Do Islamofascists Make the Tehrans Run on Time?

In his last post #3 takes on "Islamofascism," raised by the Bushies as justification for linking the War in Iraq to the War on Terror. We've discussed this before here. Since I've defended the idea that radical Islam is a variant of modern fascism, let me clarify my position. I do NOT defend either Bush's rhetorical use of the term or his strategery in the Middle East. So #3 shouldn't try to read Bushatista logic into my argument as he does in previous comments. That said, I think there is a strong case, on the academic merits, that Islamic radicalism is both more modern and more western than we might like to believe. Even if we reject Bush's facile use of the term, we're better off knowing these radicals for who they really are.

To begin, let's start with terminology. What is "fascism," and how does it relate to "totalitarianism"? The word "fascism" comes from Mussolini, who took it from the Italian "fasciare," meaning to "bind" or "fasten," which also allowed him to use the Roman symbol of the "fasces," axes bound by rope. WWI convinced Mussolini that Marxists had misunderstood the conflicts of the modern world, incorrectly assuming that economic "class" would bind people more closely than spiritual commitment to "nation," conceived as a kind of mystical unity. He thought that you could overcome factional strife through a mobilized "mass" politics focused on military virtue, national expansion (to demonstrate masculine virility), and a "totalitarian" state apparatus. Only such a unified purpose, realized in often violent and self-sacrificial "action," could overcome the fragmenting alienation of modern life and defeat the twin materialisms of Russian communism and Anglo-American liberalism.

Although originally specific to Italy, the term "fascist" quickly became shorthand for the right-wing "mass" movements sweeping Europe, including Germany, Spain, and Hungary. In each country, fascists positioned themselves, somewhat ironically, as organic anti-modernists, celebrating emotional authenticity over reason and reviving the purified unity of ancient paganism, Roman empire, or Catholicism, depending on where you were. #3 doesn't want to count Spain, but no less an expert than George Orwell saw the Spanish Civil War, in which he enlisted, as the first front against the fascist menace. Even if Franco, pragmatically wary of entering WWII, pulled back from the brink of full-fledged Hitlerian "totalitarianism," he was still a "fascist." But there's a lesson here. Although Franco was a brutal and long-lived dictator, he died without seriously threatening Europe, leaving Spain to undergo a slow but relatively smooth transition to democracy. Sometimes containment and diplomacy are the best options. But you gotta know your fascists, because they're not all the same. Plus, as Orwell records in Homage to Catalonia, sometimes when you nobly intend to fight fascists, you accidentally empower others who are just as bad if not worse, like the Communists.

Although all facsist movements are "totalitarian" in theory, they typically find it very difficult to institutionalize such a system once in power. This is why Hannah Arendt, in her famed The Origins of Totalitarianism, claims that only Hitler and Stalin actually succeeded in doing so, speculating (wrongly, I think, given Pol Pot in Cambodia and Kim Il Sung in North Korea) that totalitarianism could only emerge in technologically advanced, modern societies with massive populations. Arendt also argues, contrary to #3, that totalitarian movements have little regard for "the state." The revolutionizing force of the movement itself is everything. Any formal state apparatus is too inherently static and conservative, offering resistance to the leader who has energized the masses in the name of spiritual purification. That's why Hitler and Stalin multiplied bureaucracies and favored institutional unrest. It's also why Orwell depicts "the state" as a churning perma-purge with ever-changing enemies in 1984.

So what does all this mean for radical Islam? Well, for one, a mass movement elevating mosque--or pan-Arabism for that matter--over "the state" is eminently qualified to be either "fascist" or "totalitarian," at least in principle.

Paul Berman kicked off much of this debate in his book Terror and Liberalism by tracing the intellectual legacy of Ba'ath Socialism and Islamic fundamentalism back to mid-20th C. Europe. Berman sees himself as a faithful follower of the lefty Orwell, fighting fascists and backing a war in Iraq for the cause of liberal (or social-) democracy, and NOT as a "neo-con." Despite his early naivete, Berman has been very critical of Bush's war. We should also know who his academic targets are: first, the defenders of Nixonian realism, whom he sees as cynical and insufficiently committed to democracy; and, second, the "clash of civilizations" theorists, like neo-con Sam Huntington and the prominent Islamist scholar, Tariq Ramadan, who promotes a "You whiteys can't understand us, it's an Islamic thing" analysis. Berman's main objective is to demonstrate that we are, in fact, part of one big interconnected intellectual and political world.

The strongest parts of Berman's book come when he traces the direct intellectual connections between modern European radicalism (left and right) and the Islamists of today's Middle East. Remember, for example, that the Iranian Revolution was started by the western educated Khomeini who soaked up the alienation theories of Sartre and Fanon in the salons of Paris. Much more important for Berman is Sayyid Qutb, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood and the key intellectual influence for the Sunni fundamentalist movement that included Osama bin Laden. Qutb, who received a western education in both Egypt and the US, adapted the existentialism of Nietzsche, Kierkegaard and Heidegger into a critique of western alienation, which he blamed, ultimately, on Christianity and its "hideous schizophrenia." Only Islam could recreate human life as a meaningful "totality." The movement would have to be led by an ideologically committed "vanguard" waging spiritual "jihad."

It's not hard to see the links here. To bring back Franco, there's a short hop between the Phalangist slogan, "Viva la Muerte!," and the Islamist celebration of suicide bombing. As Berman points out, the suicide and assassination fads began in the West, especially in 19th century Russia, Italy, and the US, before winding their way to Palestine and Iraq. Rather than being peculiar to some barbaric middle eastern "other," these tactics develop out of modern and western identity crises involving the meaning of "freedom" in an increasingly atomized "mass" culture. No surprise then that so many of the leaders of this movement are at least semi-western, or that the 9/11 bombers were deeply europeanized muslims. What's going on in the Arab world is a complex cultural reaction to western "imperialism," much as the Vietnam War was. As Berman realizes, we misunderstand this conflict at our own peril. Ironically, his argument, originally an attempt to bridge east and west, has been used as the rhetorical tool of our least self-conscious jingoists, dimwitted imperialists who turn this analysis into a black and white battle between American "freedom" and Arab "fascism."

Unfortunately, for both Bush and Berman, there are many ways to misunderstand a threat. Invading Iraq to fight the Islamic fundamentalism of bin Laden was deeply confused. It would have been akin to the Allies invading Spain in 1941 and toppling Franco to defeat Hitler. Can you imagine a bigger strategic blunder? And thank God for Stalin and the Commies. If we hadn't buddied up to those totalitarians, we never would have won that war. Radical Islamists may be "fascists." They may even be "totalitarians." But that doesn't mean we haven't been behaving like "idiots."