Conflicted S1 E5 - Syria

CONFLICTED

S01E05

Thomas Small Welcome back to Conflicted. The last episode was dedicated to the Yemeni Civil War, an intractable conflict that continues to ravage the lives of the Yemeni people. Today, we're going to talk about, perhaps, the greatest tragedy of modern times, the Syrian civil war. In this war, you'll certainly notice a lot of the same players involved. It is a highly complicated civil war. And we're going to try to help you understand how on Earth serious leader, Bashar al-Assad, asset and the world let this beautiful country and its people get caught in the dangerous crossfire between government and terrorists and foreign interest.

Aimen Dean Syria wasn't known for extremism or for this kind of brutality and bloodshed. This is foreign and alien to it. And this is why, whenever, basically, I see jihadists, you know, and jihadist sympathizers, you know, whether they are in Europe or North America, in the Middle East or South Asia. and they keep telling me about Bashar this, Bashar this, Bashar that, you know, the first thing I tell them, "Shut up. You and people like you empowered him."

Thomas Small Stick with us. 

This is Conflicted. 

Here we are again, dear listener. I'm here as always with Aimen Dean, author of Nine Lives: My Life as MI6's Top Agent Inside al-Qaeda. Nine Lives: My Time as MI6's Top al-Qaeda—. 

Aimen Dean Oh, dear. You have put me in trouble now. 

Thomas Small Author – author – author of Nine Lives: My Time as MI6's Top Agent Inside al-Qaeda. Aimen Dean, welcome as always. And I'm Thomas Small, co-producer of Path of Blood, a documentary film about Saudi Arabia and al-Qaeda. 

Today, we will be discussing the great tragedy of modern times, the Syrian civil war. The last episode, we devoted to the Yemeni Civil War, a tragic conflict that is extremely complicated, in which Iran plays an important role, the Gulf states play an important role, the international community plays an important role. Today, we will be talking about another tragic civil war, the Syrian civil war, with many of the same players on the stage—Iran, the United States, Sunni jihadists, Shia militants, the Gulf states, and, in this case, Turkey as well.

Aimen Dean Russia.

Thomas Small Ugh. And, of course, Russia. It's an extremely complicated story, the Syrian civil war, much more complicated than even this podcast can do justice to. But we will do our best. 

So, to talk about Syria is a difficult thing. It's a complicated country. Its history is very complicated. The current president of Syria, Bashar al-Assad, came to power in 2000, following the death of his father Hafez al-Assad, who had been dictator of the country for thirty years. For the first three years or so Bashar al-Assad's rule, the West, in particular, was encouraged. It thought that Bashar al-Assad would introduce liberal reforms and would dial down some of the oppressive police state aspects of his regime. This was called the Damascus Spring. These hopes proved to be ill-founded when, following the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, Bashar al-Assad returned to the old ways of the Assad dynasty. He doubled down on oppression of his own people. He facilitated jihadist moving into Iraq to help undermine American efforts there. And by 2011, his people had had enough. They rose up against him, demanding reform. When he rejected those demands and instead ordered his police to fire on the crowds, the uprising became a rebellion, which was quickly infiltrated by Sunni jihadist on the one side, Iranian radicals on the other, and the whole country descended into anarchy and death and destruction. 

Aimen, tell us again, briefly, what is Iran's geostrategic aim in the region and why would it focus on Syria? 

Aimen Dean We have to remember that when we are dealing with the Iranian regime, we're not dealing with an ordinary political entity. We are dealing with a leadership of a country that believes passionately in religious ideology and eschatology. 

Thomas Small [unintelligible]. These are—. These prophecies, again, that you've been mentioning, the prophecies of the end times, and, somehow, these end times prophecies plays in – in Syria. 

Aimen Dean Indeed. And that's why I have to beg the indulgence of a Western audience when they hear, you know, prophecies. When they hear the phrase "eschatology," they immediately become cynical. But the answer is: Do not try to analyse the mindset of the Iranian regime through your own religious scepticism and cynicism. No. You know, if you try to apply your own pragmatist Western-based cynicism and scepticism, then you will fail to understand the motives and the strategic engines of the Iranian regime. 

Thomas Small So, what you're saying is some people in the West might think that the Iranian regime employs religious rhetoric in order to further strictly pragmatic aims, but they don't really believe it. Because who could really believe that nonsense? That's what you're saying the West needs to get over and realise that the Mullahs, the Iranian regime really believes this. 

Aimen Dean Yes, they do believe this nonsense. I mean, we—. This is what we have to, you know. emphasize. You know, the rallying cry of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, of the Hezbollah, the Lebanese Hezbollah brigades, of the battalions of the Houthis in Yemen, of the Shia militias in Iraq, in Syria, and elsewhere in the world, their rallying cry is: "Labaik ya, Mahdi." You know? "We are here for you, Mahdi."

Thomas Small The Mahdi, which is a sort of end-of-times figure who comes, what, on a white horse, carrying a sword to vanquish the enemies of Islams?

Aimen Dean Oh, the enemies of the Shia Islam, I would say.

Thomas Small In this case. 

Aimen Dean In this case. Yeah.

Thomas Small In– in the eyes of the Iranians, the Shia. Yeah.

Aimen Dean Exactly. And, you know, the saviour figure. So, you know—. And this is why when, you know, the entire political system in Iran is based on the Mahdi. I know many people will be sceptical, but actually, you know, the system is called Wilayat al-Faqih, which, basically, you know, for those who read Lord of the Rings trilogy, you know, you have an absent king. And so, in his stead, there is a steward. 

Thomas Small That's right. So, yes, the ancient kingdom of Ghandour has languished without a king for centuries. And in the king's place, a steward has sat on a little chair just beside the king's throne. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, what you have here is that the Grand Ayatollah of Iran, Ali Khamenei and Khomeini before him, actually, they are called Wilayat al-Faqih, which their mission is to just sit there, deputising on behalf of the absent imam, the Mahdi, who disappeared twelve hundred years ago and – when he was only a baby or, I think, he was 40 years old, according to Shia theology. And he's prophesised to emerge again when the Shia are in dire need of him. 

You know, the entire political system is based on that. The title of the Grand Ayatollah, his mission, the – what is written into the constitution of Iran is actually all based on deputising on behalf of that absent imam, the twelfth imam who disappeared twelve hundred years ago. 

Thomas Small And when twelfth imam, the Mahdi returns, he's going to return to Syria?

Aimen Dean He's going to return to a place which is between Syria and Iraq. And the idea is that, from there, he will use the armies that are based in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen, who are his supporters, to invade the Hejaz, the western part of Saudi Arabia where Mecca and Medina, the two holy cities in Islam, are located. So, therefore, Iran's strategy was that the Mahdi could only appear if all the Shia of the regions are united under one banner and one goal, which is the Islamic revolution, which will place armies that are in Yemen and in Syria and in Iraq. 

And, actually, during the Houthi war and the Syrian war, many of the discussions emerged among the Shia militias. And you can see it online, everywhere. It centres around the fact that we are fulfilling the prophecies of the end of time. Even Assad of Syria features heavily in the prophetic texts, modern prophetic texts of the Grand Ayatollahs in Iran.

Thomas Small Bashar al-Assad, the president of Syria, he will no doubt to take up a certain amount of the – of our time today, because he's a very important figure. But first I'd like to just talk about Syria. Not the Syria of prophecy, but the Syria of everyday reality. I lived in Syria for a year in 2007, 2008, during my university degree.

Aimen Dean Well, that's just one year before I visited myself.

Thomas Small Oh, my goodness. Well, you – you – you've been haunting me my whole life, Aimen. Just shadowing me like a, you know, like a – like an unlucky penny. I don't know. That's a mixed metaphor. 

Aimen Dean You have no idea what I had in my mind for you. 

Thomas Small Oh, no. [unintelligible]. I know a podcast. When I lived in Syria ten years ago—. And it's amazing to think, ten years ago, Syria was, to those of us visiting it, a haven of stability, friendliness, sectarian, cooperation, and peace. None of us would have thought that, within four years, the country was going to descend into what is arguably the most tragic civil war in – in modern Middle Eastern history, I think, without a doubt. Would you say—? How would you characterise the Syrian civil war?

Aimen Dean I would say it is. Not just only the most tragic civil war, but I would say it's the most unnecessary war to have ever occurred, you know, in modern Middle Eastern history. And – and, you know, when you compare that to Iraq, which was the most unnecessarily invasion ever, you know, that's saying something.

Thomas Small It's a double whammy. The most unnecessary invasion on one side of the Levant and the most unnecessary civil war on the other side, creating this petri dish of chaos. I mean, it's hard to imagine actually how the region will escape from it. 

Aimen, tell me, as an Arab, as a Muslim, what is Syria to the average Arab and Muslim? 

Aimen Dean If you asked me about Syria, I would say is that sitting here represents, to every Arab, the glories of the Umayyad dynasty. 

Thomas Small The Umayyad dynasty. The first great—.

Aimen Dean Dee-nasty, not die-nasty. 

Thomas Small Is that true? I'm an American. I—.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Yeah. I don't – I don't care if I'm American. You are in the UK. Here, you are supposed to say dee-nasty, not die-nasty. 

Thomas Small Listen, I spent every – every day after – after school watching reruns of Dynasty. It was die-nasty. 

Anyway, the Umayyad dynasty, the first great, let's say, secular dynasty. How would you describe it? The first great—. 

Aimen Dean Royalist dynasty.

Thomas Small The first great royalist dynasty.

Aimen Dean In Islam.

Thomas Small In Islam, in Muslim history. Centred on Damascus and ruling much of the known world at the time.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. The greatest extent of the early Muslim empire happened during the Umayyad dynasty when Damascus was the centre of the Muslim world. So, Damascus is synonymous with great architecture, with great intellectual renaissance. And at the same time, Damascus and the whole of Syria, including Aleppo and Homs, [unintelligible], many of the great cities there, are synonymous with the great heroes who resisted the crusades Saladin, Nūr al-Dīn, Imad al-Din Zengi, and all of these wonderful figures from, you know, Muslim and Arab history. After this, that—. 

You know, in modern time, you know, Syria is synonymous with amazing cuisine, synonymous with brilliant music and also with drama. I mean, you know, many of the drama and comedies that used to come out of Syria in terms of, you know, TV, production, and films up until 2011, up until the beginning of the civil war, they were catching up with the Egyptians and they were projected to replace the Egyptians as the most prolific in terms of production and in terms of viewership.

Thomas Small Something else that made Syria not – not – not entirely unique, but very special, I would say, in the Middle East is its demographic diversity. It was an extremely diverse country. It is an extremely diverse country. Yes, they're all Arabic-speaking. They're all Arabs. But within that umbrella, there – there was a tremendous diversity in terms of sect, in terms of class, in terms of ethnicity. 

Aimen Dean And history. I'll tell you something. You have Sunni Arabs. You have Kurds. You have Arab who are Ala- – Alawites. You know, a more—. A fringe sect of Shia Islam. You have Shia Muslims. You have Ismailis. And, in fact, the centre of Ismailis is in the world, in the whole world, whether they are in East Africa or in India or in Europe or in North America, their centre is a small town in Syria called so Salamiya. 

Thomas Small You have the Druze.

Aimen Dean The Druze, of course, in the – in the south.

Thomas Small And all sorts of Christians as well.

Aimen Dean Oh.

Thomas Small You have an Orthodox Christian, Syriac Christians, Catholic Christians. Even Pentecostal is Christians these days. 

Aimen Dean Oh, don't forget the Armenians.

Thomas Small And Armenians. 

Aimen Dean I—. Absolutely. I mean, you know, not to for- – forget also that we have Kildanians. You know, we have Assyrians. And, in fact, the language, the mother tongue of Jesus, you know, it still survives to this day in Syria and spoken, you know, among many Syrians.

Thomas Small Yes. Aramaic.

A Aramaic.

Thomas Small The Aramaic language. It's the only place where it's still spoken in some villages. I mean, I hope it's still spoken, my goodness. 

Aimen Dean There were—. There was a village called Jacobi. Another village called—.

Thomas Small Malula. 

Aimen Dean And Malula. And also [place]. All of these villages, you know, Aramaic, and, sometimes – sometimes, they call it Syriac, you know, was spoken and beautifully. And you can listen to the hymns. You know? So, basically—.

Thomas Small Oh, I remember when I was touring Syria and I visited Malula and I went to a monastery up in the hills above Malula, and the priest there showed me the altar, which actually was a pagan altar. It had been a pagan altar before it was converted to a Christian altar. And he said, "Would you like me to recite the Lord's prayer in Aramaic for you, i.e., the language that the Lord himself, if you like, would have recited originally?" That was a very powerful moment. 

Aimen Dean Indeed. I still remember it and I actually memorised it by heart.

Thomas Small Did you?

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small You are a poster child—. 

Aimen Dean [foreign language]. I mean—. And—. Yeah. And so—. 

Thomas Small Poster child for ecumenical harmony and peace, you former al-Qaeda member. 

Aimen Dean So – so – so, of course, Syria, you know, was diverse. And, you know, there was great harmony there. But the problem is all of this was a charade. 

Thomas Small Well, not a charade. It was all held in, I would say, extremely taut tension by a regime…

Aimen Dean Mmhmm. 

Thomas Small …a Ba'athist regime run by the Assad family for the Assad family and for the Alawite sect of the Assad family, which ended up smashing the country to pieces.

Aimen Dean Indeed

Thomas Small . So, who is Bashar al-Assad? Why has he become now a byword for dictatorship and bloodletting? This man, in addition to being a psychopath and an extremely ugly man, lived in London for several years, where he trained as an eye doctor. Lived, you know, in Northwest London. Very, very nice, civilised, middle-class area. Ended up falling in love with a Syrian British woman who grew up here, a nice West London girl with a cut glass accent, who is now the first lady of Asma al-Assad. A very strange contradiction, really. On the one hand, a nice British or Anglicised middle-class family, a doctor working on Harley Street, and, at the same time, a psychopathic dictator of Syria. 

Aimen Dean Well, shall I tell you about another evil eye doctor. Ayman al-Zawahiri?

Thomas Small Oh. Maybe it's a problem with eye – with – with eye doctors. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. Yeah. The leader of al-Qaeda is an eye doctor. 

Thomas Small Eye doctors, we've got your number.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small So, Bashar al-Assad, he's famously soft-spoken. If you look at him, he's – he's a bit of a pencil neck, actually. He doesn't seem so scary. 

Aimen Dean Well, you see, this is a problem with narcissistic psychopaths, is that they do not appear to you to be willing to sacrifice a whole nation in order for them to stay in power. You know, don't forget the man wasn't actually going to be the successor. 

Thomas Small That's true. He had his older brother, Bassel al-Assad, who was groomed to succeed the, father Hafez al-Assad. Bassel al-Assad, he died in a car crash in Damascus. He was a famously reckless driver and, famously, a psychopath. He was supposed to be the psychopath, not Bashar.

Aimen Dean Indeed. But don't forget the entire family is just a family of psychopaths. And I now, I will tell you why. First of all, we have to go back to the 1966 when, you know, you have the Ba'ath Party coming to power in Syria. Hafez al-Assas became the defence minister. And then, in 1970, he staged a coup and became the president. Hafez al-Assad, the greatest survivor of Middle Eastern modern politics. And the trouble is that he held onto power so much and he allowed his fellow minority Alawites to become powerful in the cabinet, in the army…

Thomas Small The army. 

Aimen Dean …the intelligence services. So, they know they have, you know, taken over most of the important apparatus of power within Syria. So, it became a rule of minority. Power resided with the Alawites. 

Thomas Small And within the Alawites, with the family, it was very much a mafia state in that – in that regard. 

Aimen Dean Just like Saddam Hussein in Iraq. You know, it's simple. It's like carbon copies of each other. One is a Ba'ath Party, but Sunni in terms of its, you know, makeup, in terms of power. And, in Syria, it was the Ba'ath Party, but Alawite in its makeup, with dependence on some other minorities, like the Christians and the Druze and the Ismailis.

Thomas Small One thing that's often brought up in Hafez al-Assad's favour is that not only did he bring to power the minority, Alawites, but he also protected all the other minorities in Syria. And to this day, the minorities of Syria—Christians, Armenians, Druze, as we said—they tend to support, but Bashar al-Assad to this day, despite all the destruction that's going on. 

Aimen Dean Well, the problem is, if the protection of the minorities against the majority happen not through consensus means but by brute force, this is not a treatment. 

It's just painkillers. Painkillers. And then the pain would come back again. Many people don't understand that, in Hama, in 1982—.

Thomas Small I'm glad you brought that up, 'cause I wanted to bring that up now.

Aimen Dean Yeah. 

Thomas Small That the – the sort of – the sort of uncompromising response of Bashar al-Assad to the Arab Spring uprisings in 2011 was foreshadowed by his father's response, in 1982, to a Muslim Brotherhood inspired uprising in the city of Hama, where quite infamously, Hafez al-Assad ordered his brother, Rifaat…

Aimen Dean Rifaat. Yes.

Thomas Small …to utterly destroy and crush that rebellion, resulting in tens of thousands of civilian deaths and the leveling of much of that city in 1982. So, Bashar al-Assad's response to the Arab Spring could have been foreseen. And another thing about the Hama massacre of 1982 that's quite instructive, I would say, is that it was a Muslim Brotherhood uprising that the Syrian state under Hafez al-Assad Hoff crushed. You have, in that conflict, in 1982, a similar ideological conflict of – of the one that, at least in rhetorical terms, is going on in Syria now. That between a sort of Sunni Islamist movement and the "secularism" of the al-Assad state, of the Ba'ath Party state. What does secularism mean in the context of the Ba'ath Party? And why—? And – and do you think that it is fair to hold up the secularism of – of a state like Syria before it collapsed as a – as a great achievement?

Aimen Dean You see, this is one of the debates that divides people the world over when it comes to Middle East politics. The Syrian Ba'ath Party, and they will say, "Oh, my God. It is secular. We must support it, because secular equals good." And they see the Muslim Brotherhood and anyone else basically, and they say, "Oh, they are religious. Oh, my God. Then, they are so bad.": Because religious movement equals bad. And this is where this oversimplification of the ideological, you know, tectonic plates in the Middle East that's pushing against each other, you know, result in myopic and inaccurate analysis of what happened in Syria. 

Not all seculars in the Arab world are good. Look at Saddam. He was secular. And look how many people he killed and gassed and everything and all of that. And in the name of Arab nationalism. And the Ba'ath Party, look at them. Basically, they are all secular, you know, in Syria. And yet, look how many people they have killed and caused to kill. The problem here is not about "secular equal good" and "religious equal bad." You know, it's far more complex than that. Sometime, you have religious people who have more respect for democratic process and human rights than their secular counterparts. And that the most vicious dictators in the Middle East actually were secular in their outlook. Look at Gadhafi. Look at Mubarak. Before him, Gamal – Gamal Abdel Nasser and look at Hafez al-Assad and look at Saddam Hussein. All of them are secular.

Thomas Small Sure. But you might say, if the greatest threat of all is some sort of Taliban-style government rolling across the Middle East, then perhaps you need an authoritarian secularist to crack some skulls and break some eggs to prevent an even worse evil from – from establishing itself.

Aimen Dean This is why I always say that between the two wolves, you know—. So, you have a wolfpack there and you have a wolfpack here, and they are are fighting each other. And what's happening is that the world is divided, cheering, you know, for one side against another. And I was saying no. No. You know, there are other alternatives, you know, especially when it comes to the fact that I'm an unabashed monarchists. Because monarchies tend to behave better. 

Look at Morocco, less resources than Syria. And yet, basically, the living standards and Morocco are better than in Syria. We have to ask ourselves why. The system of governance, it seems to be more resilient and less prone to torture, imprisonment, and brutal tactics. 

You know, the king of Jordan, no one is going to – going to call him a dictator, even though he is, actually, in all sense of the word "dictator." That is where people got it wrong as far as Bashar al-Assad. They saw his secularism and they viewed it as a virtue when, in fact, actually, it is not a virtue. 

Thomas Small  There's a tragic irony with – in the story of Bashar al-Assad, because when he came to power following his father Hafez's death in 2000, the first three years or so of his rule in Syria was known as the Damascus Spring, when it seemed that Bashar al-Assad was going to liberalise slightly, was going to open up more to the West, was going to bring Syria back into the fold of the international community from its self-imposed isolation and strident anti-Israeli rhetoric and all that sort of thing. That, in the end didn't happen. And it's possible to say that one of the reasons it didn't happen was because of that other tragic war in the Middle East, the invasion of Iraq, at which point, Bashar al-Assad thinks, "Hmmm, I'm probably going to be next here. Why should I be playing along with America? These neo-cons are clearly threatening me." Do you feel that that was a turning point for Bashar al-Assad, the Iraq War?

Aimen Dean Yes. And also, don't forget that many people don't understand that, you know, while Bashar was, you know, of course, basically a secular dictator, his greatest ally in the region was the theocratic government of Iran, because of the fact that, while he is secular on paper, but because he belongs to a minority that belonged to a fringe Shia sect, he asked that he saw in Iran a great ally and a protector.

So, this is where the irony comes when people say, "But Bashar is so secular." No. And, in fact, that is why when the Iraq, Bashar decided to pull two strings here. His alliance with Iran made him allow many of al-Qaeda members to actually come and pass through Syria and then get into—.

Thomas Small Yes. Let's – let's – let's go into this in great detail…

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small …'cause it's actually a wonderful story. I mean…

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small …because Bashar al-Assad oversaw a secularist regime, at least on paper, and because Sunni jihadists, in particular, and Muslim Brotherhood-influenced revolutionaries were a threat to that regime, they languished in Syrian prisons. Come the Iraq War, Bashar al-Assad, in collusion with the Iranian regime, is – is what people understand today, agreed to release those jihadists from Syrian prisons and facilitate their entry into Iraq in order to discomfit the American forces there. 

And not only that, but from all around the world, jihadists who went to Iraq to fight, to join al-Qaeda in Iraq, under Zarqawi, as we discussed two podcasts ago, they came via Damascus, and the Syrian regime facilitated that movement. Is that right? 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. In fact, you know, I happened to have met one of the grandees of the Syrian redeem, you know, who later defected and against Bashar al-Assad. He was the son of the former defence minister class. And so, when I talked to him, he confessed. He said, "Yes, we did it. We did it, because, basically for us, we wanted to make sure that the project for the Americans in Iraq never succeed." 

Then, don't forget the other string I was talking about, you know, Assad pulled the first string, which is the Iranian alliance. But the second string here was the fact that the Ba'ath Party in Iraq was still ideologically, you know, linked to the Ba'ath Party in Damascus. And, of course, they lost that power. So, many of the Ba'ath Party members fled to Syria. And there, they—.

Thomas Small So, ISIS—. So, Iraqi Ba'athists fled to Syria…

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small …where they regrouped, where they – where they also conspired against the American occupying [crosstalk].

Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, you know, basically, Bashar al-Assad was playing both sides,. was playing the Ba'athists, you know, the Iraqi Ba'athists who resided in Syria. And also he was—. He, you know—. He played the, you know, the Iraqi. So, the Iraqi al-Qaeda members and also the foreign al-Qaeda members who were coming, and he facilitated their entry into Syria. 

Thomas Small When Bashar al-Assad was facilitating foreign fighters into going into Iraq to attack the Americans there in 2006, around 2005, 2006, you were still an MI6 double agent.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small Were you working in any direct way on countering that or – or—. I mean, how – how did – how did the Western intelligence agencies counter that – that conspiracy? 

Aimen Dean Well, it's simple. I mean, we discovered, at the time, that Syria was the root from as early as 2004. How? Because what happened is, of course, many people who were in Saudi Arabia and in Kuwait and in Bahrain—. And these are the countries I was monitoring at the time. I was monitoring of activities in these countries. Whenever you have a new young man recruited and wants to go to Iraq, where would he go? You would immediately find that there are certain people, who I knew personally in Bahrain, in Kuwait, who would hand over small pieces of paper with instructions and phone numbers. And all of them are where? In the Damascus. 

So, I'm talking about one example, two or ten or twenty. I'm talking about dozens of examples here.

Thomas Small But Bashar al-Assad, by allowing this jihadist activity to take place inside Syria in those years, he was really laying the foundations for the destruction of his own country. Because, in the end, these jihadists, they came back to Syria and began fighting him. So, the Arab Spring, of course, afflicted many countries throughout the Middle East. In Syria, it played out in a unique way. Protests began in the south of the country, but quite quickly it descended into violence. What happened?

Aimen Dean Well, I'll give you my take on what really happened here. They—.

Thomas Small Well, first, give us the official narrative.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small And then, undermine that narrative, if you wish.

Aimen Dean The official narrative is that there is a conspiracy by Saudi Arabia, by Qatar, by Turkey, by the Muslim Brotherhood, by the US, by the European Union, by Jordan, even, by Israel. So, all of these powers. In fact, you know, the – the – the city TV used to call it the globalist conspiracy to topple the regime there. And what many people don't understand that no one had any interest of the regime actually falling. No one. Even the Saudis and the Qataris. No one wanted that to happen, actually. They wanted just to punish Bashar for everything he did, the killing of the prime minister of Lebanon in 2005 as – as a nation of so many Lebanese pro-Saudi and pro-Gulf politicians. But that's another story. But no one wanted him to be toppled. 

So, what happened here is that they said these protests in Daraa, which is the first city to experience protests [crosstalk].

Thomas Small In the south of Syria.

Aimen Dean Yeah. In late March of 2011. What happened there? According to the people, they were saying the three young kids, they were taken into custody for mischievous behaviour. They were just kids from a poor neighbourhood. There were young boys around the age of eleven, twelve, or thirteen. And then, their bodies were found ditched somewhere.

Thomas Small Mutilated. 

Aimen Dean Yes. And raped. By the way, you know, there has been many instances, many numerous documented instances, of rogue police officers in Syria kidnapping and raping young boys. 

Thomas Small Hmmm.

Aimen Dean And that was rampant. And no one can deny that. Because the people themselves would admit it happened. So, of course, what happened is that the atmosphere of the Arab Spring, the fall of Ben Ali in Tunisia and Mubarak in Egypt convinced people of Daraa that, "Look, do we have to put up with this anymore?" 

Thomas Small "Do we have to put up with Bashar al-Assad's policemen raping our boys?"

Aimen Dean Exactly. So, what happened is when the uprising in – in Daraa, it was actually directed at the local police. And they sent a delegation to Damascus to meet Bashar al-Assad to say, "Reign in your – in your police. The Arab world is changing, and you have to change. And your police need to be less impressive. Less powers of the police. That's how it all started. 

Thomas Small Which, it seems to me, a perfectly legitimate thing for the people to do.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Because I've been to Syria. You've been to Syria. You see how the police were behaving with impunity, taking bribes from people, you know, oppressing people. If you are a police officer, it's just—. Basically, your salary, it's just, you know, like a tip. The rest of your income actually come from bribes. So, the city a was incredibly corrupt police state, you know. Don't forget. It's the only country in the world almost where, undemocratically, a son succeeded his father as a president. The second one was North Korea. It wasn't like a bastion of democracy and human rights and [crosstalk].

Thomas Small Certainly not. No one would claim that.

Aimen Dean No one. Yeah. So, you know, the – the people said, "Well, enough is enough." Because the atmosphere in the Arab world was that of freedom.

Thomas Small So, what happened? They say, "Enough is enough." They sent a delegation to Bashar al-Assad in Damascus. What does he do?

Aimen Dean Bashar promised them to do everything right. And then, as soon as they returned, [unintelligible] were arrested. And this is basically when things started to get more ugly. People went more into the streets and started to infect other cities, where—. Then, in Homs, there was another young boy who was kidnapped by the police. Hamza Ali Al-Khateeb. Very famous case. Kidnapped, raped, and his body was dumped into the rubbish. And the police station that done it said, "If you keep protesting, we will kidnap more boys and do it." They don't understand that the world is changing and there is social media. And, you know, and this kind of tit-for-tat, "If you do this, we will do that," it's no longer applicable. People will rebel. 

Thomas Small And quite soon after, the rebellion started. The regime turned their guns on the crowds.

Aimen Dean Exactly. So, what happened here is that, you know, the protests all around the country were not anti-Bashar. Actually, it was more anti-government repression. So, their demands in the first three months, I still remember. And people unfortunately have short memories, they think basically that they wanted to topple the regime. No. The demands were the repeal of Article VIII of the constitution, which is that the Ba'ath Party is the only party that is allowed to be, you know, empowered or—. 

Thomas Small So, they – they wanted more political pluralism. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. Which is fair enough. 

Thomas Small It seems to me. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. And also, they demanded that the seventeen security agencies to be, you know, more merged into one or two or three agencies, and more – with more oversight, because every agency thought they are immune and they could kidnap boys or take bribes or arrest people at a whim and disappear them without any trace.

Thomas Small They wished for the state security apparatus to be disempowered.

Aimen Dean Indeed. 

Thomas Small So, political pluralism, less state oppression.

Aimen Dean Yeah. And the political prisoners. 

Thomas Small Now, what does that mean though? Because political prisoners in Syria, I mean, aren't these, the jihadists we were talking about? Does that – does that mean that, already amongst this movement, there was a – there was a Sunni jihadist undercurrent?

Aimen Dean Oh, no. There were so many different, you know, types of political prisoners, you know. Even sometimes comedians and, you know – you know, and even artists. Like, you know, we are part of the political prisoner movement. Sometimes, children, unfortunately. You know, there was a, a young teenage girl, sixteen-year-old. She was fifteen when she was arrested and seventeen when she was executed. [name]. She was living in Egypt. She had the blog where she was reminding Bashar al-Assad of his democratic promises when he came to power. 

Thomas Small During the Damascus Spring. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. You know, when she arrived back in Syria, she was arrested at the age of fifteen. [name], her name. She was arrested at the age of fifteen for writing a blog. And then, they decided to put her on trial in front of a military tribunal for being a spy for the Israelis. And she gave information to the Israelis, which enabled, you know, a, you know, the Israelis to target, you know, a – an intelligence officer of the Syrians, and he became paralysed for life, which is completely pathetic [unintelligible]. 

Thomas Small Clearly—. Yeah. Clearly, these are trump charges

Aimen Dean And then, she was executed. 

Thomas Small Unbelievable.

Aimen Dean Yeah. 

Thomas Small So, the protesters were in fact appealing to their president, Bashar al-Assad, to make these very reasonable reforms. But instead…

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small …he switches the psychopath button in his mind and he orders his men to fire into the crowds. And within months, the whole movement is militarised. 

Aimen Dean There as a sentence he uttered just one month after the beginning of the uprising. After one month or less than that, he gave a speech to parliament.

Well, I mean, to the appointed parliament, as you know, in Syria. And in that speech—. You know, I was listening to him so intently. Of course, basically, I was trying to see where will he go, which direction he will take. And one sentence, just one sentence, in my opinion, inaugurated the whole civil war. Because he said—. Of course, at the time there were about seven hundred, eight hundred thousand people on the streets of Syria. After—. Out of about, you know, twenty-five million, you know, population. So, it was still easily containable. 

He said that "from the videos of the protests, we have identified sixty-four thousand protestors who we believe are criminals and we will arrest them, and justice will be done." That is, in my opinion, the stupidest, most idiotic, dangerous sentence ever uttered in modern Middle Eastern history. When there are eight hundred thousand people on the streets, and you are saying, "We have identified sixty-four thousand," each and every one of these eight hundred thousand will never come back home. That you have basically inaugurated civil war, because you told them, "Keep on protesting, keep on being violent, keep on, you know, this uprising, because if you go back home, you will have the secret prisons treatment." And Bashar's prisons are very infamous, unfortunately, for being nothing but death factory. 

Thomas Small He undermined the possibility that these protests could have resulted in something like reform. 'Cause he wasn't interested in reform.

Aimen Dean Not – not just only not interested in reform. You know, when you threaten the protesters on the street that possibly all of you will be in prison—because none of them know which one of them is part of the sixty-four thousand—you give them a point of no return. You—. You give—. You put them in a – on a path where there is no return. 

Thomas Small The Syrian civil war did quickly devolve into total violence on all sides. And I'll have to ask us to sort of skip forward three or four years to when the civil war was raging at its most violent. We have a battlefield scenario where there are myriad Sunni jihadist groups, myriad so-called moderate revolutionary groups, although who these people are has never been entirely clear to anyone. You have Bashar al-Assad's forces. You have Hezbollah in Lebanon, providing troops to Bashar al-Assad to fight the Sunni jihadist. You have Iranian Revolutionary Guard commanders overseeing that Bashar al-Assad effort. You have Afghan Shia mercenaries shipped in by the Iranian regime to Syria to provide further troops. It's a total shit storm. And at the same time, you have foreign powers—the United States, the EU, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar—on the opposition side to Bashar al-Assad, coordinating, mis-coordinating. And then, in the midst of all this, you have ISIS arise. 

Let's talk about these jihadists. 

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small Why such a patchwork? Why such a kaleidoscope of jihadist groups fighting each other, fighting the regime, fighting the Americans. What was going on? 

Aimen Dean You see, the greatest calamity that Syria suffered after Bashar al-Assad, you know, was the arrival of al-Qaeda. When my wife asked me, you know, "Could you tell me in one sentence what went wrong with Syria?" So, I told her, "al-Qaeda came to town."

Thomas Small Now, tell us that story. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. Well, you see, Bashar was partly responsible for that in two ways, one before the war and one after the war.

Thomas Small Before the war, as we – as we said, he released al-Qaeda prisoners and such like people from prison and – and sent them to the Iraq, where they regrouped and came back to bite him in the butt. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. The second way after the war in which the way he responded to the uprising, which was moderate at the beginning, with violence, led to people, you know, trying to find—. "Okay. Who will protect us? Who will actually, you know, be the force that could actually force Assad us to re-evaluate his options?" [crosstalk].

Thomas Small And they turned to al-Qaeda, which was called, initially, in Syria, the Nusfra Front.

Aimen Dean  Exactly. Jabhat al-Nusra…

Thomas Small Which—.

Aimen Dean …which means the support front. 

Thomas Small And it was – it was—. The—. So, the Nusfra Front was an al-Qaeda franchise, if you like. But at the very—. At the beginning, not everyone knew that. Is that right? They was—. They had done a pretty good job of – of – of hiding their al-Qaeda affiliation.

Aimen Dean I knew. 

Thomas Small Well, yeah. You're not – you're not just everybody.

Aimen Dean But I knew, because, immediately, I started to notice. Because, don't forget, after I left the service of MI5 and MI6 2006, I became a banker, as many listeners would have known by now. And because I was a banker, I was always, you know, in the banking section, which monitored terrorism finance. 

Around November, December of 2011, just about seven, eight months after the beginning of the uprising, that there are certain, the financials in Kuwait, in Bahrain, in Qatar started some movement of collecting money for certain groups. And that's when I started to become suspicious that something is not right. And I remember, even at a great risk to me, I went all the way to Kuwait at the beginning of 2012 and even attended one of these fundraising meetings… 

Thomas Small Wow

Aimen Dean …which was risky, but I just wanted to—.

Thomas Small Risky, because, at that point, you – there was already the fatwa against you.

Aimen Dean Exactly. 

Thomas Small Your former al-Qaeda, you know, brothers were – were – were going to kill you. 

Aimen Dean So, I thank God there were hundreds basically in that big tent erected, you know, near one of the [foreign language] in Kuwait, basically. So—.

Thomas Small So, you're saying you went to a – you went to a – a – a jamboree in Kuwait specifically oriented towards raising money for terrorists in Syria.

Aimen Dean Well, tThey didn't call them terrorists. They called them basically, you know, a, you know, the cause of jihad in Syria against the tyrant Bashar al-Assad.

Thomas Small Right. 

Aimen Dean And funny enough—funny enough—I started listening to the speakers, and they were talking about eschatology. 

Thomas Small Oh, the prophecies.

Aimen Dean Again. Again. 

Thomas Small Goodness gracious.

Aimen Dean Among them were, you know, [name]. You know, he was—. He's a famous Salafist cleric in Kuwait. Among them was Hammad Ali, one of the famous supporters of al-Qaeda in Iraq. In fact, in al-Qaeda [crosstalk]. 

Thomas Small Now, why are these – why are these people able to come out in the open and Kuwait and say these things? Why aren't these people in prison, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Because not far away, just about fifteen, sixteen kilometres away in Kuwait— I'm not kidding you—in Kuwait, just at, you know, at the same week, there was another big tent that—. Yes. I'm not kidding. There was another big tent, another [unintelligible] gathering of Shia Kuwaitis, raising funds for, you know, militants to go and fight in Syria alongside Bashar al-Assad. 

Thomas Small So – so, Gulf funding was funding both sides. 

Aimen Dean Yes. 

Thomas Small Yes. It's—. The Syrian civil war has been a sort of solvent that has – that has caused national identities, other identities to wither away, and the sectarian identities are all that's left. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. And, actually, you know, to give an example, you know, I'm a Bahraini.

Thomas Small Yeah.

Aimen Dean And my nephew and cousin, both of them are Bahrainis. You know, my nephew, Ibrahim, was – he was only nineteen and my cousin, Abdurrahman, he was only twenty. Abdurrahman went to fight with Jabhat al-Nusra.

Thomas Small With al-Qaeda in Syria?

Aimen Dean With – with al-Qaeda in Syria. And he died there in May 2013, in Damascus.

Thomas Small I'm sorry to hear that. That's very sad. 

Aimen Dean Then, my nephew went. First, he was tempted to join ISIS, but I, after many Skype calls, you know, myself, his father, I mean, basically we convinced him not to join them. Basically, like, you know, just try to go somewhere else. And he joined another more moderate group, which belonged to [unintelligible], another, you know, Muslim Brotherhood offshoot, of the insurgents. And he died there in September of 2013. 

There are two Bahrainis, but there we're not the only two Bahrainis, from Bahrain, to fight and die there. There were other trainees who were from the other side, Shia Bahrainis…

Thomas Small Shia. Shia Bahrainis. 

Aimen Dean …who fought alongside Hezbollah and Bashar al-Assad. So, there are Kuwaitis fighting Kuwaitis and Bahrainis fighting Bahrainis and Saudis fighting Saudis in that conflict. It is—. You know, with the arrival of al-Qaeda, which brought with it, of course, ISIS, after that, and their purest Sunni jihadist ideology, and because they came not from al-Qaeda central—they came from al-Qaeda in Iraq, which was known at the time as the Islamic State of Iraq—and then, when they break rock away from al-Qaeda as a whole, in 2013, they announced that, "Oh, al-Nusra, these people in Syria, they are ours." And that caused al-Nusra to split, with two-thirds going to ISIS and one-third remaining, you know, which basically grew up later, of course.

Thomas Small It's quite complicated. But the takeaway is that ISIS and al-Qaeda in Syria are essentially the same organisation. They just had picked… 

Aimen Dean Split.

Thomas Small They had picked a fight with each other. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. They split in May 2013.

Thomas Small When I was in Syria, one of the monasteries that I visited there, Mar Musa, not far from Damascus, not far from Malula, in fact, where Aramaic, the language of Jesus Christ, is still spoken. It was a Roman Catholic monastery, and it's Abbott, Father Paolo, in Italian Franciscan, if I'm not mistaken, who had really worked hard for twenty years to form close relations with the Sunnis, with the Shia, with all the different groups in the vicinity. And the mo- – the monastery had become a place of pilgrimage for all these groups. When the Syrian civil war started, Father Paolo very famously refused the Vatican's demand that he – that he leaves Syria because it was too dangerous, 'cause he wanted to remain a spokesman for sectarian unity in Syria. In the end, he was kidnapped and beheaded by ISIS. 

Aimen Dean And that's the tragedy. You see, Syria wasn't known for extremism or for this kind of brutality and bloodshed. And this is foreign and alien to it. And this is why, whenever, basically, you know, I see jihadists, you know, and jihadist sympathizers, you know, whether they are in Europe or North America, in the Middle East or South Asia, and they keep telling me about Bashar this, Bashar this, Bashar that, you know, the first thing I tell them, "Shut up. You and people like you empowered him." He was about to fall. Many people defected. Even his own prime minister, Riyad Hijab, left him in March of 2012. Many people were leaving him. His army was – started – started to disintegrate. And it was clear that he either concede reforms or give up. He might lose, but what saved him was al-Qaeda.

Thomas Small The arrival of al-Qaeda. The arrival of al-Qaeda on the scene gave him a rhetorical victory. He could always say, "I'm defending Syria from al-Qaeda."

Aimen Dean Exactly. al-Qaeda did not start. They just arrived and taken advantage of that war, and, as a result, turned the war from a war of liberation in order to bring about some sort of a better Syria into a conflict that is based on sectarian jihadism. 

Thomas Small What about these moderate rebels, Aimen? We – we heard, especially here in Britain, because the UK was always going to support the moderate – the moderate rebels in the Syrian civil war. Who were these moderates?

Aimen Dean At the beginning, they were mostly soldiers from al-Assad army who actually defected.

Thomas Small The Free Syrian Army.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And many of them had purely nationalistic aspirations. Many of them were not just only Sunnis, but also they had Druze and Christians. 

Thomas Small So, what happened to the Free Syrian Army? 

Aimen Dean They were taken over by, you know, and marginalized by the jihadist and the ideological, you know, groups that were linked to the Muslim Brotherhood.

Thomas Small So, you say jihadists both infiltrated the Free Syrian Army and also attacked the Free Syrian Army and defeated them on the battlefield.

Aimen Dean Well, not just only that. But actually, more or less, just like what happened if you listen to the podcast on Iraq, when we talked about Zarqawi. What Zarqawi was money – was money, but also the name of al-Qaeda and the name of jihad. And so, they were able to cannibalize other groups, including the Free Syrian Army. So, it's just pure cannibalism on the part of the jihadists that marginalized the moderate rebels completely.

Thomas Small And what role did the Gulf states play in all of this? Because, you know, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the Emirates, they're often accused of fueling the bloody mess of Syria with money, with – with – with weapons. What's – what's the truth there?

Aimen Dean Well, the truth that is that it happened. And in fact—. You know, I'm not going to deny it. It happened. The Qataris we're supporting [name]. The Saudis were supporting Jamal Maarouf and Hazim. You know, it's a group called Hazim. And they supported Unit 13. They supported Unit 49. You know, the Turks, of course, they supported Nūr al-Dīn Zengī group. And others they supported the [unintelligible], the TIP or the Turkistan Islamic Party. You know, we will talk about them in the next podcast.

So – so, in a sense, you know, all of this was not coordinated. And at the same time, many of them, while they were moderate, but they were not moderate enough. They still had this stingy of either jihadism or Muslim Brotherhood, you know, ideology about them. 

Thomas Small But, surely, some of these Gulf states also supported al-Qaeda directly, ISIS directly. That's what we're always told. 

Aimen Dean No.

Thomas Small None of them did?

Aimen Dean None of them. See, you know—. You know, I – I always basically had—.

Thomas Small How can we believe you, Aimen, actually? I mean, surely, you're just – you're just, you know, you're just – you're just a – an apologist for Gulf – for Gulf states.

Aimen Dean No. Of course not. I'm not an apologist for anyone. I'm apologist only for the truth. And, for me, I am a ex-spy and, after that, a financial banking investigator, which means that I follow the money. And whenever someone challenged me on this and says, "The Saudis are supporting ISIS and al-Qaeda, the Qataris as supporter – supporting ISIS and al-Qaeda. The Americans actually are supporting and creating ISIS and al-Qaeda."

Thomas Small These are all the accusations?

Aimen Dean Yeah. And I would say to everyone, "Look, I have spent eleven years of my life in the banking sector. Before that, eight years of my life as a spy against terrorist groups. So, unless if you have with you, you know, official transactions, banking transactions, or any other form of transactions that I can take actually to court, then, please, do not utter this nonsense." Why? Because I have followed terrorism finance for nineteen years of my life. 

Thomas Small And you're saying there's no hard evidence that Gulf state supported either ISIS or al-Qaeda in Syria?

Aimen Dean If you have—. If you are, as a listener, have an evidence, I will actually guarantee you hundreds of thousands of pounds of – in payment from many lawyers who want to hold these countries to account and demand justice for the victims, whether they are in North America or Europe. If you have evidence, come forward. You don't, then it's not there. 

If you hear about me buying a Lamborghini and basically living in one of the machines in Beverly Hills, it means that I finally found the evidence. [crosstalk].

Thomas Small That's the lottery ticket. That's the lottery ticket. The proof we've all been looking for.

Aimen Dean Yes. Because if it happened, I would be a rich man by now. But it never happened. They were supporting groups that are not related to al-Qaeda or ISIS. They did, but these groups cannot be classified as terrorists, because they were not classified as terrorists by the US Treasury or by the EU. 

Thomas Small And in—. But—. And sadly, indirectly, the support of these other groups may have led to the empowerment and aggrandizement of al-Qaeda and ISIS when al-Qaeda and ISIS conquered those groups and expropriated the funds and the weapons that had been given them. So, it was blow back. 

Aimen Dean Indeed. Absolutely. And that's why, you know, all of these countries stopped completely, you know, by, I would say, the end of 2016. That's it. All the support dried out.

Thomas Small They realised that their support for other jihadist groups, other resistance groups in Syria had backfired. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. First, the Americans told them stop. And they also stopped on their own volition, as well as the fact that the Americans decided that the best one to fight ISEs are not those so-called moderate, you know, Syrian groups. They are useless. The only ones who can do that were the Kurds.

Thomas Small America empowered the Kurds. Now, that allows me to ask a question about America in the Syrian civil war and, especially, the former president, Barack Obama, often accused of waffling in his response to that conflict, accused of – of drawing his red lines beyond which he said Bashar al-Assad would not be allowed to – to pass, but then Bashar al-Assad would transgress the red line, and – and Obama would do little or nothing. What is your estimation of America's intervention or lack of intervention in the Syrian civil war, especially given the fact that you say America's intervention in Iraq was such a disaster?

Aimen Dean You see, the problem of the Syrian conflict is that it was a victim of the Iraq War in many ways, of the radicalization that took place in Iraq, which basically sent ISIS and al-Qaeda from Iraq back to Syria. But also, because in Iraq, the West was over-committed. In Syria, because of what happened in Iraq, the West was under committed. And what Syria needed, especially—especially—that window, between November 2011 and June of 2012. That window, if the Americans used it wisely, all what – all what was needed was just two American submarines and seventy-two Tomahawk missiles raining on Bashar al-Assad's security and military apparatus. And his own army would have ditched him immediately. There would have been a coup. And his vice president, Sunni yet secular and Ba'athist, Farouk al-Sharaa, would have become president. And the Syrian civil war would have ended before it even started. 

Thomas Small So, why didn't Barack Obama order the Tomahawks to – to rain down?

Aimen Dean Because he was a chicken.

Thomas Small He was a chicken?

Aimen Dean Yes. 

Thomas Small Okay. Expand on that. 

Aimen Dean Okay. The problem with Barack Obama is that he was always a hesitant leader when it come to world events. You know, this is why Putin took advantage of Obama's hesitation on the world stage. And he supported, of course, stupidly, the Arab uprising, especially against Mubarak. But then he did not want to intervene. 

He was always anti-intervention. 

Thomas Small But what about Libya? We intervened in Libya. Why did we intervene in Libya, but not in Syria? Oil?

Aimen Dean No. There was more to it than that. Barack Obama wanted to appease the Iranians over the nuclear deal, and he wanted to negotiate a nuclear deal with them. Antagonising them on Syria meant that he would lose Iran forever. So, for the sake of that nuclear deal, which is gone now, anyway—.

Thomas Small 'Cause Trump has vetoed it. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. 

Thomas Small Or he has abrogated it. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, for the sake of that deal, he hesitated on Syria so much that this hesitation cost the Syrians and the world, especially Europe, with the waves of migration, a lot of great pain.

Thomas Small And, finally, Russia. Russia intervened in the Syrian civil war on the side of Bashar al-Assad to protect its naval base in Tartus, on the Mediterranean Coast, to project its own influence in the Middle East further, to take advantage of Barack Obama's hesitation and, in general, Obama's withdrawal of American influence from the region. And in alliance with Iran, Russia has ended up being the major player in that part of the world. No one would have foreseen this ten years ago. 

Aimen Dean Of course not. And that's the problem with, you know, the fact that Barack Obama's foreign policy was absolutely disastrous as far as the Middle East was concerned. Because he could have put an end to this war. Even – even if he really, really forced Bashar al-Assad into a corner, he could have forced him to concede at least some reforms. But, unfortunately, he decided to sit on the side lines and allow this, you know, to happen. Why—?

S; And does – does Russia now call the shots in the region then? 

Aimen Dean Well, not in the region, but in Syria, at least. And I want to raise another issue: how to show the globalist thing of it. There are two people—two people—I blame personally for sending Syria into this chaos even further because of their constant interference—theological, ideological interference—with the uprising in Syria. Abu Qatada, the Jordanian cleric, who was based here in the UK for more than thirteen years. Possibly even more. Actually, no. Twenty years, almost. And he went to Jordan after he left the UK, of course, when he was extradited to Jordan. And there, the Jordanians, you know, allowed him to have his own Twitter account and online presence. And he kept talking about "You must do this. You mustn't do that. You must do this. Don't agree to democracy. Don't agree to pluralism. Don't agree to do [crosstalk] harmony." 

Thomas Small He's addressing the Syrian uprising, is he?

Aimen Dean Absolutely. And he just kept along with the other snake, Abu Mohammed al-Maqdisi, who was also responsible for informing the ideology of al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia in the early days, which, you know, informed your film, Path of Blood. He—. Both of them, you know, your put their poisons into the mind of the young people in Syria who were, you know, protesting based on, you know, civil rights demands and turned all of this into ideological battlefield over jihadist ideology purity. 

Thomas Small So, when you said at the beginning of the episode that the Syrian civil war was the most preventable civil war in the Middle Eastern history, is it because al-Qaeda didn't need to have arrived on the scene?

Aimen Dean I would say it was preventable because of several facts. One, Assad did not need to use repression or violence against his own people. 

Thomas Small No.

Aimen Dean He could have just conceited fewer reforms, and the number of protestors would have plummeted from the hundreds of thousands to only a few thousands, which then he can deal with. But he could have conceded reforms. Some people would say, "Oh, no. The protesters would have kept on." No. I will say no. Because we have two other countries where, when reforms were promised, the protesters went home—Jordan and Morocco. Both of them led by young people. King Abdullah of Jordan and King Mohammed VI Morocco both conceded the reforms and, in both cases, the protesters went home. 

Thomas Small So, Bashar could have conceded reforms. What – what else? 

Aimen Dean He did not need to utter that sentence, the most fateful sentence in the Syrian history when he said that "there are sixty-four thousand people we identified. We will let us them." That was wrong. You know, you just forced them to stay on the streets and then become militants. 

Thomas Small Okay. And three?

Aimen Dean And three, al-Qaeda did not need to come there.

Thomas Small When you say they did not need to come there, but who—. No. How—? Who is going to sit down with al-Qaeda and talk sense into them? They did need to go there in their own minds, because of the prophecies, because of everything they'd been working towards for twenty years. 

Aimen Dean Ah, yes, the prophecies. The bloody prophecies. I mean, basically, I—. you know, I wish, really, these prophecies never existed. 

Thomas Small So, Aimen, al-Qaeda didn't have to come to Syria. Sure. Certainly, Bashar al-Assad didn't have to respond the way he did. But now, what is it, seven years later, is it safe to say Bashar al-Assad, despite being the asshole that he is, has won the war and will be on his throne in Damascus for the time being?

Aimen Dean No. If this is winning, what is losing? Seven hundred thousand people dead. Thirteen million people displaced. The entire country ravaged, destroyed. The infrastructure is non-existent. It will cost $500 billion, half a trillion dollars, to rebuild the whole thing. If this is winning, God knows what losing is. 

Thomas Small But he's in power. 

Aimen Dean Well, at what cost and at what price? And the question is: Maybe he won the war, can he win the peace? Because why? Still, a quarter of the country is in the hands of the Kurds, and they are not going to play ball with him. They are not going to give up the sovereignty, the sovereignty they had won. One quarter of the entire Syrian territory is in the hands of the YPG, the Kurds who fought so hard against ISIS onslaught, the massacres that ISIS has committed against them, and the enslavement of many as eighty women among them. 

