March 7, 2007:
The widespread use of violence by
Islamic terrorists has masked the revival of leftist terrorist groups. Last
month, for example, Italian police arrested fifteen members of the 1970s era
"Red Brigades", and charged them with plotting the murder of people who did not
agree with their revolutionary goals. The Red Brigades were part of an wave of
small, violent, leftist revolutionary groups that emerged in the 1960s and 70s,
and were largely gone by the 1990s. Actually, the groups never died out
completely, but, except in Greece and Latin America, they were much less
violent after the Cold War ended. The Soviet Union had provided some support
for these groups, but mostly they were sustained by disaffected middle class
kids out to change the world. A new generation of disaffected, politically
motivated murderers are now signing up. Many Western leftists still see the
United States as the enemy of the people, and capitalism as something that must
be destroyed at all costs. In an odd confluence, many of these leftists are
marching (literally) shoulder to shoulder with Islamic radicals. This despite
the fact that the two groups (one anti-religious, and the other very pro one
religion) are natural enemies.
More enthusiastic adoption of socialist, and
anti-capitalist policies in Western Europe over the last century has led to a
high unemployment rate for people coming out of school, and this had made
radical politics a more attractive proposition to some. But compared to the
poverty and desperation in the Islamic world, the Western terrorists have a far
smaller recruiting pool. But like the Islamic terrorists, the Western groups
share the same basic myth. That is, if the world would only unite under a
benevolent despotism, everything would be better. Like the Islamic radicals,
the Western terrorists find it more comfortable to blame foreigners for their
trouble. In this case, the big bad is the United States, and local officials
who have "sold out" to those evil Americans.
Western governments have gotten behind the
anti-American movement, because it's easy to sell to voters, and the object of
their scorn is not likely to hit back. But their homegrown radicals are not so
civilized. So now Europe has another group of terrorists to worry about. No
doubt, they'll find a way of blaming it on the Americans.