It's Because We are Taking Over the World

What could we do, the war critics ask, to deal with Al Qaeda’s demands so that they will go away and leave us alone? What have we done to stir them up to such rage?

The thesis of the “Why do they hate us” crowd gets a good airing from the BBC’s security correspondent, Frank Gardner.

Gardner walks through the usual routine. The terror masters do not exactly tell us what they want.

But they have, through smuggled video cassettes and internet broadcasts, and in their own pedantic and lecturing way, made their demands clear. These are: the withdrawal of all Western forces from Muslim lands, especially Iraq, the withdrawal of support for Israel, and of support for "apostate" governments, specifically in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.

Of course, he admits, Al Qaeda’s grand plan is a single caliphate from the Philippines to Gibraltar, but by meeting their demands on Iraq we could damp down the enthusiasm in the Muslim street. And then the terrorists would probably go away.

But this approach, treating the West as just there and the terrorists as angry victims enraged by oppression misses the point.

The West is a world-historical movement that wants to take over the whole world and convert it to democracy and capitalism. You can personalize this if you like in the person of George W. Bush, but that would miss the point. The leader of the United States plays the role of the leader of the world-historical western movement whatever his party or his name. The radical Muslims rightly understand that if things keep going the way they are then their culture and way of life will be destroyed. The US invasion of Iraq and military presence in the Arab lands is merely a local manifestation of the world-historical force of western capitalism and democracy at work. The US deploys its armed forces in Iraq and the Arab lands because they are resisting our world-historical force.

This conflict is not going to be resolved by dialog and diplomacy. It is a clash between two world-historical forces. One of them will win, and the other will be destroyed.