So, do you think they will just roll over and give up everything they have? Because, basically, Assad was repressing the Kurds also. Denying them their language. Denying them—. Denying three million of them citizenship, even. So, now that they have been empowered, they have an army almost the size of two hundred thousand fighter, do you think they are going to give all this up and go back to being subservient to Assad? 

Thomas Small So, what you're really saying is the war is not over.

Aimen Dean No.

Thomas Small It's too early to declare a victor. 

Aimen Dean No. This is why I would say, basically, that Assad has won back about seventy per cent of the territory, because twenty-five per cent is in the hands of the Kurds and five per cent still in the hands of al-Qaeda and their allies in Idlib. So, we are not there yet. Because don't forget three and a half million people live under al-Qaeda's rule in Idlib and other jihadist groups and roughly another three to three-and-a-half million live under the rule of the Kurds. Everything that is basically east – north of the Euphrates is under the hands of the Kurds. So, the idea that he won, well—. And don't forget he won the war, but with the help of so many foreign mercenaries. One day, they have to go back. Their salaries are just draining the Iranian and Syrian coffers. One day, they will have to go back to their families and homelands. And then, Assad will not have enough manpower to control even the territories that he has won.

Thomas Small Aimen, you say that Bashar al-Assad's military strength has relied almost entirely on mercenaries for a while now, mercenaries who will eventually return home. Of course, al-Qaeda militants and other Sunni jihadist militants, they also have a tendency, eventually, to return home, which is what we're going to be talking about in the next podcast. What is the world to do about the phenomenon of jihadists, battle-hardened, ideologically-committed jihadists returning home? 

This episode of Conflicted was produced by Jake Warren and Sandra Ferrari. Original music by Matt Huxley. If you want to hear more of Conflicted, make sure you search for us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you download yours.

Conflicted S1 E6 - Returning Jihadists

CONFLICTED

S01E06

Thomas Small Welcome back to Conflicted, the podcast where we do our best to explain to you the most complicated conflicts raging in the world today, the conflicts of the Arab and Muslim worlds. This is our last episode of this series. We hope we've been able to shed some light on the issues that we have been discussing.

Today, we'll dig a bit deeper into the psychology of the jihadist and what compels him to take up arms in defence as he sees it of Islam.

Aimen Dean The prophecies, it's all a lie. It's all one big con from history. You know, it's poisoned their minds. It's very intoxicating, unfortunately. 

Thomas Small Aimen will also give us some insight into how jihadists are recruited, where they are recruited from. But we'll also get to the ever-important issue: How are we to respond to the threat of jihadists returning? And we'll also find out how al-Qaeda uncovered Aimen's double agent status. So many things to explore today. 

Let's get started. This is Conflicted. 

I am here as ever with Aimen Dean, author of Nine Lives: My Time as MI6's Top Agent Inside al-Qaeda. And I am Thomas Small, co-producer of Path of Blood, a documentary film about al-Qaeda's attempt to overthrow the Saudi government. 

Good morning, Aimen. How are you? 

Aimen Dean I'm still alive, Thomas. I'm still alive.

Thomas Small Still alive. Well, that, I hope will long remain the case. I see you've got your – your usual dose of Diet Coke. You drink more Diet Coke, I think, than anyone I know.

Aimen Dean Except for Trump, though. 

Thomas Small Oh, well. That's something you and Donald Trump have in common. I wonder how much else you have in common. 

Aimen Dean You never know. 

Thomas Small You never know. You never know. Well, Aimen, it's been a long journey so far through your remarkable life and mining the incredible – the incredible wealth of knowledge inside that head of yours. I can't thank you enough for revealing your secrets to me and to the listeners. I'm sure everyone is very grateful to you. 

Aimen Dean Oh, thank you so much. I think I maybe did they poor job so far. But, you know, we'll leave up to the listener.

Thomas Small Oh. Very humble of you. Very humble of you. I'm sure that Allah has just given you a few more pennies in heaven. 

Aimen Dean Thank you. 

Thomas Small So, we've been discussing the War on Terror 9/11, the Iraq War, the – the…

Aimen Dean The Yemen war.

Thomas Small The Yemeni civil war, the Syrian civil war. And throughout it, we've returned again and again to a possibly unexpected motivation that underlies the Islamist actors in all of these conflicts—their belief in prophecies, in end times scenarios, their belief that the world is imminently going to come to an end and that they are playing an active and vital role in ushering in those end times. And they really do believe it, Aimen. They really do. 

Aimen Dean They do. It's one of the most powerful motivators and also one of the most powerful tools of recruitment. 

Thomas Small Tell me more. 

Aimen Dean Okay. So, imagine, Thomas, that I come to you. You are a university geek. Well, you look like a geek anyway. 

Thomas Small Thank you very much. Thank you.

Aimen Dean I come to you at university campus, and I tell you, "Thomas, you know, what, if I tell you that everything we're going through right now, every event, you know, major ones I'm talking about, that's happening so far since the 1950, '60s, and '70s and onward, it's all actually happening according to a divine plan. It's all been ordained long time ago. It's – it's all been foretold." If I tell you that, of course, I will just, you know, pick your interest, because, you see…

Thomas Small Well, if you told me that, amen. I'd probably – I'd probably back away slowly.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Yeah. But, you know, of course, basically, I'm not going to you saying this in the Jehovah Witnesses kind of way, you know. You know, of course, I'm coming to you from a very different angle here. I'm coming to you about what you want to do about it, you know. "Don't you feel there's so much injustice?" "Yes." "Well, don't you feel basically that the world is going to, you know – you know, to shit?" I mean, basically—. 

Thomas Small Going to hell in a hand basket. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. "Yes," you will say. "Don't you feel basically that, you know, the world is so chaotic that it needs order?" You know? And you will say, "Yes. Okay." So, what kind of do you want? And if you're a Muslim, if you're a devout Muslim, I will say, "Do you believe of the authenticity of the Qur'an and the Hadith?

Thomas Small The Hadith, the sayings of the prophet, Muhammad. Yeah. 

Aimen Dean Indeed. So, if you say, "Yes. Okay." Do you believe there were already hints of what's going to happen?" And you will say yes. "What if I tell you every major event was foretold?" 

Thomas Small I suppose if I were a devout Muslim, I would already believe that. I would already believe that the events of history have been preordained within the mind of God. 

Aimen Dean Perfect. Then, in that case, do you want to be one of God's instruments in fulfilling these events?

Thomas Small Does that require me strapping a bomb to my chest and blowing myself up? No. Thanks. 

Aimen Dean Well, you know, maybe we could actually find another function for you.

Thomas Small Like building chemical weapons, for example, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Oh, dear. Oh, dear. Oh, dear. Guilty as charged. But, you see, you know—. But, you see, the – the issue here is that the journey towards radical Islam, and especially when we talk about radical Islamism, before it is violent, you have to go through the non-violent part of it, you see. You know, the journey through that requires considerable—.

Thomas Small Ideological training. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, for example, there has to be, first of all, identity crisis. And that can only happen when your faith in your nation state is eroded. 

Thomas Small And that might happen easily in the Middle East, because nation states there are famously oppressive and corrupt, 

Aimen Dean Actually, it's even more easy in Europe and North America. Yeah. Because the Muslim communities there are even more alienated from their own overall society. 

Thomas Small But that's interesting, though. Are they actually alienated or are they being encouraged to feel themselves to be alienated by – by people who want to take advantage of that feeling?

Aimen Dean Of course, Thomas. Come on. There is no question. You know, you have clerics coming from other parts of the world, preaching to them that what's happening to the rest of society in terms of modernity progression and also the other things that are considered vices—.

Thomas Small Sexual license, drinking, gambling, marital breakdown, gangs, drugs. 

Aimen Dean All of these are going to send them to hell. The clerics emphasise the hell factor here rather than heave. They emphasise, you know, fear of the eternal damnation rather than hope for the eternal reward or—. 

Thomas Small But for – but – but for a pious Muslim, is it not true that – that all of these things are vices and that living in this fallen Western society is going to send them to hell?

Aimen Dean Well, you see, this is where, you know, the message is different. In Islam, you need to balance your message between love, fear, and hope. Love for the Lord, fear of His eternal damnation, but also, you know, hope for His eternal reward. 

So, really the message is: "God is so forgiving, but he's also so vengeful, but he loves you." Really. That's it in one sentence.

Thomas Small That strikes me – that strikes me as a real as a – as a – as a genuine religious conflict. How is the ordinary believers supposed to navigate the tension between that triangle of – of – of negative emotion? 

Aimen Dean Look, this has made Muslims a very special class of their own from the rest of humans.

Thomas Small Inside the West, especially.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Because of their conflicting relationship with their Western societies and the societies they have adopted. 

Thomas Small Well, frankly, I can imagine. If I was a young Muslim today, a young Muslim male, perhaps, especially living in a deprived suburb of a great Western city, and I – I felt that I was called to follow the – follow the moral law, to be a good person and yet I look around and all I see everywhere is temptation, surely, it makes sense that, in the midst of the huge amount of temptation for the average Muslim inside Western societies, they would feel hopeless. They would think, "Well, I know it's up to me to avoid all these temptations. But, really, it's beyond my control. I just can't help it. It's everywhere. Sex, drugs, rock and roll. It's everywhere." 

Aimen Dean But the problem with that is that the clergy, instead of preaching love and hope more than fear, they resorted to almost exclusively using fear as a weapon. They weaponised fear of the Lord and His damnation against the young in order to deter them from falling into temptation. So, that created a generation of guilty people walking around.

Thomas Small Only to deter from falling into temptation? Or was there an ulterior motive as well to this kind of fear-based preaching? They were trying to keep their community together.

Aimen Dean And under control. There – there is an element of control there, because, basically, look—. I will give you an example here. Positive message works well, but it means you don't exert control. You know, a negative message, you know, works also well in a sense that it keeps people under check, but actually what happen is it makes them afraid. You know, it makes them weak. It makes them even vulnerable. So, if I tell you, Thomas, "This is a glass of wine here. Now, I have two messages for you."

Thomas Small It's actually a glass of Diet Coke, sadly. 

Aimen Dean Okay. Pretend. Okay. Just pretend. By a divine miracle, it just turned into wine. 

Thomas Small Ooh, I like divine miracles that involve wine.

Aimen Dean So, imagine that this is a glass of wine here, yeah? If I tell you, Thomas, "If you drink this glass of wine…"

Thomas Small Yes.

Aimen Dean …"in the Day of Judgment, you will be drinking from a cup of molten lava, melting your inside, and you will be keep repeating it forever and ever and ever."

Thomas Small That doesn't sound pleasant at all. 

Aimen Dean Okay. If I tell you, Thomas, "If you refrain from drinking this glass of wine, God will reward you in the paradise, with oceans of wine. Yours. Just yours. Wine that is nothing like you ever even conceived or dreamt about." 

Thomas Small Imagine.

Aimen Dean So – so, when you—.

Thomas Small I might still choose to drink the wine here and now, to be perfectly honestly.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Exactly. But what I'm saying here is that—. You see, the two different messages here—one is positive and the other is negative. One that tells you that "You will be punished. You will go to hell. There is no hope for you. Bye." That's it. Goodbye. And the other one, basically, which tells you that, "No. You know, look, I mean, basically God is forgiving. God understands, you know. He – He's the one who created these temptations for you. But at the same time, if you fall into them, He will be forgiving. But if you don't, He will be rewarding." 

Thomas Small Yes. I can see that that – that would be a much more—. 

Aimen Dean Unfortunately, that's not happening. You see, this is not the message that is being preached from the vast majority of pulpits, not only in the Middle East, South Asia, and North Africa, but also in Europe and North America. So, why are we talking about temptation? Why are we talking about this fear and love and hope? It's because when you have people who feel guilty, when they are afraid of eternal punishment, what happen to them when other factors comes in—like identity crisis, humiliation, the feeling of anger, you know, over injustice, deprivation, alienation—when all of this come together, it is a toxic mixture, which makes people vulnerable to people who could recruit them.

I can go to anywhere—university campuses, prisons, mosques, even social gatherings. Gangs, even. I can go to them and say, "You want to be completely forgiven?" They will say yes. "You want to liberate your inner sadist and inner violent person, you know, to direct it at the right enemy and the right target?" They will say yes. "Do you want to feel empowerment? Because, basically, you are right now, you are under their boots. Do you want them to be under yours?" Yes. "Well, join the jihad. It's a one-way ticket to heaven while you exactly strike a blow for your face and, at the same time, empower your own nation." 

Thomas Small So, in the Middle East itself, as you've told us already, there's a civil war raging between, on the one hand, the forces of radical Islamism that seek to undermine the established nation states of the Middle East and re-establish the caliphate. On the other side, you have those nation states themselves, which seek not to be undermined and have a different vision of – of the world. But, of course, those states are also full of pious Muslims. So, how do the Muslims on the other side of the civil war reconcile themselves to their religion and the current geopolitical order, which their Muslim brothers on the other side of that divide are saying is an evil world order. How do the other Muslims reconcile themselves to it? How do you reconcile yourself to it? 

Aimen Dean I spent six years of my life in four different war zones. You know, in the – in the – in the Bosnian conflict, in the Caucuses, in Afghanistan and in the southern Philippines. All were civil wars. All were the institutions of the nation state collapsed. And you see clearly what could happen if the nation state collapsed. 

Thomas Small Total chaos.

Aimen Dean Total chaos. You see, you know, imagine everything that you take for granted—an ATM out in the street full of cash, a safe street, you know, traffic lights working, a gym you go to, a school you go to, a transport system that takes you from wherever you go to wherever you want to go to.

Thomas Small A hospital, a grocery store full of food.

Aimen Dean A fire brigade, police squad that will come and rescue you if you go, you know, into trouble. So, all of these will disappear the moment the nation state collapses. And what will replace them? Irregular militias who come together under fear and under stress in order to safeguard their neighbourhoods. And – and this is basically where injustices happen, where gangs takeover, where warlords takeover, where corruption is – is rife.

Thomas Small Okay. Fine. You can appeal to people's self-interest and say, "Support the nation state." But they're still Muslims. Don't they believe in these prophecies as well? Don't they believe in the whole world view that – that says there must be a caliphate, the caliphate is absolutely vital to God's plan on earth?

Aimen Dean I believe that the majority are not conflicted, and for a very good reason. If you look closely at the prophecies—. And this is really important. I'm not going to enter too many details not to confuse the listener. But there is a set of prophecies, roughly about eight Hadith texts. You know, they are referred to as the prophecies of the Black Banners. 

Thomas Small The prophecies of the Black Banners. Sounds very romantic.

Aimen Dean Sounds more ominous, actually. So, this set of prophecies were the bedrock, the building block off all of al-Qaeda's and ISIS' eschatological theology, how they are going to conquer the Middle East and beyond, and usher in the end of times and bring in about the, you know, about the era of the Mahdi. So, the prophecies, in general—. Basically, there are eight of them together, and they are almost the same wording, which says that there will be an army of the Black Banners rising from Khorasan, which they believe to be Afghanistan, even though it's mostly in Iran.

Thomas Small Yeah. Oh, the – the prophecy of the Black Banners. How does that prophecy go?

Aimen Dean Well, it says [foreign language], which means that the army of the Black Banners, at the end of time, will arise out of Khorasan and they will raise their banner over Jerusalem.

Thomas Small That's the prophecy?

Aimen Dean Indeed. So, why do you think that the flags of al-Qaeda, ISIS, al-Shabaab, and many other Islamist groups are black? Because they believe that they were the armies of the Black Banners rising – rising out of Khorasan and bringing it. 

Thomas Small [crosstalk].

Aimen Dean Even Osama bin Laden, if you remember in the first podcast when we talked about 9/11, he actually, you know, talked about the armies of the Black Banners, liberating, you know, Jerusalem, liberating, you know, the Arabian Peninsula, bringing about change and restoring the caliphate, because he believed that – that was the vanguard of that army of the Black Banners. So, an entire theology, an entire generation drank that Kool-Aid called, you know, the Black Banners and the prophecies of the Black Banners.

Thomas Small This whole perspective of the imminent end of the world, it's so hard, I think, for most Westerners today, especially of the non-religious, secularist mentality, to – to even comprehend what this might be like. mean, some people might remember, just before the turn of the millennium, when the Y2K threat hung over the world and everyone thought, as soon as the clock struck twelve on January 1st, 2000, no computers would work and everything would – would go back to how it was in the dark ages.

Aimen Dean Planes will fall from the sky.

Thomas Small Planes will fall from the sky. The end of the world. And – and, sometimes, maybe even more recently, the most extreme forms of – of climate change catastrophism, the sense that within two years, we're all going to be under. 

It is something inside the human spirit. At least some human beings seem to be obsessed with the idea that the end is near. And in the case of the groups we're talking about, they very much have this spirit. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. You know, it's poisoned their minds. You see, it's – it's very intoxicating, unfortunately. So, the prophecies, it's all a lie. It's all one big con from history. How?

Thomas Small I want to give it – I want to give it a stab. Can I give it a stab? 

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small I think I know why.

Aimen Dean Tell me.

Thomas Small If you remember dear listener, I think in the third podcast or perhaps the fourth, we talked about the Umayyad Dynasty, the first great, world-straddling Muslim dynasty. It lasted roughly a hundred fifty years.

Aimen Dean No. Ninety years.

Thomas Small Really?

Aimen Dean Yeah. From—. Yeah. They – they – they [unintelligible] the year of 750 AD, but they estab- – were established in the year 661 AD.

Thomas Small God. Edit this out. Aimen showing me up. 

It lasted about ninety years. As that dynasty was reaching its end, a new upstart dynasty came from Khorasan, in northeast Iran, and they needed to prepare the way for their takeover of that dynasty by sowing the seeds of prophecy. They raised Black Banners, they swept out of Khorasan, they defeated the Umayyads, and established the Abbasid Caliphate. 

Aimen Dean And, in fact, when I started looking at the Hadith narrations, every last person of the narrations, of this Hadith, in other words, the first person to speak of this Hadith and build a narration chain for it, you know, going back to the prophet, every single one of them, of the eight individuals, existed in towns where the Abbasid call and the Abbasid movement was at its speak.

Thomas Small So, basically, radical Muslims today are held in thrall to a bit of eighth century political propaganda.

Aimen Dean And a theological fabrication. 

Thomas Small My goodness. So, let's – let's talk about one such group now. They've recently raised the Black Banners and infamously made themselves known around the world, ISIS. Tell me, specifically in ISIS's worldview, what they thought, in terms of the prophecies, was going to happen in Syria. 

Aimen Dean They thought that, in Syria, the armies of the crusaders—. They call them the Romans. 

Thomas Small Yes. They called them the Romans. It's actually quite flattering for us Westerners that we're – we're with a Roman emperors. As if – as if they imagine we're walking around in togas, laurel leaves on our heads, quoting Cicero.

Aimen Dean So, you see it's because of the fact that they were always referred to, you know, during the time and the era of the prophet Muhammad as the Romans. Because you see, you know, the Byzantine empire wasn't called the Byzantine empire until very, you know, until actually – until the seventeenth or eighteenth century. Before that—.

Thomas Small In fact, it was the Roman empire. In the West…

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small …we say the Roman empire fell in 476. But actually that is not true. Another lie, a scurrilous life history. 

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small The Roman empire continued until 1453 when the – when the Muslims finally snuffed it out. Nothing's ever been the same, Aimen. 

Aimen Dean So, they believe that the armies of the Europeans, the Romans, you know, will come and sweep in into Syria, and there will be this big battle in the fields of Dabiq, you know, a – a small town near Aleppo, where, you know, the fate of Islam will be decided and that it will – it will usher in the return of the Mahdi and the era of the righteous caliphate being restored, where they will sweep in to rest of Iraq, to Jordan, to Israel, to Saudi Arabia, to Egypt, and—. 

Not everyone. Of course, basically, it's, you know—. Sometime, if you hear that, you know, you are justified in asking them, you know. "Guys, whatever you're smoking, get a refund." 

Thomas Small You say that, but – but if I was a young ISIS fighter, there – there – there are times in the last three years when you might have really thought it was going to happen. Because, in fact, fierce fighting did go on within the vicinity of Dabiq, in – in northern Syria.

Aimen Dean Indeed. 

Thomas Small It did seem at times that it was all coming true. The Russians were intervening. The Americans were always on the verge of intervening. They must have felt great expectation. "It's happening. It's happening."

Aimen Dean And guess what? It basically just went completely against them. And why? Because, first of all, the prophecy of Dabiq is of questionable authenticity, to begin with. So, again, we come back into the fact that they have built their entire ideology over extremely shay grounds.

Thomas Small Well, nonetheless, ISIS was extremely powerful at one point and—. 

Aimen Dean And appealing. 

Thomas Small And appealing. It—. Many, many foreign fighters, this – even in the West, they responded to ISIS's call. What does that say about the War on Terror? How is it possible seventeen years after 9/11 that young Muslims in the West and even as far afield as China are responding to these prophetic calls? Has the War on Terror achieved nothing of convincing young Muslims to reject radical jihadism?

Aimen Dean The War on Terror already was fundamentally flawed from the beginning. It is a noble concept. It is actually something that needs to be done, except the way it was executed was completely and utterly shambolic. 

Thomas Small But apart from the invasion of Iraq, what else did the War on Terror get wrong? 

Aimen Dean It went away off track completely, because they started to focus on killing leaders and were obsessed with, you know, leaders. So, they were putting $25 million on bin Laden's head, $25 million on al-Zawahiri's head, $5 million on this guy's head. But they did not spend that money, actually, on strengthening the institutions of the nation states all over the Muslim world in a way that actually will tell people that the nation state is the only guarantor of their safety, security, stability, prosperity, education, and everything else. 

Thomas Small But we're talking not only about Muslim fighters from the Muslim world. We're talking about Muslim fighters from outside the Muslim world. Let's take, for example, a very – a little-known community, very large, that lives in western China, the Uyghurs. Now, the Uyghurs are one of the many peoples that have participated in the Syrian civil war, are a ethnically-mixed Turkic, Indo-European population in western China. They speak a Turkic language. They are Sunni Muslims, mainly. 

Aimen Dean Sufis, mostly.

Thomas Small So, yes. Traditionally, they practice the more mystically inclined Sufi part of a – branch of Islam, although, more recently, I think, they have become rather Salifised. Their radicalism is on the increase there. 

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small The Chinese state has felt threatened by their efforts to organise as a community and – and advocate for autonomy. There's a separatist movement there. A jihadist movement there indeed. In recent years, the – the Chinese state has responded very oppressively to their demands for autonomy. I think, now, there are over a million Uyghurs in detention centres across the province of Xinjiang, in the west where they are located.

Aimen Dean Although the Chinese will dispute the word "detention" and call it "re-education camps. But—.

Thomas Small Oh, re-education camps. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. 

Thomas Small Well, we know what Maoists mean when they say "re-education camps." Tell us something about the Uyghurs and how they ended up in Syria, alongside fighters from Wales and from France and from Germany. 

Aimen Dean You see, the Uyghurs are rather, like, you know, a class of their own. You know, it's—. you know, it's – it's – it's a very interesting phenomenon and how you have people who are from China, Chinese citizens forming an army. 

Thomas Small Chinese citizens, but ethnically not Chinese.

Aimen Dean They are not ethnically Chinese, but then, China encompass fifty-six ethnicities, according to official figures. In fact, take any Chinese currency—. I mean, you know, for the listener, if you go, you know, to any money exchange, you know, outlet and you buy a Chinese currency, just look at it. You will find that there are four scripts for writings, basically, on the Chinese currency. The first one is, of course, the Chinese characters. Then, you have Mongolian characters. Then, you have Tibetan characters. And then, you have Uyghur characters. So, they are recognised, basically. Their – their writing style is recognised as one of the four fundamental scripts in China. 

Thomas Small Their writing style is recognised, but they, as a community, have been subject to gross violations of their human rights in recent decades.

Aimen Dean Of course. Along with the Tibetans and many other—. And even the questions of China.

Thomas Small You say "of course." But how is that going to instil, in these communities, faith in the nation state? The nation state that is oppressing them.

Aimen Dean Yes. While the Tibetans, who are Buddhists, decided basically to embark on overwhelmingly peaceful resistance and disobedience against the Chinese authorities, the Uyghurs decided that, maybe, a violent uprising or at least a violent campaign against the Chinese authorities and Chinese interests abroad could be the way forward. 

Thomas Small So, you say the Buddhists adopted a pacifist attitude towards their oppression. And, once again, Muslims rushed to – to take up arms and start killing. 

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small Why are they always killing?

Aimen Dean So, the Uyghurs are actually forcing us to ask ourselves a question here: Is Islam inherently violent?

Thomas Small And I think this is a very important question, especially for our listeners in the West, because there is a lot of anxiety within people about returning jihadist fighters to their – their homelands in the West. Are we supposed to be afraid of them?

Aimen Dean So, if we look at the Uyghurs, for example, here, they realise, basically, that next door to them in Afghanistan, there is a war region, and that war is based on Islamic theology, which is the theology of jihad. They saw, in jihad, a possible path to salvation, to way in which they can pressure the Chinese government. Remember, the estimates now that there are a four-thousand-strong Uyghurs fighters, you know, in terms of their numbers. 

Thomas Small Four thousand fighters. That doesn't sound like that many, especially, you know – you know, to the Chinese. There's one-point-three billion Chinese citizens or something like that. 

Aimen Dean Still, remember, al-Qaeda were only four hundred 400 people only when they carried out 9/11. So, we need to see not so much the numbers, but their potential impact. And, of course, the Chinese are afraid, because, for them, Xinjiang province, which is where the Uyghurs come from—. 

Thomas Small Xinjiang province in the West? 

Aimen Dean Yes. In the past, it used to be the backdoor, but now it is a front door. 

Thomas Small The new Silk Road initiative…

Aimen Dean Exactly. 

Thomas Small …where the Chinese are attempting to recreate the ancient Silk Road to circumvent the [sea lane] shipping route, so that they can transfer their goods over land through Central Asia and Russia, all the way to Europe.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. Not just only that, but also then southwest, towards Pakistan and into the port of Gwadar, on the warm waters of the Arabian Sea. So, you, the war in Syria raging generated thousands upon thousands of Uyghurs who were attracted to that conflict because they wanted to get military training and also the experience in order to go back to China and start an armed uprising there. 

That brings us back to the question: Is Islam inherently violent? Both yes and no. Basically, Islam gives you the option, whether you opt for peace or for war. Both of them.

Thomas Small Based in certain conditions, I suppose. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, now, why—. We come back full circle here? Why jihadists and Islamic fundamentalists want to undermine the nation state, especially at this time, in this time of history? Because, in Islam, it is absolutely inherent that the use of violence and the deployment of violence is only the prerogative of the nation state, is only the prerogative of the Imam as the prophet used to say. So, if we say, if they believe in the legitimacy of the nation state, then only the nation states can deploy violence or jihad. Only them can wield weapons and use violence for political means.

Thomas Small So, you're saying they want to wield violence. And in order to do so, legitimately, they have to disavow the nation state. They have to say the nation state is not legitimate. It cannot legitimately claim a monopoly in violence. 

Aimen Dean And that's why when they undermine the legitimacy of their nation states, whether it is Saudi Arabia or Egypt or Turkey or Morocco or whether it is the UK or France or Canada or Australia, what they do here is that they take away the legitimacy of the nation state, which means that they no longer believe that the nation state is capable of deploying violence, deploying jihad to protect Islam. Therefore, it has now fallen upon groups and individuals to carry out that mission, to carry out that task. 

So, you see here, when you say Islam is inherently violent, yes, it is inherently violent, but the violence is under checks and balances of the nation state. Therefore, it doesn't appear to be so for a long diamond history. Because it was always the prerogative of the leader of the state or the sheiks of the tribe or the prince of the principality or the king of the kingdom. It's always been like this. 

But now, with the advent of the modern nation state, this is where things started to diverge. People wanted to legitimise that nation state in order for them to carry out—. Basically to deploy violence on their own initiative. 

Thomas Small But people's concerns about Islam being somehow inherently violent aren't only to do with jihad. For example, one hears, you know, remarkably consistently a story like this, a cartoonist in Denmark draws a scurrilous cartoon of the prophet Muhammad. And, suddenly, a hundred Muslims in Egypt rise up, kill forty nuns and burn down their nunnery. How are people supposed to understand that it happens with worry and consistency? There does seem to be a switch that you can switch on, and the Muslims will just kill people. I mean, I – I put it bluntly to you, Aimen…

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small …because I think a lot of people are concerned about what seems to be this prevalence of violence within – within Muslims. 

Aimen Dean And, in fact, the funny thing—. Well, not so funny, actually. It's more like sad thing, is that they are going against the Islamic principle of ignoring falsehood. You see, the caliph Omar ibn al-Khattab, who was the father-in-law of the prophet Muhammed, who was the second caliph, the second successor, truly the – the nation builder of Islam—. He's the one who built the nation of Islam as a nation, as a nation state. 

Thomas Small A political entity.

Aimen Dean A political entity with, you know, ministries and departments and made it—. You know, he created the Muslim civil service. 

Thomas Small Taxation and—.

Aimen Dean Yeah. So, he created Muslim civil service. And so, he said that what you need to do when you hear something false and provocative is you kill it by ignoring it for if you start to blab about it exactly. This is what he said. "Blab." [foreign language] n an Arabic. "For you—. If you start to blab about it, your enemies will use it against you."

Thomas Small Okay. Fine. But—. 

Aimen Dean That's what he said.

Thomas Small But isn't that just another version of the fact that when Muslims do something that is distasteful, it's easy to say, "Well, they're not really practicing Islam. That's not really Islam." But where does that leave us? 

Aimen Dean Well, again, we come back to the fact that, you know, over the last fifty years, so many articles of the faith that shouldn't have been undermined has been undermined. You know, suicide has always been, you know, considered to be completely forbidden. So, fourteen hundred years of theology turned upside down with this legitimising, this collective madness of legitimising suicide bombing. So, suddenly an absolute article of the faith that suicide is forbidden, no exceptions, has been thrown out to the window. That jihad, the military jihad, which was always the prerogative of the nation state and its leaders, also has been thrown out of the window open [crosstalk].

Thomas Small Now, anyone can wage jihad.

Aimen Dean Exactly. The execution of people by beheading from the front of the neck, in other words, as – as animals are slaughtered, was never part of Islam ever. Ever. There hasn't been any recorded instance of it. Usually, you know, the beheading happened by a swift, you know, sharp strike to the back of the head. Like a guillotine, for example. Swift, unlike this barbaric, you know, animal-like slaughter [crosstalk]. 

Thomas Small Which I see ISIS carried out.

Aimen Dean Exactly. This has never happened before. It's only now in the last fifty years, we start to see it, you know, emerge. This belief in prophecies, that, you know, big things are about to happen and, therefore, we have to take up arms, it never happened before. This undermining of legitimate leaders, you know, and kings and princes and sheiks, you know, that we see all over the Muslim world, especially in the Middle East, it never happened before. We never have—. We never seen it in this intensity. 

So, there is crisis within Islam, you know. It's almost as if Islam is becoming unhinged, you know, because of the fact that it's find itself in a very foreign, alien place and cannot, you know, and feeling bewildered and disoriented. And it's still not able to find this place in the modern world. 

Thomas Small So, what's the solution then? I mean, maybe the solution is just let's stamp out Islam. No more Islam. Islam is a problem. 

Aimen Dean Oh, well. No one can do that. That's impossible. I know you – you have almost two billion people. What do you do with them? And plus, the vast majority are kind, decent, good people. 

Thomas Small That’s true.

Aimen Dean You experienced that yourself.

Thomas Small Of course. Of course. So, again, what we do about it. What is the great solution here? Well, the great solution is, again, we confront them with the absolute stock choice, either the nation state or the abyss of the absolute chaos. That's it. There is no other choice. 

If they want to go with the nation state, then this is where the cure start. Where we start to take them on the journey towards modernity, you know, and – and strengthen their belief in the nation state. And the many people do. I mean, basically, there are many countries within the Muslim world who have done quite well. And, in fact, we need to study their experience. Take a country like Oman.

Thomas Small Oman. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. It's in the Arabian Peninsula. It is ultra conservative as conservative, as it could be, although less than Saudi Arabia, and it has ancient history. It's deeply Muslim. And yet, how many people from Oman went to join ISIS? 

Thomas Small I don't know.

Aimen Dean None.

Thomas Small But isn't that because the Omanis actually practice a very strange and fringe form of – of Islam called Ibadism. Very few other—. Very few Muslims are Ibadi Muslims. So, perhaps, they just don't feel called to join their Sunni or Shia brethren in – in – in Syria.

Aimen Dean Actually, forty per cent of Oman are Sunnis. And still—. And even the Ibadis are considered Sunnis, anyway.

Thomas Small So, why – why didn't Oman send foreign fighters to Syria and elsewhere?

Aimen Dean Not only that, actually. How many people from al-Qaeda? 

Thomas Small [crosstalk].

Aimen Dean Only one, and he had mental issues, I remember. So, maybe he just wondered there, you know, basically aimlessly. So, why is that? You know, we come back to the fact that there are societies that seems to have been immune, you know, to the scourge of extremism. And I think it's because of the fact that they were comfortable with the nation state institutions, and that's what Oman is. Oman, there is a lot of loyalty towards the nation state. 

The UAE, for example, which has about, you know, one-point-five million inhabitants who are citizens, actually, how many of them joined ISIS or al-Qaeda? You know, in total, there are about fourteen throughout its history. Only fourteen people. And that is very low percentage. 

Again, it's the comfort with the nation state and its institutions. You know, the fact that they believe in their leaders, they believe in their nation state, even though it's not democratic—Oman is not democratic—but there is something about it, about both countries, which meant that they were comfortable with the fact that they have nation states that protect them and give them, you know, the ability to lead a good and decent life. 

But now, we look at, you know, the percentages from other countries. For example, in Saudi Arabia, one hundred and forty-five out of a million joined ISIS.

Thomas Small That doesn't sound like a huge number to me.

Aimen Dean But still. You know, one hundred and forty-five. In the UAE, basically, you know, it's about eight per million. In Kuwait. You know, the estimates were about between forty-five to forty-seven per million. In Saudi Arabia, as I said, one hundred and forty-five per million. In Tunisia, which is the complete opposite of Saudi Arabia, it lived under secular rule, you know, extreme secularism [crosstalk].

Thomas Small And it's democracy.

Aimen Dean And it's a democracy. You know, it's only, like, you know, in the last seven, eight years it was a democracy. But, nonetheless, the percentage is two hundred and six per million. So, it's even greater than Saudi Arabia. So, it's not necessarily that Saudi school curriculums produce so many radicals. But, you know, you can see, like, in, I mean, Tunisia produced two hundred and six per million. 

If you look at the UK, it's three hundred and fifty-four per million, because we are not doing the entire population, only adjusting the numbers of those who joined ISIS from within the Muslim population here. So, if we only take the Muslim population, really, three hundred fifty-four per million, more than twice the average Saudi. So, can you imagine here, that if you are a British Muslim, you are twice more than twice likely to join ISIS?

And, in France, it is three hundred and eighty-four per million. 

Thomas Small Even more – even more than Britain?

Aimen Dean And it's the same percentage in Germany. And then, we go to Belgium, which is even the worst one, seven hundred and twenty-two per million. 

Thomas Small So, these figures are – are stark, that in the West, in Western countries, the – the – the likelihood of – of Muslims being radicalised is actually higher than in Muslim countries. And that's been the case, really, from the beginning of the War on Terror era, when – when Muslims, let's say, who had spent a bit of time in the West were much likelier to be radicalised than – than – than not. Like Mohammed Atta, the leader of the 9/11 plot, who had spent time studying in Germany. Even further back when the godfather of all radical ideologues, Sayyid Qutb, spent years in Colorado, in the United States, studying and returned home with a burning desire to destroy everything American. 

So, it is something about the West. But does this mean that we, in the West, should be particularly concerned? Are the foreign fighters who left the West to fight in the battlefields of Middle – of – of the Middle East going to come back, group, gather, and to conspire to undermine our nation states. Should we be concerned?

Aimen Dean You cannot, you know, basically, just ignore the fact that these people are going to come back, not just only traumatised by the war. The fact that they have themselves committed acts of, you know, terrorism and acts of violence in these wars. They will come back and, most likely, they will conspire to undermine the nation state by either recruiting more people, sending more people abroad, because they will have this kind of what they call it in, you know, in urban settings, street credit.

Thomas Small But some listeners would say this is just right-wing paranoia. Actually, these are young misunderstood people. We can easily – we can easily reintegrate them into society. We can enrol them in de-radicalisation programs. We don't need to punish them. We should welcome them back and make them feel like they belong. 

Aimen Dean I know that what I'm going to say here is a little bit controversial, a little bit heartless, it might seem, but if you make up your mind, if you decide to join a group like that and you are not willing whatsoever to abandon their principle, to renounce the principles, to renounce their ideology and theology, if, you know, if you are not willing to cooperate with your security services and the police and the government when you return, I think you shouldn't return then.

Thomas Small You shouldn't return or you shouldn't be allowed to return?

Aimen Dean You shouldn't be allowed to return even. I think Theresa May did the right thing when she started [crosstalk].

Thomas Small Theresa May, the prime minister of the United Kingdom, who used to be the home secretary for many years?

Aimen Dean Yeah. I think she did the right thing by stripping those who are dual nationals of their British citizenship once they – they are proven to be fighting alongside ISIS or al-Qaeda abroad. Because apart from the fact that they're committing treason, because these groups are seeking to undermine the nation state, including the United Kingdom nation state, also the same time, she's trying to prevent them from coming back. Because once they come back, they will do far more harm than good. In fact, what good they will do, to begin with?

Thomas Small So, you think these people can't be rehabilitated? I mean, we – we read about a new pilot scheme in Denmark where an entire town has been given over to jihadist rehabilitation. It's not—. They don't live under prison conditions. They live in a proper town. They are convinced of the errors of their ways. And in the Middle East as well, Saudi Arabia has a very celebrated rehabilitation program. Even in Nigeria, the Nigerian government has sponsored a – a rehabilitation program for Boko Haram fighters, though, I think, in that case, especially, the recidivism rate is quite high. But can these young men not be rehabilitated? And, actually, young women now, too.

Aimen Dean You need to divide them into different categories, from the hopeless to the hopeful and everything in between. And this can be only assessed on individual-by-individual cases. Seriously. Because you have those who are leaders and those who were followers. Those who are educated, those who are not educated and everything in between. You know, we're dealing with humans here. 

Thomas Small So, some people can be rehabilitated. You do hold that to be a possibility.

Aimen Dean Yes. But a minority. I still basically am a bit sceptical. I would say, basically, a minority can be rehabilitated, especially if they are, as, you know, as I was in the past, basically, and annoyingly inquisitive and a free thinker. You know, this is what needs to happen. You spot them. You see, basically, that there are people who think or themselves, who are, you know, willing to question what they've done. These are the people you should target. Those who stubbornly, stubbornly hold on to the animosity towards every society on earth, that's who you should isolate. I would accept individuals who want to come back if they just go and walk in into the British embassy in Ankara or in Nairobi or in Islamabad and declare, "I'm a walk-in. That's it. I want to renounce the group and everything that stands for." Whether it's al-Qaeda or ISIS or Taliban or al-Shabaab or whatever. If they do that, then that is actually a true willingness to abandon that path. 

Thomas Small And you can speak from experience here, because in a way, that's precisely what you did way back in 1998, when you held up your hand and said, "My bad. I don't want any more of this." 

But this hard-line view you take towards foreign fighters, could you not be accused of a certain amount of hypocrisy? Because here you are, an utterly reformed former jihadist. You worked for almost a decade inside the Western security services, protecting those states from the – the threat of – of Islamism. If people had been adopted such a hard-line view towards you, you might have been the one forever outcast from society. 

Aimen Dean You know, when you come willingly and say that "I've been part of this movement for set amount of years, and I'm willing to cooperate fully and to actually expose every bit of information that I have, in fact, basically I'm willing even to work against it," it's different. Completely different. People will not, you know, say, "Oh, no. We don't want anything." No one will say that. You know, they will be out of their minds if they do that, because you come and you bring with you a wealth of intelligence, you know, that needed in order to safeguard societies and nation states.

So, in my case, I spent four years inside the jihadist movement. For every year I spent as a jihadist, I spent two years as a double agent. 

Thomas Small Do you feel that those eight years you spent as a double agent inside al-Qaeda earned you your atonement? Do you feel that you atoned for your sins? 

Aimen Dean Of course. I think four years would have been more than enough, I think, in my opinion, because I rest my life, you know, constantly for that. I'm still to this day, actually, you know, a target of a fatwā. 

Thomas Small Why? Why is that? How is it that you, in the end, stopped being a double agent for al-Qaeda? Why aren't you still working for MI6, helping to destroy radical jihad from within?

Aimen Dean Alas, Thomas. It's your own country?

Thomas Small Oh. 

Aimen Dean The United States… 

Thomas Small The great Satan, once again. 

Aimen Dean …that ruined it completely. 

Thomas Small What happened? 

Aimen Dean Well, Thomas, I was actually, you know, for the first time in my life, for the first time ever, I was going on a holiday just as a normal human being. 

Thomas Small So, when is this? When – when did this happen? 

Aimen Dean This was June of 2006, 

Thomas Small June of 006. All right. So, the Iraq War is absolutely at its a fever pitch of sectarian bloodletting. You could have—. You – you were probably working overtime undermining terrorist operations and cells. And then, you decide, "Well, I'll go on a holiday." And then, what happened? 

Aimen Dean So, I was so overwhelmed by everything. You know, there were so many cells to uncover and, you know, threads, you know, basically identified and plots by terrorist thwarted. So, I thought, "Okay." You know? "Look, I've earned my holiday." So, I remember the service basically telling me, "Okay. Find. [unintelligible]. Where do you want to go?" Well, Paris. I'd never seen Paris. I would like to go to Paris. I spent four days there. You know, I'm just going to tour everything. You know, the Eiffel Tower, the River Seine boat, you know, Notre Dame Cathedral, the Louvre. I mean, everything that—. 

Thomas Small It says so much about you, Aimen, that after eight years as a double agent inside al-Qaeda, instead of going to a beach somewhere and relaxing, you wanted to plunge yourself into the cultural wonders of Paris. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, there I am in the middle of a tour about in Paris, you know, in the second day of my holiday. 

Thomas Small So, you're – you're sailing at the Seine. You're looking at Notre Dame, the lovely nineteenth century townhouses. You're thinking, "Nothing can get better than this. This is the apex of – of relaxation." And you get a phone call. 

Aimen Dean It was a text message, actually. 

Thomas Small Oh, a text message. You get a text message. 

Aimen Dean So, I got a text message and I look, and it says basically—. You know, it is from a associate of mine, from within al-Qaeda based in the Gulf, and he sent me a text message and he says, "What the hell is this? Go and read the Time magazine website." So—. 

Thomas Small What did you think?

Aimen Dean I thought, "Well, that's a bit cryptic." Maybe like, you know, he's angry at, you know, some American mishap or something like that or they have, you know, bombed some civilians in Fallujah or Ramadi. Whatever. So, I—. 

Thomas Small So, you didn’t—. That text didn't seem threatening to you. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. But nonetheless, I thought, "Okay." I went to an internet café. And as soon as I went into the Time magazine website, it says there, "A brilliant spy within al-Qaeda reveal that there was a chemical attack plot against the New York subway."

Thomas Small Well, I remember that – that attack plot. There was—. It was infamous. They were going to release some kind of – some kind of gas nerve agent on the New York subway system and potentially kill hundreds of people. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. It was actually blood agent. But nonetheless, you know, these are just technical terms. So, you know—. So, basically, I was looking at it, and then it talks about this brilliant spy inside al-Qaeda who actually stopped an attack against the US Fifth Fleet, you know, sailors who identified leaders of al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia and identified the external head of operations for al-Qaeda, Hamza Rabia, and blah blah blah blah. Whatever.

Thomas Small At what point did you think, "Oh, my God. They're talking about me. I'm that brilliant spy?"

Aimen Dean Yeah. I was actually reading, and I felt, basically, my heart sinking all the way to my feet. And, you know—. And immediately, you know—. And when – when – when I started reading, basically, even more—. Because, basically, that article was, you know, foreshadowing, a book that's going to be released the week after in the US. It was written by Ron Suskind, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist. He got the league from high up in the American command chain. 

Thomas Small What was the name of the book? 

Aimen Dean The One Percent Doctrine. 

Thomas Small The One Percent Doctrine. Yes, I've read it. It's quite a good book. 

Aimen Dean Well, forty-six pages of that book is devoted to me, actually. 

Thomas Small Oh, wow. 

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small Aimen, oh, my goodness. I'll have to get you to sign my copy. 

Aimen Dean No. You—. I will sign my book to you, not that, you know, journalist's book. But nonetheless, he, you know, decided to give me a name. And out of the four thousand different names and Arabic for boys, he decided to go with my real name. 

Thomas Small Did he know he was revealing your real name or is this just sheer chance? 

Aimen Dean Oh, well, sheer chance. Like, what? One in four thousand chance, basically, that he decided that to give me a name, and that name happened to be my name.

Thomas Small Ali?

Aimen Dean Yes. So, I was so angry. I mean, I, you know, I just picked up the phone. And I—. Even though it was Sunday, I phoned my handlers in a back in London, and I told them, "Go and read it." And then, five minutes later, I received a phone call, saying to me, "On the first train back to London now." 

Thomas Small They realised your cover was blown.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small So, how had this journalist found out that you were a brilliant spy inside al-Qaeda?

Aimen Dean Well, we suspected at that time, and still to this day, that the leak came from the office of the then vice-president, Dick Cheney, 

Thomas Small Oh, Dick Cheney. Gosh, is there no end to your villainy? 

Aimen Dean Yeah. What a dick, huh? 

Thomas Small Well, it could be worse. He could have – he could have shot you in the face. 

Aimen Dean Shot me in the face. 

Thomas Small And that's how he treats his friends. Imagine how he treats his enemies. 

Aimen Dean Indeed. So, that's why my spying days came, you know, to an end. It's because I couldn't do it anymore. 

Thomas Small So, you got on the first train back to London. You arrive. Your MI6 handler meets you. And what happens? They say, "Sorry, buddy. Your time's up. You got to leave."

Aimen Dean Well, you know, no more or less, basically, we have to change your apartment now, you know. Basically, so, you can't go to your apartment. I mean, someone else will go now and clear your stuff from there. We will have to take you to another city at the moment in order to, you know, think about your future. 

And, of course, basically, I mean, it was full blown crisis. 

Thomas Small And how did you feel? 

Aimen Dean Well, I – I felt betrayed. I felt basically that there was no need for this. 

Thomas Small And when did it become clear to you that al-Qaeda did realise that you had, for all those years, been a double agent, betraying them from inside? They must have considered you a friend, a comrade in arms, a fellow struggle. How did they react? 

Aimen Dean Actually, what happened is I immediately, you know, change the phone numbers, closed the email accounts. And that's it. Basically, drifted away from them to the point basically where they were asking my family members even, sometime, you know, "How can we get a hold of him?" And then—.

Thomas Small And did you tell the family, your family, "Don't tell them. Don't tell them?"

Aimen Dean "Don’t tell anyone. Basically, I'm drifting away." In fact, my family was so happy. They think, basically, that I left al-Qaeda. They didn't know, basically, I was a spy, you see. So, I told them, "Well, you know, I want to just go on the, you know, straight and narrow now, basically. I don't want to be involved with these people anymore, you know? So, could you help me with that?" And they said yes.

Thomas Small So, you never heard from al-Qaeda directly. But you did know that, quite quickly after your cover was blown, that a fatwā and Islamic ruling was released authorising your – your immediate execution.

Aimen Dean And ironically, the people who intercepted that fatwā when it was going from northern Pakistan all the way to Bahrain and Saudi Arabia and Kuwait and other places in the Gulf War I used to – I used to frequent, the ones who were intercepted that's where the Americans. So, they won the British, you know. And, of course, the services gave me a quick warning that, "Well, just to let, you know, that a fatwā has been issued."

Thomas Small How did this fatwā play out? I mean, did they send a kind of wanted dead or alive poster around all the cells across the world, saying, "If you see Aimen Dean, you kill him dead in the street?" 

Aimen Dean No. The fatwā, basically, was a little bit milder than that. You know, it basically says that "We have determined that this person"— me, Aimen Dean, although they gave me another name, of course, basically, in that fatwā—"we have determined through a tribunal, an evidence-based tribunal"—yes, it was written like this—"that he betrayed the cause and that he, you know, left the fold of Islam." So, basically, they declared me [unintelligible], which means apostate. 

Thomas Small An apostate. And apostates in Islam can be killed. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. And have aided the infidels. You know, al-kafir as they call them, in their war efforts against Islam. And therefore, if given the chance, if given the chance, then whoever can do it, then they should kill me. 

Thomas Small For ten years, then you have had a fatwā. You've had this target on your back. Have you ever come close to being executed by al-Qaeda? 

Aimen Dean Well, I wouldn't say executed or something like that. There was—. 

Thomas Small Assassinated, then. 

Aimen Dean Yes. There was an attempt in 2009. Someone wanted to push me either in front of a train and then later in front of a bus, basically.

Thomas Small How do you know? How do you know? What happened?

Aimen Dean Because – because he was trying to follow me in the underground, you know. He knew me. He knew me who I was. And it was a chance encounter completely. And the look on his face was murderous. So, I had to evade him in order to escape. And I was able to escape him.

Thomas Small Well, that’s very dramatic. Did – did you – did you even speak to him? Did you?

Aimen Dean No. He was just shocked him from behind, you know, basically.

Thomas Small Oh, my God. Did you have—? Did you—? Like, what happened? You ran away?

Aimen Dean I just decided to run away, you know. And in these instances, don't be brave. Don't be a idiot. You know, just runaway. 

And the second instance, you know, it was quite relatively recent. Almost—. Yeah. Two years ago, actually, in summer of—. Well, actually, no. It was September of 2016. I was going to my nephew's wedding in Bahrain. And I think that was what alerted them. Because, you see—.

Thomas Small But this is surprising that you would even go to a family wedding. I mean, you must know that if you appear in public like that, then – then – then you might be killed. 

Aimen Dean Unfortunately, I became complacent. Because, you know, years and years past, and there is nothing. And then, you know, I thought, "Well, he's my nephew. It's a wedding in Bahrain." You know? "What would—? What could happen?" I mean—. So, I—. You know, I was on my way there. And I remember I booked the tickets and everything and all of that. And then, just shortly before the wedding, I received a phone call, you know, from the family in Bahrain, telling me that the authorities got in touch. "Don't come. There is a plot against you. They just uncovered it." And they realised basically that they were actually aware of my arrival six weeks in advance because of this wedding. 

Thomas Small But what about your family itself? Were they under any threat? Maybe al-Qaeda would have kidnapped a sister or a – or a niece to hold her – and hold her for ransom to get at you?

Aimen Dean Oh, no. They don't do that. You know, it's not in the Arab world. They don't do that. I mean, basically, this is just a very alien concept. Maybe, like, you know, this is the drug cartels in Mexico or—. 

Thomas Small Even for al-Qaeda? Al-Qaeda has – has sort of morals. Is that what you're telling me? 

Aimen Dean Even for al-Qaeda or ISIS, because we come from a tribal society. And in tribes, basically, if someone, you know, offend you, you don't go and take it on the family, because then the family would go and take it on your family. And then, the clan will take it against the clan. And there is retribution. No.

Thomas Small I see. 

Aimen Dean You know, basically, it's, you know—. Individual disputes are held by, you know, or even between an organisation and a individual is basically between that organisation and that individual. 

Thomas Small What about ordinary Muslims? Now your is out there, they know that you were a traitor to Islam in some people's mind. They—. You – you must have had some unpleasant encounters with them. 

Aimen Dean Oh. Multiple unpleasant encounters, I would say. But nonetheless, I always stand my ground, you know. You know, and I always have these incredibly funny exchanges with them. 

