Re: [unrev-II] Fwd: [issues] Another analysis of Ben LAden strategy

From: Mark Szpakowski (szpak@well.com)
Date: Thu Sep 27 2001 - 09:06:15 PDT

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    At 06:33 AM 09/27/2001 -0700, Jack Park wrote:

    > >Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2001 17:43:23 -0700
    > >To: (Recipient list suppressed)
    > >From: Len Duhl <len-duhl@socrates.Berkeley.EDU>
    > >Subject: [issues] Another analysis of Ben LAden strategy
    > >
    > >Using my training as a psychiatrist and policy expert , I tried to put
    > >myself into in Ben Laden's mind. In doing so, I must assume that he has
    > >an amazingly agile, and brilliant mind.

    All well and good if "bin Laden" is the code name for the guy (it's
    probably a guy) who masterminded it, whoever it is.
    But what if Osama bin Laden the person is just a highly visible
    distraction, useful both for the terrorists and for the US?

    Check out
    http://www.janes.com/security/international_security/news/fr/fr010919_1_n.sh
    tml for seemingly informed analysis of who the likely ringleaders were.

    <quote>
    Israel’s military intelligence service, Aman, suspects
    that Iraq is the state that sponsored the suicide
    attacks on the New York Trade Center and the
    Pentagon in Washington. Directing the mission, Aman
    officers believe, were two of the world’s foremost
    terrorist masterminds: the Lebanese Imad Mughniyeh,
    head of the special overseas operations for Hizbullah,
    and the Egyptian Dr Ayman Al Zawahiri, senior
    member of Al-Qaeda and possible successor of the
    ailing Osama Bin Laden.

    "Bin Laden is a schoolboy in comparison with
    Mughniyeh," says an Israeli who knows Mughniyeh .
    "The guy is a genius, someone who refined the art of
    terrorism to its utmost level. We studied him and
    reached the conclusion that he is a clinical psychopath
    motivated by uncontrollable psychological reasons,
    which we have given up trying to understand. The killing
    of his two brothers by the Americans only inflamed his
    strong motivation."
    </quote>

    The relevance of this discussion to Unrev and to augment systems is that
    questions posed and intentions expressed within an overly-limited context
    or paradigm, while excellent and good within that paradigm, may well exist
    within a circle of ignorance. Not actively and deliberately trying to
    enlighten that ignorance with greater awareness can lead all the good
    efforts to results opposite from those intended. Going beyond active
    ignoring (my best understanding of the root of evil) is perhaps a role that
    the arts play, but, even more to the point, great leaders.

    A good limited paradigm goal is to eliminate terrorists. That doesn't
    address the soil from which terrorists spring, and _our_ role in
    co-creating that soil. "Our role" is something we can conceivably work with
    and change. "Their role" - much much harder.

    Sticking just to the small view, the anti-terrorists mirror image the
    terrorists ("A year later, in a combined CIA/Mossad operation, a
    powerful car bomb went off at the entrance to the house of Hizbullah’s
    spiritual leader, Sheikh Muhammad Hussein Fadlallah. Seventy-five people
    were killed."). Trying for the large view (simultaneous with the small view
    - you need both earth and heaven - and in between "man", leadership) all
    sides become both interdependent and open-ended (as in Bohm's view of
    dialogos which proceeds beyond initial bottom lines), and perhaps somewhat
    mirror the best of what they could be.

    Augment systems, if they are to augment "life", must incorporate (probably
    symbiotically) the going-beyond quality of life. Otherwise they just run
    the risk of augmenting existing directions, perhaps disastrously. This is a
    real challenge. I welcome it.

    All the best,
    Mark

    ____________________________________
    Mark Szpakowski             szpak@well.com
             http://www.well.com/~szpak
           "forever has already happened"

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