A Convergence of Ideologies
The latter half of the 20th century witnessed the rise of two distinct yet ideologically convergent movements: Neoconservatism in the United States and Radical Islamism in the Middle East.
Both emerged from a shared disillusionment with the perceived failures of liberal modernity and sought to establish new societal orders based on absolute moral values.
Despite their divergent origins and stated objectives, their paths intertwined, most notably in the conflict against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, shaping a world defined by the politics of fear, exaggerated threats, and relentless ideological struggle.
The Genesis of Radical Islamism: Sayyid Qutb’s Critique of the West
The intellectual foundations of radical Islamism were significantly shaped by Sayyid Qutb, a middle-aged Egyptian school inspector who travelled to the United States in 1949 to study its educational system. His experiences in America, particularly in Greeley, Colorado, led to a profound disenchantment with Western society.
Qutb perceived the surface prosperity and happiness of Truman’s America as indicators of an inner corruption and decay. He observed a pervasive crassness, vulgarity, and a conversational focus on superficialities like movie stars and automobile prices. Even seemingly innocuous activities like meticulous lawn care were interpreted by Qutb as symptomatic of the selfish and Materialistic aspects of American life.
A pivotal moment in Qutb’s crystallisation of his vision occurred one summer night at a local church hall dance. Witnessing what many would consider an innocent display of youthful happiness, Qutb saw a hidden and dangerous reality. He depicted the scene as rife with lust and love, with "chests met chests" and "arms circled waists," concluding that the dancers were tragic lost souls trapped by their own selfish and greedy desires.
He believed that American society was not progressing but regressing, turning people into isolated beings driven by primitive animal forces. These creatures, Qutb feared, could corrode the very bonds of society.
Upon his return to Egypt, Qutb became determined to prevent this culture of selfish Individualism from taking root in his own country. He envisaged a new society that would integrate the modern benefits of Western science and technology with a central role for political Islam, providing a moral framework to curb selfish desires.
Qutb quickly recognised that American culture was already infiltrating Egypt, drawing the masses into its seductive dream. He believed that what was needed was an elite vanguard capable of discerning these illusions of freedom and leading the masses to a higher truth. This vanguard, he insisted, must be pure and stand apart from the corrupting influences.
Qutb’s political activism began with joining the Muslim Brotherhood, a group advocating for Islam’s central role in Egyptian governance. When the Brotherhood supported General Nasser’s 1952 revolution that overthrew British rule, Qutb and other leaders were arrested in 1954 as Nasser’s new secular regime aligned with America.
Qutb’s subsequent torture in prison profoundly radicalised his ideas. He came to believe that Western secularism not only fostered selfishness but also unleashed the most brutal aspects of human beings. This experience gave him an apocalyptic vision of a global disease spreading from the West, which he termed Jahiliyyah – a state of barbarous ignorance. This state, terrifyingly, was insidious because people did not realise they were infected, believing themselves free while regressing.
In secret books smuggled out of prison, Qutb called for a revolutionary vanguard to overthrow leaders who had allowed Jahiliyyah to infect their countries, implying such leaders could be justifiably killed for being no longer true Muslims.
Despite his execution in 1966, Qutb’s ideas persisted, inspiring figures like Ayman al-Zawahiri, who, as a schoolboy, formed a secret group modelled on Qutb’s vanguard concept.
The Intellectual Genesis of Neoconservatism: Leo Strauss and the Power of Myth
Concurrently, in Chicago, Leo Strauss, an obscure political philosopher at the University of Chicago, harboured similar fears about the destructive force of Individualism in America. Strauss, a mysterious figure who avoided interviews and public appearances, devoted himself to cultivating a loyal cadre of students. He taught them that the prosperous liberal society they inhabited contained the seeds of its own destruction.
Strauss argued that Western liberalism had undergone a development culminating in Nihilism, rendering it unable to define or defend itself. This development, he contended, stripped human beings of all praiseworthy and admirable qualities, reducing them to "dwarf animals" or "herd animals," content with a dangerous life in which nothing is true and everything is permitted.
He believed that the liberal idea of individual freedom encouraged people to question all values and moral truths, leading them to be guided solely by selfish desires, thereby threatening to dismantle the shared values underpinning society.
Strauss’s proposed solution was for politicians to assert powerful and inspiring myths or necessary illusions that everyone could believe in.
While these myths might not be literally true, they were deemed essential for maintaining social cohesion and restoring power and authority to politicians in a disillusioned age. He found epitomised his ideal in American television programmes such as _Gunsmoke_, which he admired for its clear portrayal of a good versus evil narrative, and _Perry Mason_, which showcased the elite’s role in promoting necessary myths while not necessarily believing them in private.
For Strauss, the goal was to rescue America from decay by instilling a grand vision of its destiny.
Many young students influenced by Strauss, including Paul Wolfowitz, Francis Fukuyama, and William Kristol, migrated to Washington, D.C., and formed the core of the neoconservative movement.
Often struggling to secure academic positions due to their conservative leanings, these intellectuals shared a common doubt about the certainty and confidence in liberal progress.
