[Guest Post] Views on Terrorism by Padmaja

Trying to understand Terrorism, Padmaja tries to explore whether one can really go so far for the sake of just a belief and raises few questions on the world leadership. Read it.

One more terrorist attack & we are all forced to either think for the cause or the solution.The Attack on Delhi high court has set in the state of panic in the air once again.

In India we have the naxalites, the communist group which believes they are causing a revolution but we call them terrorists. Then there are the Tamil Tigers in Srilanka and the IRA group all of whom believe they are freedom fighters. And there are the religious terrorists who believe they are fighting for their religion.

I feel any man who is willing to die for what he believes in is a wonderful man. The problem is that there is a huge volume of anger and hatred behind it and so the end result is ugly. Otherwise a man who is willing to die for what he believes in has a wonderful quality. Isn't it so? How many of us are really courageous to die for what we believe?

It’s just that this is happening with enormous anger and hatred against some body and that is the problem.

It is very important that the armies, the government and the leaderships in the world look at the cause why people are so angry. For every creature on this planet, its own life is always precious. Even if you try to kill a little ant, it does its best to save itself; so it is for the human being. To be willing to die & kill for something means that “something” has become very important to him more than his own life, especially when so many people are going in the same direction.We have to address the fundamental issues beneath that decision rather than treating it as something you can just stamp out.

Who is a terrorist? People who are in it do not believe they are terrorists. It is just a term that they feel someone is using for them. Many of them think they are freedom fighters, revolutionaries and some think they are God’s own children. You stamp out one person and a hundred will be born out of that lack of understanding.

Right now in many ways the US is still the leader in the world. If truly wise leadership comes up, they can truly change the world. It doesn’t take a lot of money and resources to address all the problems in the world-it just takes the will. USA has spent more than 600 billion dollars on Iraq. A fraction of that amount could have helped in eradicating poverty or providing healthcare (forty percent people on the planet don’t get medical help), educational facilities and nourishment on the planet.

I am not saying USA is responsible for the world. I only mean the world looks at USA as a leader in many ways.

What has happened is due to lack of vision and simply looking at the world with the same eyes as the barbarians have looked at it.By cutting one hand you are making a million more hands come up. That is for sure & a very natural outcome as many of the so called terrorists are ready to die for what they believe. Is it really " the belief " that they die for?

Any belief system be it religious or otherwise cannot convince a man to die. Because when he says " I believe" knowingly or unknowingly he means " I am not sure but I think so". Beliefs may be facts or may not be facts. For example we know that we have body . It will be funny to say "I believe I have a body" because it is an experiencial fact. If I say " I believe I have a soul" it is all together a different issue as it is not an experiancial fact. Hence in my opinion a human being can not die for something he believes. As belief by its very nature is an assumption & and not a proven fact. If belief has become an obsession there must be an experiential fact which has given a concrete base to his/her beliefs. If he is dying there must be some experiencial facts which convinces him to do so.

Is it possible to look into those facts & understand them? That is what I really wonder. If yes let share our views.