The wars caused regular people to support Islam Radicals as they were the ones defending country from outside agression. Also Iran was a country where girls in 1970s wore mini skirts and had equal rights in access to education. Exactly like in the West. The revolution there changed it all.
The more we try influence them the more it is recognized as a foreign occupational forces killing your compatriots. Obviously during the war/occupation people flock to their natives even when they don't agree with them.
Example: Let's say the US was attacked by China and Ku Klux Klan would be defending the country. Taking care of the weak, running hospitals. Organizing attacks on foreign military forces.
Would you be surprised if they gained more influence? And the more foreign occupation forces would try to destroy them, the more support they would have got. Extremism grows and feeds on war.
Another example (this time a historical one, not a fictional): underground Polish army officers were involved in terrorist attacks on Berlin subway system during the WW2. German could have been calling them 'terrorists' (as they did!) all day and night long. Polish citizenry supported them anyway. That's a war. For a war you want the most crazy, delusional, brutal elements to fight it for you - not a liberal democrat concerned about sexual minority rights. I'm talking about occupation here.
Iranian history is even more complex than Afghanistan (since Iran is actually worth fighting over; Afghanistan, not so much). Even though the Shah was a pretty good ally of the US, I'm not sure whether the Qajar dynasty vs. others who came after him were better/worse. The semi-communist guy who Anglo-Iranian oil hated (and the US stupidly followed the UK on) might have been one of their better leaders of the past 200 years.
I agree the people who turn into resistance are often extremists, and if they win, can become more powerful. But there are plenty of cases where resistance fighters came from other organized groups who weren't particularly psycho to begin with; Balkans, Arabs during WW2, etc. Organization and logistics probably trumps insanity in predicting whether a group will be effective, as long as the occupier is brutal enough that everyone hates the occupier. Sure, plenty of the leaders and groups were utterly insane (Arkan's Tigers...), but I don't think it was universal on any side.
(btw, this is kind of an interesting tv show that I'd never heard of before! I'm doing some mindless paperwork right now so it's entertaining listening to a somewhat-psycho marxist making more sense than the other people at the table, oh the irony)
I agree with you. I think that if a nation lacks in organization and logistics (de facto any nation under occupation does) - terrorism makes a lot of sense as tactics. Thinking of it just as of war tactics that happens to work when confronted with organized, stronger enemy. That's how you fight such an enemy. I know, I sound controversial here, I'm not a proponent of terrorism though, just noting a fact.
And I'm not Marxist. I'm a liberal-conservative. Yeah, Zizek is a dangerous guy, lol.
Why we loose with Radical Islam? Because we have no teeth behind our values. It's not like we're going to guillotine muslim radicals taking away women rights. It's not like we're going to guillotine bankers and politicians destroying capitalism in the name of crony capitalism with zombie banks ran on the back of tax payer. We need a liberal revolution, and I hope one will come in my lifetime.