Thomas Small Tell me about one of them. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. I remember one. You know, there was this guy, basically, who—. He – he was actually my Uber driver, you know, and, you know, he was telling me, "Don't you feel basically you have betrayed the community?" 

Thomas Small How did he know who you were? 

Aimen Dean Because when you book Uber, you know, your name, you know, comes out, basically. And it just so happened that he was listening to Maajid Nawaz, you know, LBC Radio interview of mine. 

Thomas Small I see. So, he just heard an interview with you on the radio.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small And here he is. Ding. [crosstalk].

Aimen Dean Yeah. Absolutely. And so, you know— 

Thomas Small And who was this Uber driver? Was he some kind of crazy-eyed jihadist sympathises?

Aimen Dean Oh, no. Basically, he was just an ordinary, you know, British Pakistani. And, of course, basically, British Pakistanis have a great pride in their community. And so, basically, he said, you know, he said, you know, "Brother, don't mind me asking, but don't you feel basically that you have betrayed, you know, the community?" So, I looked at him and I said, "I did not know that al-Qaeda was a community. But now that you have alerted me that they are a community, basically, I will contact the, you know, the committee for racial equality to add them there as a persecuted minority. " 

Thomas Small So, you say, "I didn't betray the Muslim community, I betrayed al-Qaeda." 

Aimen Dean Exactly. So—. And then, I reminded him. I said, you know, "Brother, do you know what Imam Ali said?" And, of course, I'm Ali, the fourth caliph, live son-in-law of the prophet Muhammad, and the revered for both Muslims. You know, all Muslims, basically. Sunnis and Shia. So, he said, "What did he say?" Yeah. I said, "Well, look, he said that loyalty to the treacherous is treachery in the eyes of God. Betrayal of the treacherous is loyalty in the eyes of God. These people betrayed their nation states. They betrayed their communities. So, you just betray a bunch of traitors. That's what happened?"

Thomas Small Did he accept that? Did he – did he – did he say, "Oh, okay. Well, that makes sense?" 

Aimen Dean He went on, after that, to say basically that he was always angry at people who preach to mosques and send people to die instead of them actually going to fight and die, talking about the hypocrisy of it. So, it seems to have awakened something within him. 

Another example also. I was going actually to get a fever medicine for my daughter, you know, and I went to Boots, you know. And in—. 

Thomas Small A pharmacy here in the UK. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. And in an affluent part of London. And there, there was this Muslim woman in hijab, you know, a pharmacist, and she recognised me immediately. Of course, she follows, you know, current events. She seems like a news junkie. And, you know, she looks at me and she was so angry. She said, basically, I mean, you know, "You're a traitor. I mean, you know, you betrayed your community. You betrayed slum. And, you know, I don't want to serve you. Just go." 

Thomas Small What did you say? 

Aimen Dean Yeah. You know, I said, you know, "What is it that, basically, you know, upset you about what I did?" She said, "How could you live with yourself having stabbed your brothers in the back?" So, I said, "First of all, you know, there were no brothers, you know. There were people, basically, who were on a rampage throughout the Muslim world, plunging it into death and destruction. But let me ask you here a question, sister. If I see you walking down the road and I see someone coming behind you, taking out a knife and about to stab you in the back. So, if I come behind them and I stab them in the back before they stab you in the back. You see that intention wants to kill you. Mine was to save you. And you know perfectly well that what the prophet Muhammad said, that actions are judged against intentions. My intention is to save you. Theirs was to kill you. So—."

Thomas Small What did she say?

Aimen Dean She said to me, "How old is your daughter?" And, you know, she just prescribed the, you know—. Gave me basically the medicine, the Calpol, it's called basically, that I was asking for. And she asked for her age and weight, so she can tell me what exact dose I should give her.

Thomas Small So, that – that had—. Your explanation had put an end to her accusations? 

Aimen Dean It calmed her down.

Thomas Small So, given this fact, that after everything you've experienced, you remain a pious Muslim, Sunni Muslim, what are you doing today to help convince your co-religionists to adopt your brand of Sunni Islam? Open-minded joyous, hopeful, and loving? 

Aimen Dean There are multiple ways in how to do it, and the first one is to reinforce the belief in the nation state. I know, basically, the listener is sick of this phrase now. "Nation state." But because I've seen, you know, what a collapse of the nation state could do to a society. So, that's why I always tell people, "Look, if we believe in the nation state, then the legitimacy of those who wield and deploy violence outside of the para- parameters of the nation state are no longer legitimate. That's how we – how we delegitimise them. Once we legitimise the nation state in the mind of young Muslims, then we will have traveled a long distance in the, what I would call, counter violent extremism journey.

Thomas Small And Muslims in the West? 

Aimen Dean Especially Muslims in the West. 

Thomas Small Is it—? Isn't that an uphill battle? They look at the nation states here, their states, their governments, they think, "Well, these – these governments don't represent my interests. They don't represent me in the furthest extreme of this perspective. These are Christian governments in some respect." 

Aimen Dean Okay.

Thomas Small "They're – they're not Muslim governments."

Aimen Dean I – I understand that and sympathise with this. But, you see, you know, we have to come back to the issue of people always having high expectations. It's almost—. Not just only, you know, with Muslims, but also with Millennials. I mean, basically, we always talk about they know those, you know, so-called snowflakes or whatever, basically. I mean, and, of course, I don't insult them. I don't call them snowflakes. I mean, I don't—. I believe basically this is an insult. But nonetheless, you know, because of the high expectations they have, because of the technological revolution that we had, they have high expectations of what their governments can do or for their societies should provide them with. And these high expectations are then hitting the walls of reality, you know. And this is why I'll always say that when we manage people's expectations, you know, this is when we can achieve a lot. Not just only with young Muslims, but also with young people, whether Muslims or not. 

The second thing, there was a technique I used, which basically cured an old friend of mine of his rabid forty years old, you know, anti-American sentiments. Can you believe it? It cured him.

Thomas Small You know, I'm – I'm almost forty years, and I've – I've dabbled with anti-American sentiments myself. So – so, try it on me. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. I mean, sometime, you have to be self-hating, you know, in order to – to love yourself.

Thomas Small Oh, you have no idea the depths of my self-hatred. 

Aimen Dean So – so, you see, I remember a friend of mine who's so I'm American, and he's been always like this all his life. So, I managed to, you know, to really, you know, tame his anti-Americanism to a manageable level after it was out of control. I remember I met him in Turkey just last year, and he was so angry at America for everything that's happening. You know, Trump this, Trump that. You know? "They are bombing Syria. They are bombing Somalia. They're bombing – bombing Afghanistan. They are killing everyone blah blah blah blah."

So—. His name is Hamza. So, I said, "Hamza, you know, just indulge me. Mental exercise." 

And he said yes. 

I said, "Just close your eyes." 

He closed his eyes. 

I said, "Imagine a medical on the map, you know. See it as if you are seeing it from the International Space Station, just above there, and imagine it basically starting to explode, big super-volcanoes and started to sink into the ocean." 

And you can see a big smile on his face when I was saying this. 

"Good. Do you see it? You see the water and the ocean submerging it?" 

"Yes."

"Okay. Now, imagine the world controlled by Putin and [name], and Europe cowering and can't do anything. Do you like this world?"

"No." 

"And I remember he opened his eyes and he said, "Maybe America is a necessary evil." 

Thomas Small And that's what you believe, Aimen, that America is a necessary evil. 

Aimen Dean I believe America is necessary. But whether it's evil or good, I would say it's a – it's a necessary, and that's it. It's a necessity. 

Thomas Small It's a necessity. It's—. Whether it's evil or good remains to be seen, I suppose. 

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small Well, Aimen Dean, what is the mystery behind you? Your life story is truly remarkable. You have been through more than the average person by a degree of a hundred, say. 

Aimen Dean You're being very generous and kind here. 

Thomas Small You've – you've almost been killed several times on many battlefields. You are a double agent inside MI6. Then, in your own words, you sunk to your lowest tab and joined the financial industry. And yet, though you live with the threat of imminent assassination from your former al-Qaeda brothers, you have this remarkable, joyous spirit. You're quick to laugh. But I don't really understand how. Aren't you traumatised by all that's happened to you? Don't you suffer cold sweats? Do you wake up screaming in the night? Where is the PTSD inside you after everything you've experienced? You know, you're – you're really an enigma to me, despite how much, you know—. To be honest, I love you. You're my brother. And – and yet, I – I'm always—. 

Aimen Dean Thank you, bro..

Thomas Small I'm always thinking, "What—? Is – is this guy really okay?" [unintelligible]. I mean, do you need therapy or something? 

Aimen Dean I might have PTSD. It might be of a mild form. Thank God for the fact that he made me accept everything. You know, one of the things, basically, I believe is a cure for PTSD, basically, is just to have a complete submission to the will of the cosmic universe and what's happening there. 

Thomas Small Well, submission to the great plan is perhaps the best definition I can think of for the word Islam…

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small …which means "submission. And, you know, we're coming to the end of this extraordinary journey with you. And I have perhaps vocalised rather stridently people's concerns about Islam, about Muslims, especially in the current era. But you remain a Muslim. I think you've even described yourself as a Salafist, to me, still. And yet you are the most open-hearted, intelligent, fun, loving person I've ever met. So—.

Aimen Dean Oh, thank you. So kind. I can say the same about you. 

Thomas Small So, how—? 

Aimen Dean Even though you are, you know, a, you know, a fundamentalist, you know, Orthodox, you know, Greek Orthodox Christian. 

Thomas Small I don't know how fundamentalist I am.

Aimen Dean This has been Conflicted. Six episodes on the conflict raging across the world, really, inside the heart of Islam. I'm not sure if we've done it justice. It's a very complicated story. Perhaps the listener has more questions now than answers. But, hopefully, we've gone some way towards increasing the general understanding of what is ultimately an extremely important phenomenon in our time. 

All we can hope for in life is increase of understanding and increase in consciousness. And maybe this podcast has contributed to that. I certainly thank you, Aimen. And I thank you, the listener, for – for sticking with us for these six episodes of Conflicted.

This episode of Conflicted was produced by Jake Warren and Sandra Ferrari. Original music by Matt Huxley. If you want to hear more of Conflicted, make sure you search for us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you download yours.

Conflicted S3 E12 - Subcontinental Rift

Thomas Small Aimen, we've done it again. We planned to record an episode on Kashmir, on Pakistan and India, and, bang, right on cue the Pakistani capital of Islamabad erupts into violent protest. Aimen, what's going on?

Aimen Dean What is going on, you know, is our dear friend, and I'm being sarcastic here, Imran Khan, the former – now the former prime minister of Pakistan, is not exactly happy about being out of power.

Thomas Small Ah. So, you – you've gone straight for the juggler right away. You've alienated half of our Pakistani listeners.

Aimen Dean Look, for me, I can say that, just like the Palestine-Israel episode, we're going to ruffle some feathers here. But you know what? We are—. Here at Conflicted, we deal with facts and facts alone.

Thomas Small Well, we try to deal with facts. Sometimes, some Aimen Dean opinion slips in there. But—. Anyway, Aimen, I got to admit right up front. I'm no expert on Kashmir. I mean, I'm hardly an expert on anything. But certainly not Kashmir. So, I'm relying on you today. Let's get into it.

Right, Aimen. Listeners have been requesting we do an episode on Kashmir. And here it is, our first episode on that crisis. Perhaps our first of many. Who knows? It's been a long-festering crisis. It has erupted several times into war, involving several major players: India and Pakistan, of course, but also China, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and, of course, the US and Britain as well.

Kashmir is a classic case study in the amorphous thing we've been calling the clash of civilisations. And not in the way that you perhaps think. People think the problem there boils down to Islam versus Hinduism. Well, think again, I say. It's another example of Western modernity throwing a hand grenade into a pre-modern, traditional world with the usual conflictual results. Or so I'll argue at least. What's the situation there at the moment, Aimen?

From what I understand, the India-controlled part of the region is heavily militarised, and the people there are increasingly discontent with the Indian government's heavy-handed policies. Is that how you see it?

Oh, yes. There is no question. Heavy militarisation of any zone will result in discontented civilians. No question about it. I mean, and – and Kashmir in particular is the most heavily militarised zone in the world right now.

Thomas Small The most heavily militarised zone in the world?

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small I did not know that.

Aimen Dean Yeah. The—.

Thomas Small So, we're talking more than – more than, you know, Palestine, for example?

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. Because you have six hundred thousand Indian troops in the Indian-administered Kashmiri zone and then you have on the other side, on the Pakistani side, you have between two hundred and fifty to three hundred thousand troops in the Pakistani-administered Kashmir. So, you – you end up almost with three hundred thousand on the Pakistani side, six hundred thousand on the Indian side. Almost a million troops are facing each other there in Kashmir.

Thomas Small Oh, my God. And, of course, you know, both sides, also nuclear powers. It's—. You know, it's a recipe for – for – for a major disaster.

Aimen Dean Yeah. It—. This is—. You know, what worries me is that if you look at the – the – the size of Kashmir on either side, I mean, and put them all together—. And don't forget, by the way, Kashmir, isn't only claimed by India and Pakistan. China also, you know, taken a chunk of Kashmir in 1962 war between India and China. So, you will end up with a situation where there are three major powers, all of them are nuclear, you know, fighting over Kashmir. It is—. And it is most important to understand here that this conflict is one of the most unnecessary conflicts, you know, you could ever come across, you know, in this series.

Thomas Small We'll get there, Aimen. We'll get there. You've got a lot to say about your views on the Kashmiri crisis and, in fact, it's solution. But before you go there, I mean, I want to talk more about this: the nuclear element. I mean, you briefly referred to Pakistan's nuclear programme in the last episode, the one on Libya, because it was a Pakistani nuclear scientist who – who helped Gaddafi or was helping Gaddafi acquire a bomb for Libya before – before Gaddafi agreed to shut down his programme of weapons of mass destruction.

Now, India obviously acquired its bomb before Pakistan. In 1974, it carried out an operation. I think it has an almost hilariously inappropriate name given what it was for. Do you know the name? Operation Smiling Buddha.

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. I mean, for God's sake, like, you know, I mean, Buddha was, you know—.

Thomas Small A pacifist.

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small So, Operation Smiling Buddha, in 1974, was India's first ever test of a nuclear weapon. And so, you know, India's neighbour, Pakistan, did not take this successful demonstration of nuclear capability lying down, and its own nuclear programme, which had been launched two years earlier, was then kicked into high gear.

In – in the nineties, this came to a head when both powers became proper nuclear powers. And since then—. Well, Aimen, you know, India, Pakistan, cultural cousins, caught in a Cold War all their own since 1947, since the partition of the Raj.

When India tested that bomb in '74, was it a watershed moment in South Asian history?

Aimen Dean You know, Thomas, there is a joke in both India and Pakistan about what keep both countries together. You know? Because if you look at India, it's just a patchwork of many states with so many different languages, so many different cultures, so many different ethnicities. India is so fragmented, you know, culturally and geographically and politically and everything. So, what keeps it together?

So, they say, what keeps India together is English and cricket.

Thomas Small English and cricket.

Aimen Dean However, what is keeping Pakistan together?

Thomas Small Tell me.

Aimen Dean Cricket and India. Yes.

Thomas Small I see. So, Pakistan – Pakistan is held together by a shared hatred of India and cricket.

Aimen Dean Indeed. So—. And then— And this demonstrate the fact that, you know, the entire British Raj actually, even at the height of its power and the height of its, you know, hegemony, it was really still a patchwork of many decentralised, you know, provinces with princely states here and, you know –, you know, with many enclaves and exclaves. And, you know, it – it was really a jumble of so many things put together.

Thomas Small Tell me about it, Aimen. I mean, I have been staring at maps of the Raj for the last two weeks in preparation for this episode, trying to wrap my head around some way of simplifying that polity. You know, it is—. It's insane. If you look at a map of all the different zones of British control, semi-British control, independent Maharajahs, weird things called presidencies, weird things called agencies, it—. Not to mention, you know, like, little outposts still of Portuguese and French control. It is insane.

Aimen Dean Don't forget it's called the Indian subcontinent. It's massive. It's huge.

Thomas Small It's massive.

Aimen Dean And hugely populated also.

Thomas Small The conflict between India and Pakistan goes very, very deep. But on paper at least, it's over an extremely mountainous piece of land in the far north of the Indian subcontinent, where the Himalayas meet the Hindu Kush, Kashmir. And I say "piece of land," but, you know, it's roughly the size of Great Britain. So, Kashmir is not small at all.

Aimen Dean Yeah. It might be the size of great Britain. but the reality here is that it is absolutely essential. It is geographically gifted with high mountains. And these high mountains are the source of many rivers in the Indian subcontinent.

Thomas Small Especially the Indus River that flows down through the middle of Pakistan.

Aimen Dean If you look at Tibet and China, it is the birth place of the Yellow River, the Yangtze, and the Mekong. So, there are so many of us that are essential for hundreds of millions of people coming out of that plateau.

The same thing with Kashmir. Kashmir, actually, there are quite few rivers coming out of there. It is the source of water for Pakistan. You know, the Indus River, you know, system. And the Indus River system is what's run through Pakistan. So, especially through the Punjab. And then, later the Sindh, which gives, you know, the—. Which is, you know, the lifeline for the fertile parts of Pakistan. It's the, you know, bread basket of Pakistan there.

So, for India, having some control over Kashmir actually will have a – a strategic edge, massive strategic edge against Pakistan. Pakistan understand this and they want to be free of – of, you know, India's strategic grip on its water sources.

Thomas Small I mean, Aimen, you've actually been to Kashmir, haven't you? I think you went—. Did you go as a fully-fledged jihadist or were you already a double agent working for MI6 inside al-Qaeda?

Aimen Dean At the time, I was a fully-fledged spy inside al-Qaeda for MI6. I mean, the reason for that is because, at the time, I used to have a cover story, you know, working as a merchant within al-Qaeda, on behalf of al-Qaeda, you know, acquiring certain commodities from Kashmir in order to export, including the pink Himalayan salt, you know, and as well as the famous Kashmiri mountain honey. So, I mean, that was what—. It – it was a wild adventure.

Thomas Small So, you were going into Kashmir regularly to pick up these goods that you then sold on to – to – to make money for al-Qaeda all the while working for MI6. But what – what was the—? Let's say, what was the intelligence gathering aspect of your visits to Kashmir?

Aimen Dean So, my visits to places like Muzaffarabad and then, from there, into the Neelam Valley and, you know, the Kargil Hills and all of these places that you hear about in the news all the time—. First of all, the first impression you get there is what a beautiful place.

Thomas Small I've seen photos, and it's breath-taking. It's like be – beyond anything I've ever seen, really.

Aimen Dean It's—. It – it – it is a Switzerland, but on steroids in terms of, you know, natural beauty. I mean—.

Thomas Small Isn't Switzerland on steroids? Arnold Schwarzenegger. No, he's Austrian.

Aimen Dean No. He's Austrian. I mean, you know, he is Austrian. Okay. So—.

Thomas Small So, you're saying Kashmir is the Schwarzenegger of the subcontinent?

Aimen Dean Indeed., you know, you – you look at—. You go there and you find such amazing natural beauty, littered with, you know, training camps and military outposts. And – and you think, "Oh, my God. What a—. You know? What a pity?"

But you meet Kashmiris and you immediately, you know, notice the warmth. You know, the loveliness of the people. And, you know, you listen to their grievances. And I was surprised actually by the fact that they have very, very, you know, angry grievances against the Indians. But also, at the same time, they have equally angry grievances against the Pakistani military.

Thomas Small Sure. So, back to your – your – your trips there, what – what sort of intelligence were you gathering?

Aimen Dean At the time, I was looking into groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammed. I was looking into their relationship with al-Qaeda. The training camps of al-Qaeda set up for them there in conjunction with the Pakistani military. The Pakistani ISI. And also, at the same time, understanding their financial and cultural and ideological relationship with al-Qaeda and the Taliban and the relationship between all of these groups.

Thomas Small That's absolutely fascinating. I mean, you—. Your – your knowledge of Kashmir is, indeed, very intimate. I mean, I hope I'm not talking out of turn here, but your – your wife is actually Kashmiri.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small So, you are the man to – you are the man to turn to about Kashmir.

Aimen Dean But I can tell you that they—. You know, in order to understand Kashmir and the Kashmiri conflict right now, we have to really go back in history. Not too far, but just at least, like, you know, I mean, to the first half of the twentieth century.

Thomas Small Well, you're right. I'm afraid we're going back further than that as we always do. I love a bit of Bronze Age. I love a bit of Iron Age.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small So, let's have our typical excursus on an ancient India in this case. However, first, geography. It's called the Indian subcontinent. It is huge. It is heavily populated. It currently has—. The Indian subcontinent as a whole. So, we're talking, you know, we're talking Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh and Bhutan and Nepal, in fact. One-point seven billion people, basically.

Aimen Dean More than China.

Thomas Small Twenty-two percent of the world's population. And, yes, more than China. Very important. And it's a single cultural geographical zone, even though it's split into different nation states at the moment.

Geographically, the Indian subcontinent is basically a huge island that smashed into Southern Asia gazillions of years ago, and the force of the impact created the Himalayan. So, this is why India, from space, looks a little bit like—. Well, I'd like to think of it—. It's like the aftermath of a car crash. Like a fender bender. The Himalayas are the crumpled hood. A steep wall of mountains rising above the rest of the country below.

Aimen Dean You have dark imagination, I must say. You have dark imagination. I'll tell you why. Because when I see India, I see a slice of pizza, you know, basically. And, you know—. I—. You know? And, basically, the Himalayas is the crust.

Thomas Small Okay. That's a much, much more pacifistic or much, much sweeter – sweeter—. Or more savoury, I should say. A more savoury metaphor.

So, yes, like the crust of a slice of pizza, the Himalayas rise above the rest of India. And just below the Himalayas is this – is a huge arc of extremely fertile land called the Indo-Gangetic Plain. This is where the Indus and Ganges rivers fertilise the—. You know, an – an immense amount of arable land that has been, for many millennia, the – the – the – the source really of Indian civilisation, literally. Cities, empires, et cetera. And then, beyond the Indo-Gangetic Plain is the Peninsular plateau all the way down to the south. And the plateau is ringed all around by coastal plains, a thin strip of green running around the edge of the country. And it's – it's just enormous, the whole place. It's enormous.

Now, as I said, the Indo-Gangetic Plain is where the action has been for most of history. And, of course, I'm not – I'm not – I'm not an expert at all. The history of – of the region and its religions is hotly contested, not only by scholars, but – but especially by Indians and Pakistanis themselves of every stripe. Because religion has become so mixed up with national identity in South Asia. That's part of the story we're telling.

But historically, right? Stay with me here, Aimen. Basically, you have a people. They're called the Dravidians, right? They probably predate the other inhabitants of the subcontinent. They are now located mainly in its southern half and in Sri Lanka. They speak their own languages, the Dravidian languages. The major one of which is Tamil. They were probably the people who founded the Indus River civilisation, one of the early cradles of civilisation. This one, along the Indus River valley in what is now Pakistan. The Dravidian peoples have their own ancient religious practices. They are, themselves, very diverse. And to some extent, they have been influenced by the religion of their conquerors, the Indo-Aryans.

So, the Indo-Aryans, cousins of the ancient Iranians about whom we spoke, you know, I don't know, eons ago when we were talking about Iran, they were speakers of an Indo-European language, which split into the many Indo-European languages and dialects of India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. You know, Hindi, Punjabi, Kashmiri, Gujarati Bengali. Many, many, many more.

When they arrived as invaders from the north, during the Bronze Age, they came with a religion that was significantly different from that of the indigenous inhabitants, a religion which was codified a bit later into texts known as the Vedas. And this is—. This religion is actually not so dissimilar from Zoroastrianism, because they have similar roots in the Iranian, you know, Indo-Iranian areas of Central Asia.

This Vedic religion, in turn, developed into a highly ritualised priestly tradition, which scholars call Brahmanism, and it was against this, against Brahmanism and it's priestly stratification, that Buddhism arose as a kind of reaction sometime around the turn of the fifth century BC.

So, that sort of lays a bit of the groundwork for what happened next. And, you know, the subcontinent is too ancient and too huge and too diverse to do justice to – to it. But politically speaking, over the centuries, various empires would wax and wane, centred somewhere along the Indo-Gangetic plain, usually in its eastern half and penetrating southward. Sometimes a long way. Sometimes less. But most of the time, the whole subcontinent was fragmented into warring principalities, if you can even call them that. And this is basically the case all the way until the nineteenth century, when the whole of the subcontinent and even further, into Burma or Myanmar, was politically unified under the British.

However, I'm going to hand this over to you now, Aimen. Before we get to the British, tell us about Muslims and the subcontinent. So, when and how did Islam arrive there? It wasn't straightforward. It came in incremental waves.

Aimen Dean So, the arrival of Islam, you know, to the Indian subcontinent started roughly about ninety years after the death of the Prophet Muhammad. You know? So, in the six nineties. You know, seven hundreds, early seven hundreds.

Thomas Small Culminating, I think in 711, if I'm not mistaken.

Aimen Dean 711. Yeah.

Thomas Small Yeah.

Aimen Dean When—. You know? There were – there were the, you know the – the – the campaigns of Muhammad in [unintelligible], going all the way to what is today is modern-day Karachi and the surrounding areas. It was going towards the Sindh and, to some extent, into the Punjab.

So, you know, these early incursions, you know, incorporated some of these provinces, especially Baluchistan, you know, and the, you know, parts of the Sindh into the Umayyad Empire. It remains so. Then, after the Abbasids came, they consolidated their control over these parts, especially around the Indus River. But that's it. The Indus River, you know, formed a borderline between the Muslim conquest and, you know, the heartland of the, you know, Gangetic Plain.

Thomas Small That's right. I—. At that point, if I'm not mistaken—. So, the – the Muslims became well, you know, well-established in what is now, you know, that part of Pakistan. It remained inside the caliphate forever. Networks of ports from Arabia via Sindh grew up and grew up and dotted all around the – the subcontinent as trade. The Arab—. You know, the Arabs per – performed trade activities around India. It's not – it's not easy to know exactly how influential this trading activity was in terms of spreading Islam, but it must have played some role.

Aimen Dean So, the network of ports that the Muslim traders and merchants established, it was actually extensive. It ran all the way from, you know, modern day, Karachi, if we can call it, you know, all the way through Goa, you know, in the west of India, going all the way to Tamil Nadu and then also to Ceylon, which is known today as Sri of Lanka. Although the Arabs had a different name for Sri Lanka at that time. They used to call it Serendib.

Thomas Small Ah, Serendib. That's a beautiful name.

Aimen Dean And from there they, you know, expanded into the Maldives. They expanded their trade missions into Jakarta, Java, Sumatra, and all the way to Thailand. So, you know, the – the trade network was extensive. And through the trade network, Islam slowly and gradually was being introduced, at least being familiarised, you know, by the, you know, by the Hindu princes.

And, in fact, an entire Hindu kingdom, separate from India though, converted to Islam in later years, because of, you know, the merchant activities. That was, of course, Jakarta, the principality of Jakarta.

Now, going back, this was the first wave. But militarily – militarily, there was no further expansion, you know, after the Abbasid's, you know, dynasty was established. They focus more on Central Asia.

Thomas Small Yes. I mean, in fact, from – from Central Asia—. Well, from Greater Persia, let's call it, especially Afghanistan. Islamic rule politically began slowly, slowly to spread, you know, as Hindu kingdoms in the Punjab, in – in sort of north – northern Pakistan, north – north, you know, Western India, the Punjab and Kashmir fell to Islamic conquerors. But then, eventually, the whole Ganges valley, all the way to Bengal. So, basically, you know, the entire Indo-Gangetic Plain crystallised under Islamic rule in the thirteenth century, during the rise of what's called the Delhi Sultanate.

Aimen Dean But indeed, it wasn't the Arabs, really, who subjugated India. It was actually the Mongols, known as the Mughals. They are the ones who, when they converted to Islam, made this detour into – through Afghanistan, into the plains of India. And they conquered India this way.

Thomas Small That's right. So, first, you have the Delhi Sultanate, which conquered about seventy percent of the subcontinent. And then, in 1526, as you say, the great conqueror, Babur, and his Persianate Turco-Mongol warriors from Kabul conquered about ninety-five percent of the whole subcontinent, which was then incorporated into the Mughal Empire.

And I think Mughal India is, really, the India of the average person's imagination. I mean, like the Taj Mahal, the Red Fort, and all those sorts of Oriental dreams of what India is.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And just to let, you know, that, you know, in many ways, the—. While – while the Abbasids stopped, you know, the conquest of India at, you know, the Indus River. And that's it. They formed that political border with the rest of India.

Thomas Small Just like Alexander the Great before them, actually. That's interesting. Alexander himself stopped at the Indus.

Aimen Dean Exactly. I think it's just because, by then, you know, the Arabs had enough of elephants. I mean, basically, they fought the Persian elephants. You know? They fought, you know, the Asian elephants. They didn't want to fight any Indian elephants anymore. "That's it. We've had enough of elephants."

But, you know, the cultural exchange that happened during the Abbasid era between India and the Arab word phenomenon.

Thomas Small Yeah. Immense.

Aimen Dean Immense. I mean, the—. First of all, mathematics, you know, and geometry and architecture. I mean, the—. And medicine. I mean, it – it just—. The House of Wisdom in Baghdad, you know, the greatest library the world has ever seen by then, was receiving so many delegations from India, bringing with them knowledge, bringing with them mathematics. It was amazing.

Thomas Small Yeah. The House of Wisdom is – is most famous in the west for – for being the place where Greek science and Greek literature was translated and – and – and housed. But even more so, I would say, works of Persian and especially Indian genius populated the House of Wisdom. And as you say, lots—. And not just science, actually. A lot of literature entered into Arabic and Persian via India at that time.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Including numbers. I mean, funny enough, the Arabs came with the – what we know now as the Arabic numerals, which is what we use today globally, you know, including in the English language and many European languages. But now, the Arabs, especially of the Gulf, they are using Indian numbers instead of the original Arabic. So, that in itself is incredible.

Thomas Small So, since we're talking about—. We'll go on to talk about, you know, Hindu-Muslim relations in the subcontinent. We can briefly say that the Mughal conquests of India were somewhat chequered. There was a lot of destruction as there often is during such conquests. I think at – in phases at the beginning of the – of the Imperial expansion, you know, the native polytheistic traditions considered to be idolatry by the Muslim conquerors were, you know, were targeted somewhat in some places. But eventually, the Mughal Empire settled into a pattern of fairly sort of peaceful coexistence between a Muslim aristocracy ruling class, a Muslim, let's say, a growing Muslim merchant class, and a – a Hindu majority. There was basically peace between those communities. Is that fair to say? Do you – do you think?

Aimen Dean Yeah. Because, don't forget, you know, many of the Mughal sultans then adopted what they call, you know, Din-i Ilahi, which is, you know, means, you know, the Divine Religion or, you know, which in a try to incorporate some of the mysticism of, you know, Hindu religion into Islam.

And at the time, even during that time, there was, you know, the birth of the Sikh religion, which was trying to incorporate aspects of Islam and Hinduism. The—. It – it was mostly peaceful coexistence, you know. Riots would happen between now and then. Because why? It was a peaceful coexistence imposed from the top down.

Thomas Small Well, we want to move on cause we got to get to the twentieth century. So, when we talk about the British, I'm going to be brief. So, basically, just in summary. The East India Company is founded in 1600. It sets up a number of trading forts around the coast of India, especially Calcutta in the east and Bombay in the west. And over the next two hundred and fifty years, the – the East India Company takes advantage, really, of the slowly crumbling Mughal Empire by conquering or – or annexing or otherwise incorporating, subjugating the whole subcontinent.

So, then, in – in 1857, there's a huge uprising called the Mutiny of Disgruntled Indians, mainly Muslims, in fact, in the north. And this compelled the British government in London, which had largely let, you know, allowed the East India Company to rule the place on its behalf. But after the mutiny, the British government in London took direct control of what then became known as the Raj, British India, which was the unquestioned jewel in the British Imperial crown. You know?

Remember, again, we're talking about modern Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh. Oh, and also Nepal and Bhutan and even Burma, you know, Myanmar, for a large part of – of the history.

So, we're talking a huge, huge, huge region, heavily populated. And during this whole period, first under the East India Company and then during the ninety years of the Raj, modernity came to India.

Aimen Dean You mean, bureaucracy?

Thomas Small Oh, no. Bu – bureaucracy, the Mughals had a very sophisticated bureaucracy, which they …

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small … brought with them from the Persian tradition of bureaucracy. It's not bureaucracy. Modern ideas. So, I think what's most germane to the topic of the partition of India later and – and the Kashmir crisis is the idea – is the modern idea of religion. I mean, that might strike you as weird, but religion as a category is very modern and very Western. And it was the British who began to categorise Indians by religious affiliation. You know? Religious as the British themselves understood it.

So, the word Hindu, for example, was originally used to denote anyone who lived in Hind, in India, which was defined as "all the land east of the Indus River." But in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, its definition, the definition of Hindu, shifted and began to denote the non-Muslim religious traditions of India, which were vast, incredibly different, very diverse. Often mutually, you know, contradictory. But the Europeans amalgamated this diversity conceptually into one thing, which they called Hinduism, which they labelled a religion and considered one of the great religions of the world.

But, you know, what is religion? Is there even such a thing? I mean, is religion, which – by which I mean something that can be bracketed off from the rest of the world, from the rest of the society, from politics, from social interaction, from trade, from criminal justice, something that can be bracketed off and – and – and – and seen apart from everything else?

Or is this thing, religion, really an inherently Western concept, rooted in the particulars of European history? You know, in the wars of religion that followed. The Protestant reformation, when Catholics and Protestants were fighting. And in order to create peace, they sort of said, "Look, religion is separate. It's private. Everyone can have their own religion or whatever." 

But it's – it's a separate thing. I don't think that's the way that Muslims and – and what are now – who are now called Hindus traditionally understood it.

Aimen Dean Yeah. And this is why, like, you know, I mean, like I said, like, you know, that the Mughals adopted the, you know, the new concept of Din-i Ilahi. Like, you know, the divine religion. Everyone can worship God the way they like, you know, as long as it will be the Sultan. I think, you know, the arrival of the British and with their concept of religion as a category and an identity may have contributed to the religious divide that will take place, you know, in later years in India.

Thomas Small I think it definitely did. Historically, the peoples of India had identified with more than just whatever spiritual tradition they followed. You know, linguistic, ethnic, regional, and dynastic markers. I mean, who you – who, who your leader was.

Aimen Dean And the caste system also.

Thomas Small Well—. Yes. Those – those markers of identity were even stronger than religion. And, yes, strongest of all even among Indian Muslims, to some extent, was class …

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small … or caste. Because that Brahman-ic strand of Indian religion led to the creation of a very rigid caste system in India, which persists to this day.

Aimen Dean Even among Muslims. Even among Pakistanis. Like, you know, I mean, still. You know?

If you ask someone, "Oh, where is your wife from?"

"Oh, my wife is from the same caste as me."

"Caste?"

You know? So, I mean, it was a foreign idea to me at the time. Like, you know, I mean. "What do you mean by cost? I mean, I thought caste, you know, just is something that is, like, you know, the Hindus practice."

They said, "No, no, no. Even – even among Muslims in India and Pakistan, the caste systems still exist."

Thomas Small Well, we can—. I mean, I want to talk about this more. I mean, I hope it is not going to bore you, dear listener. But, you know, Aimen, you say that the Mughals tried this thing called Din-i Ilahi, the "divine religion" as you translated it. But let's talk about that, "din," which is translated usually as religion into English. But I'm not sure that that's the right translation. I mean, etymologically, "din" is related to the word "law" or the word "judgment" or the word—. How – how do we talk? "Din" was a much more all-embracing concept than the way we think of as religion today.

Aimen Dean Sometimes, it could be a way of life.

Thomas Small A whole way of life, but also a way of governing society.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small It's inherent in the word. You know, the sultan's din, the sultan's religion, is also his way of governing society.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small It's very different from religion as we understand it now, a private affair by – based on conscience and metaphysical ideas that you – that you, you know, give your intellectual ascent to. It's – it's more social. It's more political.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. There is no question. I mean, Islam's, you know, amalgamation of laws and rituals put together as well as transaction. So, you have transactions, laws, and rituals. And you put them together. And worship and spirituality, you put them together. That is actually what religion is. It's a way of life, all-encompassing, from the seat of power, all the way, hidden into the private room where you pray. All of this is religion.

Thomas Small From "the seat of power" is the important – the important thing.

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small So, basically the Sultan could define for his – his realm, what the "din" was. So, in – in Mughal—. The Mughals defined it as including the practices that we call Hinduism. That's the thing.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small It wasn't seen as incompatible as we now have to understand it with Islam. The sultan, a Muslim, he had a din," and that "din" included his Hindu subjects.

Aimen Dean For sure.

Thomas Small This transformation of the consciousness, let's say, of – of the inhabitants of the Indian subcontinent towards a more modern conception of religion. to some extent, came to a head beginning in 1871, when the Raj held its first of many censuses of all of the inhabitants of the – of the Raj. it was the first of several. And this helps to further engrain religious identity among Indians.

And briefly—. It would be interesting, I think, to discuss the impact this had on Bengali. Because we – we think of the partition of India of 1947 as the big partition. But there was a – a sort of a preview of the – of the major partition in 1905, when Bengal was partitioned between east and west, between an eastern Muslim majority area and a western Hindu majority area. And this was the result of these censuses, which had revealed that there were more Muslims in Bengal than was thought. And the Raj, they said, in order to administer Bengal better, although Bengalis themselves accused the Raj of – of adopting divide and conquer policies, partitioned Bengal, a huge area, into – into these – these two sides, which resulted in – in chaos.

Aimen Dean You see as partition of the Bengal and the idea that separate elections will be held for each community was the brainchild off idiotic British civil servants. And because the idea is "Oh, yeah. Divide and conquer. Divide the rule. That's the best way to do it."

But in reality, the 1905 partition and then, after that, by 1911, there were these separate elections, all of this mean that the British unwittingly planted the idea that, first, Hindus and Muslims cannot get along together in a united India and, second, you know, that if they can get along, then, in the future, maybe, maybe, you know, each side can go separately.

Thomas Small Yes. In 1911, the – the partition of Bengal was actually undone and Bengal was reunited, because the British had seen the chaos that partition there had caused. So, ironically, from that point onwards, the British themselves never favoured partition as a solution to internecine or, whatever, intercommunal political problems.

We saw a few episodes ago that in the case of Palestine, for example, the British abstained from the UN vote to create the partition there. They didn't believe that partition would work. They were proved right to some extent. And as we'll see, you know, in the run-up to the partition of India in 1947, the British also tried to avoid this. In the end, they couldn't. But they didn't want partition as policy, I think, because they'd been burned by the partition of Bengal.

Aimen Dean But you say—. But you see the problem here is that they might not have wanted partition, but their entire set of policies they implemented in India and the – and the Raj led eventually to the partition, because they were really favouring one party against another within the alliance, you know, that was, you know, trying to gain Indian independence.

And, of course, we'll be talking about personalities soon. But we are, you know, talking here about Gandhi, Jinnah, Nehru, Sardar Patel, and everyone. Like, you know, I mean, they were imprisoning one group while allowing the other to campaign and to have more political freedom. By that, I mean, Muhammad Jinnah.

Thomas Small So, the idea that Muslims and Hindus in India would eventually need their own state, it began to – to rise in India in the late nineteenth century, early twentieth century. But resistance to that idea also was on the rise. It's proponent presented something called "composite nationalism." For example, Gandhi. You know, the most famous Indian, you know, freedom fighter, independence supporter. He said, "Hindus and Muslims were sons of the same soil in India. They were brothers who therefore must strive to keep India free and united."

So, this idea that India was one, that Indians, regardless of their ethnicity, regardless of their religion, are one, is what informed the development of something called the Indian National Congress. I mean, a massive player, political player to this day in India. And I—. You know, I wish we could go into the whole story and the details, because the story of – of – of India and it's – it's struggle to get independence and then what – everything that followed is amazing, but it would take a gazillion hours to tell it properly.

So, the Indian National Congress was the most well-organised and most powerful proponent of independence from Britain. And for that very reason, it annoyed the British authorities. So, yes, as you say, Aimen, eventually, the Raj worked closer with a group that had arisen in opposition to the Indian National Congress, the All-India Muslim League, which invariably brings us to a – a very big personality in this story. Muhammad Ali Jinnah.

Aimen Dean If we talk about Muhammad Ali Jinnah, you – if you ask the Indians how do they view him, they view him entirely negatively. If you ask the Pakistanis how did they view him, they view him entirely positively. And if I ask myself as someone who's an avid, you know, reader of history, how do I view him, I really believe that his role was not entirely positive in the story of the Indian subcontinent.

Thomas Small Well, let's tell the listener first, you know, who this guy is. I mean, he was born, in 1876, near Karachi, to a wealthy merchant family. Funnily enough, an Ismaili family. That – that's quite interesting, isn't it?

Aimen Dean Indeed. I mean, this is one of the things I always, like, you know, find it puzzling. Whenever I talk to my friends from Pakistan, I ask the question. I ask, you know, "What is Qaid-i-Azam to you?" Qaid-i-Azam means the "Great Leader" and that is the title they give to Muhammad Ali Jinnah.

And they say, you know, "He is the founding father of Pakistan. He is this. He is that."

And most of the people I talk to are either, you know, Barelvis, you know, Sunni. You know, Sunni Barelvis or Sunni Deobandi from Pakistan. And they say, "Yeah. But, you know, he was a Ismaili?"

"What?"

"Yeah. He was a Ismaili."

I mean, the fact that he was a Ismaili, and as such considered a heretic, you know, by all of these religious schools, tells me a lot about the Pakistani education system. That, you know, they really gloss over, you know, his first, you know, highly aristocratic, you know, roots, you know, and the fact that he was a follower of the Aga Khan and he was a Ismaili.

Thomas Small Plus, I imagine they gloss over just how Westernised he became. And he went to London to study law. During his studies there, he was inspired mainly by the great thinkers of England's liberal tradition, like John Stuart, Mill, and others. And, you know, he – he – he – he only wore suits from Savile Row. The language that he spoke most fluently was English. So, he was very Westernised before returning to India where he set up practice as a lawyer.

Aimen Dean The reality is, Thomas, I don't believe, you know, Muhammad Jinnah was motivated by religion, to be honest. Because, for him, the majority of India's Muslims are Sunnis. And, you know, he is Ismaili. He is like, you know, I mean, completely separate from them in terms of religion. I mean, basically, like, you know, he's a fringe sect. That's the first thing.

The second thing is that he was mainly secular, liberal, and aristocratic and really, like, you know, was in pursuit of material gain. You know? And, therefore, what was his motivation about really creating that separate identities, you know, for foreign Muslims in the Indian subcontinent?

In my honest opinion, I would say he was really after one thing and one thing only. He was after power. He did not want to be the second man in the united India. He wanted to be the first man in a smaller country for India's Muslims.

Thomas Small Well, I think that one of the indications that it was political ambition that largely motivated him was the fact that in the – in the teens, you know, in 1916, around that point, he was a member of the Indian National Congress while also being a member of the All-India Muslim League, this other organisation, which opposed the – the political platform of the – of the India Congress. So, you know, he was clearly trying to straddle both sides. In the end, he threw his weight entirely behind the Muslim League and he became its, you know, he became its great leader in time.

Now, the Muslim League, quite straightforward, founded, in 1906, it wanted a state for Muslims only and it worked assiduously towards that end.

We got to jump forward now to World War II. So, by World War II, the Raj had introduced some democratic reforms. There had been elections, and members of Indian political parties were participating in governing the country. The Indian National Congress was by far the biggest of these political parties, but other parties were there as well.

Now, in World War II, when the UK declared war on Germany, India's viceroy there followed suit. So, India declared war on Germany. The leaders of the Indian National Congress, like Gandhi, like Nehru about whom we'll speak a little bit more down the line, they all resigned from the government. They opposed the Nazis, but they refused to join Britain's fight against the Nazis before being granted independence. 'Cause independence from Britain was the Indian National Congress's primary aim.

Now, Jinnah and the Muslim League were delighted by this resignation. And during the war, as Congress leaders were held under arrest, Muslim League members drew closer to British authorities, who were considered by the British—. I mean, the British considered the Muslim League to be more loyal than the Indian National Congress.

So, then when, in – in 1940, in Lahore, the Muslim League held a conference where they adopted a resolution calling for an independent Muslim state following independence, the British found themselves in a tricky situation. They didn't want partition. They wanted an independent India to remain whole, remain one, but they had really, you know, got very close to the Muslim League and its leaders, especially Jinnah. Jinnah enthusiastically endorsed the idea of an independent Muslim state, of course, which he hopes to lead. And – and because the Muslim League, unlike the Congress, was free to spread its message during the war, during the war, more and more Indian Muslims signed up to its ideology and – and began to desire an independent state.

Aimen Dean So, it became clear that, you know, as World War II was coming to an end, that India was going to be partitioned. Despite the best efforts by Gandhi, despite the best efforts by Nehru, it became clear that the distrust between the two communities has reached levels where it's no longer reconcilable.

Thomas Small This was certainly clear following the provincial elections that were held in 1946. At the end of the war, provincial elections were held, and it was understood that the outcome of those elections would help guide the policy of independence, whether to pursue partition or not. Ninety percent of all non-Muslims in India voted for the Congress and eighty percent of the Muslims who voted, voted for the League, who it seemed to be quite clear—. Though it's important to note of all Indian Muslims, only sixteen percent were eligible to vote, most of them upper-class Muslims.

So, you get a sense then that wealthy, upper class, elite Muslims felt that an independent state would serve their interests. It's not clear to me from the reading I've done that most Indian Muslims wanted to separate.

Aimen Dean Indeed. In fact, even Deoband, the school, you know, that was founded in order to preserve Muslim identity during the British Raj in 1866 was opposed to partition.

Thomas Small After the election, results came in. And then, in general, there was an increase in – in intercommunal violence. There were various riots. The situation became very, very tense in India. Desperate to leave, desperate to sort out a – a rapidly deteriorating situation, the Raj, you know, its viceroy, Lord Mountbatten, announced that, on the 15th of August 1947, India as it was then known would be independent and would be partitioned.

Aimen Dean And that partition was so messed up. I mean, seriously. Because why? They created this new entity called Pakistan, which was, you know, of course, what we know today as modern Pakistan along the Indus River. But what many listeners might not know is that there was another part of Pakistan to the completely other side of the country, in the east, and that was called East Pakistan. That is what we know today as Bangladesh.

Bangladesh was, from 1947 until – until 1971, called East Pakistan. And Pakistan today, as we know, it was known as West Pakistan, because Muslims were the majority in two sides of the country. And as a result, the partition was just looked so currently.

Thomas Small It not only looked convoluted. It resulted in – in just some phenomenally horrible scenes. I mean, fourteen million people were displaced as a result of partition as various, you know, groups decided that they had to or wanted to move to – to one either state to be amongst their co-religionists. You know, well over a million people died in riots and – and sort of pogroms and ethnic cleansing. There was – there was a lot of rape of – of women. It – it was—. It was really, really, really tragic.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. And in the midst of all of this chaos, there was Kashmir. Kashmir, at the time, was a separate principality ruled by a Hindu prince called Hari Singh. And he, you know, ruled a – an entity that was two-thirds Muslim and one-third Hindu and Sikhs and Buddhist. He was the Maharajah of Kashmir. And Kashmir at the time was invited, just like other princely states, to either join Pakistan or India.

Thomas Small Yes. That was one of the arrangements that the Raj had said. "To – to those independent Maharajahs," they said, "look, you can choose to be a part of this new India. You can choose to be a part of new Pakistan as you like. You just have to sign a letter of accession, as it was called, and – and inform New Delhi which – which country you want to join.

But Maharajah Hari Sing of the princely state of what was called Jammu and Kashmir at the time, which is – which is huge, you know. This is this big area in the north of India. He – he prevaricated. He didn't know which – which way he wanted it.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And there was a problem. He faced a problem. That he was a Maharajah, but most of the arms were with the Muslims. Because at the time, by the end of the World War II, most of the British Indian army conscripts were Muslims because of the Indian National Congress, who are mostly Hindus, boycotted World War II, as we – as you said. So, he was in a – in a pickle here. So, what he did is that he confiscated arms from the Muslim soldiers in Kashmir, gave them to Hindus and Sikhs. That created mistrust. That created communal violence. You know, twenty thousand Muslims were massacred. They got angry. They massacred and returned twenty thousand Sikhs and Hindus. And the situation was chaotic.

And so, the Maharajah, what did he do? He just left to New Delhi and, instead of the promise to remain neutral and to leave it to a vote, he actually just went to Nehru and said, you know, "I lost control of the situation. I need, you know, troops to come and restore peace in Jammu Kashmir."

Thomas Small I want to stop you there, Aimen. We haven't told the listener, Aimen, who Jawaharlal Nehru is. So, let – let's – let's discuss this man. I mean, an absolute titan, an icon of modern India. The – the secretary of state Dean Atchison, the American secretary of state, said of him, "Nehru was so important to India and India's survival, so important to all of us that if he did not exist, as Voltaire set of God, he would have had to be invented."

Nehru is a twentieth century titan. So, who was he?

Aimen Dean ell, he was from Kashmir, to begin with.

Thomas Small Yes. How incredibly convenient for us. He was a Kashmiri.

Aimen Dean Yeah. From the Pandit Kashmiris. I know—. You know, we're talking about the Hindu Kashmiris. They're called the Pandits. And so, you know, he came from the Pandit community of Kashmir and he was, you know, from a well-to-do family. He went to England to study law. You know, he and his father were some of the leaders of the National Indian Congress. And, in later years, he was, you know, extremely influenced by Gandhi and by Gandhi's appeal for India to find its soul and to return back to his traditions and to reject aspects of British modernity in favour of, you know, the spiritualism that, you know, characterise, you know, India's Hindus in the past.

Thomas Small So, Gandhi himself studied law in England. And every—. All of these guys studied law in England. And – and, you know, I could argue—. You could argue that though he – he portrayed himself, Gandhi, that is, portrayed himself as a traditional Indian, in fact, there was something very, very modern about his – his movement towards independence, his democratic ideals, his nonviolence. All of this is quite modern. Though, on the more radical, left wing, kind of spiritual side of modernity.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, Nehru is the product of being highly educated, but, at the same time, he adapted the down-to-earth attitude that Gandhi wanted to adapt. And, you know—. And he became more or less, you know, the undisputed leader of the National Indian Congress. And then, later, of course, became the first prime minister of India upon independence. But, of course, he and Gandhi were pretty much heartbroken, you know, over the partition. You know, all of them opposed the partition.

Thomas Small Yeah. So, back to Kashmir. So, Maharajah Hari Singh prevaricated about whether to join Pakistan or join India. Now, I – I think—. You know, you're a little bit nicer to – to old Hari Singh. I think he—. What he really hoped was to retain his independence and what – and hoped, somehow, of – for an independent Kashmir.

So, when we left Hari Singh, he – he'd gone to New Delhi.

Aimen Dean Yeah. He went to Nehru straight away and he said, "I need Indian troops to come and restore peace."

So, Nehru, looking at him and said, "I'm not going to help you, because you're not part of India yet. You know? How about you become part of India and I will send the troops to pacify the situation?"

So—. And that is when, you know, Nehru accepted Kashmir's accession into India and he sent him the troops. Jammu and Kashmir, you know, was the last Indian principality to decide whether to join Pakistan or India. But, you know, we have a situation here. The Maharajah of Jammu and Kashmir, while Jammu and Kashmir was two-thirds Muslims, however, the Maharajah Hari Singh was, in fact, Hindu. And he was afraid that—. Of course, he wanted to retain his status. He wanted to retain his power and influence. But he knew that if he wants to abide by the agreement that he pledged to Lord Mountbatten, the last viceroy, British viceroy in India, as well as to Nehru, that there will be a referendum, a plebiscite. Then, you know, it's – it's going to be inevitable that the population of Kashmir will choose to join Pakistan.

