Be Not Afraid

January 30, 2009, 4:00 a.m.

Be Not Afraid
Terrorists rely on intimidation and deception. We can’t be fooled, and we must resist.

By Gabriel Ledeen

Evil’s strength lies in its ability to intimidate. I saw this truth play out during my two tours in Iraq, as al-Qaeda dominated the spirit of Anbar’s Sunni population. The mighty Sunni Awakening movement represented the rejection of the oppression and intimidation the population had been enduring at the hands of al-Qaeda. As Sheikh Abdul Sattar Abu Risha said of his movement, “We Sunnis had to convince ourselves.” After all, their instincts and traditions had told them that we were the outsiders and therefore had to be worse than al-Qaeda’s Muslim operatives. They first had to understand the evil that we—and they—were confronting, and then they could take responsibility for their lives and act decisively.

Our Islamist enemies can’t win when confronted directly with the truth because they are essentially hollow. As in Iraq, they will eventually wither. Their false jihad often relies on deception, bribery, and drugs to gain recruits and compel attacks. Their movement is founded on lies, as seen in the propaganda used to indoctrinate new followers to the culture of hatred. They oppose freedom and individual liberty, and reject the value of each human life, and therefore are at odds with the self-evident Truths that govern our existence.

It is imperative to recognize the central characteristics of our enemy’s ideology in order to expose its ontologically false foundation. As Americans observed in our struggles against the Soviet Communists and the Nazis, with the understanding of the threat comes an understanding of the necessity of a sufficient response. While such a response can be costly and difficult, such efforts can be powerfully exerted when fueled by the truth. Our enemy knows this, and strives to cloud our understanding and prevent us from exposing the reality. It is our reluctance to confront such enemies that emboldens them, allows them to perpetrate evil on the world, and causes extraordinary suffering. This is not merely a philosophical point.

I have spent the last two weeks in Israel trying to understand what exactly is going on here and what it means in the broader context of the global war on terror. I find myself dwelling on the question: Why do democratic and liberal nations condemn Israel for fighting against terrorists who deliberately target civilians?

The usual answer—anti-Semitism—is certainly justified in some cases, but I reject it as the categorical cause of this illogical (or pathological) but common response to Israel’s efforts to survive. No, the fundamental answer to this question is that we, as democratic and liberty-loving societies, are afraid to identify candidly the defining nature of our common enemies. Whether knowingly or through tragic manipulation, Westerners who attack Israel in effect join, support, and propel a force that makes this world worse. This force degrades humanity by denying the value of the individual human life, the essential basis for liberty. It is a force for evil that desecrates the holy, defiles the innocent, and denigrates those values that uplift the human spirit.

Israel has no choice but to confront the threats against its existence. When one is pushed into such a position, one must either fight back or die. Israel is unique as the only democratic, non-Muslim country that is continually confronting the brutal realities of radical Islamic terrorism within its borders. Because it is unique, Israel is constantly pressured by Western opinion makers to respond only to those threats that are immediate, and to define those threats through a limited and local perspective. This way, the world’s other democratic nations can maintain their distance and continue to promote the lie that Israel’s fight against terrorism is somehow completely different from everyone else’s. Certainly we would all be more effective at confronting this threat together, with a shared understanding of what we face and the determination to defeat it. So what are we afraid of?

Studying this fear is like peering uneasily into the dark after hearing an unusual sound. If we don’t have to, we’d rather not. Why are we afraid of candor? I see two connected reasons: 1) An honest understanding would require decisive action; therefore 2) it would make us feel weak. It would make us feel weak because we would sense that we were being compelled to do some unpleasant things in the belief that doing them would improve conditions enough to make up for the doing. We despise being coerced to do what we don’t really want to do, especially when it requires sacrifice and suffering. In this it is not only our love of liberty but also our love of comfort and leisure that causes our disquiet. The longer the period of sacrifice and concentrated effort is likely to be, the stronger is the resistance and hence the more troubling are the feelings of weakness.

It is common, even natural, for an individual to feel weak if he or she is afraid. The perception of helplessness translates into a loss of self-confidence, which is then processed in diverse ways. One popular defense mechanism is to convince oneself that the threat doesn’t exist. This allows the individual to ignore the unpleasant reality, embrace blissful ignorance, act as if there is nothing to worry about, and keep a false self-confidence intact. If you doubt that this process really occurs, I encourage you to look in on a women’s self-defense class. Instructors constantly preach awareness and preparation, and always emphasize the danger of giving in to the desire to pretend that the world is a safe place. These instructors know that too many victims are unprepared to meet real threats because they refuse to accept that the threats exist. In a society where self-confidence seems ever more important, but ever harder to attain, it is unsurprising that our minds would develop ways around such conflicts.

Of course the problem is that the illusion of strength is not strength, it is weakness. It allows fear to keep us from doing what it is right. True strength is doing what is right despite the fear. Do not give in to the temptation to ignore what is true and real because it threatens you and makes you feel weak or helpless. Recognizing evil is the first and most essential step in defeating it. Once you accomplish that feat, nature impels you on your course, and you have but to continue as you have begun, with strength and virtue. Let us confront our enemies with the knowledge that Truth is with us, and the recognition that they stand arrogantly on ice, denying the sun, awaiting the thaw.

Be not afraid, for fear will be our undoing.

— Gabriel Ledeen is a senior fellow with the Vets For Freedom Educational Institute. He served two tours in al-Anbar, Iraq, as an officer with a Marine infantry battalion.


[EDITOR’S NOTE: This article has been amended since its initial posting.]
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