[infowar.de] Psychology, War & Sacrificial Death

["Orion Anderson" <libraryofsocialscience -! - earthlink - net>]

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  IDEOLOGIES OF WAR AND TERROR, Vol. XXXIX, April 2007  
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               History and Sacrificial Death

                 Richard A. Koenigsberg

CONTENTS

    I. WHAT WAS IN IT FOR SADDAM HUSSEIN?
   II. THE PLEASURE OF KILLING ONE'S OWN PEOPLE
  III. HITLER'S SACRIFICE OF THE GERMAN PEOPLE
   IV. RATIONALITY VS. IRRATIONALITY
    V. WARFARE AS BLOOD SACRIFICE
   VI. HONORABLE DEATH
  VII. HISTORY AND DEATH


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Read the entire paper at: http://www.ideologiesofwar.com/new/

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  Excerpts from the Paper

The mechanism of sacrifice lies at the heart of ideological systems
regardless of cultural context. Lives are forfeited and blood spilled-in
order to validate the ideology. Ideologies become real to the extent that
human beings fight and die in their name. Surely we imagine--if so many
people have killed and died in the name an ideology--there must be something
to it. It is difficult to imagine that all of the sound and fury signifies
nothing. 

Sheikh Abdullah Azzam was an Islamic revolutionary whose thought exerted a
significant influence upon Bin Laden. His essay, "Martyrs: The Building
Blocks of Nations," articulates the relationship between ideology, slaughter
and history. "History," Azzam writes, does not write its lines "except with
blood." Glory does not build its lofty edifice "except with skulls." Honor
and respect cannot be established except on a "foundation of cripples and
corpses."

"History" happens when a group produces death and destruction in the name of
its ideology. Hitler, Stalin and Mao are remembered--not because of their
contributions to civilization--but by virtue of the vast number of people
they killed. As Azzam puts it, the "glory" of an ideology or belief system
builds upon an "edifice of skulls." The honor or respect according to an
idea or ideal its preeminence in history--grows out of a foundation of
"cripples and corpses."

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Read the entire paper at: http://www.ideologiesofwar.com/new/

---------------------------------------------------------------

  Excerpts from the Paper

"Significance" is conferred upon a leader and his ideology based on the
number of people killed in the ideology's name. This is why historians are
keen to document the "number of people that died" in a war, battle,
genocidal episode, or act of terror. Historians establish the importance of
an event by "counting skulls." History is the record of sacrificial dying
that occurred in relationship to ideologies that seek to transform the
world. 

Hitler, Stalin and Mao established their places in history based on the
prodigious number of people who died as a result of their political acts.
Their reputations are built upon a foundation of "cripples and corpses." If
history as Saddam Hussein put it is a record of "sacrifices made in blood,"
then men like Hitler, Stalin and Mao are the greatest
history--makers--because they caused the greatest amount of blood to be
shed.

People who strive to make history seek to have their actions recorded by
journalists and historians. Events most likely to be recorded are ones that
result in the deaths of large numbers of people. Political leaders generate
episodes of mass-murder in order to be remembered for the havoc that they
have wrought-in the name of ideologies they hope will transform the world. 

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Read the entire paper at: http://www.ideologiesofwar.com/new/

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