So, he started really clumsily, you know, putting together some measures, which actually led to aggravating the situation. First, he started confiscating the arms of the – the British Indian Muslim soldiers in Kashmir. You know, the Kashmiri ones who joined the World War II and then returned back. So, they were – had their weapons confiscated. They were thinking, "Oh, he is giving the weapons to the Hindus and to the Sikhs. So, therefore, we have to do something."

So, during this trouble and the communal riots, between twenty and thirty thousand Muslims were massacred. The Muslims retaliated against the Hindus and the Sikhs in the province, and twenty thousand Sikhs and Hindus were massacred.

And to make it even worse is that the new government in Pakistan, you know, thought that they have to pre-empt what they believe to be Hari Singh's intention not to honour the agreement and not to hold the referendum. So, they invaded. And they used Pashtun tribal men to launch the invasion into Jammu and Kashmir, which had really, like, you know, the opposite of the desired results. So, they invaded. And that invasion actually led to the, you know, Pashtun tribes committing atrocities against Muslims in – in Jammu and Kashmir.

Thomas Small Yeah. This is the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947, 1948, which, you know, remarkably mirrors in many respects, the – the war of Israeli independence one year later. I mean, in—.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small Especially in the sense that that war never ended. Neither war has really ever ended. And just as Israel is sort of still partitioned between the Palestinian territories and Israel proper, so is Kashmir still partitioned along what was called the line of control, which the UN established to try to at least create an armistice between the two sides. 'Cause after Pakistan invaded India invaded and – and managed to fight back the Pakistani troops. But anyway, in the end, the UN got involved and put a stop to it right there, along the line of control.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And into this new story, like, you know –, you know, we see the fading of a character, which is Hari Singh, because Hari Singh ran straight away to New Delhi. You know, after the invasion of the Pashtun tribes from Pakistan, and asked, you know, the prime minister of India at the time, Jawaharlal Nehru, for assistance.

Nehru said, "I would love to assist you. But, you know, you know what, this is the letter of, you know, Kashmir – Jammu and Kashmir accession to India. Sign it." You know? "Because I can't, you know, send troops to restore order without, you know, Kashmir being part of India."

So, he signed it and he signed, you know, Jammu and Kashmir into India. So, Jawaharlal Nehru sent the troops to – to fight the tribal people and to send them away.

But here is the issue. There is one character that needs to be introduced into the story, which is essential, which is the character of Sheikh Abdullah.

Thomas Small Sheikh Abdullah. Who is Sheikh Abdullah?

Aimen Dean Sheikh Abdullah is a Kashmiri leader, political leader, political activist, and someone who always wanted, you know, an, you know, a Muslim power in – in Kashmir. That Kashmir should be an independent state generally. But nonetheless, between him answering to Jinnah or answering to Nehru, he found Nehru to be more amenable than Jinnah.

And this is the crucial moment, the crucial moment, when there was a meeting between Sheikh Abdullah in 1948. Between Sheikh Abdullah, Sardar Patel, the deputy prime minister, and Nehru, the prime minister. Nehru looks at Sheikh Abdullah, who is now galvanising a Kashmiri resistance, Kashmiri Muslim resistance against the Pakistani invasion. Because without the Muslims, you know, at least some segment of the Muslims of Kashmir, siding with India, India will have trouble, you know, pacifying Kashmir.

So, he told Sheikh Abdullah, he told him, "If you want to go with Pakistan, now is your time. So, make up your mind. You want to go with Pakistan or stay with India?"

Sheikh Abdullah, who would later become the first governor, Muslim governor, of Kashmir on behalf of Delhi, said, "I want to stay with India."

And that's what sealed Kashmir's fate. You know, many people, like, you know, basically don't understand that Kashmir had a shot at being part of Pakistan, because, you know, Nehru, you know, reluctantly asked him. He said, "Do you want to go with Pakistan or stay with us?"

He said, "No. I'm going to stay with India." And Sheikh Abdullah then went to the UN Security Council and condemned the Pakistani invasion. And he said that those Pashtuni tribes that invaded, "raped our girls, kidnapped out women,", you know, "killed many of ours,", you know, "and looted the country,", you know, "and, actually, we as Kashmiri Muslims, we were the victims equally, not only of Hindu nationalists, but also, you know, Pashtun tribes invading from Pakistan."

And I think this is where the, you know—. The reality is that the conflict was prolonged and prolonged because of what Sheikh Abdullah decided at the time. If he decided just, okay, join Pakistan, maybe, like, you know, I mean, this conflict would have been over. But no. The reality is that he decided to stick with India.

Thomas Small Well, in the end, tragically, Kashmir was divided.

I want to zoom out and incorporate the Cold War perspective on Kashmir, because Kashmir and the conflict there played a role, an important role, in the Cold War, a role that, as we will see in a second, ties in very neatly with all the other things we've been discussing in this season of Conflicted.

So, you know, as most people know, in the Cold War, India was neutral. As we saw with Nasser's neutrality in general, the US opposed neutrality in the Cold War. It had a "you're either with us or against us" mentality.

But in the case of India, the US was forced to adopt a more conciliatory approach. I mean, India was a huge democracy, and America hoped that it would be a counterweight to a rising communist China. For that reason, the US did not want to get involved in the Kashmir conflict. President Eisenhower's position was that the dispute should be settled using peaceful means only and, after demilitarisation of the region, a plebiscite of Kashmiri residents should take place to determine the fate of Kashmir.

Well, by this point, Nehru categorically rejected both. He wasn't interested in demilitarising the region and he certainly wasn't interested in a plebiscite, fearing that it would mean all of Kashmir was added to Pakistan. So, Nehru rejected Eisenhower's solution.

Eisenhower was, of course, focused on the Soviet threat. He realised that India wanted Pakistan to be weak. It would rather have a weak Pakistan, too weak to press its claims in Kashmir, than a Pakistan strong enough to resist Soviet pressure. So, Eisenhower decided that America had no choice but to strengthen Pakistan. And so, when he was putting the pieces together for that military alliance that would become the Baghdad Pact, he included Pakistan in it.

The Baghdad Pact. Do you remember, dear listener, all about the Baghdad Pact? How Nasser was opposed to it and how it led to all manner of – of shenanigans in the Middle East. Well, Pakistan was in that pact. So, it had ramifications for the subcontinent as well.

Obviously, the prime minister of India, Nehru, strongly objected to Pakistan being in the Baghdad Pact. He claimed that the us was taking sides in the Kashmir dispute and used it to whip up a lot of resentment against America, among Indians. You know? Nehru's position was clear. He said, "I do not like either communism or colonialism. Communism is only a threat. Colonialism is a fact."

Nehru's position here was precisely the same as Nasser's. Remember Nasser didn't like communism, but he felt that British colonialism was the real threat. And then, he saw that America was just behaving like the British colonialist from before.

Nehru felt the same. And so, this is the final piece in the puzzle that we've been putting together on and off for most of this series. Pissed off at America for America's close military support for Pakistan, Nehru reached out to other leaders equally unwilling to fall in line behind America's Cold War objectives, equally concerned at the way American policy so closely mirrored the policy of the British Empire before it. And, of course, one of those leaders was Nasser.

Nehru formally inaugurated what was called the Non-Aligned Movement, i.e., powers that didn't want to be aligned with either the Soviet Union or the United States in the Cold War. Nehru inaugurated this movement by convening the Bandung Conference in Indonesia in April 1955. Nasser was there. He was the primary representative of the Arab countries. The US had intensely petitioned Nasser not to attend the conference, but Nehru's seduction was more powerful. Nasser was there as the primary representative of the Arab countries and, thus, in solidarity with all these anti-American leaders.

Nasser returned to Cairo and – and became the man that we have seen him become. You know, he—. The man who nationalised the Suez Canal. The man who resisted the invasion during the Suez crisis. The man who led the Arabs to, well, overwhelming defeat in 1967.

So, we can say, Aimen, if it weren't for the Kashmir crisis and the formation of the Non-Aligned Movement, on the back of it, maybe the modern Middle Eastern history would be completely different.

Aimen Dean Maybe. But, you know, like, I mean, what is, you know, ironic for me is that Nehru, just like Nasser, went down the path of non-alignment. But that non-alignment meant weapons and military assistance from who?

Thomas Small The Soviets.

Aimen Dean Exactly. So, while Pakistani military was, you know, armed by the Americans, the Indian military actually was armed by who? By the Soviets.

Thomas Small So, we've laid the foundations for an understanding of the Kashmir crisis, which goes on. I mean, and it – it really does go on. As you said, Aimen, it's the most heavily militarised place in the world. It erupted into war in 1962. Again, with – with China, which took a chunk of Kashmir. War with Pakistan again in 1963. And – and on and on and on.

I mean, in the eighties, this infamous jihadist group, Lashkar-e-Taiba was founded by the – by the Pakistani military, I think.

Aimen Dean Yes. The Pakistan military and the ISI formed this group, Lashkar-e-Taiba. And—. In 1986, I think. And it started like, you know, from the mountains of Afghanistan as the jihadist movement against the Soviet Union. And then, after that, of course, the Pakistanis established even more groups such as Hizbul Mujahideen and Jaish-e-Mohammed. So, all of these militant groups were founded by the ISI and by the Pakistani military to infiltrate into Kashmir and to create, you know, a insurgency inside Kashmir against the Indian military presence there.

The reality is that it's a tragedy. It is a tragedy, because the entire Indian subcontinent is held hostage to this never-ending crisis and never-ending conflict.

Thomas Small You mentioned to me, Aimen, your idea of the Palestinisation of Kashmir in the way that Kashmir is – is used by leaders in both Islamabad and New Delhi to – to create national solidarity, to strengthen their own political positions.

I mean, certainly, you know, India is by no means a good guy in this context. The Indian military has been very brutal in its part of Kashmir. And in recent decades, Indian politics have become more and more associated with Hindu nationalism. And the Kashmiri crisis is part of that.

Aimen Dean Whenever I talk to people, I just realise that on both sides of the border, there are three major players, on both sides of the borders, who don't want a solution to Kashmir. On the Indian side, you have the Hindutva. You know, the Indian Hindu nationalists. They don't want a solution to Kashmir, because it is a cause that keep giving them, you know –, you know, followers and money and influence. Because, you know, you whip up the national, you know, Hindu feelings, you know, with the crisis and Kashmir. Kashmir has become a national pride issue.

Then, you have RAW. You know, the Indian intelligence. They love the idea of the fact that there is an enemy to be engaged with, which is Pakistan and its ISI. So, you know. And this crisis keep going on and on. And it gives importance and budget and extra influence for RAW.

And then, you'll have the Indian military. Because if there is an enemy in Pakistan and its ally, China, then, you know, there is – there is a greater, you know, importance to the Indian military. More budget, more recruit, more power, more influence. So, these are the three major players on the Indian side of the border.

On the Pakistani side of the border, even greater forces there don't want to have peace, you know, with India over Kashmir. You know, first, you have the Pakistani military. You know, as long as there was an enemy, the Pakistani military will be so powerful. In fact, the Pakistani military in Pakistan is far, far more powerful than the India military in India. They control forty percent of the economy and they control politics. They can depose any prime minister, elected prime minister, at any time. Just look at what happened to Imran Khan now. Before that, Nawaz Sharif. And before that, Benazir Bhutto twice. And it's always like this. The Pakistani military decides who actually among the civilian government rule the country. So, why would they give up – give all this up, you know, for a sake of peace?

Then, you have the ISI. The Inter-Services Intelligence like, you know, I mean. So, this agency, the ISI, the Pakistani intelligence, they get their budget and they get their influence and they get their power, because of what's happening in Kashmir and across the border and the enmity with India.

Then, you have the most important element here: the Islamist groups all across Pakistan. Whether they are the Jemaah Islamiyah or whether they are [unintelligible] Tehrik-e [unintelligible] Muhammad or whether they are Lashkar-e-Taiba or Jaish-e-Mohammed or Hizbul Mujahideen, all of these people, they don't want peace with India. Because, you know, it is the Indian or the enmity to India is what keeps all these groups together. They can raise funds. They can have recruits. They can radicalise the population. Why would they give all this up? So, you end up in a situation where Kashmir—. Poor Kashmiris. I mean, they are really caught in the middle between all of these powerful forces.

Thomas Small Well, don't forget China. I mean, there's another big player in Kashmir. China is a – is a close ally now of Pakistan. China has immense interest in Afghanistan and in the – in the new, you know, economic corridor, all the way down to the Arabian Sea through Pakistan.

You know, China, I guess, it also—. It's pretty happy with the status quo. It would like its rival India to be wrong-footed in this way.

Aimen Dean Indeed. I mean, I always discussed with my both Indian and Pakistani friends. And I'm married to a Pakistani. Like, you know, I mean, from Kashmir. So, you know. So, we always have these discussions and debates, and they are so animated. And I love it. But I always say, "Look, listen to me, I know, like, you know, what I'm going to say, you won't like. But, you know, just take a seat back. You know, take a deep breath. Relax a little bit. You know? Free yourself from the shackles of, you know, emotional nationalism and let's talk irrationally here. First of all, before I say what my solution is, I have always stated that I was – I'm very much opposed to what happened during the partition. The partition was a mistake. Historical, strategic, in every level. It was a mistake. I would rather than India as a whole, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and India today, were a one united country. Because the idea that the Muslims feared, you know, oppression by the Hindus, well, if the Muslims remained, they will be at least between thirty-five to forty percent of the population. There would be a very big minority that they can withstand anything that the Hindus can throw at them. And the Hindus will be slightly enough majority that they can have dignity and they will not feel that they are overruled by a Muslim aristocratic class."

So, we come back to the fact that the partition was a mistake. But now, we are living in the now. And so, how do we solve the crisis in Kashmir?

I always said that there is only one power in the world that have both leverage over India and Pakistan, that they can bring the two parties together and pressure them into a solution. And that power is that GCC.

Thomas Small The Gulf Cooperation Council. Saudi Arabia, the Emirates. All – all of your friends over there on the – on the Arabian Gulf.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Because both India and Pakistan, they received the majority of the energy from there. And the majority of India's and Pakistan's labour workforce, who send in billions upon billions of remittances every month, you know, come from the GCC. So, the GCC is an important lifeline, economic lifeline, to both India and Pakistan.

If the six countries of the GCC were to come together and to say, "Well, you know what, like, you know, it's time to resolve this issue. We don't want a nuclear war on our doorstep. You know? So, what we want to do is that for both sides of Kashmir, the one-third that Pakistan controls and the one-half the India controls, for these two Kashmirs, both of them become a autonomous region. And the Pakistani side would become an autonomous region of Pakistan. The Indian side to become the autonomous region of India. And both of them become totally demilitarised."

And the next phase after that will be massive investment in the tune of tens of billions of dollars by these countries into the tourism and food sector in Kashmir.

Thomas Small I mean, tourism alone would – would – would get so much investment, as you say. Kashmir is beautiful.

Aimen Dean Kashmir is a heaven on earth. It is the—. You know? Let's put it this way. Like, you know, the more attractive sister of Switzerland. And, you know—. And this is why, you know, for the Arabs of the Gulf, you know—. Just if you offer them this all-year-round tourism, whether it is skiing holidays in the winter or, you know, beautiful summer weather. You know, chalets and, you know, villas, I mean, you're talking about tens of billions of dollars of investments that actually will create millions of jobs on both sides of the border.

And you open the border. Not only across the two parts of Kashmir, which is now demilitarised. You open the entire bloody border from Kashmir all the way to the Indian Ocean. You open the entire border between the two. Because if you unlock the trade, if you unlock the commercial cooperation between Pakistan and India, what that would do to the one-point-six billion people who live there on the sub-Indian continent, it will transform their lives.

Thomas Small It's a beautiful dream, Aimen. But as you said, there are too many powerful players with interests opposed to that dream. I don't see it happening anytime soon.

As for me, you know, unlike you, I don't really live in the now. And I – I come away from this exploration of Kashmir and the history of partition just wondering. Why the hell did the modern Western style nation-state have to develop there in the way it did? You know? Why did we have to create national identities, homogenous national identities, increasingly based upon some fictional idea of religious partisanship? Why did we have to do that at all?

You know, India. India is – is so old. India had its own forms of – of governance, its own traditions. Very hierarchical. Absolutely. Not – not at all in, you know, the way that we understand, you know, governance in – in the West. But why did it have to happen? That's all I'm left with, you know. A tragedy or yet another tragedy of the – the modern state causing problems.

Aimen Dean Yeah. But you know what? I'm still optimistic that as Indians and Pakistanis become more entrepreneurial and more enterprising, that they will see that the Kashmir issue could be resolved, you know. But it needs a powerful third party with leverage over both sides coming in and saying, "You know what? Let's grow up. Let's have peace. [Amin].

Thomas Small [Amin].

Well, dear listener, that's Aimen and me on Kashmir. I'm sure we'll come back in another episode to talk more about Kashmir. There's so much that could be said. There are so many wars, so many terrorist groups, so many shenanigans happening in that part of the world. But that's it for now. This episode, God knows, is long enough. From the Indian subcontinent, stick with us, because, in two weeks, we will go to, really, the – the – the epicentre of all that we've been talking about in all of this – on all of this series, though we haven't focused in on it. And by that, I mean, Turkey.

A reminder that you can follow the show over on Facebook and Twitter @MHConflicted. And for a deeper dive on some of the subjects we cover here on Conflicted, head over to Facebook and search "Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group." There, you will find other fans of the show engaging in heated debates, enlightening conversations, and just generally geeking out over Conflicted-related topics.

Those of you who already subscribe to the show will know that, at the end of each episode, Aimen and I pick a question sent in by a lucky listener to answer for our exclusive bonus content section. To access that content, begin with the chance of getting your question answered. And to listen ad-free, you can subscribe to the show for just 99p on Apple Podcasts or sign up to Conflicted Extra on Spotify also for just 99p.

That's it for this week. Join us again in two weeks' time for another episode of Conflicted.

Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Rowan Bishop. Sandra Ferrari is our executive producer. Production support and fact-checking by Molly Freeman. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

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Conflicted S3 E11 - Gaddafi: The Arab Madman Cometh

Thomas Small Aimen, guess what movie I saw last night?

Aimen Dean Which one?

Thomas Small The new Top Gun movie, Top Gun: Maverick. It was so awesome.

Aimen Dean I hate you. I really want to watch it.

Thomas Small You've got to see it, man. And also, you know, it really put me in the right mindset for today's episode, which is about Colonel Gaddafi. So, it put me right back in the mid-eighties when, you know, America's neo-conservative, muscular sort of confidence was – was at its – at its peak and Gaddafi was the great enemy of the world.

Aimen Dean What did Reagan call him again?

Thomas Small The mad dog of the Middle East.

Aimen Dean Except – except this is the problem with Reagan. He never knew his geography. Actually, he was supposed to be, technically, the mad dog of North Africa.

Thomas Small That's true. That's true. You know, poor North Africans, they're always being lumped in as Middle Easterners. They must think, "We're not Middle Easterners. We're not Middle Easterners. We're North Africans." Frankly, given the history we're going to talk about today, I don't know which one I'd rather be.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small Right. Let's get into it.

Aimen, I've got to be more careful about what I say during these recordings. In our last episode, I just, you know, casually announced that we'd be discussing the notorious 1973 oil embargo today. But, in fact, we're actually not going to discuss the oil embargo. So, for any dear listeners who have tuned in, hoping for our take on the oil embargo, you're out of luck. Maybe another time.

Aimen Dean No. We are talking about something far more interesting than the oil embargo. We are talking about the king of kings of Africa, the dean of the Arab presidents. You know, the—. What did he call himself also? The – the – the imam of all Muslims. You know, the – the colonel. The leader of the great glorious revolution of the conqueror. Yeah. That's the name of the official revolution in Libya. Muammar Gaddafi.

Thomas Small Yes. Today we're focusing on Libya, a country that we've rather ignored over these three seasons, but not today.

Before we go back in time, Aimen, tell us what's the situation like in Libya at the moment?

Aimen Dean It's a scrambled egg of politics. Let's put it this way. I mean, you have former Libyan regime, you know, military figures, like Khalifa Haftar—you know, the field marshal Khalifa Haftar as he called himself—in the east of Libya and you have remnants of the jihadist LIFG (the Libyan Islamic Fighter Group) led by Abdelhakim Belhaj, you know, based out of Tripoli. And then, you have, you know, the Turkish- and Muslim Brotherhood-backed Bashagha, the former prime minister. And you have Dbeibah, who is kind of the prime minister who is, you know, agreed upon by everyone because he is quite weak, you know. And – and still there is no end, you know, in sight for, you know, the current chaotic scene of Libyan politics. It really needs a strongman again.

Thomas Small Oh, man. So much unrest. So much disquiet. So much chaos. It's all largely fallout from the forty-two-year rule of Libya's handsome, charismatic, and pretty batshit crazy dictator, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.

Aimen Dean You know, he was my favourite. He was my favourite dictator of all time.

Thomas Small Well, because he made you laugh more than any dictator.

Aimen Dean We have a saying in Arabic, "[speaks in Arabic]," which means that you should collect wisdom, you know, from the mouth of the insane. So, for me, he really personified that proverb.

Thomas Small Well, dear listeners, now that we've told the story of the rise and fall of Nasserism, we turn to Gaddafi and other mad men like him who believed themselves to have inherited Nasser's mental of era of leadership. Gaddafi's brazen, narcissistic insanity is the stuff of legend. And, Aimen, you've got a caravan load of funny anecdotes to illustrate just how nuts he was.

But, more seriously, Gaddafi symbolises the tragic turn towards unhinged dictatorship, which much of the Arab world underwent in the second half of the Cold War. Gaddafi, Assad, Saleh, Mubarak, Ben Ali, and, of course, Saddam Hussein, they all stalked the Middle East, like undead zombies of Nasser, a nightmare from which the Arab world is still recovering.

Dude, Aimen. Gaddafi, he was nuts.

Aimen Dean Well, I mean, can you imagine being twenty-seven-year-old and you become the undisputed leader of a large country like Libya? One-point-seven million square kilometres. Well, mostly desert and underpopulated. But still, like, you know, I mean, with oil.

Thomas Small Well, it certainly went to his head. I don't know what was inside that head of his, but there was a lot of crazy stuff. During the reading I – I've been doing, preparing for this episode, I kept thinking over and over, "Wow. I mean, how in God's name could a man like this maintain rule over a whole country for forty-two years?" I mean, he—. How is this possible, Aimen?

Aimen Dean You know what? Actually, I looked at this, throughout history, that insane and unhinged rulers tend, actually, to last longer. And there are good examples throughout history, including in North Africa. Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah, Fatimid caliph. You know, he was insane and one of his anecdotes is that he ordered all of the people of Egypt to shave one eyebrow and keep the other one. So, I mean—. And people complied. And he lasted long, because, just like every insane and unhinged ruler, people are always afraid. They are so unpredictable. People don't know how—.

You see—. You know, if you have the classical ruler, the classical leader, you know how to manoeuvre around them, you know how to outmanoeuvre them. But when you have an insane person who could just, you know, turn the entire table with a chess board on it, you don't know how to deal with them. So, this is why they last longer. People don't know how to deal with them. They are so unpredictable.

Thomas Small Well, certainly, that was true of – of Colonel Gaddafi. And this is how I want to frame the episode, really. I mean, in our last episode, we covered the Six-Day War and the Yom Kippur War, and we said that those wars marked the demolition of Nasserism, the demolition of the dream of pan-Arabism, and that the first generation of post-colonial Arab republicans were thoroughly discredited.

And when I'm thinking about Gaddafi, I'm thinking, you know, the Arab world, in a way, following its defeats to Israel and the smashing of its prevailing ideological framework, after this, the Arab world kind of went nuts.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small And Gaddafi symbolises it perfectly. It's almost like Gaddafi personified the mental breakdown that the Arab world was undergoing.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Oh, my God. When you say he went nuts, he went nuts in terms of every variety. Pistachios, almonds, cashews. Everything.

Thomas Small Also, it's interesting that, you know, this whole series, we've been talking about the – a period of Arab and Middle Eastern history through which Gaddafi grew up. He is really the product of everything that we've discussed. He grew up, you know, after the Ottoman Empire had collapsed, after the First World War changed the – the map of the Middle East, after all of these trends became firmly established. So, Gaddafi is the results of all of this history. In a way.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And this is why I think he is the product—. To – to – to an extent, he is the product of the overhyped rhetoric of Nasserism and of Arab nationalism.

Thomas Small Yeah. You told me that you – you think he sort of symbolises a continuation of Nasserism in a more radical mode.

Aimen Dean Indeed. The problem with Gaddafi was his, apart from his insanity was his excessive narcissism.

Thomas Small That is for sure. The man was—. I think he was certifiable. I mean, honestly. You've got so many great stories in our conversation leading up to this episode, man. I just laughed so much.

Aimen Dean The problem is that we have to also understand that the story of how he became the leader of Libya is as interesting actually as how he was able to continue through Libya for forty-two years.

Thomas Small Yes. And—. But before we get to the story of Gaddafi, let's talk about Libya, as we are wont to do this series, by going far back into history. Libya, you know, well, the question is, of course: What is Libya? The word "Libya" for the ancients was really the word they used for all of Africa outside of Egypt. So, it was an extremely broad term, Libya. Ancient Libya appears in Herodotus, the father of history, the ancient—. Well, you call him the "father of lies," Aimen.

Aimen Dean Yeah. I call him the "father of lies."

Thomas Small He mentions Libya. He says, "The people who inhabit Libya are four and no more than four. Two of these people are indigenous and two of them are not. The Libyans who live in the north and the Ethiopians who live in the south are both indigenous while the Phoenicians and the Greeks are immigrants."

So, this shows very clearly that Libya meant much more than what it means to us today. All of Africa outside Egypt. So, when Herodotus talks about Libyans, he's referring to the people we know as the Berbers. We don't—. We – we haven't talked much about the Berbers, Aimen, in Conflicted, but they are a very important people, especially in the history of the Islamic world.

Aimen Dean I mean, yeah. The—. We—. When we talk about the Berbers, we talk about, you know, a variety of tribes, you know, from – stretching from Egypt, from the, you know, the oasis of Siwa all the way to Mauritania, and it encompass so many of them that. There are Berbers of the mountains, of the north, in Algeria and in Morocco. And there are the Tuaregs, who, you know, straddle the – the Great Sahara to the south of the coast. And then, you have the coastal Berbers. You know, like the people of Tobruk, you know, which is known as Cyrenaica. I mean, and the people of Tripoli. And – and – and then, you have the Berbers who were the Numidians, you know, going around, you know, in Tunisia.

So, there are so many of these tribes. You know, Zenata, Sanhaja. You know, Kutama. We could go on and on and on about, like, you know, how many Berbers and Tamazight as they are known. You know, they don't call themselves Berbers, by the way. They call themselves the Tamazight people.

Thomas Small The free people. It means the free people.

Aimen Dean Exactly. They refuse the, you know, the word Berber, because this is what the Romans gave them.

Thomas Small Well, in fact, the Greeks called them Berber, and it's the same word as "barbarian."

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small They – they just called them the barbarians. It's not very flattering.

Aimen Dean Because, for the Greeks, anyone outside of Greece is barbaric. That's how they saw it.

Thomas Small Berber tribes have inhabited the land that we now call Libya for at least twelve thousand years, and they're mentioned in Egyptian records as calvary officers and the Egyptian army for some period. And even at one point, they conquered Egypt and became pharaohs. For about two hundred years, there was a Berber dynasty overseeing Egypt. So, they're a very ancient people.

The—. Hero – Herodotus specifically talks about a tribe known as the Garamantes, a large Berber tribal confederation based in what is now the Fezzan, in southwestern Libya. They had cities, they had advanced irrigation, and they formed extensive trade networks across the Sahara to the south. So, we're talking about a serious people, really, that have played a big role in history.

The next category that Herodotus mentions. Ethiopians was his word for Black Africans in general. And they don't really fall into this podcast, because, you know, Libya is mainly Berber and Arab. However, Colonel Gaddafi did fancy himself to be the leader of all Africa and formed close ties with a lot of African countries.

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. He called himself the king of kings of Africa.

Thomas Small Typical narcissism, honestly.

Finally, the two non-indigenous peoples: Greeks and – and Phoenicians. So, the Greeks founded the city of Cyrene, in – in eastern Libya, and – and that city gave its name to the whole region, which was known in classical antiquity as Cyrenaica. And this was a major urban centre of the eastern Mediterranean, and it particularly had a huge Jewish population. Cyrene had tens of thousands or even a couple hundred thousand Jews at the time of Christ. I mean, really quite a remarkable fact. You know? 'Cause back – back then, Jews were – were widespread across the Mediterranean world.

The city of Cyrene is perhaps best known because it's the place where Simon of Cyrene came from. This is the man who, according to the Gospel accounts, carried Christ's cross for him on his way to Golgotha before the crucifixion. Now, this, Aimen, bear with me, this is a random, but, I think, quite a fun digression. So, Simon of Cyrene became a very important figure in what's called Gnosticism, right, an early form of Christianity considered heretical by the Orthodox churches, which, among other things, denied the materiality of Christ's body.

Now stay with me, Aimen, here. So, Saint Irenaeus of Lyon, who compiled a compendium of heresies in the late second century AD—so about 150 years after Christ—he described the beliefs of one of these Gnostic groups, the Basilides. He said—. They—. This is what they believed: Christ himself did not suffer. Rather, a certain Simon of Cyrene was compelled to carry his cross for him. It was he who was ignorantly and erroneously crucified, being transfigured by God, so that he might be thought to be Jesus.

Aimen, why do I find that so interesting?

Aimen Dean Because that's what the Islamic belief is.

Thomas Small I know. Isn't that—? And I think that's how the – the majority interpretation of the Quranic verses about the crucifixion go. That Jesus wasn't crucified. That someone was transformed to look like Jesus and he was crucified instead. So, this – this – this belief, this idea may have originated amongst Gnostic Christians in Cyrene. I – I just think that's amazing.

Aimen Dean Interesting.

Thomas Small Anyway. So, eventually, Cyrenaica, this is eastern Libya, was conquered by the Persians, incorporated into their empire, and ruled as a part of Egypt and then, as a part of Alexander's empire and so on. So, it was basically, for many, many centuries, a faraway outpost of Egypt. This is eastern Libya.

The Carthaginians, these are people who originated in – in modern Lebanon, they founded three cities in what is now western Libya. And because there were three of them, the Greeks called the area Tripolitania, i.e., the land of three cities. And though the cities were not Greek, they were Carthaginian. Modern-day Tripoli is one of those cities. The Carthaginians were an extremely powerful imperial power. They subjugated the Berbers, who sometimes revolted. It was quite a chaotic time, I think. Eventually, the Romans crushed the Carthaginians. They incorporated triple attained into their empire, which became part of a province of Africa as they called this province based in modern-day Tunisia. So, from that point on western Libya was basically always in the orbit of Tunis.

What's the main point here? What we think of as Libya was never a single, unified political entity until the twentieth century.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small Modern Libya is the cobbling together of three regions that were always marginal parts of other larger polities: Tunis and Egypt, basically.

Aimen Dean Actually, everything you said, Thomas, is absolutely accurate. To this day—to this day—you can tell that Eastern Libyans and Western Libyans don't see eye to eye re – whether – regarding politics, regarding, you know, traditions. You know, even, you know, dishes and culture and, you know, cuisine and all of that. I mean, both sides of Libya are not only just separated by a massive desert between them and a long coast, but also by, you know, centuries of being attached to two different political entities.

Aimen Dean Right. Okay. So much for ancient history. Let's talk about Islamic Libya. The – the Arab conquest came to Libya, as it came to all of North Africa shortly after the death of the prophet. But the Berbers, they strongly resisted the Arabs, didn't they?

Aimen Dean You know, Thomas, the story of the Muslim conquest of North Africa is so fascinating. It took fifty years. Actually, fifty-five years. And it is the story of conquest, reconquest, re-reconquest, and re-re-reconquest, because the Berbers kept pushing the Arabs back and kept defeating them and kept pushing them back. But the Arabs were so persistent. "No. We're coming back."

So, in the end, the Berbers just got sick of – of it and they said to the Arabs, "What would it take for you to just get lost?"

So, they said, "Well, I mean, convert to Islam."

"Here. That's it. We convert to Islam. We're all changing our names. That's it. We're all Muhammad and Abdullah and Abdulaziz and everything. That – that's it. Leave us alone now."

So, this is the story of how Islam came to North Africa.

Thomas Small Does that mean that, to this day, Berbers have a reputation? Maybe a bit like the past tunes, actually, of – of being Muslims, of being pious Muslims, but, in a way, being Berber first?

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. I mean, there is no question that the Berber identity was so strong, and it will actually carry on in later years into Andalusia and the conquest of the Iberian Peninsula, Spain and Portugal. You know, the armies that went to conquer were two separate armies: one is a Berber Muslim and one is an Arab Muslim. From the beginning, they had their separate armies, their separate entities, their separate identity. You know? And they remained like this for a very long time.

Thomas Small We're spending all this time talking about Berbers. But, in a way, we shouldn't be because Libya, amongst all those North African places, was the most Arabised. Though this happened later than the conquest themselves, in the eleventh century, two notoriously riotous, Arabian tribes, one of them from the Nejd, you know, from the heartland of Saudi Arabia, they came to the land that is now Libya and they – they didn't – they didn't really make themselves so welcome, did they?

Aimen Dean Indeed. The Banu Hilal and the Banu Salim.

Thomas Small The Beni Hilal and the Banu Salim.

Thomas Small So, who are the Banu Hilal and Banu Salim? I mean, they are Nejd tribes from Arabia and they were actually contracted by the Fatimid caliph at the time in order for – to use them as mercenaries against rebels in Tunisia, in modern-day Tunisia. And, you know, oh, boy, what they – what did they do to North Africa? I mean, they laid waste, not only to the rebels, but to Carthage and to Tunis and Kairouan and all of these cities that were rebelling. And then, they settled in Libya. And their settling in Libya—. Although some of them, when they wanted to go back to Nejd, actually, they settled in Sinai. And, actually the Bedouins of Sinai and the Bedouins of Libya were always known to be notorious. Sometimes, they were pirates or brigands or highway gangs. I mean, they were not exactly an exemplary citizens. Let's put it this way. And funny enough, our subject for this episode today, Colonel Gaddafi himself, is from Banu Hilal.

Thomas Small Yes, indeed. The Qadhadhfa tribe from which he gets his surname were – were among the Bani Hilal. And a few hundred years after the Bani Hilal and the – the Banu Salim came and conquered Libya, the famous North African polymath, Ibn Khaldun, in his potted history of the region, still re – recalled their arrival with great sadness. He said, "It was at this point that our civilisation, that our irrigation, that our great wealth, it was undermined. Agriculture declined, and we became a more sort of backwards, rather chaotic collection of city states, always warring with each other."

He blamed the Bani Hilal, i.e., in a way, Colonel Gaddafi's grandfathers.

So, from that point on, Libya is something of a backwater to history. Obviously, it fell within the Ottoman Empire to some extent, although it was sort of marginal a – a dynasty of – of Turkic leaders called the Karamanli ruled it when it became infamously piratical. In fact, the first ever foreign war that the United States fought very early on in its history were called – are called the Barbary Wars against – basically against the Libyan city states who were harass – who were harassing shipping in the Mediterranean.

So, we just want to skip ahead, really, to when Libya enters the modern period, and that's in October 1912, when the Ottomans signed a treaty with Italy, inaugurating, really, what is the most, in my view, the most horrendous period of European colonisation in any Middle Eastern or Arab country.

Aimen Dean You know what, Thomas? Our image of Italy and the Italians always that they are the easy-going people. You know, they're just busy drinking, eating, having a good time, dancing, concerts, you know, and just falling in love. You know, amore. You know, that – that's what the Italians are.

But that's not the Italy or the Italians that the Libyans experienced in 1912 and beyond. Oh, my God. When the Libyans – when the Libyans saw the troops landing in Tobruk, in Zuwarah, in Tripoli, in Misrata, I mean, that was like the gates of hell opening.

Thomas Small Especially from the 1920s, when – when Mussolini came to power and – and he decided to make an example, really, of Libya. Libya became his – his sort of petri dish of Italian fascist imperial power.

Aimen Dean Indeed. I mean, you know, in Benghazi and Tripoli and other places, you know, there was this Italian fascist tradition of hanging people just as an example. So, they will hang them in the public squares and the streets and then, they will take photos and make these photos the postcards. So, if an Italian immigrants, you know, in Libya—. Settlers. They call them the Italian settlers who settled there. If they want to send a postcard back to their family in Italy, it will be actually the picture of hanged Bedouins. And Mussolini, in particular, loved to collect these postcards and he used to love, you know, looking at them, basically. It's just—. Wow.

Thomas Small The fascist rule in Libya was ruthless. It was brutal. No Libyan, for example, was allowed any education beyond primary school, and the education that they did receive was explicitly Italian-ising. I mean, they were trying to turn them into Italians, if possible.

Also, as you told me, Aimen, they – they had a network of concentration camps in Libya.

Aimen Dean General Rodolfo Graziani, who was, you know, one of the most, you know, brutal and bloody generals of the fascist war machinery in Italy, he started the process of what he called "concentrating the Bedouins." So, he took roughly about seven hundred thousand Bedouins and he put them behind barbed wires. Like, you know, I mean, he actually started the first concentration camps built by fascist in the African continent.

So, from 1929 onward, you know, seven thousand Bedouins were concentrated. And then, when he wanted to cut off the Libyan resistance, you know, led by the Senussis, who we'll talk about later, and by Omar Al-Mukhtar, you know, who's a – the national hero of Libya, he wanted to cut off their support from Egypt, because the British, as well as the Egyptian Muslims, were – were supporting the resistance against the Italians and the Mussolini fascists. So, he used a hundred thousand Bedouins to build a massive barbed-wire wall from the Mediterranean all the way to the desert. And tens of thousands of people died during the construction of that barbed wire, you know, across the sand. It was a tragedy beyond belief.

When the Italians came to Libya, there were one and a half million, you know, Libyans living in Libya. When—. You know, by the end of World War II and the fall of Mussolini in 1943, there were only eight hundred thousand left. Half of the population died at the hands of the Italians.

Thomas Small That's amazing. Unbelievable.

You mentioned this man, Omar Al-Mukhtar, the Libyan national hero, someone who Gaddafi felt particularly inspired by. Tell us about him and – and the battle of Jabal al Akhdar.

Aimen Dean Indeed. I mean, Omar Al-Mukhtar is one of the followers of the Senussi Sufi Tariqa. And the Senussis were the descendants of the Prophet Muhammad. They are ashraf. You know, we talked about the Hashemites before. They were the Hashemites of Libya. And they were leading the resistance against the Italians. And so, he was the military commander of that movement. And, you know, and, you know, even when he advanced in age, even at the age of seventy-one, in 1929, he scored one of his greatest achievements. It is a military history, really, and it still reverberates to this day. The reason for that why, because, in the Battle of Jabal al Akhdar and the Battle of the Bridge in the Jabal al Akhdar, or the Green Mountain as it's known an Arabic, Omar Al-Mukhtar and his people did the first thing, you know, that, in – in terms of jihadi tactic, that is still being used to this day.

First of all, it was the last battle in, you know, history where a cavalry charge was successful against a mechanised army.

Thomas Small So, these are warriors on horses against tanks, basically.

Aimen Dean And—.

Thomas Small And they succeeded? They won?

Aimen Dean They won, because it was an ambush. But they won, because, thank God for the IEDs they used. And so, it was the first time ever that IEDs were used against tanks. So, where they planted many dynamites charges in that killing field. And when they lured the tanks and the armoured personnel carrier into that field, the Italian ones, the Libyans then, set off all of these dynamite charges, and that destroyed a few of the tanks and the armoured personnel carriers, confused the defenders. And, of course, with the cavalry charge, you know, closing on them from four sides, it was a massacre. So, that was the last time in modern history, in modern warfare history, that cavalry was able to, you know, overrun a mechanised division.

Thomas Small A little sliver of Libyan history that re – resonates to the present, because jihadists have taken that – that strategy on board ever since.

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. IEDs everywhere. From Afghanistan against the Soviets. You know, from Chechnya against the Russians. From Iraq against the Americans. You know, in Syria against Assad. You know? And so on and so on. So, the use of IEDs now was pioneered by a Libyan leader of the jihad at that time, a seventy-one-year-old Omar al-Mukhtar.

Thomas Small Well, as you said, eventually, Italian rule came to an end in Libya at the hands of the British, who conquered the country during the Second World War. Well, with the help of the French. They conquered a part of it, too. But it really fell within the British sphere of influence. And after the war, the question arose: What sort of country would Libya become? You know, as we've said, it had never been unified. It had always been split between different, competing political centres in west and in east.

In the end, the British, through a very confused and confusing the sequence of events, oversaw the coming to power of a king of Libya, Idris al-Senussi. King Idris, as you said, Aimen, was a Hashemite, just like, you know, his – his distant, distant, quadruple cousins who were ruling in Jordan and in – and in Iraq. He was a Hashemite, a sharif. He was a British client. He had been in Egypt, which Britain oversaw, from 1922 onwards as a Libyan freedom fighter. And so, he had very close ties with the British Empire and the British – and British politicians in the Middle East.

And on the 24th of December 1951, the United Kingdom of Libya was established, a federal constitutional monarchy. Now, at the time, Libya was literally the poorest country in the world. Its illiteracy rate was ninety percent. And in the whole country, Aimen, in the whole country, there were only sixteen university graduates. This did not auger well for King Idris's new state.

Aimen Dean Indeed. I mean, this is the legacy of the Italian colonisation, you know. And, you know, it shows basically that, you know, no matter how much the Italians tried, they are not as organised as a British. Because if you look at Egypt next door, the education was far, far better thanks to the British rule there. So—.

But the reality here is that, you know, this is the hand that, you know, the Libya was dealt. You know? King Idris comes to power after many years of fighting against the Italians and then trying to convince the British that it's time for Libya to become independent. And he realised that Libya is in dire state. But thank God. I mean, at the end of the day, the king was praying and praying. And by the way, that king was a saint. I mean, you know, we – we have to say from the beginning that king was truly a saint.

Thomas Small Yeah. Let's talk about that.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small Let's talk about King Idris as a personality, because he is very different from the other leaders of the Arab world at the time, including other monarchs like – like King Hussein in Jordan or, as you know, King Faisal in Iraq. He was a very traditional ruler in the mode of a holy man, which is an archetype throughout Muslim history, especially in North Africa. A holy man, a holy warrior, essentially, who becomes king and rules very religiously, very ascetically. He was a great ascetic. He had a very austere, rather sort of unadorned style of governance. He was very traditional in that sense.

Aimen Dean Let's put it this way. He was frugal also. I mean, the man was frugal on himself. I mean, he was generous with the Libyan people, but he was frugal on himself and the family and the royal family. And the reason is because, basically, he really believed that he should not live, you know, in great extravagance while the Libyan people are, you know, living in poverty. And as I said, the man, you know, was more concerned with the afterlife than this life. So—. Yeah.

Thomas Small And – and he had a certain humility. For example, he refused to have his face on the currency.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small He refused to have any monument in the country named after him. This is not typical of Arab leaders at the time.

Aimen Dean King Idris, you know – you know, even though there were other Hashemite kings across the Arab world, not only, you know, in the Middle East itself, but also in North Africa—. Don't forget that the royal family of Morocco are also Hashemites …

Thomas Small Absolutely.

Aimen Dean … who's been, you know, rolling the – the kingdom of Morocco since the 1700s, you know. But, you know, in the case of King Idris, being a saint doesn't mean, unfortunately, being a capable ruler, because sainthood could be mistaken for weakness. And, unfortunately, while he commanded the respect of the country, the country needed a firmer grip. However, he was lucky also and he always believed that it was his prayers, you know, that God will send some providence and deliverance to Libya, that oil was discovered during his time.

Thomas Small That's right. In 1959, oil was discovered in Libya, and this meant, well, many things. First of all, it meant that Libya was no longer as dependent as before on foreign aid. You know, it had been receiving a lot of money from both the British and the Americans, who had a – a big airbase in Libya, and Libya had become an important node in the American Cold War military sort of world. So, Libya no longer needed to rely so much on foreign aid. But it also—. Sadly, as it does pretty much everywhere, oil money led to increasing corruption throughout the country. And this became endemic towards the end of King Idris's period.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Because, you know, while he commanded respect, he did not come on the authority. Unfortunately. He couldn't keep an eye on everything. And he was – started to become, in the later years, distant and distant and distant as if he doesn't want to rule.

Thomas Small Oil really was the watershed moment. So, before the discovery of oil, the – the governance in – in Libya was very traditional. King Idris had a very hands-off approach. He based his rule on the principle of shura, on consensus amongst elites, amongst nobles. It was very patriarchal rule and – and it was focused on the palace just – just like a kind of traditional, even medieval, kind of state. The administration was basically subjected to tribal structures. Power was very diffused. Political parties were banned. King Idris wanted nothing to do with that sort of modern style of – of politicking. He distrusted democracy immensely. So, this is before oil. It was so—. It was – it was traditional. It was old school.

After the discovery of oil, in order to manage the industry that built up around it, Libya was forced to become more centralised and was forced to build more modern state institutions. This, in the end, would play into Colonel Gaddafi's hands when he decided to launch a revolution there. So, King Idris, in a way, against his will, in order to build up the oil industry, created or allowed to be created a state apparatus that then could be turned against him.

Aimen Dean Indeed. While King Idris was lucky, by the way, in regard to the discovery of oil, he wasn't lucky with his neighbours, especially his neighbours to the east, Egypt, because the Nasserism was in its prime. I mean, the Libyan people were listening to Nasser and thinking, "Oh, look at this dynamic figure that is standing up against America, against France, against Britain, against—. He—. Against Israel. You know? While our king is just meek and weak and doesn't want to get involved, you know, and all of this war rhetoric that is going on."

Unfortunately, that played into the group of officers led by Gaddafi, the young, you know, captain in the military and the military communication and intelligence, that, you know, in the end, decided to overthrow him.

Aimen Dean And so, we have reached Colonel Gaddafi. According to my reading, Aimen, his birthday is unknown. I mean, he – he—. At times, he said it was 1943, 1941. You – you say it was 1942, for sure. I think – I think though, as a Bedouin, it's – it's possible that his birthday wasn't really recorded. Isn't that right?

Aimen Dean Yeah. It might not have been recorded. But actually when he launched the coup in 1969, he was described as a twenty-seven-year-old. And these were the official records of the Libyan military. So, you know, 1942 is possible. But also, because one of – one of Gaddafi Gaddafi's Egyptian biographers said that Gaddafi was born one year before the fall of Mussolini. You know, the fall of Mussolini from power. So, he fell from power, you know, and fled Rome, I think, in 1943. So, it is safe to assume that Gaddafi was born 1942, and that corresponds with him being twenty-seven-year-old when he led the coup in 1969.

Thomas Small So, basically, he was born at the very end of the Italian period, at the very beginning of the modern period of Libyan independence under King Idris. So, Gaddafi was a thoroughly modern Arab man. He was born a Bedouin to family in the Qadhadhfa tribe, born in a small desert village south of Sirte, which is in the western half of – of Libya, long the coast. His father was a goat herder, and Gaddafi grew up in a tent. So, he was the real deal. And when he ended up going to primary school in Sirte, he had to walk there and sleep the nights during the school week in a mosque, because his family remained in the desert. And in—. Its—. At school, he was bullied for being a Bedouin. And this – this rather scarred Gaddafi, I think. It may be the roots of the narcissistic shell of grandiosity that he began to build up around himself.

Family eventually moved to Sebha, in the Fezzan, in the south of Libya. And this is where Gaddafi went to secondary school. And it's at this time that – that Nasser becomes his idol. He – he claimed later on that he would memorise Nasser's speeches because he loved him so much. Inspired by Nasser, he would be – he – he began railing against the British and the Americans at school. He sounds like a major pain in the neck, really. And he was expelled and so went to Misrata, where he went to school there.

In the end, he landed up in a military college in Benghazi, where a British officer—this is very interesting—described him as "inherently cruel." At one point, Gaddafi hogtied and murdered a young cadet who was accused of homosexual acts, for example. So, not a nice guy.

Aimen Dean This – this is absolutely, like, you know, I mean, the same way with Saddam Hussein and his childhood, you know, and the same with Stalin and his childhood. It – it's just mirror – mirror image of all of these, you know, famous tyrants.

Thomas Small Traumatised children growing up to inflict trauma on others. It's a classic dynamic.

So, Gaddafi was insolent. He was opinionated and he was cruel, but—and this cannot be denied—he was also charismatic, inspiring, and intellectual, though, idiotic. But he was intellectual. He believed himself to be a man of ideas. And – and he – he did write – he did write books and he wrote poetry. He was—. He was—. He had intellectual ambitions. And we'll discuss some of his ideas in a little bit there. Particularly ridiculous.

Aimen Dean You know, Hitler thought of himself as an artist, you know.

Thomas Small Well, I mean, I—. The trouble with artists and intellectuals, when they get power, man, you got to go far away.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Absolutely.

Thomas Small So, Gaddafi had long dreamt of – of emulating his idol Nasser and launching a revolution in Libya as long ago as when he was in secondary school. And when he finally became a military officer, he created what was called the Revolutionary Command Council, and they – they began the – the process of – of building up a network of officers to overthrow the government. Though, you know, unlike Nasser's similar movement, the – the Gaddafi version was – was almost farcical.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. It was really like a, you know, young school boy is trying to play politics. And, you know—. And, actually, like, you know, they were planning. "How do we do it?"

Thomas Small It—. In fact, it was farcical. In fact, they had to postpone the coup twice because of – of hijinks that ensued. The first one, the first date that they'd chosen was the 12th of March 1969, but they realised, on the day, that the famous Egyptian singer, Umm Kulthum, was performing a concert in Libya that day, a benefit concert for the Palestinian cause. So, they thought, "Well, that's not really a good day to launch the coup." So, they postponed it. And they postponed—.

Aimen Dean Very considerate.

Thomas Small They postponed it for a couple of weeks, at the end of March. But then, someone in Libyan intelligence got wind of the plot. And so, King Idris was sent to Tobruk for British troops to protect him. So, again, Gaddafi cancelled. So, so far they're not having good luck.

Aimen Dean Indeed. However, in September, they got their break, because the king went for an extensive medical treatment in Turkey. And, actually, the king realised that his conditions were, you know, really severe. And so, he was going to send a telegram. And he sent a telegram informing the palace and the government at the time of his application in favour of his son, Prince al-Hasan.

However, who received, you know, that telecom was the – the communication intelligence division of the Libyan military and who was in charged, you know, in that day was good Gaddafi. So, he received that and he was thinking, "Great. Come on, guys. Now is our moment. Mobilise, mobilise."

And so—. You know, and so they went and they launched their coup.

Thomas Small The coup itself was – was pretty ridiculous. At one point, Gaddafi who was in a Jeep leading the other plotters, you know, he turned left. They turned right. They got separated. They had to come back to each other. You know, it – it wasn't an auspicious beginning to his forty-two years in office.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And at the end of the day, you know, many historians in the Arab world, they say, "Well, look he was confident enough to launch the coup, because he knew the king wasn't going to resist. That the British garrisons in Libya are not going to, you know, fight, because the king will say, 'Well, look, I mean, I don't – I don't want to fight. I don't want to be restored to power.'"

And really, you know, the British actually consulted with King Idris. They said, like, you know, I mean, "If you tell us right now that we should, you know, counter the coup, we will come through the coup."

King Idris refused. He refused outright to counter the coup.

Thomas Small I think that rather suited the British to be honest. Because by 1969, they were no longer able or really willing to employ their military to shore up their Middle Eastern allies. Their empire was on the way out. But yes, indeed.

On the 1st of September 1969, a bloodless coup unfolded in Libya. The king's guard did not intervene. There he was, Captain Gaddafi, soon to be self-designated Colonel Gaddafi, in charge of Libya, which, at that point, had no real sense of unity, really, or nationhood. As we'd said, King Idris's rule was very traditional. Power was very diffused. The regions largely determined the identity of Libyan citizens. So, the country was like a blank canvas for him to paint his weirdest political and economic and even religious ideas upon.

