HATRED OF US IS NOT BECAUSE OF MISUNDERSTANDING

Avi posted the video of this lecture yesterday. The staggering importance of the study - for military and diplomatic strategy - really can't be overestimated. It's not just an FYI about Islamist manipulation of the media. It's also a staggering condemnation of US diplomacy surrounding the War on Terror, driven as it has been by this delusional State Department belief in marketing ourselves to the Muslim world. As if the problem is that they misunderstand us. Never considered: the Muslim world understands us only too well, and they just don't like what we are. Because if that was ever considered, then we'd have to start confronting the possibility that this war is going to last a long time, and it's going to involve more than diplomatic niceties. Problem: the Muslim world understands us only too well, and they just don't like what we are:

The popularity of online Iraqi Sunni insurgent media, the authors contend, reflects a genuine demand for their message in the Arab world. A response, no matter how lavishly funded and cleverly produced, will not eliminate this demand. The authors argue that efforts to counter insurgent media should not focus on producing better propaganda than the insurgents, or trying to eliminate the demand for the insurgent message, but rather on exploiting the vulnerabilities of the insurgent media network.

It's not about our failure to explain ourselves. They already know that we let our women drive cars and our people worship freely. Explaining that to them again isn't going to make them less hostil - perhaps very much the opposite.

[Read an extended version of this post at Mere Rhetoric]