Empire frames the jihadist struggle as an internal Muslim ideological contest

Evidence

The current struggle against Islamist terrorism is much less a clash of civilizations than an ideological struggle within Islam. The United States cannot win unless the Muslim mainstream wins. There is very little likelihood that people like Osama bin Laden can ever be won over with soft power: hard power is needed to deal with such cases. But there is enormous diversity of opinion in the Muslim world. Many Muslims disagree with American values as well as American policies, but that does not mean that they agree with bin Laden. The United States and its allies cannot defeat Islamist terrorism if the number of people the extremists are recruiting is larger than the number of extremists killed or deterred. Soft power is needed to reduce the extremists’ numbers and win the hearts and minds of the mainstream. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 499

Categorization

• ADDENDUM: Direct supporting evidence for the vault’s Islamophobia-as-imperial-policy thesis: shows liberal-gentle framing still casts Muslims as a population to be managed for US strategic goals.
• XREF: connects to: Counterterrorism is framed as an internal ideological struggle over Muslim mainstream; Soft power frames the war on terror as an ideological struggle within Islam itself.; What looks like Islamic resurgence is actually an internal contest over defining Islam — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 839

Broader Connections

• Soft power frames the war on terror as an ideological struggle within Islam itself. #corroborates (0.95)
• Counterterrorism is framed as an internal ideological struggle over Muslim mainstream #corroborates (0.92)
• What looks like Islamic resurgence is actually an internal contest over defining Islam #corroborates (0.88) — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 839