Aimen Dean Oh, dear. And what an affliction. I think, in hindsight, I think the British, you know, regretted deeply not countering that coup and reinstating King Idris as the king. Fifteen years later, they would have said, "Why didn't we do it?"

Thomas Small Absolutely. You know, for the first year or so after the coup, you know, no one knew for sure what was going to happen. There was a brief moment of – of – of pure narcissism. In 1970, Gaddafi had a jamboree in Tripoli, where leaders from around the Arab world gathered to celebrate the evacuation of American troops from Libya. Gaddafi had expelled them. And during this jamboree, Gaddafi turned to Nasser—who was his idol, remember?—and suddenly, in anger, threatened to expose him as a coward and a hypocrite if he didn't move faster toward Arab unity. In the midst of all of these Arab leaders, he – he – he, you know, shouted at Nasser. A sign of things to come, I think.

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. Shouting at other leaders is going to be his tradition. And we're going to talk about it, you know, in a few moments. But the man was unhinged. And the – the signs were there from early on.

Thomas Small A few months after this jamboree in the desert, Nasser died. And this changed everything. Earlier, Gaddafi had said that Libya's oil wealth could be at Nasser's disposal to help create Arab unity. But after Nasser's death, Gaddafi decided that he was the guardian of his legacy. And he – he made it his – his life's mission to bring the Arabs together, unite Muslims against the West. All sorts of stuff. He – he became—. I don't know. How do you—? How do we even describe this man?

Aimen Dean Be—. You see, we can't, because of his unpredictability. Because he was unhinged. It's very difficult to. Because, you see, the mood swings were so frequent and violent that, forget the whiplash, you could be decapitated. I mean, this is how – how – how violent these mood swings were.

You know, the – the issue here is that he was so narcissistic in his own mind that he didn't believe that there was a greater man ever living at the time. He wanted to be the new Che Guevara. So, what did he do? He started, you know, supporting all these revolutionary groups and terrorist groups: the Ba'aths, the ETA, IRA, the Red Brigades, you know. You know? He – he—. You know, the—. He'd left no revolutionary group or a terrorist group or insurgent group in the world he didn't support. With weapons, with money and everything. And then, he started engaging in terrorism. You know, bombing nightclubs and bombing airliners and, you know, masterminding all these things.

And then, after that, he started, you know, picking up fight with other Arab leaders and especially Sadat. You know, his own neighbour.

Thomas Small President Sadat. The president of Egypt, Anwar Sadat.

Aimen Dean Which is, by the way, my favourite Egyptian president ever anyway.

Thomas Small You always remind us.

Aimen Dean So, you know, my favourite quote from Sadat when, you know, when he was told about how Gaddafi is, you know, spending hours and hours insulting him, you know, during long – long-winded speeches. You know, just like Castro and Chavez, like, you know, Gaddafi had the tendency to speak for hours. So, you know, all that Sadat, you know, while he was smoking his pipe, he said, "And why do I care about what this, you know, mad boy of Libya think of me?"

The mad boy of Libya. And, you know, the – the way it's said, and it is said in Arabic is even more. He said, "[speaks in Arabic]."

I mean, you know, when – when you – when you hear it in Arabic, it's even more, you know, insulting. So, Gaddafi didn't like it. And that's why Gaddafi celebrated the day that Sadat was assassinated by Islamists.

And Gaddafi also wanted to always stay against the Americans. So, when the Americans started to support the Afghans against the Soviets, he supposedly the Soviets against the Afghans and he banned in Libya any mention of jihad or Mujahadeen or anything. And then, when the Arabs, you know, basically, like, you know, wanted to have nothing to do in terms of support of the Khomeini in Iran, he actually was supporting Khomeini until he fell out, you know, basically, with them again.

And then, he—. In terms of foreign policy, he was always swinging from one end to the other, but it is always seeking that recognition as a revolutionary, as someone who stands against the West. But he always chose the wrong causes, the wrong time, the wrong place, and the wrong players. Always.

Thomas Small One way of understanding Gaddafi, I think, which helps – helps to sort of make sense of – of this madness is that he was, at heart, a Bedouin. For example, he – he styled himself as a modern – hypermodern, radical revolutionary on the one hand. But on the other hand, he also considered himself to be a defender of Islam as he understood it.

After he came to power, sharia law was integrated into the Libyan legal system for the first time. Zakat was made obligatory. You know, the – the – the charitable tax that Islam imposes. And – and so, he had—. On the one hand, he had this kind of traditional Islamic piety. I don't even know if that's – that's the right word. But on the other hand, in 1973, he announces a popular revolution. So, all existing laws are repealed, all anti-revolutionary "perverts and deviators," as he called them, were weeded out. Bureaucrats and the bourgeoisie, in general, were targeted for elimination. So, this is very sort of Maoist Chinese style, cultural revolution stuff. But – but then, at the same time, all foreign ideas contrary to the Quran were to be destroyed. So, he – he said, "Trample under your feet any bourgeoise bureaucrat. Tear up all important books that don't support Arabism, Islam, socialism, and progress. Burn and destroy all curricula that do not express the truth."

So, Arabism, Islam, socialism, and progress. How are you going to – how are you going to balance these four pillars, you know, in – in a stable structure?

Aimen Dean And that's why, you know, he wrote that, you know, ridiculous book of his, trying to mimic Mao, which is, you know, the – the Green Book.

Thomas Small The Green Book. Yeah. Published in 1975. I have read the Green Book, and it is a real—.

Aimen Dean How did you go through it without traumatised?

Thomas Small It's a real mind-scrambler. I tell ya.

Aimen Dean You see, my – my favourite quote from there, when he said it is important for, you know, for the woman to advance to a position of power regardless of her gender.

Thomas Small So, there you go. You see, this is the strange – that strange combination of hypermodern and hyper-traditional. It's like a modern Bedu. It's very strange.

Aimen Dean I mean, – I mean, it was a rollercoaster. Let's put it this way. By the way, he wrote a book later called the, you know, [speaks in Arabic]. You know, the White Book. And I will tell a speak about it later. But, you know, the issue here is that the man started to behave pretty much like, you know, the Fatimid caliph, Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah, who ordered people to shave one eyebrow, as I said before, and leave the other. He started to come up with the weirdest laws. For example, he would come with a decree. He will say that, you know, "Why do we have shampoo, which contains eggs? Eggs is the food of the masses. And, therefore, we should get rid of every shampoo that contain egg." So, people displaying obedience to him, they will take all of these shampoo containers and they will pour them – pouring them on the streets, you know, in obedience.

And then, he said, in 1986—I remember I saw this on TV when I was young—he said that music is haram. You know? "Music is forbidden in Islam. I mean, what do we have music?" And so, he ordered all the musical instruments in Libya would be destroyed. And the people gathered in the public squares and they were destroying the guitars and the drums and the pianos and everything. But then, six months later, he ordered – he said, "Why there is no music in the country?" You know? "Bring back the concerts again." I mean, come on.

Okay. You know, I'll give you another one. He really was, you know—. You know, he was pretending to be, you know, a pious Muslim. As you know, Islam, you know, in the Sunni sense, which is what followed by the majority of Muslims, is based on the Quran, you know, which is the equivalent of the Jewish Torah or the Bible and the Hadith, which is the equivalent, maybe, of the Talmudic tradition. But, you know, it is the statements of the Prophet Muhammad on the Quran. And so, you know, it is accompanying the Quran and it is understood that it is the two pillars upon which Islamic tradition and faith and creed stands. This is something accepted by all Muslims, you know, under the Sunni umbrella. So, he then came up with this insane idea that "No, no, no, no, no. Only the Quran, because, you know, Muhammad was just a messenger. He was just, like, you know, the guy. He got the message. He gave it to us. So, why do we have to revere what he has to say? I'm a man and he's a man."

Thomas Small Oh.

Aimen Dean And after that—.

Thomas Small That's a real – that's a real narcissistic gaslighting right there.

Aimen Dean Exactly. He couldn't believe. He said, "Why do we say [unintelligible], you know, 'I bear witness.' There is no God. But God. And Muhammad is his messenger. Just keep God there and keep Muhammad out of it."

Thomas Small He wanted to just say, "There's no God but God, and Gaddafi is god."

Aimen Dean Yeah. That's it. And then, went further than that by, you know, banning the Hadith, you know. For a few years, you know, he abandoned. And so, Muslim scholars from Saudi Arabia and Egypt and everything declared him to be a heretic. And he was angry about that. And he said, "I understand Islam more than they do."

Okay. Okay, Gaddafi. Just calm down. And then, he started to come up with the weirdest, you know, economic ideas, you know, from establishing what he called the Great River of – of Libya, you know, which wasted all of Libya's aquifers, you know, pumping them into the sea. I don't know for what reason. For a great agricultural project. But, actually, it was a failure. $27 billion failure. Let's put it this way.

And then, he went on to—. After the project started to fail—. Well, you know, in 1996, he was talking to the Libyan people. He was saying, you know, "You know what, my fellow Libyans? Libya is so uninhabitable. I mean, there was hardly any water. It's too hot. It's just desert. There is nothing there for us. Yes, there is a little bit of oil, but that's it. You know what? How about we give every Libyan $10,000 a month and, you know, let them just go somewhere else, find somewhere else to live, and we close Libya."

It's not a restaurant. It's not, like, you know, I mean, a failed business. And – and this actually shows that, you know, he was dealing with Libya, you know, as if it was a, you know, just a group of tribes, you know, wandering in the desert. What was he, Moses, and, you know, the Libyans are the Israelites?

You know, one of my favourites is that how he altered the name of Libya.

Thomas Small Oh, yes. The—. He gave Libya the – the longest. It's a real mouthful.

Aimen Dean Okay. So—.

Thomas Small Say it in Arabic. I love hearing you say it in Arabic.

Aimen Dean Okay. So, – So, basically, I love how Sadat used to say it, you know. So, he was—. He will say—. Sadat, he will say, "Okay. What – what did he name this – his country, this mad boy of Libya?"

"Oh, yeah. You know, Jamahiriya Al-Arabiya Al-Libiya (take a breath) Al-Shabiya Al-Ishtirakiya (take a breath again) Al-Uzma."

So, you know—. So, which is means that the Republic of the Masses of the Libyan Socialist Arab Great, you know, Republic or something like that. I mean, it was – it was—.

Thomas Small The Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small That's [crosstalk]. And I want to talk about this word, jamahiriya, because it's – it's – it symbolises much of what we're saying, 'cause it's a nonsense word. I mean, already, it's such a—. it's a word – it's a word that – that he made up.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small It's sort of, I mean, the word jumhur in Arabic is – is mass – the mass, a mass of people. So, a republic is jumhuriya. A mass. You know, the – the people's state. And—. But the – the plural of jumhur is jama – jamahir. So, he was like, "No. We're not just a republic. We're like republics. We're like many. We're a huge republic." It's – it's insane.

Aimen Dean It's a super republic.

Thomas Small It's so narcissist. A super republic. The Great socialist People's Libyan Arab Super Republica.

Aimen Dean I mean, it's such a mouthful. And, you know, and not to mention the other antics, like, you know, living in a tent, having only female body guards, by the way, you know, which—. What was that about? No idea. Only female bodyguards.

Thomas Small But what – what about his infamous, you know, hashish smoking ? I think—.

Aimen Dean Oh, my God.

Thomas Small I think he was—. I think a lot of this can be explained by the fact that the man was high as a kite most of the time.

Aimen Dean High as a kite. More like high as a satellite. I mean, I will tell you, actually, a story of what happened. You remember I told you about how he's always had spats with other Arab leaders? One of the most famous one, which was—. Because of high—. You know, and because he was high at the time with hashish, he had a spat with King Abdullah.

Thomas Small King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia? This is, in fact, when Abdullah was still crown prince. This is in 2003.

Thomas Small So, this was in Egypt and, you know, and Mubarak, President Mubarak was – of Egypt was the chairman of the summit. And when it came time to introduce Muammar Gaddafi, he, you know—. So, he said, "This is, you know, the—. And now I have the pleasure to introduce." And, of course, he – he pulled—. So, he pulled a big paper in order to read it, you know. "The dear brother Muammar al-Gaddafi, the leader of the great revolution of the September of 1969. You know, the king of kings of Africa, the dean of the Arab leaders, the – the supreme guide of the Libyan revolution, you know, and – and – and the imam of all Muslims, you know." Yeah. "Brother Muammar, you know, the floor is yours." So—.

And he started talking rubbish about King Fahad. You know, the—. At the time, King Fahad was having a stroke. So, King Abdullah, as the prince regent and the crown prince, was there. And so, he started talking rubbish about, you know, King Fahad was afraid of Saddam, you know, and how King Fahad was running to the Americans to ask them to come to defend him during the Iraq invasion of Kuwait. And that's when King Abdullah lost it.

Thomas Small Well, this—. It climaxed with – with Gaddafi saying, "The Saudi king would cooperate with the devil himself to protect his kingdom."

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small And this was too much for Abdullah.

Aimen Dean Yeah. So, you know, he said to him, "You know, you do not talk about things that do not concern you." You know, he – he said, "We, you know—. We, you know, in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, we are Arabs and we are Muslims and we do not, you know, ally with the devil. And speaking of the devil, who brought you to power?" You know, he was talking about "Who brought you to power?" He was accusing him of being, you know, a – stooge – a stooge of the Soviets and, you know, others and another colonial powers. And so, – so, you know, so, he said to him, "Don't lie, you know. Otherwise, you know, the grave is before – before you." What he meant is that, you know, if you keep lying, you know, one day you will die and he will answer before God.

So, you know, Gaddafi was, you know, laughing to his delegation and he said, "What is this old man is saying? I don't understand what he's saying." He was making fun of the Bedouin accent of King Abdullah and also making fun of "I can't hear what he's saying."

So, two, three years passed, and there was the uncovering of a plot by Gaddafi to kill King Abdullah, because he felt that he was insulted by King Abdullah. You know, it shows the vindictiveness of this guy. So, they met in a summit in Qatar this time. You know, while—. You know, King Abdullah was there. Now, he's a king. And Gaddafi is there again in the summit. And the – the emir of Qatar was speaking. And suddenly, Gaddafi interrupted him and he started talking on the microphone. He was saying, "Abdullah. Abdullah." You know, he was call – calling the king. He said, "Abdullah. Abdullah." You know? ""Why are we fighting? You know, why are we—?" And he was talking really heavy. He was under the influence of hashish. "Why are we fighting? Why are we arguing, you know? You know, how about you visit me, I visit you, and we sort of this thing between us, you know?"

And then, he started looking around and he was wearing sunglasses. He was saying, "Why am I here?" You know? And he was looking around. "Why am I here? How come I'm here? I'm the king of Kings of Africa. I am the dean of the Arab leaders. I am the imam of all Muslims. And my international status doesn't allow me to be in a gathering like this."

And then, he finished his speech.

We all watched this in the horror and we were thinking, "God, save Libya, because this guy—."

Thomas Small I feel bad for those other Arab leaders, other Muslim leaders. I mean, can you imagine having to sit opposite Colonel Gaddafi and treat him with respect? I mean, my God.

Aimen Dean But then came the final insult to everyone is the UN speech. That UN speech was hilarious. Even the translator gave up and left the auditorium altogether. Couldn't keep up at all.

Thomas Small Tell us the story.

Aimen Dean Well, in that speech, he was angry that people were falling asleep. He was saying to everyone in the UN – in the UN main hall, addressing the delegates, he said, "Why are you sleeping, huh? Didn't you have enough rest? You know, I—. am I too boring for you?"

So—. And then, he was holding his new book, the White Book. Now the White Book is one of the funniest read you'll ever have. He's talking about, you know, a new solution for peace in the Middle East. It is called Isratin. So, Isratin is a country that is both Israel and Palestine.

Aimen Dean Isratin.

Thomas Small Isratin.

Aimen Dean So, Isratin is, you know, the new country that will usher in a new era of peace in the Middle East. And he said that – "This is the White Book. It's all there." And then, he threw the White Book at Ban Ki-moon, the second gen of the UN at the time. And you can hear the people in the auditorium taking a deep breath and, you know, like, you know, they couldn't believe what he did. He—. How could you throw a book, you know, at the face of Ban Ki-moon? And then, he grabbed the UN charter. He tear it apart, you know, in front of everyone. He said, "This is from 1945. It's not fit for this world anymore." And then, he started, you know, talking about, you know, the – all the international conspiracies and how, you know, the world is going into rubbish. And that's it. Like, you know, I mean, he was done. But after, you know, many hours in which, you know, several interpreters, you know, in many languages, like, you know, basically we were drafted in, you know, to relieve the other interpreters who were having a nervous breakdown.

Thomas Small Well, I mean, Aimen, you could speak forever about Colonel Gaddafi and his madness. I think we – we—. Let's take him a little bit seriously for a while. I'd like to go back to his Green Book, which, as I said, was published in 1975 and which he considered to be a blueprint, not just for the solution to Libya's problems, but he believed he had cracked the secret to governance everywhere. And – and when you read this book, you realise that the man was a Bedouin. And I don't actually mean to insult Bedouins. I – I've – I've met Bedouin. They're very—. They're charming people. Lovely people. But if you remember, dear listener, back in episode two of this series, we talked about the difference between and al-bedawa and al-hadara, the Bedouin and the civilised man. And, you know, Gaddafi. a symbol or a – a son of al-bedawa. He was a Bedouin. And he seemed to be animated to some extent by a kind of instinctive hatred for the city, the things of the city, state institutions, you know, hierarchical organisations that weren't just, you know, surrounded by him, with him at the centre.

So, the Green—. He presents the Green Book as "the ultimate solution to the problem of the proper ruling apparatus." We're already in the world of 1970s radicalism. It's a bit – it's a bit nuts. And his – his solution is basically this: Abolish all state institutions so that society can rule itself directly. So, he – he's really trying to create a stateless society. He wants to go back, in some modern way, to the way that the Bedouin life has always been. No state. Just people kind of doing their own thing in subservience to a stronger patriarchal personality.

Now, for this reason, he opposed all parliamentary or representative democracy as false. He opposed political parties. He said that they led to deceit, to internal discord, and to partisanship. In fact—and this I find fascinating—he wasn't wrong about this, really. And one of the things about reading the Green Book is, every now and then, a sentence will jump out at you as like, "Oh, that's actually true." And then, you don't know what to think. "Maybe Gaddafi was a genius." Who knows? This is what – this is what it's like to be in conversation with a narcissist.

He said, "In parliamentary democracies, the opposition party must minimise the government's achievements and cast doubt on the government's plans, even though those plans may be beneficial to society. Consequently, the interests and programmes of the society become the victims of the party's struggle for power. Such struggle is therefore politically, socially, and economically destructive to society despite the fact that it creates political activity. Anyone who lives in a post-modern democracy can see the truth in this, where you have an opposition party that must rubbish everything that the government's doing, a government is constantly having to defend itself. And in the meantime, society just fragments."

But for him, as an outsider, as a Bedouin, he's looking at this process and he says, "This is just corruption. This is too complicated. Why – why is it so complicated? Listen. Listen, my friends, it's simple. Just do what I say."

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small "All will be well."

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small So, instead of this sort of democracy as we understand it, he advocated direct democracy. He – he thought—. And he – he created these things. What are they called? The people's councils?

Aimen Dean Yeah. The people's councils and [speaks in Arabic].

Thomas Small Everything would be ruled according to what he called the Third Universal Theory. He says, "The Third Universal Theory now provides us with a practical approach to direct democracy. The problem of democracy in the world we'll finally be solved. It will be replaced by its true definition. The supervision of the people by the people."

I mean, you read it and you start losing your mind.

He says, "The people become the instrument of government, and the dilemma of democracy in the world is conclusively solved."

So, he thought that he's going to create these peoples' councils. And he did. They were all around – around Libya. He even had these sort of revolutionary councils that were – that were in charge of – of dispensing with justice, revolutionary justice, against, you know, against criminals or whatever. You know, the sinners against the revolution. And he thought it would just all run itself.

At the same time, he believed in radical equality. He did not believe that some people should have more than other people, that some people should have money while other people don't have money. So, he said, "The ultimate solution in the problem of inequality in society is to abolish the wage system. This would emancipate people from the bondage of wage slavery. And we revert to natural laws, which define relationships before the emergence of classes."

So, for this—. For example, it meant that farmers were no longer allowed to hire labourers to help them run their farms, 'cause they weren't allowed to pay anyone a wage. It was illegal to pay a wage to someone in Libya. So, what do you suppose happened to the farm?

Aimen Dean Well, again, we come back to, you know, the problem of insane people trying to experiment with people's lives. And that's exactly the consequence. Yeah.

Thomas Small He also had a solution to the housing crisis. Housing crisis is a big – a big thing that whips around the Western world today. He said, "Housing is an essential need for both the individual and the family and should not be owned by others. Living in another person's house, whether paying rent or not, compromises freedom." So, he abolished rent. And this meant, of course, that – that people, you know, had no money to build houses, to maintain their houses.

In the end, the irony is that by trying to create this so-called classless, stateless society, Gaddafi allowed the state to take ownership of everything.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small In his stateless society, the state was all that there was and the state was Gaddafi. That's how the system played out. Libya became a—. What was it called? A centrally unplanned economy. It was a chaotic, unplanned economy where the state dominated everything and the state was reducible to Gaddafi the man.

But then, this – this is the – the final gaslighting moment. He even pretended that he wasn't in power. He refused to be given any official title like president. No, no. He was—. He – he was simply the brother leader. He was the brother of the – of the – of the Libyans. He wasn't their official leader at all.

Aimen Dean He was only the leader of the revolution. But that's it. No more than that. Just the leader of the revolution.

Thomas Small So, I always knew that this episode was going to be a bit looser, a bit more conversational than our other episodes. And, you know, God knows we could talk for another hour or two about Gaddafi and about the times – the life and times of Colonel Gaddafi. And perhaps, we'll have to do another episode one day, because there's lots that we're not talking about. I mean, he had an infamous rivalry with Yasser Arafat, an infamous rivalry with Saddam Hussein. We mentioned his spat with King Abdullah. But he, you know—. My goodness, I'm just looking at my notes here, Aimen. You know, his African adventures, you know, supporting liberation movements in countries in Zimbabwe, Angola, Mozambique. He helped Idi Amin for goodness sake. He had – he had a network of mercenary armies all around Africa trying to spread his – his revolution or whatever the hell he was trying to do.

I mean, you mentioned how he made Libya a centre of organisation for all sorts of terrorist groups: the IRA, the Red Brigades, the Ba'aths, the Sandinistas. You know, Carlos the Jackal who led the 1975 OPEC hostage crisis, which, you know, Muammar Gaddafi, it is understood, mastermind.

You know, the – the killing of Louise Fletcher in – outside the Libyan embassy in London in 1984. Terrorist attacks, hijackings of airplanes.

Aimen Dean Bombing of airplanes.

Thomas Small Bombing of airplanes. Most famously the – the infamous Lockerbie bomb – air, you know, airplane disaster of 1988. This caused, you know, America to become increasingly infuriated with him. They bombed Libya in 1986, including his own palace, to try to, you know, bring him to heel.

Oh, my goodness. You know, he—. His—. The life and times of Colonel Gaddafi are – are really—. They're – they're huge, and we can't do them justice. So, I just want to talk here about two – two things, really. First of all, Islamism. Colonel Gaddafi comes to power as a – as a Nasser-ite – a Nasserist. He rules as a kind of weird, psychotic Nasserist, Islamist to some extent. But then, he, as you said, he's proclaimed a heretic, 'cause his views on Islam are crazy and he becomes a target of – of this growing Islamist – all these growing Islamist movements throughout the – the Middle East at this period. And as a result, he ends up cracking down hard on Islamists in Libya.

Aimen Dean Well, there is the infamous Abu Salim prison massacre. Abu Salim Prison is a prison that Gaddafi reserved only for the Libyans who went to fight the jihad against the Soviets in Afghanistan, as, you know, he supported the Soviets. However, those Libyans who came back or those Libyans who supported the Afghan jihad or those Libyans who were members of the Muslim Brotherhood, they were sent to Abu Salim Prison in Benghazi, and that was a very notorious prison.

Thomas Small They had organised themselves, you know, in – in Afghanistan. They had decided, "When we come back to Libya, we're going to overthrow Gaddafi," whom they called the pharaoh. He—. They – they believed he needed to be overthrown. And they were right about that.

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah.

Thomas Small So, they founded what was called the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group. And in 1995, the regime in Libya uncovered their network and cracked down on them hard, sending them to this Abu Salim Prison, which, in the end, was the site of – of an enormous prison uprising in June of 1996. It is this uprising that led to the – the infamous massacre.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Which, of course, the—. Gaddafi gave the order that everyone inside the prison to be shot.

Thomas Small One thousand two hundred and eighty-six people were killed and buried in a mask.

Aimen Dean Indeed. No dignity. Nothing, you know, afforded it to these people. Regardless of the fact that, like, you know, I mean—. I mean, I disagree with every single one of them, you know, in an ideological reason. But, you know, no matter what, like, you know, I mean, you don't just kill them and then you put them in mass grave.

And I think, you know, the – the – the reality is that Gaddafi had ruled Libya with a mix of intimidation and cruelty and, you know, just pure, pure vindictiveness for many, many, many years.

Thomas Small The people of Benghazi, in the – in the east of the country, experienced this particularly harshly after the Abu Salim crackdown. I mean, Islamist activity was particularly strong in the east. That's where the Senussis had been based. This kind of, you know, Sufi [pioutistic] movement that eventually, you know, gave rise to the king. So, the – the east of the country was always particularly Islamic. They had a – they had a – a form of Islam not so different from Wahhabism, actually. And so, it's where the Islamists were largely located. And after the Abu Salim crackdown, Gaddafi punished the whole area. So, he basically implemented collective punishment against eastern Libya. And – and Benghazi and the surrounding towns were – were—. They became much, much, much less developed than the rest of – of Libya. And therefore, perhaps it's unsurprising, that, in 2011, it is where—. It's there that the uprising against Gaddafi began, which would result in him meeting a very, very hairy end.

Aimen Dean You see, the pity here is that, in the last days of Gaddafi, you know, we're talking about 2009, '10 and '11. I mean, roughly the last two, two and a half years of his life or his reign over Libya were less vindictive and less repressive than the previous forty years. And, you know, why is that? We say – we say because of his son, Saif al-Islam Gaddafi. He started moderating his father's view. He started reaching out to the Islamists and reaching out to the people of Benghazi and Derna and Tobruk and other places and started to have a – a more constructive negotiations with them. Started to get them out of prisons, rehabilitating them. You know, inviting them to come back from exile.

The whole idea is that Saif al-Islam saying to his father, "Well, look, I mean, you are old now. One day, you will pass this to me. So, let me start putting it together, you know, a, you know, a more consensus rule."

And Saif al-Islam had a good head over his shoulder. You know? I knew one of his classmates, you know, when he was studying. And so, they were always saying that he was a cool-headed guy. Like, you know, I mean, you know, very different from his dad.

Thomas Small At the same time international sanctions, which were levelled against Libya in the eighties and especially the nineties, really did begin to bite. So much so that – that Gaddafi himself realised that he had to change his relations with – with the rest of the world somewhat at least. And so, he did agree to give up his weapons of mass destruction plans. He did, to some extent, come in from the cold. And, you know, in the noughties, there was this idea that, maybe, even with Gaddafi in power, maybe Libya can be reformed. Maybe Libya can become a – a functioning state.

Well, whether or not, we'll never know because in 2011, the Arab Spring came to Libya. And, in fact, that's one of my favourite quotes from Gaddafi. When – when the – when the Libyans began protesting, inspired by the protests in Tunisia and in – and in Cairo and elsewhere, Gaddafi was told about the protesters and he said, "You know what? I'm going to go protest, too. There is so much injustice in Libya."

Aimen Dean Isn't that defeating the purpose? I mean—. You know – you know what? Like, you know, I mean, he was—. His last speech, you know, when he went, you know, and spoke from the ruins of the palace, which, you know, the Americans bombed in 1986, he gave a speech, a very passionate speech, but very angry and vindictive and, you know, incoherent. And it's like a – a dad who felt betrayed by his, you know, ungrateful kids. He gave that speech in which he was, you know, saying to them, "You can protest, but not in the streets or the squares."

"Then, where? I mean, I'm sorry, but where then? Where do you want them to protest?"

But then, he said something interesting. He said, "You want me to resign?"

"Resign from what?"

"I don't have an official position. If I have an official position, I will throw the resignation letter in your faces."

And you think, "But you're the leader. I mean, you are in control. I mean, if you can't see it, then who?"

And you see this—. You know, again, as if, like, you know, basically, you know, he felt betrayed by kids who are ungrateful. It's – it's a sign of, like, you know, internal madness. And the people were waiting for Said al-Islam Gaddafi to speak. Unfortunately, when he spoke, he sided so much with his father and he decided that, you know what, blood is thicker. You know? "We're going to fight it." And ironically, they were winning.

Thomas Small Yeah. NATO intervened, because the – the – the regime's forces were on the verge of really cracking down hard on Benghazi. There—. You know, there – there was the idea that there would be mass slaughter. At least that's – that's what was believed.

Aimen Dean Well, that's the idea. But the problem is to be in all fairness—in all fairness—was there going to be a mass massacre? Because they took over Misrata. They took over other places. And there was no massacres. I mean, was he reserving the massacre for Benghazi? It is disputed. But nonetheless, the intervention happened.

Thomas Small It empowered the – the – the forces against Gaddafi.

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small Gaddafi himself was forced to flee, first to Sirte where, you know, near where he had been born. And then, when Sirte – when they closed it on Sirte, he – he got in a convoy and headed back to his home. His home is a little village in the desert. That place that he was born, that he grew up and lived in a tent. And there, the Arab Spring militants found him, crouching, hiding in—what was it?—a sort of sewage pipe.

Aimen Dean It was a sewage pipe.

Thomas Small Unbelievable. I mean, really this is an epic story. To think that he was reduced and for all the world to see. They had their …

Aimen Dean Cameras.

Thomas Small … their iPhones out and they—. You can see him. They dragged him out of the sewage pipe. They harangue him, they beat him, and they murder him.

Aimen Dean At the end of the day, it was an unfortunate end. For me, I wish if he stood trial and answered every single charge against him, including the Abu Salim massacre and not to be killed in that way, you know. Nonetheless, he's a leader. Regardless. Like, you know – you know, you don't treat leaders like this. There is a protocol here, and the protocol is that you take him, you put him before a court and he has the right to defend himself and he has the right to say what he has to say. But then, justice will catch up with him.

Thomas Small I don't know, Aimen. I – I don't feel much sympathy for Colonel Gaddafi. And he – he ruled as a Bedouin. He died as a Bedouin. I don't really think—. I don't care. I don't need him to have been put on trial. I mean, I – I've – I mourn for what – what happened to Libya next, to the descent into terrible civil war, being torn apart by different foreign powers and by its own chaos. All of this is the legacy of Gaddafi, and God knows when that will be sorted out.

But we started this episode by me suggesting that Gaddafi could be a symbol of how the Arab world as a whole, in a way, after the defeats of 1967 and the death of Nasser, kind of went nuts and all sorts of crazy characters came to power: Saddam Hafez, al-Assad, and then his son.

Aimen Dean Saleh.

Thomas Small Saleh in Yemen. Beni Ali, perhaps less So, but still bit of a dick in Tunisia. Mubarak even in Cairo. This style of Arab big man, wearing sunglasses, spouting nonsense, ruling rather haphazardly, rather impetuously and completely dictatorially. Even like Yasser Arafat to a certain extent.

I mean, what do you think? I mean, you're an Arab, Aimen, although you're not from one of those countries. But, nonetheless, what – what the hell happened? Why was the Arab world forced to endure for so many decades such characters?

Aimen Dean I'm afraid I'm going to have to resort to one of the statements by the Prophet Muhammad in order to explain this.

Thomas Small Please do. I mean, Gaddafi wouldn't like it, but.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Well, I – I don't care what you he like or doesn't like. He's dead. Good. Six feet under anyway. But what the Prophet Muhammad said. He said, "[speaks in Arabic]." "As you are, your rulers will be. Your rulers will reflect you." So, if you're good people, if you're decent, you know, your rulers will be good and decent. But if you are deceitful, if you are, you know, not united, if you are distrustful towards each other, if you are not, you know, aspiring for, you know, for better life for, you know, dreaming for a better future, then why should your rulers be better than you?

Thomas Small Also, if you have become under the influence of totalitarian, absolutist modern ideologies, various isms—nationalism, internationalism, communism, even to some extent, you know, liberalism, capitalism—while, at the same time, wishing to remain faithful to what you understand to be or inherited tradition of Islam and all of that. it's – it's – it's hard. And – and Gaddafi – Gaddafi symbolises that.

You know, we—. You and I, Aimen, we've – we've had this ongoing debate about the extent to which modern ideas, which are largely, you know, Western in orient – in origin, can co-exist harmoniously with – with Islam. And I know – I know what you say and – and the listener knows what I think. But, certainly, in the case of Gaddafi, there's a symbol of – of my – my argument, which is that when modern ideas—.

Aimen Dean Yeah. But he was unhinged. He was unhinged.

Thomas Small Well, he was unhinged. But you – but you say, you know, you say that the – the Arabs at the time who were trying to balance in their minds these different, I think, irreconcilable ways of thinking and ways of living …

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … you know, they – they got the – the ruler that they – the rulers that they deserved, you know, because—.

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small But the Arabs soul was being torn apart by these mutually incompatible ideologies, perspectives, whatever you – whatever you want to call them. Religions, even.

Aimen Dean Exactly. And you see, he, wasn't the only leader who met, you know, a – a, you know, a bloody fate. Look at Saleh, you know, in Yemen. He was killed by his allies in the end, the Houthis.

Thomas Small Saddam.

Aimen Dean Saddam. And, you know—. And, you know, so, at the end of the day, you know—. And one day, Bashar al-Assad will receive, you know, will receive that. Like, you know, karma has its own way, you know. Bashar will end up like the—.

Thomas Small Inshallah.

Aimen Dean Inshallah. So, you know—. So – So, what I'm saying here is that we come back again to the fact that this is what happened, you know, when you jeer against a saint like King Idris and you cheer, you know, for an insane clown like Gaddafi. You get what you deserve. The Arab masses will get what it deserves, you know.

And this is why what I'm saying is that, you know, when someone was saying, "How do we achieve, you know, [speaks in Arabic]?" You know, the virtuous kingdom. I remember, in front of me, one of the most celebrated, you know, Salafi al – al-Hadith clerics, you know, in the Arab world, he was asked. "How do we achieve [speaks in Arabic]? How do we achieve the virtuous kingdom?"

And he said, "First, establish it in your heart, and it become a reality in your life, on the ground. But if, you know, if your heart is not virtuous, there will be no virtue in real life."

Thomas Small "The kingdom of heaven is within you." I certainly believe that.

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small That's – that's a – a note of unity between you, my Muslim friend, and me, your Christian friend.

I hope, dear listener, you have enjoyed our rather strange conversation about a very strange man, Colonel Gaddafi, after a few episodes that have told more or less a single story, climaxing in the Six-Day War and the Yom Kippur War. What we're going to—. We've spent this episode and we're going to spend another couple of episodes meandering a bit. This episode on Colonel Gaddafi.

In the next episode, we are thankfully going to leave the Arab world for a while and travel to the Indian subcontinent. Yes. Stay tuned for Aimen and me discussing Kashmir Partition and all things Indo-Pakistani.

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And if you're a fan of exclusive extra content, then you may be interested to know that, at the end of each show, Aimen and I pick a question sent in by one lucky listener to answer for our exclusive bonus section. To access this content and to listen to Conflicted ad-free, you can subscribe to the show for just 99p on Apple Podcasts or sign up to Conflicted Extra over on Spotify for the same great perks, again, for just 99p.

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Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Rowan Bishop. Sandra Ferrari is our executive producer. Production support and fact-checking by Molly Freeman. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

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Conflicted S3 E10 - Arab-Israeli Blitzkrieg

Thomas Small No time to banter today, Aimen. We've got so much to cover in this episode.

Aimen Dean So much to condense for sure.

Thomas Small The Six-Day War of '67 and its bold sequel, the Yom Kippur War of '73. But you are still alive, right?

Aimen Dean Alive and thriving.

Thomas Small Good to hear. Now, let's get straight into it.

Yes. We finally reached the climax of the Cold War in the Middle East. Well, a climax at least. The outcomes of both the Six-Day War and the Yom Kippur War are relatively well known. Less so, the political machinations leading up to them. We'll do our best, dear listener, to take you behind the scenes of the corridors of power and into the minds of Arab and Israeli leaders.

No one wanted war. Yet war arrived. Why? That's our question? These two wars were transformative. Nasserism was out, and radicalism was in. And in the ongoing clash of civilisations in the Middle East, a new and improved player emerged from the wreckage of war: radical Islamism. Are you excited, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Of course. Of course. Now, I can trace the roots of my ideological, you know, youth, to the 1960s and 1970s.

Thomas Small The Six-Day War was a turning point in the history of the modern Arab world. Arabs were left traumatised by their spectacular defeat. The Nasserist project was thoroughly discredited. And so, a huge Egyptian transition began, away from the Soviet union and toward the United States, away from a centralised command economy and toward crony capitalism, away from Arab nationalism and toward Egyptian nationalism. And all of these changes had huge reverberations across the region.

But in the years running up to the 1967 War, things had changed since the first clash between Israelis and Arabs in 1948. Israel's victory in '48 is largely down to the corruption of its Arab enemies. They were weak regimes, still dependent upon colonial powers and internally disunited.

But by 1967, this had all changed. Arab states were now independent. They were centralised. They were heavily armed and radically nationalistic. Syria and Egypt had Soviet military advisers, as well as armaments. So, even though with hindsight, we know that Israel soundly defeated the Arabs. Before the war began, an Israeli victory was far from certain.

Okay, Aimen. Give me the global Cold War context in the run-up to the '67 War. We're in '63, '64. What's the world like at the time?

Aimen Dean Many listeners, you know, will be thinking right now that, "Oh, we have a war on Ukraine. We have a war, you know, with the Taliban. You know, took over Afghanistan. We have, you know, crisis here, crisis there."

You know, if they were living, you know, in the 1960s, I don't know what they will do. They will go into significant panic, because 1966, you know, in October and November, the world came really pretty close to nuclear annihilation.

Thomas Small The Cuban missile crisis.

Aimen Dean The Cuban missile crisis.

Thomas Small Yeah.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, can you imagine? And then a year later—almost a year later—in 1963, in November, President Kennedy was assassinated.

Thomas Small Wow. Yep. That's true. Imagine if—. I mean, we – we can't really imagine it now. It must—. It was so huge.

Aimen Dean The channels of information were really scarce. You know? People were depending primarily on, you know, radio, newspapers, and, you know, a few TV stations. That's it. So, it was a really panic-stricken world at the time. 1962: Cuban missile crisis. 1963: Kennedy was assassinated. 1964: the Vietnam War.

Thomas Small '64: Vietnam starts. Yeah.

Aimen Dean So, you know, it was, like—.

Thomas Small The world was crazy.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. You know? 1962: China invaded India or at least, like, you know, parts of India. And there was a war between India and China. I mean, the spectre of war between India and Pakistan was always ever-present. You know? The world was not exactly a very happy place at that time or it didn't seem so. So, that is why we understand that the Middle East was not—. The Cold War dynamics in the Middle East did not happen in a vacuum. You know? The entire world was in turmoil.

Thomas Small Zooming down into the regional level. I mean, we're talking about the Middle Eastern heartland here: Israel and Palestine, Syria, Jordan, and, of course, Egypt. What's the status quo at the time there in terms of the borders? I mean, tell us about the Green Line.

Aimen Dean If you go to 1960, '62, '63, '64, '65, and '66, you know, these years, the Israeli borders were pretty much, you know, you take away the West Bank and Gaza and the Golan Heights, and that's what Israel looked like at the time. So, it is from, you know, from the Lebanese-Israeli border, there was a demilitarised zone. The Golan Heights, all of it basically was demilitarised zone. And then, you have the Green Line, which separated the West Bank, you know, from Israel proper. Including even the Green Line barricades, you know, and kind of scary in the middle of Jerusalem.

So, Jerusalem was divided into East Jerusalem and West Jerusalem, West Jerusalem: Israeli. East Jerusalem: Jordanian.

Thomas Small It's important to say, I think that it wasn't—. The Green Line wasn't really a border. It—. Because there – there had only been an armistice after the '48 War, not a peace treaty.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small So, in effect, the war, that war, the war of Israeli independence, never ended.

Aimen Dean Yeah. So, actually, East and West Jerusalem resembled, you know, East and West Berlin to an extent, except, basically, there was far greater movement, you know, between the two sides for religious reasons. It's more like, you know, if people in Northern Ireland who are listening to this, they will remember the Green Line in Belfast. I mean, it's something similar to that, between the two communities.

Thomas Small Exactly. So, as you say, there were – there were DMZs with Jordan and Syria mainly. I mean, with Lebanon, too. Lebanon doesn't really come into it. And across the Jordan and Syria DMZs, they had been fighting back and forth. And especially with Syria.

Now, as for Egypt, right. Remember their listener, Israel had taken Gaza and much of the Sinai Peninsula from Egypt during the Suez Crisis in 1956. But after the crisis, under international pressure, they had withdrawn. And Suez and Gaza were being patrolled by the United Nations Emergency Force (the UNEF), which, of course, leaves Jordan, the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, which had occupied and annexed the West Bank in the 1948 War. So, they were controlling Jerusalem. They were controlling all of the holy places in the region: Jewish, Christian, and Muslim.

But it might surprise the listener to know that, at that time, Israel actually had quite a good working relationship with King Hussein.

Thomas Small Well, King Hussein was always pragmatic, to be honest. I mean, and at the end of the day, he realised that, "Okay. These are the people on my border. I need to keep Jerusalem as part of my fiefdom, part of my kingdom, part of my legacy, part of my inheritance." Because King Hussein realised that, you know, his grandfather and his great-grandfather lost Mecca Medina, you know, and the Hejaz to the House Saud. And so—.

Thomas Small We talked all about this in the last episode, on the Hashemites.

Aimen Dean Exactly. So, he needs to keep Jerusalem. And he realised, you know. And if you – if you – if you read many of the interviews basically that he gave throughout the years, of course, in hindsight, he was always sounding regretful, you know, about, you know, participating in any of the Arab foolishness regarding, like, you know, annihilating Israel and all of that, because he realised he lost the West Bank and Jerusalem because of that.

Thomas Small He had some other difficulties, too. Internal difficulties. And his regime was Western leaning on the whole. But it was always being opposed by the Palestinian majority inside the country. Remember he was ruling not just the present-day Jordan, but also present-day West Bank. So, the majority of his country were Palestinians. They were fervently pro-Nasser. They were fervently pro-Arab nationalism.

And so, the revolutionary Arab regimes—like Syria, like Egypt—were always interfering internally in Jordanian affairs, putting the King Hussein in a tight spot.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. And this is the problem is that, you know, the – the – the Palestinians at that time were started to fashion themselves as the new cool kids, you know, of the revolutionary scene globally. I mean, you remember, these are the 1960s. These are the days of Castro, Che Guevarra. You know, all of these, you know, revolutionaries, like, you know – you know, parading around dinner with their berets and all of that. And the military uniforms. And, you know, they are the cool kids. You know, the socialists. You know, the leftists.

So, the Palestinians started to fashion themselves around that image of global socialist, internationalist, revolutionary solidarity. And this is where it clashed completely with the image of the calm, stoic monarchy of Jordan.

Thomas Small Okay. So, that's the regional political status quo. Now, let's drill into the Israeli government's mind at the time. After the Suez Crisis of '56, right, the Israeli government changed policy. It did not want war. And the government had specifically told the Israeli Defence Force (the IDF) to avoid any escalation with the Arab countries.

To this end, the prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, was obsessed with obtaining nuclear weapons for Israel. He – he said this: "What Einstein, Oppenheimer, and Teller (the three of them are Jews) made for the United States could also be done by scientists in Israel for their own people."

The Israeli acquisition of nuclear technology is a fascinating Cold War story in its own right, isn't it. Aimen?

Aimen Dean Oh, indeed. There's no question. I mean, the – the secrecy. The piracy. You know, the stealing of information. The espionage. The intrigue. Oh, my God. Like, you know, I mean. The—. You know? But in the end, they got what they wanted.

Thomas Small They did. They did this by working closely with, perhaps, a country that people wouldn't expect.

Aimen Dean Funny enough, it's France.

Thomas Small That's right. The French. Now, the French they'd been developing their own nuclear deterrence. This is actually one of the consequences of the Suez Crisis. Remember, the Americans refused to support Britain and France in that war. And at the end of the war, the French were like, "Well, we can't trust the Americans. We don't want to be under their nuclear umbrella. We need our own deterrence."

So, they were developing nuclear bombs. And already, as we saw in episode six, France and Israel were really close allies. In fact, it was not the US back then. It was France that was by far Israel's closest ally. France was the main supplier of weapons to Israel. And Israel had been helping France combat Algerian freedom fighters by passing on intelligence gathered from North African Jews during the Algerian War for Independence.

And – and remember it was France that had arranged for Israel to contribute to the Suez campaign. And, in fact, to get Israeli support for the Suez campaign, France had agreed to supply Israel with vital nuclear technology, which became part of Israel's Dimona reactor in the Negev Desert. This reactor would play an important role in the '67 War.

Aimen Dean In fact, Thomas, the – the, you know, the – the – the French alliance with Israel goes further than just the nuclear cooperation. The entire Israeli Air Force at the time was made up actually of French fighter jets. You know, the Mystère and the Mirage. The Mirage fighter jets were really, you know, a league ahead of their Soviet counterparts. And so, you know, the French military cooperation with the Israelis played a decisive role, you know, in the wars to come.

Thomas Small In Israel's mind, they were developing nuclear weapons in order to prevent war. Israel hoped that a nuclear deterrent would convince their Arab enemies never to invade.

Of course, that's not how the Arabs saw it. And they – they saw the development of an Israeli nuclear weapon programme as a reason, possibly, to go to war to prevent Israel from getting a nuclear bomb.

Aimen Dean Sounds familiar.

Thomas Small Throughout this story, we will see, you know, interpretations of – of one side's actions by the other, which run exactly counter to the intentions of the enemy.

This is – this is, of course, something that we have to always bear in mind when we're talking about war. You know? We have this objective God's eye view of the situation now. With hindsight. But at the time, you know, what Israel is thinking, Egypt doesn't know. What Egypt is thinking, Israel doesn't know. They have to guess based on the moves that they can see.

Aimen Dean And this is the problem with conflicts. You always sleepwalk into conflict when you start second-guessing what your neighbours and adversaries and your enemies might be thinking, When you start second-guessing and, you know, you start, you know, underestimating what they are thinking, what they are trying to do, and you try to delve deeper into their mindset and you go into the wrong path rather than the right path, the path will lead to war.

Thomas Small That was definitely true of the Six-Day War. It was true of the First World War, actually. It was true of a lot of wars. Maybe even the recent war with Ukraine and Russia.

Aimen Dean And, of course, like, you know, I mean, if anyone wants to understand, like, you know, how second-guessing and underestimating your enemies could lead to war, please read the book The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman. It was published in the 1960s. And this book basically will give you an idea about how really, like, you know, I mean, second-guessing your enemies could lead to dire consequences.

Thomas Small Okay. Right now, that's Israel's – that's Israel's perspective at the moment. They don't want war. They're developing a nuclear deterrent in order to prevent war. They've told the IDF not to foment war with the Arab states.

Let – let's move now to Egypt and its president, Gamal Abdel Nasser. Put us inside Nasser's head in the mid-1960s, Aimen. I mean, after the Syrian coup, in '61, took Syria out of the UAR (the United Arab Republic), Nasser's prestige was damaged, and he began remorselessly attacking the Syrian regime. He – he began doing all sorts of slightly more aggressive things. What – what – what – what was going on inside Nasser's mind at the time?

Aimen Dean Nasser's mind was really like a scrambled egg at the time, and for a very good reason, because he was having one setback after another all across the Arab world. Nothing was going his way.

Thomas Small Not just across the Arab world. In fact, the social and economic policies of Nasserism, which were becoming more and more extreme (nationalising industry, nationalising finance), these were beginning to bear quite rotten fruit at home. And there was a growing unrest within Egypt. The economy wasn't doing great.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Because, of course, like, you know, I mean, since when collectivisation and, you know, nationalisation of industries, like, you know, I mean, and crony socialism ever work?

And so, that's exactly what happened to him. I mean, you know, and at the same time, there was a resurgent Muslim Brotherhood. There was a second wave of the Muslim Brotherhood, you know, in Egypt, in the 1960s. He really wasn't having a good time. And the pressure on him was just so great.

Thomas Small Absolutely. And Nasser was still animated by a kind of anti-Israeli feelings. He had suffered two embarrassing defeats at the hands of Israel or Egypt had at least: the '48 war and the '56 Suez Crisis to some extent. He had not forgotten these defeats.

But Nasser had disengaged from active hostility to Israel by the early sixties. He'd stopped supporting guerrilla attacks against Israeli territory for example, because he believed that the Arab world needed to unite first and undergo a proper social and technological revolution before it took on Israel. So, instead, Nasser was focused on shoring up his project of creating a pan-Arab union with Egypt at its centre. And this was leading him to do more and more desperate things.

I mean, in 1962, he invaded Yemen. Most people don't know this. Egypt invaded Yemen, trying to force Yemen to join with Egypt. I mean, there were sort of tens of thousands of Egyptian troops. Tens of thousands dead. This was very much weighing down Nasser's ability to act.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And in fact, basically that war soured the relationship with Saudi Arabia and with other Arab countries, and some Arab people started to view Nasser as an imperialist himself rather than an anti-imperialist.

Thomas Small Soured relations with Saudi Arabia. My goodness. Way more than that. I mean, Nasser was bombing Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia was working with the United States to repel the Egyptian attack in Yemen. Very much similar to the situation going on in Yemen today.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Absolutely.

Thomas Small So, there was this alliance of conservative Arab states against Nasser. He was feeling blue. What he really wanted was a Syrian regime that recognised his leadership of the pan-Arab cause or at least pretended to do so. And he got it in early 1963 when, as we said in – in the last episode, both Syria and Iraq experienced successful Ba'athist coups. And in order to strengthen their new regimes, the Ba'ath movement immediately initiated talks with Nasser on a new union, a new UAR between Egypt, Syria, and Iraq.

Aimen Dean Indeed. To the point where a new flag was created with three stars, which is, you know, today's Iraq flag. Funny enough. [unintelligible].

Thomas Small This new union was greeted with huge jubilation, especially by the Palestinians. The signatories had made it a signature aim of the new union to liberate Palestine. This was an explicit aim of their agreement.

And so, the Arab street erupted in – in glee. So, there were huge riots inside the – the West Bank of Palestinians waving a flag with four stars on it, 'cause they were really hoping that – that Jordan would also join this union.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Because, you know—. The – the listener must remember that the West Bank at the time was part of Jordan.

Thomas Small That's right. Now, Nasser's regional enemies greeted this new revived UAR with great dismay. Ben-Gurion, the Israeli prime minister, said that the new union meant the spectre of a new Holocaust. But perhaps more than anyone, it was King Hussein of Jordan who freaked out. Just like in 1958, when the first UAR was announced, in 1963, King Hussein was like, "Oh, God. This is not what I want."

Aimen Dean Indeed. I mean, don't forget, for King Hussein, this is 1963. In 1958. you know, his cousin, his dear cousin, King Faisal of Iraq, was killed. You know? So, he still feel, five years later, that at any moment, it could be him.

Thomas Small He said, "The ring is closing around us once again."

Poor King Hussein. He must have felt so insecure. And that wasn't helped when US Intelligence learnt that Egypt was in league with pro-Nasser officers in Jordan about launching a military coup there. A bit like what happened to his cousin in '58. A military coup that they hoped would incorporate Jordan into the UAR.

Aimen Dean And that's why the Israelis really freaked out when they felt that Jordan could be the next to fall. Because if Jordan falls, then Israel will become extremely vulnerable. And that's why they threatened to invade and annex the West Bank.