They viewed themselves as idealists, aiming to halt the social disintegration they believed liberal freedoms had unleashed. A key tenet of their ideology was the notion of the "proposition nation," supporting open borders and viewing America as defined by its liberal democratic ideals rather than ethnicity.
This position placed them at odds with traditional conservatives and libertarians, whom neoconservatives consciously sought to displace from the American right.
Parallel Paths: Shared Critiques and the Search for Purpose
Both Sayyid Qutb and Leo Strauss, and by extension, the radical Islamists and neoconservatives, articulated strikingly similar critiques of Western liberal society.
Both observed a loss of faith in ideologies and a decline into materialism and [[Individualism]]. They equally believed that this decay eroded the moral fabric of society, leading to a state where people were detached, self-interested, and susceptible to corruption.
Crucially, both movements converged on the idea of a necessary elite or vanguard to guide the "bewildered herd" (a concept used by journalist Walter Lippmann, whose ideas were foundational to Adam Curtis's Century of the Self). They sought to reassert absolute moral values and provide meaning and purpose in a world perceived as atomised and rudderless.
For both, this meant confronting an existential threat, often abstract and intangible, yet requiring dramatic, even revolutionary, action. This shared understanding of a society adrift, needing fundamental re-engagement through powerful narratives, laid the groundwork for their unlikely convergence.
The Afghan War: An Alliance of Convenience Against the Soviet Union
The opportunity for these ideologically disparate groups to collaborate arose in the context of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. The Reagan Administration, heavily influenced by neoconservatives now in positions of power, adopted the Reagan Doctrine.
This doctrine, driven by a small cabal within the White House, viewed the Mujahidin resistance in Afghanistan not merely as nationalists but as "freedom fighters" who could precipitate the downfall of the Soviet Union and spread democracy worldwide. Jack Wheeler, an adventurer described as the "Indiana Jones of the right," was credited with crystallising the concept of supporting various global freedom struggles as part of a single historical movement against the "evil empire."
William Casey, the new head of the CIA and sympathetic to the neoconservative view, became instrumental in this strategy. Convinced that Afghanistan was key to an aggressive new foreign policy, Casey ordered agents to provide unlimited funds and sophisticated weapons, including Stinger missiles, to the Mujahidin. This influx of American money and weaponry began pouring across the Pakistan border, accompanied by CIA training in techniques of assassination and terror, including car bombing. The American approach to foreign policy, as demonstrated here, often involved arming proxy groups, a strategy that, through a recurring pattern in history, has led to these groups turning against the United States.
At the same time, Arab volunteers, spurred by religious leaders, arrived in Afghanistan, believing it their duty to free Muslim lands from Soviet occupation. Abdullah Azzam, a charismatic religious leader, organised these Arab volunteers, establishing a "services Bureau" in Peshawar on the Afghan border, which became the headquarters for an international brigade of Arab fighters.
Azzam became a powerful figure, raising funds and recruiting volunteers, even visiting America for this purpose. He, like the neoconservatives, saw the Afghan struggle as the initial phase of a broader revolution. A member of the Muslim Brotherhood, Azzam aimed for political overthrow of corrupt Middle Eastern regimes but insisted on political means, making fighters pledge against using terrorism on civilians.
Osama Bin Laden, a wealthy Saudi, became one of Azzam’s closest aides, providing significant financial support. However, a growing rift emerged within the Islamist fighters in Peshawar.
Extreme radical Islamists, expelled from prisons across the Arab world, began to arrive. Among them was Ayman al-Zawahiri, who led a radical Egyptian faction, Islamic Jihad. Zawahiri, building on Qutb’s theories, argued that democracy encouraged politicians to usurp divine authority and thus they, and their supporters, were no longer true Muslims and could be legitimately killed.
This radical interpretation clashed directly with Azzam’s moderate approach. Zawahiri actively sought to undermine Azzam, seducing Bin Laden and his money away by promising him leadership of his extremist group. In late 1989, Azzam was assassinated by a car bomb, an act whose perpetrator remains unknown but which cleared the path for the more radical elements.
As Soviet troops began their withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1987, under Mikhail Gorbachev’s leadership, both Americans and Islamists perceived their efforts as the decisive factor in the Soviet Union’s downfall. Gorbachev’s warnings that a Mujahidin victory would not lead to democracy but to extreme forms of Islamism were ignored by Washington hardliners who insisted on no negotiations. This shared, yet illusory, victory in Afghanistan would serve as a powerful foundational myth for both movements.
The Aftermath: New Enemies and Cycles of Violence
The perceived victory in Afghanistan profoundly shaped the subsequent trajectories of both neoconservatives and radical Islamists, leading them to invent new enemies and engage in cycles of conflict.
Neoconservatives: The Pursuit of a Phantom Enemy
For the neoconservatives, the collapse of the Soviet Union was a validation of their aggressive use of American power to transform the world and spread democracy. This triumph became their central myth, inspiring them to search for new "evil empires." Initially, their focus shifted to Saddam Hussein following his invasion of Kuwait in 1990.
