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The first level of stupidity was that of his parents who allowed their child,
at the age of 16, to travel to Yemen in order to continue his studies of
Islam. In America, we allow people to practice any religion they want, but we
are also required to exercise jurisdiction over minor children.
Lindh's parents apparently thought religion was more a matter of fashion than
faith. You can put on anything that looks good. His mother is reputedly a
Buddhist and his father is Catholic. Having no discernible attachment to
their own beliefs, letting an immature child seize upon Islam as some magic
instrument was not only acceptable, but excuse enough to let him travel
halfway across the globe to pursue his studies. Stupidity is perhaps a kind
explanation for such bizarre behavior.
Lindh's choice of Islam may just have initially been the appeal of something
exotic and foreign, but Islam offers something that few Western religions do.
It offers absolute certainty. The Koran is said to be the word of Allah and
immutable. For a child of divorced parents, living in the la-la land of
California, such certainty must surely have had a great attraction.
Islam is a conquering faith that does not accept the validity of any other
religion. It exists to capture the mind and soul of its adherents and
promises death to those who resist. For an idealistic youth, adrift between
the religions of his parents, there is a lot of comfort in knowing you
possess the one true faith and that it calls you to do battle with those who
will not accept it.
Lindh's acceptance by the Muslims in Yemen and, thereafter, in Afghanistan,
gave him a new family. That is perhaps one of the most overlooked factors in
his development. Here was an American who was embraced by Arabs who saw him
as a brother. His emails to his parents revealed he easily shed any loyalty
to the country of his birth.
"I really don't know what your big attachment to America is all about," he
wrote while traveling the Middle East. "What has America ever done for
anybody?" Thus, we add a new level of stupidity to his actions because,
anyone who has passed through even elementary school classes should surely
have learned something about the freedoms inherent to and protected by our
system.
"In the summer of 2001, John Walker Lindh swore allegiance to jihad after
being told that Osama bin Laden had sent fifty people to carry out multiple
suicide operations against the United States and Israel," said Attorney
General John Ashcroft when he announced the ten-count indictment against
Lindh. He went on to say, "It is extraordinary for the United States to have
to charge one of its own citizens with aiding and conspiring with
international terrorist groups whose agenda is to kill Americans. Today marks
an important step in securing justice for John Walker Lindh."
Lindh's lawyers have a thankless job, but it is one that our system demands.
Anyone accused of a crime in this nation is entitled to a vigorous defense.
It is the strength of our system that we require that the accused by held
innocent until proven guilty. I predict that his lawyers will ultimately
argue Lindh was brainwashed. I predict his ultimate, final defense will be
that he joined a cult, that he was the victim of mind control.
This argument has already been advanced by FACTNet.Inc, a group that exposes
cults and mind control. "It does not make sense to Americans that John Walker
Lindh should be found amongst the Taliban and, seemingly, willing to take up
arms against fellow Americans. Unless he is seen in the more probable and
logical context that he is a victim of modern mind control and cult
techniques."
This argument fails when we consider the revelations that at least two high
ranking members of the Central Intelligence Agency and the Federal Bureau of
Investigation turned out to be spies for the former Soviet Union and
present-day Russian Republic. They both made a conscious decision to turn
against their fellow Americans, though more out of greed than ideology.
Lindh's decisions, it can and should be argued, were voluntary in the sense
that his allegiance to the United States was negligible at best and the
opportunity to live out his adolescent dreams offered by Al Qaeda and the
Taliban were irresistible. People his age pledge allegiance to the flag every
day in schools across this land and, if they join our military, they take an
oath to protect our Constitution at ages comparable to his choice to join the
Taliban.
"In these public trials much good could be done by narrowing in the public's
mind our targeting of 20,000 terrorists in mind control cults that can be
deprogrammed," says the FACTNet January newsletter. This reduces the
enormity of their past and potential crimes to mere mental aberrations,
easily changed with some form of counseling. It trivializes events such as
the Holocaust as examples of mind-control through propaganda.
There are cults in this world and they do exercise control over their
followers, but those people who give themselves over to these cults make
certain clear choices in doing so.
I will leave it to the courts to sort out the facts of his guilt or
innocence, but that he is the son of two stupid parents who made stupid
choices is obvious. They permitted and funded his journey to foreign lands
and foreign peoples, some of whom hold strange and extremely dangerous
beliefs.
As for John Walker Lindh, while his youth might explain away his initial
attraction to these beliefs, it cannot excuse his failure to put the safety
of the lives of his countrymen first among his priorities. Those who are
willing to die for al Qaeda, for jihad, must face a justice that places a
priority on life and opposes a martyrdom based on killing those who resist
their beliefs.
Alan Caruba is the author of "The United Nations Vs. The United States", for sale from the Internet site of The National Anxiety
Center, a clearinghouse for information about scare campaigns at
www.anxietycenter.com.
Copyright, Alan Caruba, 2002
Published by permission.
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