Fairly muted reaction in Germany to the third anniversary of the terror attacks in the US on 9/11. Much of the discussion was colored by the recent shociking events in Beslan, Russia. The boys at Medienkritik have a tribute to the German victims of the 9/11 and quote in full a speech by their maximo lider George W. Bush. Unfortunately the Weblog has taken on an increasingly Islamo-phobic tone: most of the Western media and the entire SPD in Germany are accused being ‘girlie-men’ for attempting to put terrorist acts in a historical, geopolitical context.
The same black-white, good-evil, us-them interpretation of terror is expressed much more effectively and articulately by Henryk M. Broder in an essay published in Der Spiegel : “Three Years Afterwards” (Drei Jahre Danach: Die Terroristen-Versteher) For Broder, the terrorists embody an absolute evil, and it makes no sense to try to understand – much less negotiate with – individuals who love death and are determined to destroy themselves along with as many other innocents as possible.
Was aber, wenn “die” kein anderes Motiv haben als die Lust am Töten und den Spaß am Sterben? Wenn sie nicht vom Wunsch nach globaler Gerechtigkeit angetrieben werden, sondern von der Freude an der Barbarei? Dann wären wir blöd dran.
I agree with Der Spindoktor that, in spite of the element of truth in Broder’s rhetoric, there can and must be a political – not just military – response to terror.
Dass der Terror aber zumindest im Ansatz auch eine Reaktion auf die Machtbestrebungen westlicher Mächte im Nahen und Mittleren Osten ist und politisches Handeln nicht völlig vergeblich ist, vergisst oder unterdrückt er aber der Polemik willen.
Der Spindoktor also links in his post to a fascinating discussion forum of responses to Broder’s essay.
Terror is difficult to understand and even harder to combat. I think the best analysis this week was provided by Anne Applebaum in her Washington Post column “The Irrationality of Terror“. Applebaum understands quite well institutionalized terror and is the author of the brilliant history of the prison camps in the Soviet Union – Gulag: A History. Applebaum’s WaPo piece is an indictment of the Chechnyan terrorists in Beslan, but her concluding sentences apply not just to them, but also to those of us responding to terror:
“The hardest thing in the world is to resist injustice without hatred, or to resist brutality without brutality, or to fight any kind of war without losing your own humanity.”