While President George H W Bush, rooted in a more realist tradition akin to Henry Kissinger, opted for stability and a balanced power in the Middle East, ending combat operations after Kuwait’s liberation, neoconservatives like Paul Wolfowitz were furious. They viewed Bush’s actions as an expression of the "weakness of American liberalism" and a moral relativism that compromised with evil. Their anger was directed less at Saddam and more at American liberals seen as a source of corruption.
Faced with this perceived defeat, the neoconservative movement turned inwards, seeking to dismantle liberalism within America. They strategically allied with the religious right, ushering in the culture wars to re-centre moral and religious issues in conservative politics. For the neoconservatives, religion, like the myth of America’s unique destiny, served as a "noble lie" – an instrument to promote morality and ensure social order, rather than a genuine spiritual conviction.
This approach manifested in campaigns against abortion, gay rights, and multiculturalism, culminating in the 1992 Republican convention. However, this harsh moralism alienated mainstream Republican voters, leading to Bill Clinton’s victory.
Undeterred, neoconservatives sought to treat Clinton as they had the Soviet Union: by transforming him into a fantasy enemy to expose the "liberal corruption of America." They orchestrated a barrage of allegations, including sexual harassment, the Whitewater property deal, the suspicious death of Vince Foster, and drug smuggling claims, through publications like the _American Spectator_. Despite these stories being largely untrue, the neoconservatives, including figures like David Brock (who later renounced these tactics), saw them as "political terrorism" necessary to achieve their goal.
Even when special prosecutor Kenneth Starr, linked to the neoconservative-aligned Federalist Society, failed to find incriminating evidence in Whitewater or the sexual scandals, the discovery of the Monica Lewinsky affair provided the perceived leverage needed to launch an impeachment campaign. This campaign, marked by intense moral fury and deception, ultimately failed as American public opinion remained largely indifferent to these moral issues, leading to William Bennett’s lament about the "Death of Outrage." This marginalisation would persist until a new, dramatic event would provide the external enemy they desperately sought.
Radical Islamists: The Descent into Terror
For the Islamists, the "victory" in Afghanistan fuelled a belief that a revolution would sweep across the Arab world, toppling corrupt leaders. In the early 1990s, Islamist parties in countries like Algeria and Egypt gained significant popular support, winning local elections and parliamentary seats, pursuing an idealistic vision of a new Islamic society through peaceful means.
However, the ruling regimes reacted violently. In Algeria, the army staged a coup in 1991, cancelling elections and brutally suppressing Islamist protests. In Egypt, the government launched a massive crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood, arresting and torturing members. These actions dramatically confirmed Zawahiri’s belief that Western democracy was a corrupt sham. Radical Islamists, under Zawahiri’s influence, now intensified their focus on violent revolution. He interpreted Qutb’s theories to mean that not only leaders but also ordinary people who supported them were corrupted and could legitimately be killed, as their refusal to rise up demonstrated their complicity. The terror generated by such killings, he argued, would "shock the masses into seeing reality."
Zawahiri, now based with Bin Laden in Sudan, used this as a base for Islamic Jihad’s attacks on Egyptian politicians and advised other radical groups across the Arab world. However, the anticipated mass uprisings failed to materialise; regimes remained in power. This failure led to an even more brutal logic: if the masses would not rise, they too were corrupted and could be attacked. This spiralled into horrific violence in Algeria, where Islamist groups killed thousands of civilians. Generals, seeking to maintain power, infiltrated these groups, encouraging even more extreme violence to destroy public support for the Islamists, presenting themselves as the bulwark against terror. By the mid-1990s, the Islamist revolution was failing, marked by mass demonstrations against their violence and internal conflict that led to self-destruction, exemplified by Algeria’s GIA, whose leader eventually declared that almost all of Algerian society should be killed save his tiny remaining faction.
Facing widespread failure and isolation, Bin Laden and Zawahiri convened a press conference in May 1998 to announce a new Jihad. Zawahiri concluded that the failure was not due to their theories, but the corruption of the Muslim masses by Western liberal ideas. The solution, therefore, was to attack the source of the corruption directly: the United States. Their declaration marked a shift of anger borne out of failure towards America, setting the stage for future dramatic confrontations.
Enduring Legacies of Fear
The mutual need for an external enemy, whether real or imagined, sustained both neoconservative and radical Islamist movements. The neoconservatives, marginalised by 1998, would soon find their longed-for evil enemy in the attacks that would hit America. These attacks would, in turn, provide the dramatic impetus for the neoconservatives to transform the failing Islamist movement into the grand revolutionary force that Zawahiri had envisioned, creating a new phantom enemy that largely existed in public imagination.
This historical convergence illustrates a cyclical pattern: ideological disillusionment leads to the invention of overarching narratives and the identification of external "evil" forces. These myths, though often detached from truth, are employed to unify populations, justify radical actions, and consolidate power. The consequences, as demonstrated by the interwoven histories of neoconservatism and radical Islamism, are often widespread conflict, violence, and a perpetuation of a global state of fear.