Psychology of suicide violence

CONVENTIONAL military theory continues to take the backseat to suicide-attack-driven urban insurgencies as the negative fallout of the war against terrorism expands, growing violence now establishing its presence as routine in increasing parts of the world.

Muscle obviously does not suffice to subdue a charged enemy whose thesis revolves around taking his own life in order to inflict damage upon the opponent, sometimes more psychological than physical. The other option of diplomatic engagement, though not yet tried in the right spirit, is also unlikely to yield desired results, since the extremists’ demand-list comprises total power and unquestioned implementation of their extreme reading of religion, ‘or else’!

Yet that is not reason enough to abandon the search for alternatives to head-on collision, especially since the elusive extremists seem much better at it. Clearly they won’t stop ramming explosive-loaded cars into sensitive buildings and pulling suicide belt triggers in busy markets till all manner of opposition to their designs is either finished or submits, implying that this is definitely a fight to the end in which only one side will be left standing. That is all the more reason for a serious look into the psychology of this new, seemingly irresistible wave of suicide warfare.

It has been some time since a suicide bomber drew any sort of muted sympathy from pockets of lesser extremist circles, highlighting frustration and depravation in the fight for an apparently just but unachievable cause. Though the phenomenon is not new, its post 9/11 implementation has seen increasing numbers of civilians included as targets, innocent men, women, children and the elderly. It does not matter to the attackers whatever the collateral damage amounts to as long as their antics keep blood flowing, send financial markets tumbling and the fear factor always high. That, along with brutal suppression of almost all forms of social and political rights in areas under their control, is an apt indicator of the barbaric and brutish nature of their mindset that is forever locked in an ancient, no longer applicable era.

A closer look leaves one aghast at how carefully implemented indoctrination has produced hordes of such fanatics ready to blow up themselves and everything in sight when directed. Equally concerning, though, are geo-political factors they leverage for their twisted cause — unspeakable but real violation of human rights on part of those whose hunt is now getting the innocent common man trampled upon in the process.

The brainwashing factor shows that the solution must also begin with an ideological and intellectual push. Along with that, the international system needs to evolve into a more egalitarian environment, where excesses of superpower interests and client states stop squeezing the life out of the lesser unfortunate just as inhumanly as the bombers, if not more cunningly.

Just as military manuals need rewriting, so does the social order, or we will be dogged by fanatics dancing to the orgy of death and destruction that is underway with force till all manner of civility is lost, and only killers of children and women remain to enact their absurd laws.