Thomas Small This is 1963, dear listener. We're – we're – we're still leading up to the '67 War. But this is all really important context.

Aimen Dean Indeed. You know? You know? In – in 2018, when I was in Israel, I have driven from Tel Aviv, you know, to Jerusalem and it took literally twenty minutes. Twenty-minutes' drive exactly to go from Tel Aviv to the board of the West Bank. That's it. So, in reality, you know, for Israel, you know, the West Bank was its Achilles heel. If the West Bank is controlled by a hostile power, then what's going to happen is that they can cut Israel in half in twenty, thirty minutes. That's it. There is no strategic depth.

And so, for the Israelis, they threatened Nasser and they threatened the Arabs that, you know, if Jordan falls, a hostile power, if there is a military coup, "we will invade the West Bank to shore up our strategic depth and strategic defence.

Thomas Small This threat by Israel to invade, in fact, kind of made Nasser back off. So, the – the – the—. Any – any machinations inside Jordan to launch a coup there stopped. And in fact, by mid-'63—so, only three or four months after the new UAR was announced—the scheme had already basically failed.

As we said in the last episode, Ba'athists and Nasserists, they didn't really like each other. There was a lot of infighting between the two groups. And in Syria, there was a massive massacre of Nasserists in Damascus, so much so that Nasser broke off relations with Syria entirely. He called the Syrian regime fascist. So, Israel must have heaved a sigh of relief thinking, "Well, at least the Arabs once again are more divided than they are united."

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small Yet it was at this point that David Ben-Gurion suddenly resigned the premiership of Israel. For mysterious reasons. You know? In fact, this is one of the great debates of history. Maybe he couldn't take the pressure who knows. But what's important for the '67 War is – is his replacement.

He was replaced as prime minister by Levi Eshkol, a Ukrainian Jew as it happens.

Aimen Dean Levi Eshkol was of the, you know, of the pragmatist, you know, school, you know, within, you know, the long list of Israeli prime ministers. And he came to power hoping to deescalate rather than escalate. His dream, you know, always basically was of having a – a more cordial relationship with his Arab neighbours. I mean, they were looking for acceptance rather than for confrontation.

Thomas Small He – he had been a lifelong Zionist, an early player in the Israeli Zionist movement, a major player in the founding of the state of Israel. But yes, as you say, he was hoping, as really was the whole government establishment in Israel, for something like peace or at least, you know, a modus vivendi with its neighbours.

Now, Eshkol also—and this is really interesting—he had a long experience in water development, which is important, because water became a massive casus belli in the '67 War. You'll like this, Aimen. You're always talking about how water in the Middle East. It explains so much.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small There had long been tensions between Syria and Israel, especially over Israel's water development plans, which were diverting source waters of the Jordan River into Israel.

Aimen Dean Well, as you know, basically, Mount Hermon is, you know, one of the most important sources for the, you know, River Jordan.

Thomas Small Yes. A very tall – a very tall mountain to the north of the Golan Heights. At the very tip of Israel, in that part of it. A very tall mountain.

Aimen Dean The white cup mountain actually sits on, you know, the meeting point of three borders: Lebanon, Syria, and Israel. And, you know, from the Lebanese side is my mother's village. You know? So, the village of Shebaa, which, in Aramaic, means Sabbat, which means "seven" in Arabic.

Thomas Small Oh, seven.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Because it's shaped like the number seven in Aramaic. So, from there, you know, the icecap mountain basically, like, you know, provide a lot of the water that flows into the Jordan River. Actually, that mountain, Mount Hermon, is called, in Arabic, Jabal al-Shaykh. You know? For those who, you know, who speak Arabic among our listeners.

In the—. In 1957, you know, that mountain was important for me personally, because, basically, on the Lebanese side of that mountain, in one of the springs and a waterfall there, you know, a very beautiful setting, that was the wedding of my mum and dad.

Thomas Small Oh, Aimen. That's sweet.

Aimen Dean Oh, thank you. Thank you so much.

So, basically the, you know, the, you know, the waters were flowing, you know, from north to south, going from Mount Hermon, going into, you know, the Sea of Galilee and from there, into the River Jordan. And, of course, that was divided. That water was divided, you know, between the Arabs and the Israelis, you know, according to UN agreements.

Thomas Small That's right. The UN had been invited in to mediate the – the – the dispute, and their plan allocated thirty-eight percent of the Jordan's water to Israel. Okay. Israel was, in fact, developing the area, developing the water resources of the area, and they were sticking more or less to within that thirty-eight percent allocation.

However, when the Ba'athist coup happened in Syria in '63, all diplomatic dialogue with Israel was suspended and the new Ba'athist Syrian regime threatened what it called a suicide war with Israel over water. And this resulted, in 1964, to a rather remarkable Arab League Summit.

Aimen Dean In the 1964 Arab League Summit, it's when they decided to divert, you know, the water away from Israel, which actually amounted to an act of war. I mean, it's the Middle East after all. Water is so scarce.

Thomas Small Israel certainly considered the – the – the plan to divert its water to be an existential threat. And they did prepare for war. This caused for fighting again to break out across the DMZ with the Syrians. And on the 16th of March 1965, the Syrians fired on Israeli farmers, in the DMZ. They were settlers. Technically, they shouldn't have been there. They were fired upon. And a tractor driver, an Israeli tractor driver, was killed.

Now, this was a pretext for the IDF (the Israeli Defence Forces) to open fire, although they didn't actually target the place where the attack on the tractor had come from. They targeted the Syrian water diversion project. They'd had it in their sites, and they were waiting for an excuse to attack it.

Aimen Dean And the question was that since the Israelis were attacking Syria right now, would the, you know, Egyptians join the fight? Because, see in that summit of 1964, they created something called the United Joint Arab Command, you know, which actually was anything but united and joined. And then, so—.

Thomas Small It did. It did. It was a military command that united all thirteen Arab states militaries. That's something

Aimen Dean On paper only. Come on, Thomas. This was only on paper. What coordination was there? There was nothing.

Thomas Small Well, that is true. Nonetheless, people did wonder: Is Nasser going to send in his troops since Israel had attack Syria? But, you know, he was bogged down in Yemen. He did not want to be lured into any war with Israel. And so, he – he didn't do anything. That means that the United Arab Command, which was announced with great fanfare the year before, was just another example of Nasser sort of scrambling to make symbolic displays of Arab unity. But in fact, behind the scenes, he always favoured a cautious, incremental approach. He hoped primarily to ensure Egypt's domination of the Arab world.

Aimen Dean And this is why, Thomas, I think, you know, the – the path to war, unfortunately, was paved, you know, with such, you know, jingoistic, nationalistic rhetoric. You know? Nasser, you know, and for all the Arab leaders who actually inflamed the passions of the street about, you know, the glories of the Arabs and the restoration of such union and the crushing of Israel and its colonial backers, I mean, when – when you raise such expectations so high, then with high expectations, you know, these expectations, unless if they are satisfied, they will turn into dissatisfaction.

And this is where, you know, Nasser put himself and trapped himself, you know, between a rock and a hard place. Between his, you know, populous, who were expecting too much, because of his rhetoric, and the realities of "I can't win a war against Israel."

Thomas Small Well, radical Arabist pan-Arab expectations went up again in February 1966 when there was another coup inside Syria in which radical Ba'athists overthrew moderate Ba'athists. And this is the coup that resulted in a certain military officer being made minister of defence. Do you know whom I'm talking about?

Aimen Dean Oh, indeed. Assad the father. Assad the senior. Hafez al-Assad.

Thomas Small Hafez al-Assad. He became minister of defence in 1966. Of course, you know, in 1970, he would take full control of the country. But during the '67 War, he was minister of defence, Hafez al-Assad.

Now, this coup inside Syria that brought the radical Ba'athists to power in Damascus was provocative to Israel. The regime in Damascus supported "direct popular struggle against Israel," by which they meant guerrilla warfare or perhaps, to speak more plainly, terrorism. However you want to describe it. Damascus was calling for revolution now against imperialism and Israel. And this was important, because in the meantime, two new players had emerged on the regional chessboard.

First, let's talk about the PLO (the Palestinian Liberation Organisation), because it was another consequence of that '64 Arab League Summit.

Aimen Dean So, the Palestinian Liberation Organisation was established as a political organisation initially, not a military one. And it was Nasser's tool, you know, in order to control the internal Palestinian narrative, which angered so many other Arab leaders, including – including King Hussein, because he was the king of the Palestinians, as well as the Jordanians. You know? And this was seen as Nasser stepping on Hussein's territory.

Thomas Small Beyond the refugee problem, the Palestinians, you know, they hadn't really been a political player. They'd been absorbed into Jordan, and the Arab powers were making decisions on their behalf, you know, including by creating the PLO. Nasser, the Arab League, were still managing Palestinian affairs.

Aimen Dean And this actually approves more or less that the Palestinians, even by the 1960s, they did not yet develop what they call basically like, you know, I mean, aspirations for statehood, for a separate Palestinian state. I mean, at the time, they were just hoping for a larger Arab entity to incorporate them as part of the pan-Arab nationalism.

Thomas Small So, as you rightly said, Aimen, the PLO was connected to Egypt and, therefore, it followed Nasser's orders. And – and – and for that reason, they did not launch attacks inside Israel, because Nasser did not want a war.

However, that was not the case with the other Palestinian player that emerged in the mid-sixties: Fatah or the Palestinian National Liberation Movement. Many people think that the PLO and Fatah are the same thing. They ended up merging. And we'll get to that. But in the beginning, they were very different.

Aimen Dean Well, Fatah was actually, like, you know, modelled around, you know, the contemporary, at that time, you know, the contemporary socialist revolutionary movements, such as, you know, Castro and Che Guevara. And, of course, like, you know, I mean, among the Fatah, you know, founders, you know, of the very famous Yasser Arafat.

Thomas Small Yasser Arafat. He—. I mean, in the eighties and nineties, when I was coming of age, my God, there was – there was perhaps no more iconic Arab. He was everything.

Aimen Dean Indeed. With his, you know, wearing the kufiya and the way, like, you know, he was wearing his military uniform. He was trying to be, like, you know, I mean, a mix of a Che Guevara and a Qasem or whatever. But anyway, he and Fatah were far more violent and far more revolutionary, because they were, at the end of the day, like, you know, I mean, you know, a bunch of students, you know, coming from Cairo and Oman and other places in order to, you know, advocate for the overthrow of Israel as a whole. Like, you know, I mean, you know, completely like, you know, annihilation of the state of Israel as it was known at that time.

Thomas Small Yeah. Yasser Arafat and Fatah favoured "popular struggle." They'd been inspired by the success of the Algerian War for Independence. They identified the US as part of the enemy camp. They saluted the USSR, China—especially, they loved Mao—and all the non-aligned countries. So, in the Cold War kind of binary, they were definitely setting their – their – their – themselves against the United States.

They were obsessed with the idea—rightly as it turned out—that Israel was on the brink of acquiring a nuclear bomb. This was part of their motivation for – for fomenting all-out war. They wanted war as soon as possible to prevent that from happening. And starting in early '65, Fatah began guerrilla attacks against Israeli forces. And so, the IDF, in turn, began commando attacks on Fatah positions inside the Jordanian-held Westbank.

Eventually, the Fatah attacks would grow more and more sophisticated, because they received aid by the new radical Ba'athist regime in Damascus. This kind of climaxed in November 1966, when Fattah gorillas, they were – who – who were attacking Israel from the West Bank, which Jordanian-held, but they were being supported by Syria. Jordan didn't support Fatah. They—. The Jordanians hated Fatah. But the Syrians were supporting Fatah from within Jordan to attack Israel. So, these attacks were getting worse and worse. And eventually, the IDF (the Israeli Defence Force) decided to launch a massive raid inside the West Bank. This raid on the village of Samu is – is notorious.

Aimen Dean Indeed. I mean, it was a, you know, the—. It led to significant loss of life, you know, among militants and civilians. And it was widely condemned. You know, widely condemned across the Arab world. And it galvanised, you know, public opinion.

Thomas Small It was called Operation Shredder.

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small And eight tanks, four hundred paratroopers were sent in. They captured the village. They – they blew up. They dynamited fifty houses, the police station, a medical clinic, a school, and a mosque. It was a pretty – pretty harsh reprisal.

This actually forced the Jordanian troops to intervene. So, fighting broke out between the IDF and the Jordanian troops. Even jets were scrambled. The – the Jordanian Air Force got involved. Two Jordanian jets were shot down by the Israelis. It was pretty tense, especially since following this attack, huge riots again broke out across the West Bank. There were demands for the entire Jordanian government to resign. King Hussein's rule was – was on a knife's edge. He felt extremely threatened. He was so politically weakened by all of this that he felt himself being compelled closer to Nasser and the other revolutionary Arab regimes to bolster his credential with his people.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Practically, he was bullied into it.

Thomas Small And those Arab revolutionary governments were getting stronger, because, in November 66, by some miracle, Egypt and Syria set aside their rivalry and, to the great surprise of the Israelis, they signed a renewed mutual defence agreement.

Now, it's important to point out that Nasser actually hoped that the military pact with Syria would restrain Syria. He was worried that Syrian aggression was provoking Israel – Israel into war. He didn't want a war.

But the Israelis saw Arabs uniting "against us." It's another example of – of how both sides misunderstood the other's motivation, which – which climaxed in a massive way, in a way, the first shot of the '67 War, in a way, on the 7th of April 1967.

Aimen Dean I mean, it's all, again, coming back to a tractor. Yet a second tractor. What is the problem with tractors? You know, they always cause trouble.

So, Syrian regular troops, you know, fired upon a agricultural tractor on the Israeli side. The, you know, the driver was killed. So—. However, this time, the Israeli Air Force immediately scrambled and immediately went into a frenzy deduction. And they went after every Syrian military target they can. From Al Qunaitra, you know, and the Golan Heights, all the way to Damascus. They dropped sixty-five tons of bombs, you know, on these positions. To the point where even when the Syrian Air Force started to – scrambled to resist them, they shut down two Syrian MiGs—you know, fighter jets—over Damascus itself.

Thomas Small What's interesting about that event is that the Israeli government had not been consulted. The commander of the air force acted alone. This is an example of how the tensions, the military tensions that had been ratcheting up over the previous years, were creating a dynamic within the military, not just in Israel as we'll see, but in Egypt and elsewhere, and a dynamic where the military felt it needed to respond so quickly that civilian governments were being slightly side-lined.

But again, in this case, the Arabs and the Soviets, who were backing them, did not know this. They did not know that the air force had acted without government approval. They assumed it was the first move in an Israeli attempt to bring down the Syrian regime.

Aimen Dean And that left Nasser totally humiliated.

Thomas Small Humiliated again.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Why? Because, you see, Jordan was attacked. That village of Samu was attacked. And nothing happened. You know, Nasser, you know, did not do anything. Then, Syria was attacked. You know? Was—. You know, the – the – the – the Israeli Air Force made a mincemeat out of Syrian forces. And the—. The Syrian Air Force. And Nasser yet again did not do anything.

So, really, you know, since you are not good in terms of economy, you are no good in terms of, you know, diplomacy, what are you good for if you are not, you know, going to deter the Israelis?

Thomas Small The Soviets were also really worried at this point. So, just to kind of remind the listener, Soviet military advisers had been training the Egyptian army now for over a decade. And in fact, in September '65—so, just eighteen months before—a huge new arms deal had been brokered between the Soviets and Egypt. And Nasser, in fact, had been made a hero of the Soviet Union during a visit to Cairo by Khrushchev in 1964. That shows you how close the countries had become.

Aimen Dean So much for non-alignment, huh.

Thomas Small At around this time, the head of the commander of all the Warsaw Pact countries—so, this is like the Soviet NATO—the commander of the Warsaw Pact countries paid Nasser a visit. He told Nasser that the Egyptian army was battle-ready, offering encouragement to Nasser, but in fact, knowing full well that this was mere flattery.

The thing is the Soviets had decided they wanted Nasser to do something. The USSR had immediately become a very close ally of the new radical Ba'athist regime in Damascus. And following that April attack on Syria by Israel, Syria had been rocked by protests organised by the Muslim Brotherhood. And there was an increase in terrorist attacks across the border into Israel, which led the Israelis to say that they would have no choice but to launch even more decisive reprisals.

The Soviets began to fear that the Ba'athist regime was on the verge of collapse and/or conquest by Israel.

Aimen Dean So, the Soviets, unfortunately, you know, and in their infinite lack of wisdom, they decided that, to manipulate Nasser into believing that the Israelis are about to attack Syria and depose the Ba'athist regime in Damascus, they told Nasser that they have solid intelligence that Israeli army brigades are marching on the Syrian-Israeli border. And, therefore, because he already told us obvious before that any attack by Israel against Syria will lead to a Egypt intervention, so the Soviets thought, "Uh-huh." You know? "This is how we can manipulate, you know, this guy into actually doing something in order to prevent our allies in Damascus, you know, falling."

And so, that is basically how the intelligence was passed—that was false intelligence—to Nasser. Nasser immediately ordered mobilisation. And this is when you can see that, once you give the military more power, they do foolish things.

Thomas Small That's absolutely right. So, you have, you know—. Israel is now panicked. Israel thinks that Syria and Egypt are planning an attack. Syria is panicked. Syria thinks Israel is going to invade. Egypt is panicked. It thinks that Israel is going to attack Syria and lure Egypt into a war that it does not want. So, it's in this context then, on the 16th of May 1966, the Egyptian army chief of staff orders the United Nations Emergency Force (the UNF), which was in the Sinai, to withdraw from its positions along the Israel-Sinai border.

Now, it's important. Just like before, when they, when the Israeli Air Force attacked Syria, this order did not come from Nasser. It came from the Egyptian army chief of staff. This was a sign that Nasser wasn't in complete control of the military. The logic of war was, in a way, overwhelming the political decision-making.

Aimen Dean In fact, Field Marshall Abdel Hakim Amer, you know, the head of the Egyptian military, you know, he actually requested that the UN forces withdraw from the border only. They just—. He just wanted them to go south. He did not want them to leave the entire Sinai.

Thomas Small That's right. The UNEF first asked Israel if it could perhaps take up positions on its side of the line of the border to be a buffer. But Israel refused. Israel never wanted UN troops inside its territory.

This put the UN in a bind. I mean, it couldn't just withdraw its forces south away from the border with Israel deeper into Sinai and watch as Egypt amassed troops along the border, and the two sides start fighting. You know, they're a peace—. They're peacekeeping troops. What would be the point of doing that? So, they – they were in a bind, and they – they were left thinking, "What do we do?"

Now, the following day, tensions ratchet up again when two Egyptian fighter jets are spotted flying over the Dimona reactor. Remember that, dear listener? The reactor that was the centre of Israel's nuclear development plan.

Aimen Dean I mean, of course, for the Israelis, they thought, "Oh, this must be, like, you know, I mean, a Egyptian, you know, [unintelligible] mission, you know, preparing for a strike on our, you know, nuclear reactor."

So, the Israelis really freaked out now.

Thomas Small And it was certainly widely believed that already, at that time, Israel had a couple of crude nuclear bombs that they could draw on and that they would be able to produce a proper one in six to eight weeks should it be required. So, Israel knew that was the case. Israel had reason to think its enemies knew that was the case. So, you know, it thought, "Oh, my God. They're gonna – they're gonna attack our nuclear programme as a way of luring us into war."

But it's important to note that Nasser still did not want war. Even the fly over at the Dimona reactor was just a show of force. All he wanted to do was deter an Israeli attacked on Syria.

Aimen Dean Again, we come back to the fact that everyone was engaging in second-guessing the other.

Thomas Small Meanwhile, the UNEF had reached its decision. So, as I said, on the grounds. That it couldn't just withdraw to the south and watch Egypt and Israel fight each other. It ordered a full withdrawal. All UN troops evacuated, and the Sinai was free for Egypt to move its troops into.

Aimen Dean So, Nasser was really praying to God, you know, "Please, you know, let the UN stay." But the UN did not, and the UN decided to evacuate Sinai. And by evacuating Sinai, they created this void, this, you know – you know, vacuum that he needed to fill immediately.

Now, he really didn't want to put the Egyptian military into Sinai. But now, he has to. You know? His hand was forced. So, he sent the Egyptian military into Sinai. And now that they are in Sinai, you know, okay, the Arab world is waiting. The Archibald is waiting with bated breath. Like, you know, "Hey." You know? "Do something."

So, what he ends up doing, he closes the Straits of Tiran at the mouth of the Gulf of Aqaba against Israeli shipping, military and civilian alike. And, you know, in international law, this is an act of war.

Thomas Small Not only Israeli shipping, actually. He closed it to all ships carrying strategic materials to Israel—i.e., oil, most of which interestingly enough was coming from Iran at the time, which, back in those days, was in Israeli ally.

Aimen Dean Indeed. The shah an ally of Israel at the time. So, that was, you know, as far as the Israelis were concerned, you know, the last straw.

Thomas Small Yes. So, this was an act of war. Israel made it clear this is an act of war. But the funny thing is Nasser still didn't want a war. And one week later, at the end of May 1967, he said so. He said Egypt would not be the one to fire the first shot. What he really hoped for was that, by closing the straits of Tiran, he could claim to have had some kind of victory over Israel, placate the Arab masses, and go back to business as usual. But it got out of control. By this point, it was – it was going to happen anyway.

Aimen Dean Mainly, you know, Nasser didn't want to walk. But that was not the case with the Egyptian military. Their adoption military were really eager to wash away the humiliation of '48 and '56. And Abdel Hakim Amer …

Thomas Small The minister of defence.

Aimen Dean … he put together a plan called Operation Dawn or [speaks in Arabic] al-Fajr, in which an invasion of Israel actually was, you know – you know, meticulously planned and put forward. And it was supposed to be launched on 27th of May. Of course, the Israeli intelligence, you know, got hold of that. They warned the Americans. The Americans warned the Soviets. And, of course, the Soviets came back to Nasser and said, "Hey, hey, hey." Like, you know. You know? "We wanted you to just to be on the border to scare the Israelis, not – not to invade Syria, but not to start a real war. Please."

Thomas Small Nasser had actually not greenlit the plan. He was on the fence about it. He also didn't really know what was going on at this stage. He was slightly afraid. Is Israel going to attack? You know? He didn't know. But all this whole thing left Israel on even higher alert. In their mind. Egypt had been on the verge of invading their country. All the while other, Arab states had begun mobilising. Sudan, Iraq, others. Even Saudi Arabia, they all began saying openly, with this, you know, pan-Arab rhetoric that they would contribute to any war with Israel. The tensions were at, you know, really—. You could – you could cut – cut it with a knife.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And, of course, then came the thing that pushed the Israelis over there: King Hussein signing a mutual defence agreement with Nasser.

Thomas Small Yeah. This was really surprising. On the 30th of May. King Hussein and Nasser had been enemies basically quite openly for, well over a decade. And yet there they are assigning a mutual defence agreement in the midst of all this tension. Nasser states, "Our basic objective will be the destruction of Israel. The Arab people want to fight." This coming from a man who didn't want a war. This is a way—. This is another sign that Nasser's rhetoric was overwhelming his own cautiousness. You know? But this whole situation was being goaded on by other Arab nationalist leaders, real radicals, such as Hafez al-Assad on asset, who said, "Our forces are now entirely ready not only to repulse the aggression, but to initiate the act of liberation itself and to expel the Zionist presence in the Arab homeland."

So, this is a real threat to Israel.

Aimen Dean So, in the early hours of 4th of June 1967, even though the Israelis were outnumbered three to one on almost every metric—three to one when it comes to crafts, three to one when it comes to tanks, three to one when it comes to deploy troops—the Israelis nonetheless decided to, you know, be, you know, to test the odds. And they launched a, you know, one of the most audacious, unsuccessful air raids in modern history.

Thomas Small So, yes, the war started on the 5th of June, at 7:45, in the morning with Operation Focus. And indeed it was a focused operation. The – the goal was to destroy the Egyptian Air Force.

Aimen Dean Indeed. The Israelis Ironically learnt this, you know, lesson from the Germans during World War II, the Blitzkrieg. The idea that in order to achieve quick, decisive victory, you need to really annihilate your enemy's air force and you achieve immediate air superiority within the first twenty to forty-eight hours. And that was the Israeli objective.

Thomas Small They certainly achieved this. Egypt was caught off guard in fact, because Israeli intelligence had cleverly planted false news reports and newspapers, saying that the IDF was on vacation and that the air force would be carrying out routine training mission. So, the Egyptian Air Force was in a way cooling its heels. And in fact, the – the advanced warning systems that the Egyptian Air Force relied on was not even online. It wasn't on.

Aimen Dean So, a hundred and eighty-three Israeli jets, they flew so low over the Mediterranean, and they surprised, you know, the Egyptian Air Force when they attacked for airfields with such precision that they destroyed eighty percent of the Egyptian Air Force on the ground.

Thomas Small Three hundred and thirty-eight Egyptian jets were destroyed.

Aimen Dean You know? And at that time, Abdel Hakim Amer, and the head of the military intelligence, [name] Nasir, and many other generals were actually having a hangover from the previous night's party. And, you know—. And they were in one of the military headquarters somewhere outside of Cairo, when they saw what was happening. And so, they actually were trying to rush back to the ministry of defence. So, they went to one of the airports, but they found it was bombed. So—. And, you know—. And the – and the military car that dropped them there already left. So, they called for a taxi. I'm not kidding. They called for a taxi to come and pick them up while the country is being bombed and the air force is being shredded by the Israelis. And they all crammed into one taxi trying to get to the Ministry of Defence, so they – to find out what really was happening.

Talk about total surprise and total incompetence.

Thomas Small They didn't know it was happening, because Radio Cairo was pumping out the usual propaganda, which was masking the scale of the Israeli attack. It was saying that Egypt was on the verge of victory. It was being believed by its own – by its own military leaders. And not – not just in Egypt, but actually all around the Arab world. They were thinking, "Oh, Egypt is winning," when, in fact, it was the exact opposite.

That very morning Israel invaded the Sinai Peninsula in force and, within a day, had captured the entire thing. In – in response to all of this, Jordan began shelling Israel from the West Bank. And so, on the 6th of June Israel invades the West Bank and, within a single day, had taken the whole thing. The Syrians began shelling Israel. And on the 9th of June, the IDF invades the Golan Heights and, again, captures it the very next day. It had been a total route.

Aimen Dean It was a total route. One, because the Israelis had superior weapons from France. But two, which is extremely important, training, training, training, and training. You cannot underestimate how many times Israelis where drilling and drilling and drilling and training and training and preparing, you know, for this. The average Israeli soldier and the average Israeli pilot had almost nine times the amount of training and the amount of drilling that their Arab counterparts had.

And finally, number three: intelligence. Intelligence was really important.

Thomas Small Well, on the Arab side, it was a total disaster. Abd al-Latif al-Baghdadi, a former Egyptian vice-president, later said, "We felt as though we were dreaming. It was mayhem. Like a nightmare. How could our air force have been wiped out in the space of one day and our ground troops decimated the next? How could they be so strong that we couldn't hold out for more than thirty-six hours?"

Aimen Dean That's what happened when you have a very well-motivated, very well-trained and advanced, you know, and coordinated, you know, military. No matter how small it is, it can take on any larger military that is not coordinated, not well-trained, not well-motivated.

Thomas Small The aftermath of the Six-Day War was sort of inconceivable. The Suez Canal became a war zone and the canal was closed for eight years, disrupting global shipping to a degree that we can hardly imagine. The Palestinians, once again, you know, they were pretty much screwed. At the time, there were about one million inhabitants of the West Bank, about twenty-five percent of them became refugees. Again, another wave of Palestinian refugees, mostly to Jordan. And – and in addition, a hundred and thirty thousand Syrian refugees from the Golan Heights were created by the war.

Fatah and the PLO, as we said before, merged in the wake of the '67 disaster. And now, Yasser Arafat was in charge of the whole organisation, the new merged organisation, and they began escalating their tactics. Not only would they attack rural sites as they had been, they were now going to target urban areas as their strategy became more explicitly terroristic.

In addition, Palestinian nationalism, which as we've said again and again, was not really a thing, it now becomes a real thing. More and more Palestinians are saying, "We need to push Israelis out of the way and take over a historic Palestine for ourselves with our own state."

I think, possibly, the greatest personal tragedy of the '67 War is with Gamal Abdel Nasser himself. On the 9th of June in the midst of the war—it's still going on—he announces his resignation. I mean, he was – he was heartbroken.

Aimen Dean Well, I mean, yeah, of course. Like, you know, I mean, you know, the, you know—. No – no shit, Sherlock. Like, you know, basically, he was responsible for the whole mess. Like, you know, I mean, he did not understand the law of unintended consequences.

But nonetheless, you know, the Egyptian people, you know, being, you know, at the time, the naive people they were at the time, I mean, they just swarmed the streets in their millions, asking for him to remain in power and shouting his name and, you know, slogans off, you know, [speaks in Arabic]. You know? "But no, Mr. President."

And the Soviets also urged him to stay. In fact, you know, he received a telegram personally, like, you know, from, you know, Soviet premier, you know, promising that all the military hardware that Egypt lost, you know, in this war (the aircraft, the tanks, the artillery) all of this will be completely replaced and replenished by the USSR free of charge. That was a very sweet deal.

Thomas Small It sure was. That was an incentive. So, Nasser changed his mind. He did not resign and to some extent, I suppose, revived—. He led an Arab summit in Khartoum later that year. This is the famous Arab summit of the three noes: no peace, no recognition, no negotiation with Israel. And this led to what's called the War of Attrition, a kind of constant bombardment by the Arab allies of new Israeli positions that lasted three years.

Aimen Dean Not only the bombardment of the Israeli positions east of the canal, but also commando raids, you know. You know? And it was actually a tit for tat commander is between the two sides. And it was—.

Thomas Small As it had been since 1948. It never ended. There wasn't peace.

Aimen Dean Definitely no peace.

Thomas Small However, just around the corner, a prospect of peace arrived when, in September of 1970, unexpectedly, Gamal Abdel Nasser, the great man of Arab unity, the great Arab of the mid-twentieth century, died. He – he had a heart attack and he died. His funeral is something to be seen. Look it up on YouTube. It's – it's amazing. You might—. You would have thought maybe Jesus Christ himself had died.

But he is followed by a long-term colleague of his. To some extent, the – the brains behind the whole Nasserist project from the beginning. Anwar Sadat. Anwar Sadat becomes president of Egypt and immediately signals his intention to reach some sort of agreement with Israel.

Aimen Dean Well, first of all, I must state to the dear listeners that Anwar Sadat is my favourite president of Egypt. You know? You know, hands down. He's my favourite. And, you know, later, I'll explain why.

The first thing he did actually, in 1971, and he insisted again on that on 1972, you know, is to ask the Israelis, "Please." You know? "Can you withdraw thirty-two kilometres east of the canal, and that area will become adoption zone of control, so shipping can resume and so we can make money out of the canal. I mean, and, you know, we can give you whatever guarantees. It would be demilitarised." You know?" But still, thirty-two kilometres is of the canal that will be ours."

And the Israelis were saying, "No, no, no, no, no." Because Israel has already built a – an impregnable, you know, line of defence, you know, from the mouth of the canal in the north to the mouth of the canal in the south, and that was called the Bar Lev Line of Defence. It's one of the most impregnable lines of defence in modern history.

Thomas Small Or so they thought. In fact …

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah.

Thomas Small … in 1973, on the 6th of October 1973, which was Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, Anwar Sadat, having been convinced that Israel would never agree to any sort of peace unless the Arabs could have something like a military victory, launched the Yom Kippur War as it's known. It lasted from the sixth to the 25th of October 1973. And this podcast episode, God knows, has gone on long enough. So, we cannot talk about it in any detail. The main point is this line—. What's it called, Aimen?

Aimen Dean The Bar Lev Line.

Thomas Small That's right. The Bar Lev Line was fantastically, heroically, and miraculously breached by the Egyptian troops.

Aimen Dean Yeah. The crossing was something of a legend. While the war itself wasn't exactly a victory for the Arabs—.

Thomas Small Not at all in the end. Israel beat them all back. But at the beginning, there was something fantastic that happened.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And you see, like, you know, the crossing—. You see, this is why the Egyptians, to this day, they always celebrate every day – every year on the 6th of October, the crossing. The crossing. That crossing, basically, which is the miraculous crossing of the canal.

In fact, one of my teachers, when I was in middle school in Saudi Arabia, he was Egyptian and he was a conscript and the Egyptian military in 1973, in the Yom Kippur War. And just to show you basically about, like, you know, the heroic, you know, Egyptians in their little dingy, you know, rubber, you know, boats, like, you know, crossing, you know, and using their high-pressure hoses in order to bring down the sand fortifications of the Israelis, you know—. But, you know, he was talking about it so animated to the point where he reached the point where he said, "Even the dolphins came out of the water, fighting with us."

And it's kind of in my image. Like, you know, basically, you know, dolphins with their fins, you know, basically holding AK-47s and shooting and—.

You know? We always grew up with so many movies produced by the Egyptian drama companies about the crossing. They never talk about what happened after the crossing, because it was embarrassing. It's just "We crossed." That's it. That's the most important thing. "We did cross. We did breach the Bar Lev."

And I give them that. It was really a – a piece of military genius. It's just the question of what to do next. And they failed at that.

Thomas Small Well, the Yom Kippur War did create the conditions for something like peace, which was finally achieved several years later when Anwar Sadat went to the Knesset in Jerusalem and said that Egypt would like to make peace with Israel.

We'll probably get to that story sometime in Conflicted. We don't have time now, you know, 'cause another great story from the Yom Kippur War is the Arab oil embargo that it – that it created, which changed everything. And we're going to talk about that next time.

As far as this episode is concerned, to – to sort of close it out, I find in terms of its historical impact one of the most interesting things about the '67 and '73 wars is how it marked the end of – of mid-century Arab nationalism. As the Arabs grew very disillusioned with the promises of secular Arab republicanism, very disillusioned with the kind of, you know, modernisation programmes that the socialist leadership were constantly offering them without getting anything back in return or not getting nearly as much as they were promised.

And instead, they began to retreat away from this form of sort of modern development, modern nationalism, modern patriotism, et cetera, and instead moved in the direction of a renewed political Islamism.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small As for now, because we should raise the question of a clash of civilisations that we're supposed to at any rate, I mean, I think you can see the '67 War, the humiliations that the Arab suffered at the end of that war, the '73 War, we can – you can see this period as the – as the time when mid-century Arab nationalism and all the promise that it held out to the Arab public was lost. And the Arabs began a move towards a greater cynicism towards that vision of modernity and instead retreated back to what they thought was their own civilisation. Something more native to – to the Middle East, native to Arab culture, and that's the – the resurgence of Islam, especially in its political, its Islamist form.

Aimen Dean In fact, Thomas, just nine months, like literally nine months before the 1967 six days war and the humiliation of it, there was a little event that was happening in a jail cell somewhere in Egypt that will have a grave impact. It will be the beginning, you know, of the rise of Islamism and the beginning of the decline of Arab nationalism. It is the execution of a relatively unknown Egyptian thinker by the name of Sayyid Qutb. Nasser had him executed, you know, just nine months before the humiliation of 1967. Little did he know that by doing so, he sealed the fate of Egypt and the fate of the Middle East for many decades to come.

Thomas Small Arab nationalism wasn't dead, but it was now the radicals who were in the driver's seat. A new generation of Arab strongmen came to the fore: Assad, eventually Saddam, and others, but, perhaps most dramatically, Gadhafi. These characters and especially Gadhafi are what we'll be discussing next time.

Join us in two weeks, dear listener, for the next episode of Conflicted. If you don't already, you can follow the show on Facebook and Twitter @MHConflicted. And if you would like to carry on the conversation and learn more about the topics discussed here on Conflicted, you can search for "Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group" on Facebook where you'll find fascinating conversations and debate between other fans of the show.

Those of you who subscribe to the show will know that, each week, Aimen and I choose a different listener question from Twitter and Facebook to answer for our exclusive bonus content section. You could be in with a chance of having your name read out on the show and hearing your question answered by subscribing to ad-free listening and extended bonus content for just 99p on Apple Podcasts.

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Join us again in two weeks' time for another great episode of Conflicted.

Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Rowan Bishop. Sandra Ferrari is our executive producer. Production support and fact-checking by Molly Freeman. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

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Conflicted S3 E9 - Hashemites!

Thomas Small Aimen, how are ya?

Aimen Dean I'm still alive, Thomas, as every listener by now …

Thomas Small Good.

Aimen Dean … would have guessed.

Thomas Small Good, good, good. You know, I had considered naming this episode Arabs are revolting, but thought – but thought maybe people would get the wrong idea.

Aimen Dean Revolting or revolting?

Thomas Small Exactly. I mean, if I had called it that, it would be in reference to the Arab Revolt, one of many topics we're going to discuss today because yes, this episode is all about the Hashemites. Proper Arabian stuff.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small So, Aimen, you're going to be in the driver's seat today, especially since we're going to focus on Iraq. And as you told us back in episode three, your family has close Iraqi connections.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Because, of course, my grandfather was, you know, head of the colonial police in Basrah.

Thomas Small Traitor, traitor, traitor.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. From 1919 to 1926. You know, tumultuous years. And, actually, he was involved in the suppression of the 1920 rebellion in Iraq.

Thomas Small As we will hear about. I've got a big list of questions, Aimen. I cannot wait to pick your brains. Let's get to it.

As we race toward the 1967 and 1973 Arab-Israeli wars, we're putting our final duck in its row. After the fall of the Ottoman Empire, Jordan and Iraq both received Hashemite monarchs, and the rivalries and ideological conflicts that followed still reverberate today, perhaps nowhere more powerfully than on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Focusing mainly on the tragic history of modern Iraq, but also on Jordan, this episode engages with the clash between modern-era of republicanism and something like traditional monarchism—Aimen's favourite—as competing versions of pan-Arabism violently spread throughout the region, prompting the Hashemites into evermore desperate acts of self-preservation.

But first, Aimen, the present day. I joked that the Arabs are revolting. But in fact, on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the Arabs have in fact been revolting. At least some Arabs have been. What's going on?

Aimen Dean In all honesty, I've been looking at the latest clashes, you know, in Jerusalem. And all I can see basically is an attempt to buy some elements from, you know, Hamas, mostly to ignite a fourth intifada as if we had a third intifada. I don't know if we had a third Intifada by now.

Thomas Small So, just to make sure our listeners understand. In mid-April, violence broke out on the Temple Mount ostensibly, because some extremist Israeli kind of religious fanatics were intending to sacrifice a goat up there in – in line with ancient ideas of the Passover. But this – this idea that Israelis are going to start bringing back old temple sacrifices, it sometimes pops up to create a conflict over the holy spaces there. So, then, on the 15th of April of this year, Palestinian protesters began marching early in the morning. It was 4 AM. They began marching around the Al-Aqsa Mosque, carrying Palestinian and Hamas flags.

So, Aimen, you know, the – the – the media reports were a bit confusing and contradictory. What – what do you think happened?

Aimen Dean First, there was the question of, like, you know, the Passover ritual. Then, you have the marches, you know, trying to disrupt that. Then, of course, the marches, you know, start throwing stones and all of that at the protesters. The security forces wanted to clear them off the Temple Mount. And funnily enough, because there were Palestinian elder people basically who were angry about the presence of these troublemakers in the Temple Mount. And – and this is what exacerbated the clashes. What really made me question whether this was a premeditated on the part of the Hamas elements is the fact that they brought with them stones, rocks, and fireworks into the Al-Aqsa Mosque. And from inside, they were launching the fireworks and the stones and the rocks on the security forces and Jewish worshipers at the Western Wall. So, in my opinion, they really wanted to provoke a significant clash inside Al-Aqsa Mosque, in order to create the conditions for a third or fourth intifada depending on how you think about this.

But what surprised me more than ever is the – almost the lack of the predictable outrage, you know, from the Arab world, whether on social media or—. You know, it – it was more muted this time. It was more, you know, measured response rather than the out loud, you know, outrage.

Thomas Small And that's the case, even though, you know, it was violent. A hundred Palestinians, according to reports, were injured and four hundred were arrested. Only three Israeli police officers were injured. So, clearly there was a, you know, disproportionate response. Is that right?

Aimen Dean Well, in a sense, yes. But again, what really made the general, you know, sentiment among the Arabs on social media—. And I'm talking here about the Gulf Arabs, because, of course, basically, like, you know—. And to some extent, many Egyptians, and to some extent also some Moroccans and other nationalities seems to be less enthusiastic this time about supporting the Palestinians, because there were so many photos and videos spreading of these kids bringing in rocks and stones into the Al-Aqsa Mosque inside, that they were entering the mosque with their shoes. They were playing football inside the mosque itself. I mean, inside the mosque, over the carpet. That really angered many Arabs, saying, "What the hell you're doing?"

So, there was an element of, you know, are these kids really defending Al-Aqsa or taking advantage of Al-Aqsa? You know? You know, are they there because they were told to be there. Is there something else behind this?

Because there were also many Arab writers and journalists who were saying, "Don't be fooled. This time, it's not really a proper Israeli provocation. There is something else going on here."

Thomas Small The response may have been a bit more muted than in past years. But nonetheless many Arab countries, including, you know, big ones (Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Morocco), they openly condemned the actions of the Israeli government. I mean, is this going to upset any of the recent peace accords, any of the recent cooperation moves between Arab states and Israel? Or – or do you think those condemnations were just for show?

Aimen Dean Ah, for show. I mean, these condemnations basically were just recycled old condemnations. I mean, it's the same language from before. It's just a formality. That's the best way I can describe these condemnations. Because they have to do it. I mean, they have to say, "Well, look, I mean, you know, even if you – if there are provocations from inside the mosque, you have to take more measured response."

But what surprised me is that, this time, we start to see clashes between Palestinians and Palestinians inside the mosque, between the younger generation and the older generation. Between elders who are saying, "For God's sake, don't make the mosque into a—. Don't turn it into an arena of conflict between, you know, you and the Israelis," and the younger generation who are hot headed, and they really want to start yet another intifada.

Thomas Small If you remember, dear listener, in episode seven, the one on Israel, we talked about the recent Negev summit, where the Israeli foreign minister met with his counterparts from several important Arab countries, except not Jordan. Jordan was invited, but it declined to attend.

You didn't tell us why though. Aimen. What got the Jordanian king's back up? Why didn't he attend the summit?

Aimen Dean The king of Jordan, King Abdullah II, was not happy about many aspects of the reproachment and the closeness between the Gulf Arabs and Israelis, because, in particular, he is threatened by the prospect of a Saudi-Israeli normalisation of relations. Because the price that the Saudis are demanding—and this is based on in, you know, well, certain intel and certain information that are not available in the public domain, if we can call it this way—but the Saudi price for normalisation of relationships with Israel is the Temple Mount. They want to have a full custody of Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock.

Thomas Small Because right now, the Temple Mount is managed as a waqf, as a charitable endowment, overseen by the king of Jordan.

Aimen Dean Yes. So, it's the Jordanian waqf, the Jordanian, you know, religious trust that, you know, looks after the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock within the Temple Mount complex.

Thomas Small But the Saudis want to get it.

Aimen Dean Yes. The Saudis, you know—. And it is, you know, for a good reason. What they are saying is that, "Look, if we want to convince our people, the most conservative Arab population in the Middle East, if we want to convince them that there is, you know, going to be a normalisation of relations with Israel, then there has to be a price."

And this price is worth that normalisation of relations. What is that price? You know, the Temple Mount itself, Al-Aqsa Mosque, and the Dome of the Rock. So, what will happen is that instead of the king of Saudi being called the custodian of the two holy mosques, he will become the custodian of the three.

Thomas Small It's – it's fascinating. You know, it's – it's—. In a way, it's also the sort of final insult of the House of Saud against the Hashemites.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small I mean, a hundred years – a hundred years ago, an earlier clash between the Saudis and the House of Hashim, the Hashemites laid the foundations for much of the modern Middle East.

In this episode, we're focusing on Iraq mainly, but the episode is called Hashemites. So, in geographical terms, it will be a bit discontinuous. After all, the Hashemites don't come from Iraq. And though in the modern period, they ascended the thrones of Syria briefly, Jordan and Iraq, they come from the Hejaz.

Aimen, historically, who are the Hashemites? Why are they called Hashemites?

Aimen Dean Well, the Hashemites, you know, if we go back—really, really back in time, like, you know, fifteen hundred years ago, I would say, just a hundred years before the birth of the Prophet Muhammad—the great ancestor of Muhammad from, you know, the tribe of Quraysh. So, there was a tribe of Quraysh, and Muhammad belonged to that tribe. So, the Prophet Muhammad line is that his great-great-great grandfather is Hashim. So, Hashim is, you know, the founder of one – one of the clans from within the Quraysh tribe. So, there were other, you know, clans such as the Umayyads, which, you know, would later clash with the Hashemites, you know – you know in later years after the death of the Prophet Muhammad. And also you have, you know, the [unintelligible], you know, the [unintelligible]. You know, the—. You know, there were so many different—.

Thomas Small These are all clans within the tribe of the Quraysh.

Aimen Dean Exactly. So, Muhammad was from Bani Hashim of the Quraysh. And, of course, there were other, you know, clans within Quraysh. But in order to distinguish, you know, who are, you know—. When we say – say the Hashemites, it's means the people who belong to the same clan from within Quraysh of the Prophet Muhammad.

Thomas Small So, that doesn't mean that they're direct descendants of the Prophet Muhammad in fact.

Aimen Dean No.

Thomas Small They're just direct descendants of this Hashim who lived earlier.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Bani Hashim. And, therefore, you know, when the Abbasids, the Abbasid caliphate, you know, you have that kind of dynasty, while they were not descendants of the Prophet Muhammad, they were descendants of his uncle, Al-Abbas. And as a result, they were Hashemites, even though, you know, the modern-day Shia don't like to call them Hashemites. But they are Hashemites in a sense.

So, today, whenever we say Hashemites, really, really, we really mean the descendants of the Prophet Muhammad from his two grandsons, Hasan and Husayn, and they are the sons of his daughter, Fatima. So, really that's the meaning of Hashemites

Thomas Small In the end, the Hashemites held a special title, Sharif of Mecca. And what does that mean? What is the Sharifate of Mecca? I understand it became a political power in 967—so, you know, three hundred years and a bit after Muhammad's death—during the revolt of a sect from Qatar of all places called the Qaramita. Tell us about this story.

Aimen Dean So, if we have to distinguish that there are the Ashraf of Mecca, the Sharifs, and there are As-sada. You know, the masters. So, "sharif" means noble, and "as-sada" or "as-sayid" means, you know, "masters." And so, there are the nobles and the masters. The Nobles are the descendants of Hasan ibn Ali. So, the older grandson. And the nobles or the, you know, sada, or the, you know, masters are the descendants of Husayn, the younger son.

So, you know, for the Shia that you reveal the latter. For the Sunnis, they revere, you know the earlier ones, you know. So – so, basically—.

Thomas Small Well, I am ashamed to say, Aimen, I never knew this. This is so illuminating.

Aimen Dean Yeah. That's why they—. You know, if you hear about someone called a Sharif, they are descendants of the Hasan ibn Ali. If they are a Sayyid, you know, the master, you know, then they are descendants of Husayn.

Thomas Small And also Sayyids are Shia, and all Sharifs are Sunni?

Aimen Dean No. I mean, it's still—. Like, you know, basically, from both. I mean, there are even [unintelligible], you know, who are, you know Sharif and Sayyid, and there are Sunnis who are Sharifs and Sayyid, and there are Shia who are Sharifs and Sayyid.

But, you know—. But the Sayyids have more status, you know, within the Shia. And between you and me, like, you know, I mean, let's be honest, you know. The vast majority of those who claim to be Sharif or Sayyid, basically, like, you know, is false, really. I mean, there is—. Impossible, you know, to determine the fact, like, you know, there are ten million Muslims who are descendant from the Prophet Muhammad. It's just impossible.

Thomas Small But what about your illustrious family, Aimen? Are you a Sharif or a Sayyid?

Aimen Dean No. We are not.

Thomas Small Oh, that's very humble of you. Why don't you get on the bandwagon and claim direct descendance from Muhammad?

Aimen Dean Well, at the end—.

Thomas Small Bolster your credentials?

Aimen Dean At the end of the day, what does it do? Like, you know, I mean, you know, it does nothing at the end of the day, like, you know, basically, to, you know, to elevate me above certain people. I don't believe—. I believe in egalitarian, you know – you know, societies, you know. And with monarchists being just tribal chiefs rather than, like, you know, I mean, basically, like, a, you know, just a class of nobles. I don't believe in classism. So, therefore, I don't believe in the Sharifs and the Sayyids.

But nonetheless, because of all this instability, you know, that was taking place in the Arabian Peninsula and the constant raids, you know, by either religious fanatics or by, you know, brigans against the pilgrims and their caravans, you know, their responsibility of securing the hijabs, securing Mecca, securing Medina for the pilgrims and for the Pilgrimage season fell upon the Sharifs of Mecca, you know, which means the were basically the holders of the keys to the Kaaba, but they were the servants, you know, of the shrine and servants of the Kaaba.

So, the Abbasid caliph, who was, like, you know, ceremonial position at the time, you know, bestowed upon the Sharifs of Mecca the title of princes. And that is how the Sharifate of Mecca was created in 960s.

Thomas Small Eventually, this title, Emir of Mecca, passed to a sub-branch of the Hashemites called the Banu Qatadah, and this sub-branch held the title until 1925. And these are the people that we're going to talk about now, 'cause we've got to jump forward to the crumbling Ottoman Empire.

The British were fighting the Ottomans in World War I. And when thinking about how the Middle East would be ruled after the war, they came up with the Sharifian solution.

Now, Aimen, what is the Sharifi and solution? It was Lawrence of Arabia's idea.

Aimen Dean Well, as far as Lawrence of Arabia was concerned, he was looking at the Hejaz and thinking, "Okay. There we have a family"—you know, the Banu Qatadah—"that'd been around for nine hundred years." Can you believe it? Like, you know, a royal family been around for nine hundred years. Continuous line, you know, of succession.

So, he thought, "Okay. This family could be the key to unlocking the independence of Arabia." And when we talk about Arabia at the time, you know, they meant—. You know, it wasn't just the current peninsula of Arabia, which extend, you know, just only Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and the other GCC countries. No. He—. You know, you're talking about Iraq and Jordan and modern-day Syria. All of this was included, you know, in what was known as Arabia at that time.

The idea is that since the Ottomans were on the side of the Germans in that war, since the Ottomans were an obstacle, you know, to British interest in the region, especially the Suez Canal, and, you know, other strategic assets, therefore, there is the need to unite that Arabs and to use them as the Achilles' heel of the Ottoman Empire to bring it down.

And who could be able to unite them? Except the Sharifs of Mecca who have this noble blood, you know, who could, like, you know, unite them and fight the war?

Thomas Small This plan for how the Arab Middle East was to be governed after the Ottoman withdrawal became known as the Tangle, because it – it was so convoluted. But before we go a bit more into detail about the plan, let's talk about monarchy briefly. I mean, you're a big supporter of monarchy, Aimen. God knows you've told us that many times. And the Sharifian solution, Lawrence of Arabia's solution, envisioned a monarchical future for the Middle East.

However, from what I understand throughout history, really, Muslims have sometimes believe that monarchy, milk or milkia in Arabic, monarchy is not truly Islamic, because God alone is the monarch of the universe.

So, did this British plan, which meant to kind of recreate the Middle East almost in a British constitutional monarchical way, was it destined to fail in a region that was already a little bit ambivalent about monarchy as a principle of governance?

Aimen Dean Actually, Thomas, I believe there is a misconception among Westerners that there is an antipathy in Islam or among Muslims towards the idea of monarchy. No, it's not. In fact, the founder of the Umayyad dynasty, Mu'awiya, the first Umayyad caliph, he said, [speaks in Arabic]. You know? "I'm the first king of Islam." You know, that's the first thing. And the second thing is that the title king actually is not looked up – looked down upon, you know, in the Quran. You know, you look at, like, you know, King David and King Solomon, and, you know, they were actually the, you know, the perfect image of what a king should be.

