsible for killing
Muslim civilians, <strong>the</strong>y also could legitimately be killed. The logic of this argument may
have flaws, but it has many of <strong>the</strong> same elements that <strong>the</strong> British officials provided to
justify <strong>the</strong> attacks on Kurdish villages in <strong>the</strong> 1920s.
The concept of “lesser evil” does not exist in Islamic <strong>the</strong>ology <strong>and</strong> so militant Jihadis have
recently exploited <strong>the</strong> concept of “retribution” to legitimise <strong>the</strong>ir actions. Retribution
is allowed under some circumstances in Islamic law but it is strictly limited. Killing an
innocent for <strong>the</strong> crime of ano<strong>the</strong>r has never been allowed but <strong>the</strong> GSJ ideologues have
stretched <strong>the</strong> principal to provide an ethical fig leaf. The attacks of 9/11 were justified by
Al Qaeda as symbolic retribution <strong>and</strong> a “lesson” intended to compel <strong>the</strong> US <strong>and</strong> o<strong>the</strong>r
western governments to withdraw <strong>the</strong>ir troops from Arabian <strong>and</strong> Muslim countries. The
justification echoes Churchill’s feelings towards <strong>the</strong> Germans during WWII: “[Those] who
have loosened <strong>the</strong>se horrors upon mankind will now in <strong>the</strong>ir homes <strong>and</strong> persons feel
<strong>the</strong> shattering stroke of retribution.” Churchill viewed <strong>the</strong> necessity to visit retribution on
thous<strong>and</strong>s of civilians in German cities as “higher poetic justice”. 425
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<strong>Air</strong> <strong>Power</strong>, <strong>Insurgency</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>the</strong> “War on Terror”