US hostility to Islamism depended on whether it served US interests

Evidence

Muammar Gaddafi also deployed Islamic symbols and language to legitimize his rule in Libya in the early 1970s. A vocal opponent of the West, he proclaimed that Libya was an Islamic state and that he intended to promote Islamic “radicalism” and “terrorism” around the world. The United States frowned upon Gaddafi but at the same time gave its consent to King Faisal of Saudi Arabia as he attempted to Islamize politics in the region. The logic was that the kind of top-down Islamism promoted by Saudi Arabia could be controlled from above and therefore made to work in the United States’ interests, whereas Gaddafi’s variant could not. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 233

Categorization

• XREF: This is the core ‘myth-dismantling’ move the reader wants — that US Islamophobia was never about Islam itself but about control. Same logic as the distinction between controlled (Saudi) and uncontrolled (Gaddafi/Iran) forms. — connects to: Iran’s 1979 events made Islamism the coming Green Menace for the US. — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 254; US support for the mujahideen inadvertently seeded the creation of al-Qaeda — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 257; US refusal to examine its own Mideast policies enabled future terrorism — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 267 (+25 more)

Broader Connections

• US imperial interests, not Islamist actions, determine Islamist ally or enemy status #corroborates (0.85) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 278