Thomas Small And does the Quran use the word melik (king)?

Aimen Dean Exactly. Yes. You know – you know – you know—. And, actually, you know, talking about David and Solomon, they were kings. And in fact, like, you know, I mean, the idea of a king to unite were enshrined in the Quran when it talks about the Israelites asking the prophets to send them a king. [speaks in foreign language]. "Send us a king, you know, from God." So, the idea of a God-anointed king is already enshrined in the Quran. And it is there. So, when many people said Islam doesn't like the idea of kings, no. Actually, like, you know, I don't know where this idea come from. But actually, it is there. Even Saladin, you know, the – the one who conquered Jerusalem from the crusaders, I mean, he was called [name], you know, which means "The Victorious King."

Thomas Small So, in Islam, then what's the difference between a king and a caliph?

Aimen Dean So, you can imagine, you know, for a Western audience, it's the difference between the Holy Roman emperor and, you know, you have the kings of Europe, you know. So, that's the only difference, is that there is someone who is a semi-pope and a semi-emperor at the same time. You know, someone who hold a religious position as well as a political position. So, it's a marriage between the Holy Roman emperor and the pope at the same time. This is what a caliph mean.

Thomas Small I see.

Aimen Dean And there can only be one caliph, but there can be so many kings subordinate to him.

Thomas Small This is very reminiscent of the ancient Persian idea of the king of kings.

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small A Shahanshah. A king that is above all other kings. And, you know, in the Roman period, this is what the Roman emperor was. He was over all the kings. He had a kind of universal monarchy, whereas kings had territorial monarchies. They were limited.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. And this is I think where the – the, you know, the idea that kings, you know, and kingship doesn't – doesn't really clash with Islam, because there can be a caliph, you know, over, you know, that can be, you know, where all other kings can be subordinate to him.

Thomas Small Well, let's go on now to outline this Sharifian solution in a bit more detailed. So, the Sharif of Mecca at the time of Lawrence of Arabia was Sharif Husayn bin Ali. And he had four sons—Ali, Abdullah, Faisal, and Zeid. Lawrence's idea was to give those sons parts of the Middle East to rule as kings. Ali, the eldest son was going to become king of the Hejaz after his father Sharif Husayn died. The next son Abdullah was supposed to be king of Iraq. Faisal, the next son, was supposed to be king of all of Syria, of Greater Syria. And finally, the youngest son Zeid was supposed to become king of northern Mesopotamia. Kurdistan, in fact.

Right. Let's see how the plan worked out. Let's start with Faisal. Now, Faisal was Alec Guinness in Lawrence of Arabia. Remember? Now, Aimen. How did Faisal's part in this plan go? He was the commander of the Arab Northern Army during the Arab Revolt against the Ottomans. And in that capacity, he worked very closely with Lawrence.

Aimen Dean Well, Faisal, of course, was a charismatic figure. I mean, no question about it. And he was, you know—. He had that charisma and the [unintelligible] and all of that. But also he had the help of the British. And what helped him also is the fact that during the late stages of the Ottoman Empire, the Ottoman rule, you know, became increasingly Turkish rule, and there was exceptional amount of xenophobia and racism from, you know, the Turks towards the Arabs. Not to mention, of course, you know, the atrocities they committed and the neglect – and the neglect they showed to many parts of the Arab world. You know, from Syria all the way to Yemen. So, his mission was made easier by the Turks. And, of course, then when the Turks decided to enter the First World War on the side of the Germans, he – he struck, you know gold—let's put it this way—British gold, when he found that the aims in off the Sharifs of Mecca now, you know, corresponded nicely with, you know, the aims of the British Empire.

Thomas Small That's true. And at the end of the war, he was at the head of an army that conquered Damascus, where he was installed as king of Syria in October 1918, again, claiming all of Greater Syria, of the traditional Syria—Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine. The whole thing. Although in fact, he was only in control of the inland regions. He was only in control of the – the parts of Greater Syria on the other side of the mountains, the Levantine mountain ranges.

Now, sadly for Faisal, when the British eventually agreed with the French to withdraw to the southern half of Greater Syria only, and leaving the French in charge of the northern half, including Damascus, Faisal had to fend for himself against the French. And that didn't – didn't really go so well for poor Faisal, did it?

Aimen Dean Well, Faisal found out in 1920 that British promises are not even worth the paper they are written on.

Thomas Small You're not the first one to find that.

Aimen Dean But he found out to his, you know—. To great cost that, yeah, you know, whatever the crown – the British crown promised him, basically, means nothing really on the ground, because the British promised the same land to someone else, the French. And, you know, the French, after Versailles of 1919, were in no compromising mode at all. And so, they just, you know, chucked him out of Syria after the Battle of Maysalun.

Aimen Dean Yes. The famous Battle of Maysalun July of 1920. This was a big battle between Faisal's forces and the French army of the Levant. And Faisal, I'm afraid, was defeated.

Aimen Dean Of course. I mean, he was able to win against the Ottomans, because of British arms, British guns, and British, you know, officers. None of this was available to him at the Battle of Maysalun. And, of course, he lost, and he withdraw all the way to Jordan. And then, from there, to the Hejaz.

Thomas Small Defeated, Faisal's kingdom of Syria ceased to exist. But before long, the British installed him as king of Iraq. So, yay, Faisal. He did get something in the end. We talked about Faisal becoming king of Iraq in episode three, because his installation as king there followed the notorious crushing of the great revolt against the British, which your grandfather helped achieve, Aimen.

Aimen Dean Indeed. My illustrious grandfather,

Thomas Small Right. That's Faisal. We'll come back to Iraq. But what about Abdullah? So, he commanded the Arab Eastern Army during the Arab Revolt, and he was earmarked to rule Iraq. What happened? It's very mysterious. What – what happened about this? Apparently, you know—. You read some things, and it says that he was in fact proclaimed king by you know, a congress of Iraqi notables, but he refused the position. Why, Aimen? Why – why did Abdullah not become king of Iraq and his brother did?

Aimen Dean So, Sharif Abdullah, he decided not to take up the position in Iraq, because, one, there was already the internal family agreement that, you know, after the Battle of Maysalun, that if Faisal couldn't get the Greater Syria, then what would happen is that Faisal will end up being the king of Iraq, even though Faisal was the younger.

Thomas Small Even though Faisal was the younger brother. Because why? Actually, you know, Abdullah was having his eyes set on the greater prize, which is Jerusalem and the Transjordan region. So, for him, it's a greater price. Why? Because it is closer, you know, to the, Hejaz. You know? Remember, it is 1920. They are still in control of the Hejaz. You know, the family as a whole. So, his father Husayn, his older brother Ali. They are family in control of the Hejaz. And therefore what they – what he wanted is to have Jerusalem. So, having a holy city and for him to be the Sharif of that holy city is greater than, you know, that place called Mesopotamia or as they call it the Messy Pot.

Thomas Small Well, perhaps with Jerusalem in mind, after his brother Faisal's defeated Maysalun, Abdullah did head in the same direction towards Damascus. He hoped to defeat the French. Grabbed Damascus for himself, and from that position of power, established claims over Jerusalem. But it didn't go so well for him either. On the way, Churchill, in fact, Winston Churchill convinced him to stop in Jordan, and he ended up king there, and they founded a new kingdom, the Kingdom of Transjordan in 1921. Abdullah's desires were really cut down to size, I would say, because the Kingdom of Transjordan, it wasn't really much to sniff at at that time. Pretty, pretty poor. Pretty under-populated. Pretty bad, really.

Aimen Dean Actually, I mean, between you and me, Jordan is the most—. In its current form, it's the most natural resource impoverished country in the Middle East. And yet, it is one of the most stable. Funny enough, like, you know, it just shows you, like, you know, the power of monarchy. But, you know, it – it doesn't have that much access to the sea. It doesn't have that much water. It doesn't have any oil, any gas, any natural resources except phosphate, which has been completely, you know, ravaged by now. So, really poor Jordan.

Thomas Small Since we started out talking about political control of a holy site, Jerusalem, giving legitimacy to Muslim leaders, we can briefly mention another sad chapter in the Hashemites' story, the Sharifian caliphate. So, if you remember, dear listener, the Ottoman caliphate was abolished in 1924. Sharif Husayn, who was king of the Hejaz, claimed the title for himself. He was going to be the caliph of all Muslims based in Mecca. But sadly, this gains little traction in the Muslim world. And within a year, your friend, Aimen, King Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia launched his successful conquest of the Hejaz and sent the Sharif of Mecca packing. Husayn, the father fled to his son King Abdullah in Oman. And – and – and there he died in the end. And – and where – where is he buried, Aimen. Where else but?

Aimen Dean Jerusalem.

Thomas Small Oh, that's right.

Aimen Dean Temple Mount, actually.

Thomas Small On the Temple Mount. Inside – inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Aimen Dean Just beside it.

Thomas Small Amazing. Now, Husayn's eldest son Ali, who was supposed to be the king of Hejaz, he – he briefly did hold that title, but he ended up fleeing the Saudi onslaught to Iraq, where he died. So, you know, in the end, the Hejaz was no longer ruled by the – the House of Hashim. It had been ruled by the House of Hashim for thirteen hundred years and fell into a Najdi royal family's hands, the House of Saud.

Aimen Dean Indeed. The only thing that didn't change, though, is the, you know, the custody of the Kaaba itself. And the keys of the Kaaba remained with Bani Hashim.

Thomas Small Right. So, as I said, Husayn's eldest son Ali fled to Iraq where he died, which brings us back to Iraq. Let's talk about Iraq. Aimen, you are a big fan of a famous Iraqi sociologist called Ali Al-Wardi. What does Ali Al-Wardi have to say about Iraq and especially the Iraqi people?

Now, dear listener, I warn you. Ali Al-Wardi has some rather controversial, somewhat extreme opinions on the nature of Iraqi people.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Ali Al-Wardi, you know, of course, is one of the greatest sociologists, you know, of the entire Arab world. And he commented a lot on Iraq and, you know, Iraqi people. And he said in one of his writings, you know, he said that the census will tell us that there are fifty million people in Iraq. He said, "I disagree." You know? He said, "There are thirty million people, because each Iraqi is capable of being two people at the same time."

So, you know—. So one person—. So, if we – if we talk about, like, you know, the Iraqi person being two, one person is capable of being generous. You know, a good father, a good husband, a wonderful neighbour. You know, a charitable individual. And then, the same person will possess another personality, which will be sadistic, you know, murderous, treacherous, and, you know, capable of atrocities.

Thomas Small Oh, my goodness. What—? What—? Our – our Iraqi listeners are going to feel insulted, Aimen? I mean, I guess one of their own laid out this theory.

Aimen Dean I didn't say that, you know. I'm not Ali Al-Wardi. I'm not Professor Ali Al-Wardi, that is. You know, although he died in 1995. But, you know, his books are amazing, basically. Like, you know, I mean, if there are any Iraqi listeners, you know, they will know about [unintelligible] and many other books basically he'd written and the personality of the Iraqi individual [unintelligible]. I mean, all of these wonderful books he'd written, like, you know, and—. You know, and wonderful writings. But he never minced his words.

And why this is important. Because he talked about the difference between the civilisational, you know, progress of Iraq and of the other regions, you know. For example, he what—. He talked about the Levant, he talked Persian, he talked about Egypt, and how Iraq was different, you know. So, for example, he said Egypt and Iraq, you know, both are river civilisations. Both are very old. Seven thousand years old. Both are invaded by different empires, controlled by different empires. Invaded almost by the same set of empires, you know. Greeks, Persians, Arabs, you know, British. You name it. But how the Iraqis, you know, deposed their king in 1958 and how the Egyptians deposed their king in 1952 shows the complete difference between the two.

Thomas Small Oh, you're racing ahead. We will get back to that when we get to the infamous revolution in Iraq of 1958. But sticking with the post-Ottoman period. Now, post-Ottoman Iraq was earmarked to be a British Mandate, like Palestine and Transjordan. But immediately, in 1920, the Iraqis rebelled against this plan, and the rebellion was put down by the British and your grandfather, Aimen, quite brutally, and agreement was reached via what's known as the Anglo-Iraqi Treaty of 1922.

Aimen, honestly, what did your grandfather, a pious Muslim, think he was doing allying with the British to crush Iraqi national aspirations?

Aimen Dean Okay. So, my grandfather had a lot to say.

Thomas Small No doubt. Your grandfather had a lot to say? I don't believe it.

Aimen Dean Yeah. He had a lot to say about the 1920 revolution. I mean, first of all, the 1920 revolution started actually, you know, as a small alliance between the [unintelligible], you know, the former Ottoman officials, and the Shia religious clerics or Karbala and Najaf and what they call the middle Euphrate region. You know, the area between Karbala all the way to Basrah. So, the middle Euphrate. So, this is where, you know, the revolution started, because, at the time, there was a British civil servant, who was the viceroy of Iraq. You know, Sir Arnold Wilson. And he wasn't exactly, like, you know, the brightest, you know, tool in the shed. Let's put it this way. And so, he didn't know how to deal with it. And that's why he – he lost control over swathes of Iraq. I mean, first it was a – a Ottoman remnants and Shia clerics, you know, revolt, you know, started the revolt.

Now my grandfather was in the south. So, as an ardent Sunni, you know, the British used him, you know, really and many other officers from the British Indian Army. And, you know, most of them are actually Afghans, just like my grandfather. You know, they were used, you know, to really crush, you know, the rebellion. And they were telling them, "These are, you know, the Shia. You are Sunni." So, you know—. So, there was.

But then—. There was an element of sectarianism there. But then – then, you know, it was a big surprise when the tribes of Shamar and Zoba and others, you know, who are Sunnis, started to rebel.

Thomas Small So, the Shia had rebelled in the south and then more in the north. The Sunni tribes from the desert are rebelling. Oh, my goodness.

Aimen Dean And even the Kurds started to rebel also. And this is when, you know, our dear friend, Winston Churchill, you know, used chemical weapons to – to subdue the Kurds and actually—.

Thomas Small Good ol' Winston.

Aimen Dean Yeah. So, Sadam, where did he get his idea to gas the Kurds?

Thomas Small Oh, no. It's true.

Aimen Dean Yeah. So, this is when Winston Churchill decided, "You know what? Like, you know, [unintelligible] use chemical weapon." Because it was mountain warfare, you know. The desert, you can, you know, have easy warfare there. But in the mountains there, just use gas. And, of course, he got the idea from what the Germans did in – during the World War I. And so, he deployed chemical weapons in Kurdistan. It's well-documented that Winston Churchill did it.

And, of course, it all came to an end because the 1920 revolution failed. Why? Because it was carried out by multitude of disparate groups. No coordination. They didn't know how to fight. They had no modern weaponry. And the most important thing is that the British deployed another viceroy, a much more competent viceroy, Sir Percy Cox. And he, of course, like, you know, I mean, reached the 1922 treaty, the Anglo-Iraqi Treaty, which, you know, solve the problem. How? Again, we come back to the Hashemite solution.

Thomas Small Well, it's true. Faisal was king, and – and Iraq was pacified, I suppose. But only for the time being. In – in British mandatory Iraq following the 1922 treaty, religious ethnic groups asserted their claims to autonomy or they wanted a greater share of power in this new growing modern central government.

I mean, first, as you said, there's the Shia. They weren't so happy. In general, again, as you mentioned, Aimen, tribalism was rife in the society, and it was a huge hindrance to creating a strong modern state as tribalism always is.

So, just like as it was happening at the same time in Iran, in Saudi Arabia, really everywhere, the modern state was extending its bureaucracy into the countryside, forcing a transition away from tribal organisation, from tribal values. And as a result, in the thirties, there were tribal revolts. The tribes did not wish to be sort of subjugated to the – to the central government.

In addition to the Shia, the Sunni tribe, the Kurdish tribes, there were a lot of Christians in Iraq as well, especially in the north, especially amongst a population called the Assyrians. The Assyrians are a fascinating people descended from the ancient Assyrians who were, in fact, the first people to unite Egypt, Syria, and Mesopotamia into one empire way back in the eighth century BC. They were eventually Christianised during the First World War. They were at the receiving end of Turkish genocidal mania. And so, were resettled in Northern Iraq. And during the British period, they were organised into a colonial military unit, which the British used during the revolt in 1920 with great effect.

However, the use by the British of this Christian militia as a police force for Iraq would rebound upon the Assyrians when the British Mandate ended in 1932, and Iraq gained a greater measure of independence. In 1933, there was tremendous fighting between the Assyrians and the new Iraqi army. The Iraqi army really crushed the Assyrians. Summary executions were widespread. And in general, there was a huge increase of distrust between central governments and minorities.

In the midst of all this chaos, the military becomes politically prominent for the first time in Iraq. It would always remain so. This is the legacy of British rule in Mesopotamia. Iraq was becoming a very challenging country to run. And this brings us to a very important Iraqi, the man who was running Iraq at the start of the Cold War and would play a very important role in regional geopolitics in the 1950s, Nuri al-Said.

Aimen Dean Oh, yes. Nuri al-Said.

Thomas Small Tell us about Nuri al-Said.

Aimen Dean So, Nuri al-Said, he was born in Baghdad. You know, belongs to a family from Mosul, in northern Iraq, and, you know, of Arab origin. He—. You know, his father was actually, you know, a civil servant, you know, within the Ottoman Empire. And that's what enabled him to send his son Nuri to Istanbul. You know, to the, you know, military academy there, where he graduated, you know, one of the top of the class, you know, to put it this way. You know, he was sent to the Balkans to fight the war there for the Ottomans. So, we're talking here about someone who was, you know, Ottoman, you know, really, through and through. And he fought for the Ottoman Empire. But, of course, events in Iraq later would change his mind and change his allegiance. With the beginning of the Arab Revolt, he lent his services to the Hashemites and to the Arab Revolt. His military you know, training, his understanding of Turkish military tactics. He understands—. His understanding of automated weapons made him indispensable.

Thomas Small He fought with Prince Faisal in the Arab Revolt. He was very close to Prince Faisal and then King Faisal. In fact, he was at the head of Faisal's armies who conquered Damascus. So, he really played a very important role in the revolt and, therefore, was in a position to benefit when Faisal became king of Iraq.

Faisal actually appointed Nuri al-Said director general of the Iraqi police force in 1922, which I suppose means he was your grandfather's boss. Is that right, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Eh, in a sense. Because you see, my grandfather was, you know, distinct – distinctively in the Iraqi colonial police. Not the Iraqi national police.

Thomas Small Ah.

Aimen Dean These two forces are separate. Because my—. For example, my grandfather was more responsible for the protection of the strategic assets such as the port in Basrah, such as the canals, you know, such as the water facilities. You know, while the national police were more responsible for the day-to-day, you know, running of the security within the urban centres,

Thomas Small Right. Let's move on. Nuri al-Said eventually was made prime minister in 1930 and signed a revised Anglo-Iraqi Treaty, which granted Iraq more independence, but also gave the British the right to station its troops in Iraq. Why? Well, those – those strategic assets you just described, Aimen, especially oil. The Anglo-Iraqi Treaty, guaranteed British control of the oil industry and was, therefore, not at all popular.

Aimen Dean Not at all popular, you know. And again, it shows the short-sightedness of the British at that time for not granting, you know, favourable terms in terms of oil, exploration and oil revenue sharing that could have prolonged, you know, British influence there in the long run. Unfortunately, it was short-sighted.

Thomas Small Just like what we saw in Iran with the Mossadegh case, the – the British made this mistake a lot.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Not the Americans, though.

Thomas Small Yeah. That's one of the things that made the Americans a little bit more successful in their long-term ability to keep oil-producing nations under their umbrella.

Aimen Dean Including Saudi Arabia and other countries. Yes. Indeed.

Thomas Small So, as a result of the dissatisfaction with the new treaty, Nori was dismissed by King Faisal. But then, suddenly, King Faisal died of a heart attack and was succeeded as king of Iraq by his son, Ghazi. The British convinced King Ghazi to appoint Nuri al-Said foreign minister. And then, Nuri would go on to be prime minister eleven more times. So, fourteen times in total. And his proximity to the British made him increasingly unpopular.

As a sign of this closeness to the British, when the new king, Ghazi adopted an anti-British policy and supported a military coup against the civilian government, the first military coup in modern Middle Eastern history, the king was then killed in a mysterious car crash. People said the crash had been on Nuri al-Said's orders.

Aimen Dean Well, after King Ghazi was mysteriously and unfortunately killed, his three-year-old son became the king of Iraq, King Faisal II. Of course, he's young. So, there needed to be a regency. And, of course, who was appointed as prince regent? Prince Abdul Ilah, the uncle of King Faisal II. And who happens to be a very close friend of Nuri al-Said?

Thomas Small Yes. And the – the – the alliance between Nuri al-Said and Abdullah for the next few years was very powerful in Iraq. And – and in a way, given that Iraq's king was a small child, the civilian prime minister, Nuri al-Said and, you know, and others, but mainly Nuri. So, the civilian government was able to have a lot more control than the otherwise would.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Because, of course, the military was a little bit side-lined in that case. And the military was always more or less, like, you know, I mean, influenced by British officers as well as by – by Prince Abdul Ilah himself.

Thomas Small Anyway, Iraqi politics is as confusing as Syrian politics. So, let's jump forward to the period following the Second World War. Now, Iraq declared neutrality at the beginning of the war. So, Britain, which had actually withdrawn from Iraq in 1932, reinvaded it and occupied the country until 1947. In 1947, the British wanted to stay on. They used their closeness to Nuri al-Said to negotiate a new Anglo-Iraqi Treaty, which went down even worse than before.

Aimen Dean And the situation was changing in Iraq. Because, don't forget, the Soviet Union triumphed, you know, over Nazism. And that gave rise to many communists, you know, movements in the Middle East, including in Iraq. Communism started to find more sympathetic ears in Iraq, especially among the educated young classes, especially among the Shia young, educated classes.

Thomas Small Yes. That's right. The communists were just one of many, many groups of people who were very angry by the new Anglo-Iraqi Treaty. Massive protests broke out, which were followed by harsh police crackdown. Nuri al-Said became extremely hated, especially by those communists, whom he hated back in turn. He hated communism, and his government became harshly anti-communist.

I think it's worth pointing out, though, Aimen that the political system in Iraq at the time very much favoured big land owners and the urban rich. Inequality was – was stark. And – and, therefore, the growing dissatisfaction wasn't based on nothing.

Aimen Dean Oh no, there is no question that, you know, the south was neglected. The north was neglected. And, you know, it was, as you said, like, you know, favouring, you know, the people of the big cities—Baghdad, Basrah, and Mosul. You know, if you are – if you are not part of the urban elite there, then you are part of the peasantry.

Thomas Small At the same time, the nationalist anti-colonial movements of Mohammad Mossadegh in Iran and Abdul Nasser in Egypt struck a strong chord among the Iraqi people. Riots broke out again and again and were put down violently again and again. Trouble was on the way. Which brings us finally, after so many hints and so many episodes, to the Baghdad Pact.

All right, Aimen. Here's one of my long historical rants as I – as I tried to put the Baghdad Pact in context. Nuri al-Said had learnt from the protests following the Anglo-Iraqi Treaty that a subtler arrangement had to be found for keeping Iraq within Britain's security umbrella. He was pro-British. He wanted Britain to remain a big player in Iraq. But he needed to do it in a way that would get the Iraqi people onside. So, wanting the subtler arrangement with the British, he would soon get it. But as he'd find out, the consequences would literally be fatal.

All right. Remember back in episode six, on Nasser, we said that the us had suggested to Egypt that it participate in a new alliance, like NATO only for the Middle East, and that Nasser had said, "No. Thank you. The Soviet Union doesn't threaten us. Britain threatens us." Right? Remember that?

Well, the US pressed ahead with the alliance anyway, which they reconfigured as an alliance of "northern-tier nations of the greater Middle East." Basically an arc of nations to the south of the Soviet Union, which would help to contain Soviet expansion southward. At a first step towards this goal, in April 1954, Turkey and Pakistan signed an agreement of friendly cooperation, basically a lightweight defensive agreement. And in response, Nasser convened the Arab league and strong armed all the Arab states to promise never to join a non-Arab military alliance. Nuri al-Said, the Iraqi prime minister, rather reluctantly agreed to go along with this. Nuri al-Said favoured a military alliance with British-oriented powers.

However, this wasn't to last long. In episode six, we also covered the Anglo-Egyptian Agreement, which Nasser signed with Britain, in which Britain agreed to withdraw from the Suez Canal Zone by the summer of 1956, which it did, which prompted Nasser to nationalise the canal, which led to the Suez Crisis. Remember?

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small Anyway, that agreement with Britain, which was signed in '54, contained an important clause. That Egypt would allow Britain to reoccupy the canal zone in the event of an attack on Turkey. Now, that may sound weird, but Turkey was in NATO. And so, an attack on Turkey would have meant a Western assault on the Soviet Union—World War III, basically—in which case control of the Suez Canal would be vital.

In Nuri al-Said, this clause that allowed Britain to reoccupy Egypt of Turkey was attacked was something like a three-way defensive alliance between Egypt, Turkey, and the UK. So, he negotiated his own defensive agreement with Turkey, which was signed on the 24th of February 1955.

Over the next few months, Britain, then Iran, then Pakistan would join this alliance. The headquarters for which was Baghdad. Thus was born the Baghdad Pact. So, the Baghdad Pact was a defensive alliance, like NATO to some extent. It was aimed at preventing the spread of communism in the region like NATO. But unlike NATO, it had no central military command or anything like Article V, which says that an attack on one is an attack on all.

So, it was – it was like kind of mini NATO, a watered down NATO for the Middle East. But most importantly, Aimen, unlike NATO, the United States was not a member of the Baghdad Pact. Why – why was that, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Well, the two reasons why the US did not join is simple. I mean, first, they wanted to stay completely away from the British sphere of influence when it comes to antagonising Nasser, as well as antagonising the, you know, the Israelis who they were supporting.

Thomas Small That's right. I mean, they supported the Baghdad Pact, but from behind the scenes. They did not join it. They were "benevolent patrons" of the Baghdad Pact. It was part of Eisenhower's ceaseless quest to balance Arab nationalism and Zionism at the same time. He didn't want to piss off either side in that divide.

It's obvious why Iraq joined a pact like the Baghdad Pact. I mean, for most of its history, Iraq has been at the mercy of whoever controlled Anatolia, like Turkey, or whoever controlled the Iranian plateau, like ancient Persia, like modern Iran. I mean, Nuri al-Said thought that joining a military pact that included both Turkey and Iran would neutralise the threat from either side. And this was actually foresighted, because as we'll see, you know, Iraq would eventually withdraw from the pact. And from that day onward, its relations with both Turkey and Iran have been dangerously strained.

Aimen Dean Oh, yes. For sure.

Thomas Small Which leaves the elephant in the room. Aimen. Why didn't Jordan join the Baghdad Pact? I mean, when we left Jordan, the Hashemite king, Abdullah, was in power. Jordan became independent of Britain in 1946. During the 1948 war with Israel, it annexed the West bank, thus expanding its borders. So, it seems natural given that it was a British protectorate, given the – the – the close relationship between the British military and Jordan that it would join the Baghdad Pact. Why didn't it?

Aimen Dean Well, because of an event that happened in July of 1951 that rocked, you know, the Hashemite monarchies of the Arab world. As you know, Jerusalem was part of King Abdullah I's domain. You know, the Trans—. The kingdom of Transjordan. And so, as usual, every Friday, he would go to a Al-Aqsa Mosque. He would pray there. And in that fateful day, a Palestinian assassin, twenty-one-year-old, who, under the influence of Hajj al-Amin al-Husseini, which we talked about before, you know, Hitler's propagandist, shot and killed, you know, the king on that fateful day. And, of course, basically, that really was a deeply shocking event and a destabilising event for the Hashemites.

And, you know, the—. Not only like, you know, the royal family in Jordan took note of it, of course, but, of course, the Royal family in Baghdad. The cousins, you know, took note of it.

Thomas Small King Abdullah's fifteen-year-old grandson, the future king, Hussein, was by his side when he was shot and killed.

Aimen Dean In fact, he – he received the bullet himself. But, you know, what happened is that he was wearing a medal that his own grandfather insisted that he wears. And it's that medal, which actually, you know, where the bullet was lodged. Otherwise, he could have been killed.

Thomas Small A miracle.

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

Thomas Small So, Abdullah's son Talal succeeded him. But Talal, King Talal, was pushed out of power the following year and – and they – and the sixteen-year-old Hussein became king. Why was Talal pushed out of power?

Aimen Dean It was a palace coup, and it was organised, of course, by the Talal's wife. You know, Queen Zein al-Sharaf. You know, so Queen Zein al-Sharaf, the mother of king Hussein, felt that her husband was too much of an Arab nationalist. I could—. At least that's one of the stories.

Thomas Small The official story is that he was suffering from schizophrenia, and he was sent to an insane asylum in Istanbul.

Aimen Dean There are two conflicting stories here about why Talal was pushed away. I mean, and this is a Conflicted, so we have to talk about the two stories here. I mean, the first story is that he was released, because [unintelligible] prone to violence and, therefore, an unstable. Therefore, you know, he needed to be removed in favour of a more stable and rational form of governance.

The second story here is that, no, he was actually a pan-Arab nationalist, and he was, you know, more or less, like, you know, I mean, trying to form an Arab alliance in order to liberate Palestine and all of this, you know, nonsense. Let's put it this way.

But nonetheless, you know, the time ago him being deposed is rather interesting. It was merely just three weeks after King Farouk of Egypt was ousted, you know, by the Free Officers Movement in Egypt, in the 1952 revolution. So, you know, two kings out within quick succession, except King Talal was deposed through an internal palace coup. And that was it. I mean, it was organised by his wife, who was very close to the British, especially the British head of the military. You know, Glubb Pasha.

Thomas Small Now, the famous Glubb Pasha. I swear,Aimen. We should just—. We should do a whole series on each one of these episodes. There are so many great personalities. Queen Zein was a very strong character.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small And though, her son, only sixteen years old at the time, King Hussein, became king, she remained very influential from behind the throne. King Hussein and policymakers in Jordan wanted to join the Baghdad Pact, getting back to what we were talking about in 1955, but as soon as they announced their intention to join, riots broke out across Jordan, protesting the alliance. So, Jordan didn't join. And it's important to note that these riots were largely influenced by Nasser's very sophisticated anti-Western propaganda machine.

So, the Baghdad Pact split the Arab world right down the middle. You were either pro-Western or pro-neutrality with a leaning towards the Soviets. And this began to play out as a battle between Nuri al-Said and Iraq and Gamal Abdel Nasser, the president of Egypt.

But the chips were really stacked against Nuri al-Said all along. He was already extremely unpopular inside Iraq for his draconian authoritarian, anti-communist, anti-minority regime. And then, after the Suez Crisis, Nasser became way more popular inside Iraq. Nuri al-Said was very much undermined by this.

Which takes us up to where we left off at the end of the last episode, the episode on Syria. With the formation of the United Arab Republic, the UAR. The union between Egypt and Syria, which was formed in February 1958. The idea then was that other Arab countries slowly, slowly would also join this new union. The announcement of the United Arab Republic freaked out the Hashemite monarchies. Didn't it, Aimen? Especially King Hussein in Jordan.

Aimen Dean King Hussein really freaked out about the United Arab Republic, because one reason is that, to the north, it's Syria. To the Southwest, it's Egypt. He is sandwiched between two big Arab powers, you know. And he is an underpopulated, small country.

Thomas Small It's also important that he was only twenty-two years old. I mean, a lot of the decisions that King Hussein would make over the next few years might be attributed to the fact that he was a very young man. Young men aren't really famous for their wisdom.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small And this brings us to the Iraqi king, Faisal II. You know, when we left Faisal II, he was only three years old following his father, King Ghazi's death in that car crash. Well, it's important to note that King Faisal had come to power properly in 1953, when he was eighteen years old. So, when the UAR was proclaimed in 1958, he was also only twenty-two years old, just like his cousin King Hussein in Jordan.

Aimen, tell me about Faisal II. I know that you love him.

Aimen Dean Well, who wouldn't? I mean, I – I would definitely uh, encourage the listeners to go and Google him. I mean, basically. I mean, and just see some of the videos of him visiting, you know – you know, world powers and all of that. I mean, you can tell, like, you know, I mean, his gentle demeanour, his, you know, charisma, his, you know – you know, good nature. He doesn't strike you as a despot, as a dictator, as someone basically, like, you know, who's bloodthirsty. In fact, he was one of the gentlest kings that ever, you know, reigned over any Arab country.

Thomas Small Yes. I mean, he—. I mean, he had received a Western education, and he—. But he, you know—. He's famed for being a proponent of – of democracy. He was hoping to turn Iraq into a proper constitutional monarchy.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And it – it was a dream. And what a dream. Unfortunately, this dream ended up a nightmare.

Thomas Small Nasser was, by this point, so popular and his brand of pan-Arabism so inspiring that both King Hussein of Jordan and King Faisal II of Iraq feared that they'd be overthrown by forces favouring joining the UAR.

Now, what does this say about monarchism, Aimen? If it's supposed to be the great unifying, stabilising force that you say it is, then – then why were the Hashemite monarchs at the receiving end of so much pro-republican agitation by their people?

Aimen Dean Because the monarchs or the time did not understand yet the power of transnational ideas and how they can cross borders and, you know, and the power of the media, the power of ideas spreading like virus. And at the time, it was communism and international socialism.

Thomas Small And Arab nationalism.

Aimen Dean And Arab nationalism. Arab nationalism, you know, based on the socialistic ideas, were really infectious at the time. And they did not have, you know, what we call the countermeasure. You know, the ability to counter this narrative, you know, with their population. So, it was all about not the monarchy or a nationalism. It was actually the failure of narratives.

Thomas Small It's interesting. I mean, Arab nationalism had, for a brief period in the 1910s and twenties, been sort of focused on the Sharif of Mecca and his sons creating a pan-Arab monarchical Imperium. And it was – it was pan-Arab. I mean, they – they hoped to unite all the Arabs under their Hashemite rule. It didn't work. The Western powers didn't play along exactly as they should have or would have or could have. And then, Arab nationalism took a secularising turn with the rise of Nasser and – and other movements like the Ba'ath Party and things. And so, the vision of pan-Arabism that the Hashemites had first propagated came back in the secular form to bite them in the butt.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And bite them, it did. And this is what will bring us, you know, to the July events of 1958.

Thomas Small That's right. In extreme haste, after the announcement of the United Arab Republic, on King Hussein's initiative, he and King Faisal proclaimed their own union, the Arab Federation. Literally, within thirteen days, they dreamt up a whole new union, the Arab Federation. Nuri al-Said was appointed prime minister of the new federation, but it was not destined to last long.

Aimen, as you say, this brings us to an episode in Iraqi history that you always speak of with great emotion: The 14 July Revolution of 1958,

Aimen Dean It was a curse day, a dark day. A black spot on the history of not only Iraq, but the entire Middle East.

Thomas Small As we've been saying, inside Iraq for several years, opposition had been brewing against Nuri al-Said, against the regime there. Whether it was led by Nuri al-Said or someone else, the regime had become very authoritarian, forcing most opposition voices underground.

The disparate strands of the Iraqi opposition at this point were either pro-Nasser or at least anti-anti-Nasser. So, this is from right-wing nationalists to left-wing communist. And the opposition coalesced into a new political organisation, the United National Front. So, uniting all the opposition under one umbrella.

At the same time, you know, as early as 1952, in fact, radical officers inside the Iraqi army inspired by Nasser and the other young Egyptian officers who had overthrown King Farouk had begun to organise. It's a sign of Nasser's influence, of how inspiring he was. Wasn't it, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Yes. I mean, this is the problem, like, you know, I mean, with Nasser's and that—. It really reminds me of the aged. You know, that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Thomas Small These officers loved Nasser's centralising reforms. They loved his position of non-alignment in the Cold War. They loved his boldness during the Suez Crisis. And they were itching for radical change.

Okay. So, now we're going to talk about this in detail a few episodes down the line. But in 1958, the year of the UAR and the Arab Federation, Lebanon suddenly collapsed into civil war. The young King Hussein in Jordan was spooked again.

Aimen Dean And that is why King Hussein requested military aid from his cousin, King Faisal, in Baghdad, you know, to deal with, you know, the ramifications of the Lebanese civil war.

Thomas Small He feared that the fighting in Lebanon would spill over into his country. So, he called upon his cousin in Baghdad to help. Nuri al-Said ordered Iraqi troops to Oman to defend the regime there. But instead they marched on Baghdad.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And they were marching on al-Rehab Palace, where, you know, King Faisal resided. And when the news came to King Faisal, he was told that "we can defend you. We can quickly, you know, erect the barricades. We can defend you all the way until you can get in an airplane." Because it was supposed to fly that day to Istanbul in order to seek the hand, you know, of his fiancée in marriage. You know, he was supposed to be engaged that day. That very day. His beautiful fiancée was waiting for him in Istanbul.

So, King Faisal, having already instructed the guards not to fight and open the gates of the al-Rehab Palace, he came down with his uncle, his aunts, and his cousins. And most of them were females, actually. Young girls. And he was carrying, you know, a white flag. All of this magnanimity and, you know, and surrender did not spare him at all. They were all put against the wall in the al-Rehab Palace, in the courtyard, and they were all shot dead. And, you know, even when one of the guards took him to the hospital, he was still bleeding, but alive. The soldiers prevented the doctors from saving his life, and he died bleeding on a hospital stretcher.

Thomas Small That's right. It's – it's a terrible, terrible story. The whole—. The revolution was the work of two officers, mainly Abdul Karim Kassam and – and another one. I mean, Kassam is the – the man who ended up leading the revolutionary state that – that would emerge after the revolution.

Yeah. There was no resistance from the royal palace, as you say. He – he was gentle. He said, "Look, we're going to let these people in. They're our – our fellow Iraqis." And at 8 AM, the royal family were taken out into the courtyard and executed by firing squad.

Nuri al-Said, who they were also looking to kill, escaped. But the next day, he was spotted in the street. And – and right there, right where he stood, they shot him dead. The bodies of Nuri al-Said, of the Royal family, as well as politicians and businessmen who had been hunted down and killed, the bodies were dragged through the streets, strung up. I—. You know, it was disgusting.

Aimen Dean It was extremely barbaric. And, of course, the king was buried in an unmarked grave, you know, like a commoner. Until years later, Saddam Hussein of all people exhumed – exhumed the body of King Faisal. Gave him the proper burial. And while I do believe that what happened to King Faisal, that to regicide, you know, that, you know, barbaric killing of that young, you know, king who actually had nothing but good intention towards his people and towards his country, I think it is what really sent Iraq, you know, down that spiral of instability, you know, and warfare and bloodshed that is still plaguing the country until now.

Thomas Small Well, after the revolution in Iraq in 1958, the – the era of federation that kings Faisal and Hussein had so hastily put together immediately fell apart. I think that's obvious. Iraq also withdrew almost immediately from the Baghdad Pact. In fact, the revolutionary officers had invoked the Baghdad Pact as a justification for the coup.

It's likely that most of the revolutionaries expected that Iraq would join Nasser's UAR. But Abdul Karim Kassam, the – the general who managed to grab the reins of power in Baghdad, he didn't want to surrender any power to Nasser. So, he didn't join the UAR. And the – the course towards pan-Arab union was stalled once again. Iraqi politics became very messy. For eighteen months, Iraq saw escalating violence as a new political elite, swirling around Kassam polarised. There were pan-Arab unionists versus Iraqi nationalists, socialists versus liberal democrats versus communists. Nasserists versus Ba'athists, i.e., Iraqis who were more pro-Egypt and Iraqis who were more pro-Syrian. Christians versus Muslims. Kurds versus Arabs. Poor versus rich.

Aimen Dean Shia versus Sunni.

Thomas Small Iraq, it fell apart.

Aimen Dean indeed. And, you know, one of the things, when you look at the, you know, at the what ifs of history is that there was no need to kill the king. You know, they could have easily just, you know, went all the way to him and, you know, say, "Okay. That's it. We're taking over the government. Dismiss Nuri al-Said. Dismiss your uncle, Abdul Ilah. And we are taking over as a government with you as a figurehead." And things would have been pretty much different.

Thomas Small Eventually, the general, Kassam, was able to navigate a way through this chaos, and he crushed dissent. So, he became the dictator of Iraq for five years and built a state much like Nasser's in Egypt—secular in outlook, oriented toward development and social mobility, but a military dictatorship. Oh, and also just like Nasser, he turned to the Soviet Union for loans and armaments.

Kassam himself was overthrown in a coup by the Ba'ath Party in 1963. And Iraq like Syria, at around the same time, was now fully dominated by a radical secular dictatorship espousing pan-Arab nationalism.

There's a pattern here. You say, Aimen, that monarchism is built into the Middle Eastern mindset or so or whatever. But surely, the relentless spread of pan-Arab nationalism in the fifties and sixties is a powerful argument against your view. It was all very popular.

Aimen Dean It was. And the, you know, the secret word here. It was. Was. You know? W-a-s. Was. It, you know—. It's, you know—.

Because if you look at the popularity of monarchy right now, it is really soaring. Because when you look at Egypt, when you look at Iraq, when you look at Libya, when you, you know, ask around basically the population there, and they will always now remember, you know, the monarchs of all more fondly. The monarchy has been rehabilitated, because populations went through hell, you know, due to, you know, all the decisions that were taken by these dictators, especially, like, you know, I mean, Saddam, Hafez, al-Assad, [unintelligible]. All of these dictators who ruled their countries with iron fist. You know, if they start to compare them with what came before them, they would say, "Oh, we wish that era never ended."

And the same with Iran. Many people still looking at the repressive days of the shah, you know, with more fondness when they compare it to what they are living under right now, under the, you know, Mullah's regime in Tehran.

Thomas Small Well, Aimen, I don't – I don't really have a sermon to end today's episode with. All this talk about the Temple Mount, the temple in Jerusalem, has gotten me thinking about kingship and especially sacred kingship. In – in the Hebrew Bible, the original temple in Jerusalem built by King Solomon was intimately bound up with the monarchy. The king was something like an image down here on earth of what God was up in heaven. This, despite the fact that, according to the text of the Bible, when the Israelites asked God for a king, he told them they'd be better off as they were: a loose collection of self-governing tribes, which in times of trouble would turn to divinely-inspired judges to help them through the crisis.

Nonetheless, the Israelites insisted. And so, God gave them what they wanted: a king. With decidedly chequered results, I must say.

Now, when Christianity came along, a similar sort of tension arose between right worship and kingship. Christ's kingdom was "not of this world," he said. But when the Roman emperors became Christians, they would rule as the vice [unintelligible] of God on earth.

And again, the results were not altogether Christian. We've already discussed Islam's ambivalence about kingship. I would say you disagree, Aimen. But in all three religious traditions, worldly kingship, monarchical governance existed alongside in a sort of stable tension with other more explicitly religious forms of authority. Rabbis, priests, elders, sheiks, judges, monks, ulama. But modernity and secular republicanism, which is modernity's most pure political expression, upset that balance, that tension. The part of the world that the monarch had governed was secularised and made absolute.

The other half, it was hardly even acknowledged, certainly not in the same way, and it was marginalised. Now, I don't know where I'm going with this, Aimen. But I sound like a broken record. But again, you do see modernity imposed in a non-modern, non-Western civilisation, and the result is clash, conflict, violence.

Aimen Dean Exactly. That is why, in my opinion, the best form of governments are those which are organic.

Thomas Small We agree about that, Aimen.

Okay. We've done what we can to tell the story of the rise and rise of Arab nationalism, pan-Arabism, Nasserism, whatever. With more and more Arab countries going nationalist and tilting toward the Soviet, all the pieces were in place for a couple of civilisation-shaking wars with Israel. Stay tune.

Did you know, dear listener, that you can follow the show @MHConflicted on both Twitter and Facebook. And did you also know that there is a Facebook discussion page where you can join like-minded listeners to pick over the details of the subjects we discuss on the show? Well, now you know. Head over to Facebook and search "Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group" to learn more.

Finally, we'd like to let you know that, at the end of each episode, Aimen and I answer a question posed to us by one lucky listener. Send us your burning questions on Twitter and Facebook. Then, to hear if your question is read out, subscribe to ad-free listening and bonus content access on Apple Podcasts for just 99p.

If you listen on Spotify, you can access the same perks by subscribing to Conflicted Extra also for just 99p.

We look forward to you joining us again in two weeks' time for the next episode of Conflicted.

Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Rowan Bishop. Sandra Ferrari is our executive producer production. Support and fact-checking by Molly Freeman. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

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Conflicted S3 E8 - The State of Syria

Thomas Small Aimen, you're not a fan of the Lord of the Rings, are you?

Aimen Dean Of course, I'm a fan. You know, my favourite character was always Sauron.

Thomas Small Oh, Aimen, that can't be true. Surely, it's – it's – it's Samwise Gamgee. Come on. Everyone loves Sam.

Aimen Dean Come on. Like, what? A doofus gardener? I mean, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. For me, Sauron. Sauron was always the most intriguing character in the entire trilogy.

Thomas Small You have an insatiable thirst for power, Aimen.

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

Thomas Small What about The Silmarillion? Did you ever read that book?

Aimen Dean Yeah. I mean, it was just a little bit of, you know, history of the Lord of the Rings, where you learn about the Elves and the Maiar and the Valar and whatever and all of that. And then, I got lost completely.

Thomas Small Oh, dear. I'm afraid that our listeners in this season of Conflicted will be feeling the same way every time we go to the Bronze Age. 'Cause I was thinking – I was thinking that, like, the main storyline is the Lord of the Rings. But every time we go to the deep past, it's going to The Silmarillion. But oh, my goodness. Now I'm afraid they might hate it. 

Aimen Dean They do. 

Thomas Small All right. Let's get into it.

This episode, Aimen, is all about Syria. But before we launch into Syria's past, what's going on in Syria right now? It's not in the news as often as it used to be. Has the civil war ended? Is it a stalemate? Like, how much of Syria does Bashar al-Assad's government in Damascus actually control?

Aimen Dean Well, I can – I can – I can tell you that the war in Syria is – is in – in some sort of hiatus. Like, you know, it has taken a sabbatical, you know, for – for a better use of a word. At the moment, Bashar al-Assad is controlling rough, let's say, about roughly two-thirds of Syria. And in that two-thirds of Syria coexist two competing powers here. First is Iran and its proxies, whether it is Hezbollah or the Iraqi Shia militias stationed in Syria or the Afghan and the Pakistani Shia militias stationed also in Syria, and they are part of a global Qudz Force. So, this is one part, you know, of the equation.

The other part of the equation, you know, will be the Russians. And so, the Russians and the Iranians, they have—. You know, they exist. They coexist in the semi-harmonious zone of influence within the two-thirds that Bashar al-Assad controls.

Thomas Small I see. So, two-thirds of the country, Bashar al-Assad, Iran, and Russia control. And what about the other third?

Aimen Dean The other third is, well, divided. I mean, one-fifth, you know, of Syria as a whole is controlled by the Kurds known as the YPG or the PYD depending basically on who you ask.

Thomas Small The Kurds, they are mainly focused in the Jazira, that – that area of north-eastern Syria that's between the Tigris and Euphrates. Is that right?

Aimen Dean Yeah. Al-Hasakah, Deir ez-Zor. All these places. Like, you know, I mean, so, this is where, you know, where – where the Qamishli is, where the Kurds are based. And that is, to some extent, an American zone. You know, the Americans are mostly based there. And that is where the oil is, by the way.

Thomas Small I see.

Aimen Dean So, yeah. You see, like, you know, I mean, you Americans, wherever the smell of oil is there, you just can't resist. Can't you, huh?

Thomas Small And what about the rest? What about the rest?

Aimen Dean Okay. So, the belt, which is the west of the Aleppo countryside, all the way to Idlib, passing by Afrin, that is controlled by the Turks and by their proxy jihadist groups, such as HTS and PTI, the, you know, which is the party of the Turkish, you know, Islamic, you know, Turkistan whatever, which is the Uyghur party that is stationed there.

Thomas Small I see. So, how would you describe Syria at the moment? I mean, does it – does it work? Does it run? I mean, what would it be like to be there?

Aimen Dean It is a semi-functioning failed state. That's the best way I can describe it.

Thomas Small A functioning failed state. I like that description. "A functioning failed state." In my view, that description would apply to all of Syrian history, from the mid-nineteenth century to the present, as we hope to demonstrate.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small Actually, that reminds me. We were meant to be talking about a clash of civilisations in the Middle East, and whether that can help us understand the conflicts going on there today. And I think the stories we've been telling—and it hasn't been very linear, I admit—of the late Ottoman colonial and Cold War periods do shed a lot of light on that theme of clash of civilisations.

In episode three, on Saudi Arabia, we indicated ways in which the sharia law and traditional ideas of Islamic governance and jurisprudence differ sharply from the modern norms. There you have, in one local forum, a civilisation. Let's call it Islamic.

At the end of episode four, on Russia, I laid out the Cold War ideological fault line between the West and the Soviet Union. Each side was championing a specific version of modernity, which each understood to be universal in character. As far as I'm concerned, this is another civilisation: modernity. And despite its universalist pretensions, it is essentially Western.

Over the following three episodes, on Iran, Egypt, and the Holy Land, we showed the different ways in which Western modernity forced its way into those countries, aided and abetted by the colonial powers, by the CIA, by local modernisers with big ideas, and by European settlers with nationalist ambitions of their own.

Today, we're talking about Syria. It has been described as a fulcrum of geopolitical hegemony. A bit like Ukraine, interestingly. A fulcrum of geopolitical hegemony in the Middle East. For that reason, for thousands of years, Syria has been fought over and smashed up by invading armies from all directions, making it a somewhat amorphous patchwork of tribes, regions, and cities practicing a wide variety of religions. More than perhaps anywhere else, Syria's road to modern nationhood has been strewn with conflict, which we'll explore through the prism of our continuing journey across the Cold War Middle East.

Ready, Aimen?

Aimen Dean I was born ready.

Thomas Small Right. The first question is: What is Syria? What is Syria? How do we define it?

Aimen Dean What definition you want? Do you want the Greek definition? Do you want the Roman definition? Do you want the Arab definition? Which definition you want?

Thomas Small We can start with a sort of geographic definition, because geography is destiny. So, there's this thing. It's called the Dead Sea Rift, and it runs north-south along the eastern Mediterranean, the Levantine coast. It's a fault system where the African plate meets the Arabian plate. And this is fascinating. They're both moving in the same direction towards the northeast.

Aimen Dean An Arabian plate and an African plate. That, you know, that sounds to me pretty much like, you know, bringing ugali, you know, and you mixing it, like, you know, I mean, with feta cheese. And that's it. Like, you know, I mean, you end up with—.

Thomas Small I have no idea what you're talking about.

Aimen Dean You're talking about plates, man. Plates.

Thomas Small Tectonic plates, my friend. Tectonic plates.

Aimen Dean Oh, okay. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry.

Thomas Small The Arabian tectonic plate and the African tectonic plate meet along the Dead Sea Rift. They're both moving in the same direction, toward the northeast. But the Arabian plate is moving faster, pulling away from the African plate ever so slowly. So, there's this rift in the land. That's the reason for the distinctive geography of the Eastern Mediterranean, where, after a narrow coastal plane, you have rippling strips of high mountain ranges and plunging valleys, including the Jordan Valley, which, at the Dead Sea, is the lowest spot on Earth.

So, if we're talking geography, we have to think in these terms. Mountains and valleys. Good places for lots of different—I don't know—minorities to hide out.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. I mean, Mount Lebanon, you know, was historically, since fourteen, fifteen years ago, always as a refuge for all sorts of fringe religious sects to go and hide there and flourish there.

Thomas Small Muslim and Christian.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. And other, you know, neo-founded religions like the Druze and others. So, that is why Mount Lebanon was always, you know, such a refuge for these minorities.

