Speaking of Empire and Resistance: Conversations with Tariq Ali

The American public, Ali notes, rarely have their media place American foreign policy in historical context. How did terrorist Muslim fundamentalism arise? Well, the U.S. encouraged it, funded it, in the Muslim world during the Cold War, against such Arab nationalists like Nasser who threatened U.S. hegemony over the oil supply.. The modern fundamentalist movement in Indonesia blossomed when the U.S. backed General Suharto seized power in 1965 and the CIA gave lists of suspected communists, to Muslim fundamentalist groups in the country. Such groups and the Indonesian mlilitary massacred about one million people, mostly poor peasants. Indonesia, the largest Muslim nation in the world, also had the largest Communist party in the world outside of the Soviet Union and China. However, with Suharto's massacres, the secular left in Indonesia was crushed and Muslim fundamentalists were left as the only alternative to the barbaric Suharto regime. Hence today, Muslim fundamentalists, including the Al Qaeda elements among them, are the pre-dominant opposition groups in Indonesia. In Egypt, the late President Sadat used Muslim fundamentalists to crush his secular leftist opponents. In Pakistan, Ali writes, Muslim fundamentalists gained influence by the use of the weapons and money that was being funneled throughout Pakistan throughout the 1980's because of the Afghan war. Such groups have been rampaging about the country terrorizing people, part of the reason why Pakistan is such a basket case now. Then there was Afghanistan. From 1979-92, the U.S., directly and indirectly through the Pakistani military, gave a couple billion dollars to the Afghan Muslim funamentalist warlords and "Arab Afghan" fighters such as those led by Bin Laden. These groups, of course, later morphed into groups like Al Qaeda. Ali notes that Zbigniew Brzezinski, Jimmy Carter's national security advisor, bragged to a French newspaper in the late 90's, about his role in causing the Soviet Union to collapse by his support of this war. When asked about the side affects of these activities--the formation of the Taliban, the unleashing of Bin Laden, etc--Brzezinski declared to the effect that the collapse of the Soviet Union was more important than "a few stirred up Muslims." Zbig, the great warrior, of course, made these comments before 9-11. Religious fundamentalism has arisen to pre-dominance because secular possibilities for reform have been destroyed. Certainly the corporate globalization policies enforced by the IMF and World Bank, make the possibilities for attacking concentrated economic power in the third world, very limited. So secular politicians (Ali gives the example of the Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif governments in Pakistan) have mainly devoted themselves to embezzling and getting favors from foreign corporations and the U.S. In free market India, the Hindu fundamentalist party BJP which was in power from 1998-2005, distracted the increasingly impoverished Hindu mas

Tariq Ali is one of the more vocal left-wing public intellectuals in the modern world. The Pakistan-born British resident is a prolific author of both fiction (the Islam Quintet) and non-fiction (Clash of Fundamentalisms, Bush in Babylon and the like). He is also a magnetic public speaker, with the gift of a whithering turn of phrase to complement his impressive analysis of the global political situation. "Speaking of Empire and Resistance" is a collection of interviews conducted by David Barsamian over the early years of this century. There are also two solo pieces, one is a speech which Ali gave on radio and the other is an afterword specifically written for this book. In these pieces, Ali clearly sets out his views on the current state of the world, views covering everything from the War on Terror through to Pakistani politics and American adventurism in Latin America. Having seen him speak at considerable length on many of these topics, I can vouch that the voice coming through here is most definitely that of Ali. For the reader familiar with Ali's politics, there is probably nothing much new here. As in "Clash of Fundamentalisms", the Pakistani political culture comes in for its fair share of criticism. Similarly, readers of "Bush in Babylon" will note that many of the same remarks on the war in Iraq are made here. What is quite interesting, however, is that these interviews are (presumably) raw products and creatures of their times. Thus, Ali's impressions of the anti-war marches in London are found here, along with his rather gloomy predictions about exactly how much they will be taken notice of - predictions which came true very soon thereafter. The strength of "Speaking of Empire and Resistance", however, is that Ali's views are presented in this raw forum. Unlike in his books, where he sometimes seems to get carried away with metaphor and name-calling, these interviews focus on facts and analysis. This does not mean that the criticisms are tempered to any degree, just that they are (if anything) more hard-hitting. Readers of a conservative persuasion, or those who tend to take the Israeli side in the dispute between that country and Palestine should be aware that Ali is from totally the opposite side of the ideological fence. While one other reviewer here has unhelpfully categorised Ali's views as "right-wing", this is quite a false description as he has consistently appeared on the left. As a result, there will be a section of the population to whom this collection will sound like many other left-wing writings. For them, this is almost definitely not the book to buy. For those interested in broadening their minds, or those already aware of Ali's firebrand views, "Speaking of Empire and Resistance" is a superb read and highly recommended.

Tariq Ali speaks of the role of religion in empire building and in terrorism and in so much killing in the world. There have been big increases in fundamentalist religious fighting groups in recent years. One of the reasons for this is that fundamentalist groups have been becoming the safety net for persons in need of food and medical care in parts of the world for their entire families and many persons have real and powerful loyalties to these fundamentalist religious groups.

As a solitary, anguished New Yorker, afflicted by the nightmares of this world, I found the Ali-Barsamian conversation both refreshing and cheery. To be honest I learnt a great deal and can now read the NYT more critically. I have never read such material on Pakistan, Iraq and, yes, Israel. I am not Jewish, but have been sympathetic to Israel because of the past. No longer. The flow of the conversation is hypnotic and I strongly agreed with Eduardo Galeano's cover comment referring to the book as a feast to which all are invited...a comment, incidentally, which attracted me to the book in the first place.

I had not read any books by Tariq Ali, but now intend to do so.Usually I read him on the Counterpunch website, but here he expands at length on many themes, including the role of poetry. As a person of Jewish origin I was especially pleased by what he wrote in this book on Israel and the fact that he quoted Israeli dissident and newspapers to support his argument, something rarely done in the US press or even in the Italian media (I live in Rome). I am well aware that those of us who criticize Israel are often described as 'self-hating Jews'. I don't hate myself but I do hate those who coined the phrase. Ali's description of Zionism is hardly a surprise and I would recommend his detractors to read 'Zionism contra Israel' by Nathan Weinstock which I read in a Maspero edition during my teen years in Paris a long time ago. I also greatly enjoyed Ali's blunt and refreshing remarks about the 'house Arabs'....Fouad Ajami and Kanaan Makiya....does that make him a 'self-hating Arab'?