Thomas Small Not just Mount Lebanon. So, Greater Syria, we can think of as – as basically a large plateau, quite arid, that is hemmed about by mountains. The Taurus Mountains in the north. So, that's the Southern part of Anatolia. And then, there's these mountain ranges. First, the Amanus Mountains or the Nur Mountains. And that was largely populated with Armenians.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small Then, you have a little gap. And then, you have the al-Ansariyah Mountains, which were populated by Alawites. And then, you have a little gap. And then, as you said, you have Mount Lebanon with Druze and Maronites. And the Anti-Lebanon Mountains on the other side of the Bekaa Valley. Druze and Sunnis there. Another gap. Mount Carmel. Jews and Christians. Another gap. And then, the Judean Hills stretching down into the Sinai.

So, it's a very undulating sort of landscape down that strip. But then, on the eastern side of that strip, desert.

Aimen Dean Well, Syria is not just only about, you know, hills and valleys and mountains. You know, we have to talk about the people who inhabit these hills, valleys, and mountains. And these are the Central Semitic people.

Thomas Small The Central Semites.

Aimen Dean Yes. Central Semites.

Thomas Small So, that's sort of like Canaanites, Ugaritic speakers, Aramaic speakers, Hebrew speakers, and, of course, Arabic speakers. These are the Central Semites.

Aimen Dean And that is why these lands are called Bilad al-Sham, because it's named after Sam or Sham as he is known in the Bible, the son of Noah, the biblical figure from the flood. So, that is why the land there is called Bilad al-Sham.

Thomas Small The forefather of all the Semites.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Including us, by the way. 

And talking about, you know, a, you know, city that is specifically called al-Sham by the local inhabitants of Syria, you know, in modern times, it's Damascus, you know. You know, whenever you hear a Syrian, you know, "Oh, I just traveled, you know, to al-Sham."

"Well, you live in al-Sham."

I mean, you know, he said, "No, no, no. We call Damascus, the city itself, we call it al-Sham. And all the surrounding suburbs is called al-Sham."

Interestingly, Thomas, do you know that Damascus is, in fact, the oldest inhabited, continuously inhabited, capital city in the world? It was built in 5000 BC. So, it is seven thousand years of being a capital city. Unbelievable.

Thomas Small Well, in fact, what do we mean when we say "capital city?" A very long time ago, it was the capital of a small principality known as Aram Damascus. But – but, really, it wasn't a major capital city until it became the capital of the Umayyad Caliphate, the first big caliphate of Islam.

Aimen Dean Indeed. But still, it was always the most important city in the province of Syria for the Greeks, for the Romans. And, of course, it was always around, you know, as a important city, you know, that controlled significant amount of land around it. So, it was always a city state in its own, but also a capital of a larger entity.

Thomas Small Yeah. That's the word. City state. And in fact, it was one of many city states that dotted Syria: Aleppo, Hama, Homs, Tripoli, Latakia, Antioch, Tyre, Sidon.

Aimen Dean Beirut.

Thomas Small What else? Beirut. So many cities that are very ancient and that really ruled themselves for many thousands of years. They may have been incorporated into other imperial entities like the Romans and like the Umayyads. But actually, the Bilad al-Sham, Syria was, for most of its history, run as a collection of independent city states who were largely left to rule themselves.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small Okay. That's Syria defined. But as you can see, it's like I said before. Syria is a rather amorphous concept.

But let's get back to the Cold War. Let's get back to where we left off a couple of episodes ago. Because at the moment, we're aiming at the Six-Day War of 1967 and the Yom Kippur War of 1973. Those wars were mainly between Israel, Egypt, Jordan, and Syria. We've covered Egypt and Israel. And today, we're going to focus on Syria. We're putting our ducks in a row as it were. Or we're trying to at least.

Now, listen, the Arab world in the 1950s is about as complex, confusing, and convoluted as could be. It's been described as a game of multi-dimensional Cold War chess. We're doing our best to streamline the story. But pay attention, 'cause we'll be jumping around a bit. All right?

Now, first, a recap, a reminder of the Middle Eastern Cold War dynamic of the late fifties at the moment of Egyptian President Nasser's ultimate triumph when he defeated the Western powers and Israel during the Suez Crisis in 1956. Recall, when Eisenhower came to power in '53, he condemned European colonialism and supported nationalism. But he also feared that the Soviet Union, by manipulating nationalist feelings in the Third World, would turn the Third World communist.

Aimen Dean And Eisenhower wasn't actually paranoid, to be honest. I mean, Stalin, before his death in 1953, he was doing everything he could in order to turn the Arabs against the West, including America, by, you know, painting them as just an extension of the colonial West, the old colonial West, and he was trying his best to bring them into the Soviet camp.

Thomas Small Iraq and Jordan, at that time, were both monarchies under Hashemite kings. So, they were aligned with Britain. And Saudi Arabia, under its new king, Saud, well, it was sitting on the fence and playing a rather tricky game. But Egypt was committed to pan-Arab nationalism. Egypt's nationalism was worrying enough for Washington. Remember how Nasser bought weapons from the Soviet via Czechoslovakia in 1955? But then, Nasser declared his neutrality in the Cold War. He didn't want to side with the West or the Soviets. He wanted Egypt to be independent. Neutrality wasn't anti-Soviet enough for Eisenhower.

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. Because the Americans—I'm sorry to say it, Thomas—always have this mantra, which is "You are with us or against us." "My way or the highway."

Thomas Small This was definitely true during the Arab Cold War. I mean, Eisenhower was certainly convinced that Soviet influence was dangerously on the rise, especially after Egypt's victory in the Suez Crisis brought Nasser closer to the Soviets.

So, Eisenhower produced his famous doctrine, the Eisenhower Doctrine, in January 1956. It stated that America will intervene militarily in any Middle Eastern country threatened by international communism. And as far as he was concerned, Arab nationalism was now such a threat, which is ironic, because, as we've seen, America had already intervened several times in the internal affairs of Middle Eastern countries. 

In 1952 in Egypt, when the CIA helped overthrow King Farouk. 

In 1953 in Iran, when the CIA helped overthrow Muhammad Masonic. 

But in fact, as early as 1949, the CIA helped to overthrow a democratically-elected president of a Middle Eastern nation. 

Do you know which nation, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Who else? Syria.

Thomas Small Syria was the first Arab country to win its complete independence from a colonial power. In Syria's case, from France, in 1943. Well, partially in 1943 and then fully in 1946. Still the first, though. Syria's first president was Shukri al-Quwatli. 

Aimen, tell us about Shukri al-Quwatli.

Aimen Dean Shukri al-Quwatli. What I can say about him? First of all, he's an aristocrat. You know, that is important to say. That he was a descendant of a – a noble Hashemite family that came from the Hejaz, from Mecca, in the eighteenth century and settled in Damascus. And worked for the Ottoman. That family worked for the Ottoman empire. One of his grandfathers, Hasan Pasha al-Quwatli, you know, who was the chief of all the traders and, you know, chief of the commerce actually in Damascus for the Ottomans. And yet, despite this privilege and coming from an aristocratic family, he actually was a early proponent of Arab nationalism, even during Ottoman time.

Thomas Small Ah. So, he believed that the Arabs should be independent of the Turks. So, he was a sort of pan-Arab before pan-Arabism.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. I mean, from the beginning. I mean, he was—. Clearly, he showed such potential. And he was all the ways opposing all forms of colonialism, whether it is the Ottoman, as well as British and French.

Thomas Small And for that reason, he actually hated monarchy. He believed that the Arab monarchies were tools of the colonial powers.

Aimen Dean Even though the Arab monarchies, most of them are Hashemite at the time, and he's a Hashemite. And yet he stuck to his principles. No. No monarchies.

Thomas Small So, back to the CIA coup in Syria, 1949. The war with Israel was still raging. Arab losses were causing widespread discontent inside Syria, and President al-Quwatli called on the army to crush protests there. He was adamant against any negotiations with Israel. Unlike Egypt and Jordan, they were negotiating armistice agreements.

Now, Syrian General Husni al-Za'im, the leader of the Syrian forces in the war, had long had designs on a military coup. And in early 1949, he approached a CIA officer at the American embassy in Damascus to sound out the US for support.

Aimen Dean And the reason, Thomas, why the US really disliked Shukri al-Quwatli can be summarised in one word: the Tapline. Now, what is the Tapline?

Thomas Small The Tapline?

Aimen Dean The Tapline is an oil pipeline that will go from the oil fields in Saudi Arabia in the east, on the waters of the Gulf, passing through Jordan through Syria into Lebanon. And from there, the oil will be exported to the West. 

Now here's the problem is that, you know, Shukri al-Quwatli, disliked monarchies so much so that he didn't want, you know, an oil pipeline passing from Saudi Arabia through Jordan, two monarchies he disliked. You know, he considered them to be the Stooges of the West. And they will pass through Syria. That pipeline will pass through Syria into Lebanon. So, he didn't like to play ball.

Now, you know what happened when you have oil, someone doesn't like to play ball, and America involved in one sentence. Do you know what's going to happen?

Thomas Small Well, I mean, in addition to the Tapline, America had its general worries at the time that democracy would lead to pro-communist sympathies. So, it's not really in keeping with – with America's ideals. But al-Za'im therefore had a good – a good audience in the embassy. He said, apparently, according to his own memoirs, "There is only one way to start the Syrian people along the road to progress and democracy: with the whip."

Aimen Dean Typical. That's very typical.

Thomas Small I mean, pretty prophetic words. I think a certainly fateful one.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small The US gave General al-Za'im the go-ahead. And on the 30th of March 1949, he launched his coup. President al-Quwatli was overthrown and exiled to Cairo. That's important. Keep that in your mind. With al-Za'im now in power, the Tapline was approved. Internal order was restored, and an armistice with Israel was agreed. 

General al-Za'im's coup was the first coup out of nine that Syria would go through between 1949 and 1970, when the infamous Hafez al-Assad came to power. Or maybe even more, I mean, honestly, there were so many coups that scholars can't even agree on the number.

Aimen Dean Do you know that between 1946 and 1966, Syria had twenty governments and five constitutions?

Thomas Small Oh, poor Syria.

Aimen Dean Yeah. They give the Italians a run for their money, man.

Thomas Small It's certainly a sign that Syria's nation building project wasn't going well

Aimen Dean Indeed. Absolutely.

Thomas Small Okay. So, there you have it. 1949, the CIA helped overthrow President al-Quwatli, the first of its many attempts to control political processes inside Middle Eastern countries.

Now we started by talking about the Eisenhower Doctrine of 1957. And the first test of that doctrine was where? You guessed it. Syria. To understand how we're now going to zoom out back to the regional dimension. Throughout 1949, Israel signed separate armistice disagreements with the Arab states.

Aimen Dean Yeah. I mean, there were several demilitarised zones or DMZs as they call them. I mean, the, you know—. Along the Golan Heights with – between Israel and Syria. Along the, you know, the West Bank, and around east, west Jerusalem between Jordan, which now occupied the West Bank and Israel. And you have along the border in the Negev and the Sinai deserts, between Egypt and Israel. These were, to some extent, policed by the United Nations, you know, Peacekeeping Forces. They were some of the earliest peacekeeping forces were ever deployed to the, you know—. Anywhere around the world, actually, early on in the United nations.

Thomas Small Well, they weren't policed very well, because over the following years fighting broke out between both sides, between the Israelis and the Arabs, in the demilitarised zones, including with Syria. And with Syria quite badly in 1951. These were part of what Israeli history calls the Border Wars. Back and forth, tit for tat raids.

What's more Egypt, which had occupied the Gaza Strip during the 1948 War, remained in possession of Gaza.

Aimen Dean Well, Gaza is always on the news these days. It's been always on the news for as long as anyone could remember. Actually, if you are, you know – you know, listening to this podcast and you are in your eighties, then in the 1950s, you would still have heard about Gaza all the time. Because, you know, in 1949, 1950, 1951, 1952, you know, you always hear about raids by Palestinian militants supported by the Egyptian military, as well as the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood launching raids against Israel, you know, in those days. It was always in the news then.

Thomas Small We actually referred to these raids in our episode on the Suez Crisis, because Israel would eventually choose to join France and Britain's invasion of Egypt, partly as a way of stopping these raids.

Anyway, in 1955, the year before the Suez Crisis, during one of these Palestinian raids from Gaza, an Israeli citizen was killed. When the culprit was in turn murdered by Israeli forces, he was carrying documents linking him to Egyptian intelligence. So, in reprisal, Israel launched Operation Black Arrow.

Aimen Dean That raid actually was led by none other than Ariel Sharon, who would later become—.

Thomas Small Oh, Ariel Sharon.

Aimen Dean Yeah. The prime minister of Israel.

Thomas Small Well, I – I – I think of Ariel Sharon as the guy who was on life support for, like, twelve years. And you always – you always ask yourself, "Is Ariel Sharon still alive?"

Aimen Dean No. He died. But, you know, he left behind him a legacy, man. Like, you know, I mean, the man had a very long history. And most of it—. It's—. It – it was in conflict with the neighbouring Arabs.

Thomas Small If you could say that again.

Aimen Dean Yeah. In 1955, I mean, he led that raid, into Gaza, you know, landing with—.

Thomas Small Operation Black Arrow.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Landing with a hundred and fifty of his paratroopers in Gaza, surrounded the Egyptian base near Rafa, and they killed thirty-eight, you know, Egyptian soldiers.

Thomas Small Oof.

Aimen Dean Of course, that operation had significant ramifications.

Thomas Small Yes. In Syria, Operation Black Arrow triggered a major policy change. So, since the coup in '49, six years earlier, Syria had been through four more coups and – and a major uprising that was crushed. The latest coup had seen a return to parliamentary democracy, and the new government was anti-Nasser, anti-leftist. 

Operation Black Arrow, though, caused the people to become fervently pro-Nasser, leading to further political turmoil.

Aimen Dean And guess what? There was someone in exile in Cairo who was reading, you know, the political scene there in Syria and reading the mood of the people and decided "now is the time." 

So, with, you know, support from Nasser himself and his intelligence services, you know, Shukri al-Quwatli, you know, the president who was toppled by a CIA coup, you know, returned back from exile in Cairo, landed in Damascus Airport, and announced, "I'm going to stand for president." And guess what? He won.

Thomas Small So, President al-Quwatli is back in power, and he immediately signed a joint defence agreement with Nasser, basically creating a mini-NATO. The agreement said an attack on one was tantamount to an attack on the other. 

Now, Nasser had bought his Czech weapons the month before. Syria would do the same the month after. This close cooperation and coordination between Egypt and Syria was really worrying to Washington. Something like a Soviet Alliance System seemed to be emerging in the Middle East, centring on Syria and Egypt. And so, at this point, in early 1957, Eisenhower announces his doctrine.

Aimen Dean Well, it is a fascinating speech, Thomas. And I – I definitely urge listeners, you know. Go on and read that speech. It really shed light on, you know, the, you know – you know, the fears the United States have during the – those dark, you know, years of the Cold War.

Thomas Small I was amazed at how clear and precise it is. How honest it is. You'd never hear a speech by an American president to Congress like it today. You know, it's intelligent and sophisticated. It contrasts very sharply with what we listen to these days.

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small The doctrine, Eisenhower said, would "include the employment of the armed forces of the United States to secure and protect the territorial integrity and political independence of such nations requesting such aid against overt armed aggression from any nation controlled by international communism."

Now that's convoluted diplomatic speech for "If you think your neighbour is falling to international communism, tell us and we'll invade them." 

And – and because only Egypt and Syria were receiving weapons from the Soviet Union at the time, the doctrine was clearly targeting them.

Aimen Dean They worried that Eisenhower and the wider US administration at the time used to have is the fact that, through Syria, you know, two important oil pipelines were going: the Tapline, which we talked about before, which, you know, the former president, Shukri al-Quwatli opposed; and also another oil pipeline that was going from Iraq, a major oil producer, also going through Syria, you know, and then from there into the Mediterranean to export to the West.

Another thing also is the fact that some of the Gulf oil from Kuwait, from Saudi Arabia, from UAE, from Oman used to go through the Suez Canal. And who is now controlling the Suez Canal? Egypt. So, you have two countries with Soviet, you know leaning and sympathising governments you know, more or less putting their thumbs, you know, on the oil jugglers of the West.

Thomas Small So, keeping those countries free of Soviet control was of paramount strategic importance to the United States. My question, though, Aimen, is: Was there ever any real chance of communism taking hold in the Middle East?

We said before that Eisenhower wasn't paranoid. And it is true that the Soviet Union was pursuing a policy of convincing the Arabs to – to turn against the West. But I don't know. I don't really think that Arabs would ever really become communists.

Aimen Dean Well, Thomas, I – I – I somehow never believed that the Arabs had it in them, basically, to become a fully-fledged communists, whether Leninist or Bolsheviks or Trotskyites, you know. I mean, you know, I can't—. I just don't see it happening because of the fact that the Arabs, whether Muslim or Christian, they do have that tendency towards, you know, having God being central to their lives. I mean, you can't just, you know, take away your religion from everyday lives of the Arab people. And, therefore, the idea that somehow—somehow—you will end up with Arabs, you know, basically, like, you know, believing, you know, in the nuclear family being redundant or, you know, adopting a fully-fledged communist societies, no. It's never going to happen.

So—. But why did the US believe is – it was going to happen in the 1950s? I think because, you know—. And there were studies, you know, done at the time, which says that if the Muslim Central Asian republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, and other places, you know, were in fact incorporated, you know, into the Soviet communism, so will other Muslim societies.

And what happened with the Tudeh Party in Iran and the, you know, some of the wider appeal that they had within Iranian Muslim society, that also scared the Americans into believing that there is a real chance for communism to spread into the rest of the Muslim world.

Thomas Small Yeah. I think you're right. I think that Muslims are too religious, really, to be swayed by atheist, godless communism. But when I read the – the text of the Eisenhower Doctrine and think about it, I sort of think, you see, here's an example of kind of Western modernity seeking to dominate the Middle East by invoking these universalist ideas of freedom and – and – and liberty and – and prosperity and progress. But it had to be on America's terms. 

You know, modernisation is westernisation. You know, because you can't—. I think you can't modernise without being Westernised. I think modernisation is a civilisation, and it clashes with Islamic civilisation.

Aimen Dean Not necessarily. I mean, I would say that if – if you go back to the Middle Ages, you know – you know, Western physicians couldn't have actually, like, you know, become physicians and actually, you know, involved in the medical sciences without having studied Arabic. So, at the end of the day, like, you know, I mean, to modernise is to Arabise, you know, in the Middle Ages, you know.

Thomas Small Hmmm. I think we're having a clash of civilisations right here, Aimen. I don't agree. I don't think that West – Western scholars reading Arabic texts to become better doctors is what I mean by modernisation or modernity. Modernity is about much bigger things. About individualism, about rationalism, about a secular state that dominates every part of your life. This is – this is a specific civilisational sort of impulse that runs counter to Islam.

Aimen Dean In a sense, yes. But really, you know, does religion prevent a civilisation?

Thomas Small No. No. I just—. No. Yeah. I'm not saying that at all. I'm saying that Islamic civilisation is different from Western civilisation.

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small But that Western civilisation is modernity. It is modern civilisation.

Aimen Dean But you can always have modernity in a different flavour. You can have Islamic modernity. You can have a Christian modernity. You can have Jewish modernity. You can have a Hindu modernity. At the end of the day, you can have modernity whatever flavour you like.

Thomas Small Well, this is what this season of Conflicted is all about. I don't think we agree. But anyway, getting back to the story. After Eisenhower released his doctrine, Syria immediately denounced it. They weren't stupid. It clearly stated that if one of its neighbours asked the US to do so, the US would order its forces to occupy Syria. It accused the US of being an imperialist power.

Okay. Things really started to heat up from there. In July of that year—this is 1957—the Syrian defence minister flew to Moscow for talks. The Soviets were offering low-interest, long-term loans, low-cost weapons deals, and technical assistance without political strings attached. This is very different from the United States, who were always expecting the recipients of their aid to fall in line with their own political project, just like Nasser and the Aswan Dam. So, the Syrian defence minister goes to Moscow for talks, and these talks are a success. The Soviet premier, Khrushchev, announces a new, even bigger arms agreement, with Syria.

Then, the next month, mysteriously, three American diplomats are expelled from Damascus for alleged involvement in a conspiracy to overthrow the regime. And a few days later, the president of Syria appointed a man named Afif al-Bizri as chief of staff to the Syrian army. This really freaked out Washington.

Aimen Dean Oh, yes. Because Afif al-Bizri is a troublemaker. I mean, he is a full-fledged socialist. Without any hesitation. And he was always anti-Western, anti-colonialist, as well as being very anti-Israeli. I mean, he participated in all the wars that Syria participated in against Israel.

Thomas Small At a press conference, Eisenhower expressed grave concern. And the Syrians, two days later, had their own press conference. "Our policy is anti-Zionist and anti-imperialist," they said. "Not communist." They rejected the paternalism of the great powers.

And, Aimen, I can tell you, they had a point. I was reading some recently unclassified cables between the British foreign office and the state department. And when you read these cables, the way, especially the Brits, I must say, especially the way the British talk about Middle Eastern countries, it is very paternalistic. They're always being like, "Maybe we'll put this guy in power here. But that would piss off this guy. So, we have to make sure that they think this. But we choose to put this person in power here." Very like as if they're still in control.

Aimen Dean Well, it is the hangover of the empire, you know. But, you know—. But – but I can – I can tell you yes, to an extent, the Syrians were right to say, "Well, look, I mean, we are not communists." After, all the Syrians were always very entrepreneurial. I mean, just like their, you know, neighbours in Lebanon. They were always, you know, commercially-minded people.

Thomas Small Well, that's not how the communism hunters in the American government thought. In late August of 1957, a telegram was sent from the US embassy in Riyadh to Washington, and the language is frankly hysterical. It said, "The time is approaching, if indeed not already arrived, when Syria will cease to be effectively an independent nation, but will have been taken over, made into a Soviet satellite, having independence only in name. And it will reach out in efforts to subvert surrounding countries, thus propagating communist virus."

Aimen Dean Wow.

Thomas Small It's – it's amazing.

Aimen Dean I don't know. It sounds like a trailer for a movie directed by Senator McCarthy. I mean—.

Thomas Small After sounding out regional governments, the US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles reported to Eisenhower that Israel, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, and Turkey thought that Syria would fall to communism within sixty days if nothing were done to stop it.

Now, remember the doctrine. If a Middle Eastern country asks for military assistance against the Soviet puppet, the US will comply. The Turks were especially serious and were demanding a military solution.

Aimen Dean Well, Thomas, for – for Turkey, there was no question, you know, that they had, you know, this headache of communism. I mean, from the east, the Soviet Union, they don't want to have another Soviet satellite, you know, in the south. Because even to the West, you know, they have a border with Bulgaria, which was a communist country. They don't want Syria to become yet another communist satellite country. And that is why they did what they did.

Thomas Small Yeah. They began to concentrate troops at the Syrian border. And the US ostentatiously begins airlifting new armaments to Jordan, which the Soviet Union denounces as an American policy of conspiracy.

Aimen Dean Well, there were already conspiracies everywhere. I mean, you know, even the Iraqi prime minister at the time has, you know, suggested that "How about, you know, we just stage a false flag operation? You know, a – a little explosion at the pipeline, you know, stretching between Iraq and Syria. We can use it as an excuse. And then, yeah, let's invade. Let's, you know, get the US to support us."

Thomas Small In this increasingly tense environment, the Syrians made a bold move. They sent public letters to the governments of Iraq, Jordan, and Lebanon, asking if they'd been talking to the West about Syria. Those governments were forced to deny it. Otherwise, they'd piss off their own people for stabbing a fellow Arab country in the back. And they expressed their solidarity against Zionism and imperialism. Nonetheless, at the end of September 1957, the US sends a naval fleet to the Syrian coast.

Aimen Dean Well, this is where Nasser, you know, was able to gloat and to say, "I told you so. Just like the British, you know, sending the gunboat." Except this time, it's bigger American gunboats. America, just another colonial power as far as Nasser was concerned.

Thomas Small Right. America had shown its hand, and its navy was in the Levantine Sea. At this point, everything changes, and the Soviet Union gets the upper hand. First, Syria invites the Saudi king and the Iraqi prime minister to Damascus for a conference where they make a big show of unity. The Turks are angered. 

But on the 4th of October 1957, Sputnik is launched. This amazing event, the first satellite in space, would technically allow the Soviets to launch an intercontinental ballistic missile at the United States. The event was greeted by the Arabs as a sign that the USSR was technologically the West's equal, if not its superior, a big boost in Soviet prestige. 

A few days later, Khrushchev then reveals the US machinations about Syria in a New York Times interview, and he denounced this such imperialism and offers the US a world peace agreement instead. He then sends letters to Western European socialist parties, like the Labour Party in Britain, calling for a stance against any war in Syria. This wins Khrushchev kudos as a peacemaker. So, we see Khrushchev playing the diplomatic game perfectly, manipulating the Western media and exposing America's game playing for what it was. 

And as its Arab allies now take a step back, the wind is knocked out of America's sails. The first test of the Eisenhower Doctrine showed how toothless it was in the face of geopolitical reality. And on the 13th of October 1957, Egyptian troops land at the Syrian coastal city of Latakia to a rapturous welcome. Nasser was made president.

Aimen Dean This explains why the Syrian flag, you know, today, you know, got two stars. It is the Syrian flag that was actually created for the United Arab Republic. The United Arab Republic actually, the flag, remained to this day in use as the official flag of Syria. The two stars are Egypt and Syria.

Thomas Small It's alleged that President al-Quwatli warned Nasser, "You have acquired a nation of politicians. Fifty percent believe themselves to be national leaders, twenty-five percent to be prophets, and at least ten percent to be gods."

But Nasser tried his best. He imposed centralised dictatorial rule centred almost on a cult of personality of himself. Only authoritarian centralised control would make the ungovernable Syria governable. All Syrian leaders after him would agree.

Right, Aimen. Syria and Egypt in union. Seems weird, doesn't it? But it's not. If you take the widest possible historical view over the past three thousand five hundred years, for the vast majority of that time, Syria, or parts of it at least, and Egypt, or parts of it at least, we're politically united in some way. I mean, the vast majority of time. Like, ninety-five percent of the time.

Aimen Dean Yeah. They were either part of the you know, Greek empire. You know, whether they were part of Seleucid Empire or whether they were part of the Ptolemaic Empire, the Umayyads, the Byzantines, the Romans. You know, the Abbasids, the Fatimids. I mean, we could go on and on and on about them being provinces within an empire, within the same empire,

Thomas Small It goes all the way back to the Bronze Age, to the seventeenth dynasty of Egypt. That's when the Egyptian empire was established, by conquering Syria and incorporating it into Egypt.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, they were always together as part of an empire.

Thomas Small History doesn't really repeat itself, but it does rhyme. Sometimes, eerily so. And here's a historical rhyme for you. If, in 1958, Nasser came from Egypt and imposed upon Syria, a modern one-party dictatorship replete with all the usual instruments of state oppression—secret police, propaganda, centralised economic planning, and so on—then, the modern state itself in any form was also imposed upon Syria by a strongman from Egypt way back in 1831.

You know who I'm talking about, right, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Muhammad Ali Pasha.

Thomas Small You got it. If you remember, back in episode six, the one on Egypt, we talked about Napoleon's invasion of Egypt and how that event marked the onset of modernity in the Middle East. After Napoleon withdrew from Egypt in disgrace, a power vacuum opened up there. And after several years of fighting, Muhammad Ali Pasha was the last man standing. We mentioned him in episode six. An Albanian warlord from Northern Greece and the Sultan in Istanbul had sent him to Egypt to fight the French. But he stayed. By 1811, he'd become the master of Egypt. And over the next twenty years, he'd increasingly rule Egypt not as the Ottoman sultans vassal, but in his own right.

This power grab culminated in 1831, when Muhammad Ali's modern army, which he'd built up with European help, invaded and conquered Syria.

Aimen Dean I think what Muhammad Ali learned from the French and, you know, under Napoleon is that, one, you need to abolish feudalism in the traditional sense that the feudal lord is the one who provides you with the military, you know, conscripts. No, no, no, no, no. You have to establish a professional army. You conscript from the population directly, bypassing the feudal lords that the Ottoman Empire used to rely on. And also, you know, just get rid of the idea that you have a special elite of force called the Janissaries. He basically, like, you know, I mean, also abolished, at least within Egypt, the reliance on the Janissaries as a force. So, he was really building an army according to European, you know – you know, line of thinking when it comes to, you know, a military reorganisation.

Thomas Small That's right. He had built a modern state—autocratic, bureaucratic, with this huge conscript army. Very different from the Ottoman model.

Now, Aimen, why do I bring this up, you may ask? Well, because we're not here just to narrate the Cold War for the hell of it. We're trying to understand the Middle East, specifically the conflicts that plagued the Middle East. And, you know, for goodness sake, look at Syria. It's been through an absolutely nightmarish civil war where sectarian violence erupted on a huge scale, waged on all sides, and all in the name of either overthrowing or supporting an absolutely disgusting dictatorship, one that is more or less operating according to the Nasserist model with modifications.

And as I suggested before, though we may disagree about aspects of it, I believe this conflict is the consequence of a civilisational clash between Western modernity on the one hand and the Islamic tradition on the other, and that this clash is not just spiritual, but concrete. The modern state, a piece of modern Western technology that encodes the basic principles of Western civilisation, was imposed upon the Middle East, upon Syria. It was an unstoppable force. But this is the point. Islamic civilisation is an immovable object. And the meeting of the two causes sparks like two pieces of flint banged together. And it was brought to Syria by Muhammad Ali and was then built upon by the Ottomans, by the French during the Mandate, by Nasser, and, eventually, by the Ba'ath Party, which continues to rule Syria horribly to this day.

Aimen Dean This is why, Thomas, I believe that modernity can only exist in the Middle East within the framework of monarchy. And I know, like, you know, many listeners will be, you know, groaning and saying, "Oh, no, Aimen. Again? Come on."

But seriously. If – if you look at any of the fact that the royal family of Saudi Arabia, they've been around for about three hundred years. The royal family of Oman have been around, like, you know, for five hundred years. If you look at the royal family of Bahrain, been around for three hundred years. Kuwait, Qatar, and, of course, the Hashemite ruling families, you know, especially in Jordan and Morocco. I mean, they've been around for centuries and centuries. And the reality is that these monarchies, the eight monarchies of the Arab world are the most stable out of all of them.

I'm not talking about just because of oil, money. I mean, Jordan doesn't have any, and, you know, Morocco, it, for certain, it doesn't have any oil. 

But, you know, it comes back to the fact that what is a king in the Arab, you know, mindset? It's just nothing but the glorified tribal leader. And, you know, the tribal system could actually evolve to incorporate modernity. But, you know, that is why the nation state that is built within the framework of monarchy seemed to have fared better than nation states built on a Western political framework, if you see what I mean.

Thomas Small I do see what you mean. And I think this is something that we do agree about. You know, we're going to talk about this more in the next episode, in which we talk all about the Hashemite monarchies of – of Iraq and Jordan and other places.

And – and, you know, listen, I don't mean to romanticise the pre-modern state in the Middle East. One thing about traditional Islamic governance that was, in a way, its blind spot or at the very least a weakness that modernisers have been able to exploit was its inequality. Non-Muslims were second class citizens.

Aimen Dean Well, there was no question about it. That the laws of the Ottoman Empire in particular and the application of these laws in the provinces, whether Syria or regions, or elsewhere, were discriminatory against minorities, religious minorities, whether they were you know, Christians, whether they were Druze, whether they were Jews, or whether they were Shia, even, you know. So, you know, this is some things that, you know, we cannot escape. It was part of history.

Thomas Small Traditional Islamic civilisation was unequal and socially hierarchical. Muslims were an elite cast above the rest. And what I find interesting from the perspective of what we're talking about now is that this discrimination gave European powers their way in over several centuries. European powers were able to leverage their growing power over the Ottoman sultan by posing as protectors of Christians.

Aimen Dean Yeah. The French protecting the Catholics in Lebanon and Syria. The Russians protecting the Orthodox Christians in Syria and Lebanon and Iraq. I mean, yeah, unfortunately. That was the way through which these powers were able to meddle in the affairs of the Ottoman Empire. If the Ottoman Empire just, you know, did not discriminate against anyone, you know, then these people wouldn't need protection and, therefore, they would have protected their internal affairs.

Thomas Small Yes. And once the modern state, even at the time of Muhammad Ali, introduced the principle of equality into a civilisation that for so long had been stratified with Muslims on top and everyone else beneath them, two major things happened. First, intercommunal tensions exploded as Sunni Muslims sought to retain their historic privileges over other communities and some non-Sunnis began forging closer alliances with foreign powers, then with the local authorities. 

And second, having been divided for so long, the people of Syria were forced to ask themselves, "What brings us together?" You know, after all, the modern state is one. It is centralised. It not only equalises. It homogenises. They were forced to reckon with tough questions. 

What are we? Who are we? Are we Syrians or Arabs? Or are we Damascenes, Aleppans, Latakians, or Muslims, Christians, Druze? What brings us together?

That answer was not quickly forthcoming.

Aimen Dean Remember that four centuries of Turkish Ottoman rule had, you know, a significant effect, you know, of changing the ethnic and sectarian landscape of Syria and Lebanon, you know, to the point where even there are many Lebanese, you know, Hashemite families converted to Christianity in order to avoid the, you know, the forced conscription into the military by the Ottomans.

So, you know, there you have it. So, the problem is that—.

Thomas Small We welcome all converts, Aimen. I don't care. If you want to convert to Christianity to escape the army, you're welcome.

Aimen Dean As long as you become my confessor, Thomas, then, yeah, I will. I will consider it.

Thomas Small Imagine—.

Aimen Dean So—.

Thomas Small Imagine, dear listener, imagine hearing Aimen Dean's infection. Holy moly, I don't know what dark memories haunt your heart, you former spy.

Aimen Dean Oh, indeed.

Thomas Small Anyway, you were saying.

Aimen Dean You will need lots of antidepressants after that, anyway. So – so – so – so – so, for me, I – I would say that, you know- you know, after four centuries of Turkish Ottoman rule, I would forgive the Syrians for becoming collectively schizophrenic about their identity. Like, you know, "Who are we?" The trauma of it.

Thomas Small Well, all those questions of identity exploded into real crisis during the Arab Revolt. Now we're going to talk about the Arab Revolt that helped bring the Ottoman empire to an end next time. What we'll say for now is what is today Syria was given to France to rule as a mandate. The locals didn't like it. They rose up against the French, but they were crushed. The French ruled, in my opinion, scandalously badly. I mean, even worse than the British, I think, by far in the Mandate.

Aimen Dean Well, look, I mean, this is a problem with the French, is that wherever they ruled, they really screwed up, whether it's Vietnam, Algeria, you know, and, of course, like, you know, I mean, in this case, Syria. And why? Because it was called mandate. It should have been "womandate." And then, you know, the Arabs would have been happy and, you know—.

Thomas Small Oh, man. That's a bad joke.

Aimen Dean Sorry. I couldn't – I couldn't resist.

Thomas Small Well, the French, when they ruled Syria, they based their rule on the model they had pursued in Morocco, which they also ruled, you know, where they encouraged the subject population to identify primarily with their tribe or with their religion. The French actively moved away from encouraging the building of a Syrian nation.

Aimen Dean Well, I mean, that is exactly what they were trying to do in Algeria. That's what they tried to do in Vietnam. And, of course, basically, that is exactly what they were doing in Syria. They were not exactly, you know – you know, pursuing a policy that would actually, you know, bring in a greater harmony in the end. They were actually pursuing short-sighted policies for short-term stability over long-term stability.

Thomas Small Especially since they favoured minorities against the majority. I mean, this led the French army of the Levant to have a disproportionately high number of Christians and non-Sunni Muslims, Alawites, Druze mainly. And, you know, this – this would have massive consequences down the line.

Aimen Dean Exactly. And this is what the British used to do actually in India. They were always incorporating minorities into their, you know, British military in order to—.

Thomas Small And in Iraq, as we'll find out next week.

Aimen Dean Indeed. And Iraq also. So, this divide-and-conquer is a colonial textbook, you know, tactic, and it's going to haunt Syria for a very long time to come.

Thomas Small Keeping Syria divided meant that it remained a collection of city states, really, under the French. And this would also bedevil Syria long after it won its independence. Political parties were often regional-based. They pretended to be ideological, but they were really just like regional power networks. Their foreign policy was often based on the sort of economic ties that these regions had had during the Ottoman period: Aleppo with Iraq and southern Turkey, for example, or Damascus with Egypt and Arabia.

Aimen Dean You know, one of the things I always talk to people about is the fact that, geographically even, you know, it was stupid. Just like when the British carved Iraq and they incorporated Kurds and, you know, Shia and Sunnis together. You know, they – they did the same with Syria and Jordan. Because the Arabian Peninsula, many people think that it really ends, you know, with the borders of Jordan and Iraq meeting at the northern tip of Saudi Arabia. No. The Arabian Peninsula go all the way, you know, to the Euphrates peninsula. You know, to the northern Syria.

Thomas Small The Arabian desert really is like a—. It's like an ocean of sand …

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … compared to which the mountains of Syria, southern Turkey, and the rivers of Iraq are like the shores. And then, this – this – this ocean of sand moves southward all the way to Yemen.

Aimen Dean Exactly. And that is where the extension of the tribes, the Arabian tribes, especially like, you know, Shammar and al-Uqaydat, al-Baggara, al-Jubur. All of these tribes extend all the way north to Iraq and Syria. Anbar, al-Nineveh, and Deir ez-Zor and Palmyra, you know. So, the – the Badiyat al-Sham. As they call it, the Sham Desert or the Desert of Syria. You know? 

So, this is why, I mean, when the borders were created, these tribes were, you know, forcefully, separated from their natural, you know, borders, like, you know, from their brethren in the newly formed Saudi Arabia. So, that created also a greater division within both Iraq and Syria, as we will see later.

Thomas Small That's one example of the divisive nature of the European colonial period in the – in the Levant. And all of it taken together is why, after Syria won its independence from the French in the forties, there were so many coups in such quick succession.

We mentioned all the coups. Now, obviously this is going to come as a burst of info, but just to give you a sense, dear listener, of what we're talking about, as we said in March of '49, General Za'im, overthrew Quwatli, the president. That was supported by the US. 

And then, later that year, another general overthrew al-Za'im. That was supported by the British. 

And then, later that year, another general over through that general, and he ended up setting himself up as a kind of dictator. His name was al-Shishakli, kind of like a pre-Nasser Nasser, really. He ruled behind the scenes. 

But then two years later, in another coup, he overthrew the president and becomes the sole ruler. But then, he is overthrown two years later. And then, that person is overthrown a year later. 

Finally, you know, creating the conditions where Quwatli comes back, becomes president and, you know, negotiates the famous union with Egypt: the United Arab Republic.

Which brings us back to 1958 and the proclamation of the UAR. The UAR lasted only three years. Nasser's dictatorship wasn't what the Syrians had bargained for, neither the military nor the civilian leadership there. So, in 1961, they overthrew him.

But the damage had been done. And once the Ba'ath Party came to power in 1963 by, yes, another coup, military dictatorship would be the rule.

Aimen Dean This is where Syria started to enter this dark tunnel of Ba'athism based on sectarianism, marginalisation of the majority in favour of the minority, which, you know, the French did before. And now, it's coming back to haunt Syria. The alliance of the minorities is against the majority. And that will create festering grievances that will explode many years later.

Thomas Small We haven't talked about the Ba'ath Party, which is a massive oversight. We don't have time to talk about it now. We won't have time to talk about it next time. We—. Eventually, we will talk about the Ba'ath Party. But it is germane now to talk about the differences between the Ba'ath Party and Nasserism. They were both pan-Arabic nationalist movements, but there was a big difference. The Ba'ath Party had an international organisation with political offices throughout the region, organised in a way more like international communism, but with pan-Arabism as its goal.

Nasser didn't have this sort of organisation. Instead, his movement was really linked to his – himself, to his personality, the personality of Nasser. And the Ba'ath Party was not so linked. And there's an irony about all of this. You know, the – the reason that the United States turned against Syria, turned against Egypt, creating the sense by Egypt and Syria of being under siege, is because they feared a communist takeover.

But, actually, the reason why Syria and Egypt United was because of the Ba'ath Party was fearful of a communist takeover, and they thought that Nasser was the only man strong enough to prevent a communist takeover. So, when they united, immediately, Nasser launched a major crackdown on communists in Syria. He imposed his socialist authoritarian regime and, despite that, was immensely popular. This suggested that Arabness was more powerful at that point than Syrian seriousness.

Aimen Dean Exactly. And this is why, you know, for Syria, they went on a programme of something called Arabisation, you know, to the point where even the teaching of medicine in Syria became Arabised. You know, they have, you know, translated all the medical Latin terms into Arabic, and they were insisting on teaching every single scientific subject under the sky in Arabic.

Thomas Small That's funny. 'Cause earlier, you said that the West only got modern medicine because we translated texts from Arabic. And you're saying that the Arabisation of Syria in the modern period is by translating Western medical texts back into Arabic.

Aimen Dean Yeah. I mean, but – but – but nonetheless, in my opinion, you know, this actually made the Syrian doctors disadvantaged. I mean, they – they – they actually made them disadvantaged in comparison to other doctors around the world, because they have to catch up with the Latin phrases, you know, that they needed in order to, you know, practice medicine. It chose, you know, short-sightedness and pig headedness when it come to, you know, what the Arab nationalism was, actually.

Thomas Small Oh, poor Syria. You know, Aimen. I lived in Damascus for one very happy year in 2008, before the civil war. I was naïve then. I – I know now that the peace and harmony I felt as I traveled around was only surface deep. In fact, the country had been poorly governed for decades. Age-old rifts and modern resentments were festering, and outsiders as always were keen to intervene.

But when I was there, one of my favourite places to visit was a pilgrimage site halfway up Mount Qasioun, which is the mountain that towers above Damascus. The pilgrimage site is known as the Cave Of Blood. Maghārat al-Dam. This cave, according to Islamic tradition, is where Cain, the son of the first man, Adam, killed his brother, Abel. He lured him inside and killed him dead. The cave itself is meant to have cried out in alarm and shock at the sacrilege of the murder. And to this day, you can see a large tongue in the rock, stained red from the blood, frozen in an anguished cry.

The Bible and the Quran both agree that Cain murdered Abel out of envy. Cain, in some unexplained way, hadn't worshiped properly. And so, God rejected his sacrifice. But he accepted Abel's. So, in a rage, Cain killed him. After the murder, Cain is cursed. He builds the first city, Eridu, in Mesopotamia. And it is from his descendants that all the instruments of man's domination over other men originate: cities, agriculture, pastoralism, music even, writing, law, war.

I think the story of Cain and Abel pretty much sums up everything. There are two halves to humanity, to the human heart. One inclining toward truth, humility, piety. The other toward violence, control, pride. And the truly virtuous will always incur the wrath of the proud.

Traditional civilisations, for all their Cain-like flaws, recognise and even prioritise sometimes what the myth calls the Works of Abel. The modern state, on the other hand, valorises and prioritises the works of Cain and his descendants. And just as the myth teaches, in Syria, as elsewhere throughout the world, the growth of the modern state saw the death of Abel and everything he symbolises. That is a clash of civilisations.

What do you think about that little sermon, Aimen?

Aimen Dean For me, I slightly disagree. We still can have always, you know, benevolent civilisations. We can always have benevolent cities. We can always have benevolent industries. They are now able to present the romantic vision of the, you know, noble wilderness living. But you can't ask that of eight billion people, because there is no enough wilderness.

Thomas Small A typical Islamic response to my little Christian homily there, Aimen.

Aimen Dean You know, well, that's the, you know, difference between idealistic Christianity and realistic Islam.

Thomas Small Well, that's it. There you go. Next time, we focus on Iraq and also Jordan and the Hejaz. All things Hashemite.

We'd like to remind all listeners that you can follow the show @MHConflicted on Twitter and Facebook. Plus, to get your teeth into further discussion and debate on the topics we discuss here on the show, you can join our discussion page by searching "Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group" on Facebook.

Also a reminder that, at the end of each episode, Aimen and I choose a question from one lucky listener and do our best to answer it in our exclusive extended bonus feed. Please shoot over your questions on Twitter or Facebook. And to hear if your question has been chosen, subscribed to ad-free free listening and extended bonus content for just 99p on Apple Podcasts. Or if you listen on Spotify, find Conflicted Extra to also listen ad-free and get access to extended bonus episodes for just 99p per month.

As always, thanks for listening. And do join us in two weeks' time for our next episode.

Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Rowan Bishop, with production support and fact-checking by Molly Freeman. Sandra Ferrari is our executive producer. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

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Conflicted S3 E7 - Zionism and It's Discontents

Thomas Small Hello, Aimen. Hello, hello. Hello from Greece, in fact. Here I am in sunny, Greece. Sunny, springtime Greece. Enjoying myself enormously. 

Aimen Dean I hate you. 

Thomas Small You'll like this, though, Aimen. The other day, I was at a dinner party in Athens, and I was sitting next to a splendid, old Greek gentleman who told me all about his ancestors in Alexandria. 

Aimen Dean Uh-huh. [crosstalk]. 

Thomas Small Do you remember last episode? We were talking in that last episode all about the Aswan Dam. Well, this guy's grandfather had been the Greek engineer who built the dam in Aswan that preceded Nasser's dam. And he – he was still saying—. He was saying, "And I don't know why Nasser needed to build a new dam. There was nothing wrong with my grandfather's dam. Nothing at all." 

So, the history that we talk about in Conflicted, it really is still alive, and the memories of people in the Middle East. Not that I want to say Greeks.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. 

Thomas Small Greeks or Middle Easterners. I wouldn't want to affect their sense of memories.

Aimen Dean No. No. No. They are—. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. The Greeks, they have to accept that they are Middle Eastern, because they, two thousand and three years ago, they invaded the Middle East. Anatolia, Iraq. You know, Mesopotamia, Syria, Egypt. So, they have to bear the consequences and they should be lumped with us. 

Thomas Small Man, you Middle Easterners. No wonder the conflicts never end. Your memories are far too long. 

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small Today's episode, it's the big one. I mean, or is it the big one? Tell me. Why do you think I've been so scared, really, now for three years, so scared, to talk about Israel on this podcast? 

Aimen Dean Because, literally, it is, you know, a minefield. Wherever you step, you know, it might blow in your face, you know. So, I always avoided this conversation with so many of my friends. And, you know—. And whenever people keep telling me, "Oh, you are not sympathetic to the plight of the Palestinians. Have you ever been occupied?" or whatever, I say, "Well, yeah. My mother's village in south Lebanon, Shebaa, you know, was occupied by the Israelis, you know, from 1978"—the year I was born, ironically—"all the way until the year 2000." 

Thomas Small Wow. That's amazing. So, growing up in Saudi Arabia …

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … you knew the whole time your mum's village is being occupied by – by Israelis, the enemy.

Aimen Dean Yeah. That's what I was always told. Although my mum, you know, funny enough, like, you know, I mean, we're equally angry with the Palestinians as she was with the Israelis, because she said, "They are the reason, you know, for the calamities of my home country, Lebanon." Because their presence there provoked the Israelis to invade and provoked the civil war within Lebanon. So, she had no love lost for the Palestinians either.

Thomas Small Now, Aimen, that's – that's a sort of trailer for some episodes way down the line when you get to the Lebanese Civil War. 

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small Today, we're talking about Israel, where it came from, how it was founded as a way of setting up those episodes that will, in a way, climax in the 1970s. So, stick with us, listener. This time. we're going back to the bronze age, going back to the Ottoman period, going back to the early twentieth century, putting all of our – our pieces together on the chess board. 

I think we must have some sort of internal crystal ball, Aimen, because our plan for this series has overlapped quite eerily with current events. We recorded an episode about Russia. And hey, presto, Russia, invades Ukraine. And now, Israel. I mean, suddenly, it's back on the front pages due to an extraordinary summit that recently took place in southern Israel, in the Negev Desert. 

On the 27th of March, the Negev Summit took place, where the foreign ministers of Israel, of course, but also the UAE, Bahrain, Egypt, Morocco, and the United States, met to discuss a range of bilateral and regional issues. 

Aimen, what was the focus of the summit? If I had to guess, I'd say Iran. 

Aimen Dean Well, no one can escape the shadow of Iran in the region. Well, of course, because Iran, you know, operates many proxies across the region. The Houthis in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza. You know, the Syrian militias from Iraq and elsewhere. So, of course, you know, for Israel, they are surrounded by these proxies. And, you know, the UAE and Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. So, the ramifications are very clear for everyone to see. 

So, the summit focused a lot on countermeasures against Iran's proxies and their expansion in the region, whether it is to establish a sort of a mini-NATO air defence umbrella, you know, to help these countries counter the growing threat of precision weapons that Iran use. Long range, precision weapons, offensive weapons, such as, you know, ballistic missiles and drones.

Thomas Small Now, I can understand the desire for these countries to band together to resist Iranian encroachment. But what surprised me was that a pretty powerful player was missing. Saudi Arabia wasn't there. Why wasn't Saudi Arabia represented at the summit? 

Aimen Dean Actually, Saudi Arabia was represented—unofficially, though—because the foreign minister of Bahrain was actually representing Saudi Arabia as well as Bahrain in the summit. His name is Abdullatif al-Zayani. 

Thomas Small Oh, I see. Abdullatif al-Zayani, the foreign minister of Bahrain. Saudi Arabia doesn't formally recognise Israel. So, they can't really be there personally, but they send Bahrain to speak on their behalf. And Abdullatif al-Zayani is a good spokesperson. I – I met him once. I—. Well, I met him twice.

Aimen Dean Uh-huh.

Thomas Small I interviewed him once for a …

Aimen Dean Interesting.

Thomas Small … for a film. And he – he – he's a very – a very sophisticated man, a very civilised man, and extremely articulate. Tall, handsome. He's a good – he's a good interlocutor for the Saudis with the – with these other partners. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. And he spent the majority of his career, actually, in Saudi Arabia, because he was the secretary general of the GCC, and it is based in Riyadh. So, he is extremely familiar with the decision-makers of the Saudi foreign policy. 

Thomas Small So, Egypt was there in the Negev, at the summit. Egypt and Israel signed a peace treaty way back in 1979. And then, in 2020, a couple of years ago, the UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco also normalised relations with Israel. So, the UAE is there. Bahrain's there. But – but Jordan signed a peace agreement with Israel in 1994. Why wasn't Jordan at the Negev Summit? 

Aimen Dean Ah, well, Jordan is not happy at the moment with any of its neighbours, whether the Israelis or the Saudis, for a host of reasons. 

Thomas Small Oh, my goodness. Jordan is not happy. Jordan, you know—. As we'll see later, when we talk about the 1948 Israeli War of Independence or the first Arab-Israeli War, Jordan often has a rather tricky relations with some of its neighbours.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. You know? And so, the Jordanians were – were invited, you know. They just decided not to come. 

Thomas Small So, let's get back to the summit in Negev. You mentioned it addressed the -the problem of Iranian proxies in the region. But what about its nuclear ambitions? Did the summit address Iran's nuclear ambitions? 

Aimen Dean The summit did discuss, indeed, the Iranian nuclear ambitions and the fact that they are not far away from achieving the breakaway point, you know, of having enough fuel for a nuclear device or even two. The other things also they discussed is the fact that with this alliance or semi-alliance between Iran and Russia and the fact that the Russians are very nervous about, like, what's happening in the region, you know, with Iran, this could impact the food security of the region. And with food security, there could be unrest, especially in places like Egypt, which is exactly why, after the summit, the Saudi government deposited $5 billion in the Egyptian Central Bank to help Egypt deal with the rising food prices and fuel prices they have to import. Not to mention favourable terms in terms of oil and all of that. 

So, actually the summit is looking at Iran, looking at its proxies, and looking at the ramifications of the Ukrainian War on the region. 

Thomas Small Yes. And – and those ramifications are massive, especially in food security. But the – the summit was not only interested in food. It was also interested in water. And in fact, they've decided to make the Negev Summit an annual thing to be held in a different desert city every year. They've chosen a desert city to shine a spotlight on this main issue: water. 

Aimen Dean The Israelis are one of the most advanced nations on earth when it comes to water treatment, water management, and water efficiency. 

Thomas Small The Saudi's water insecurity was recently highlighted when the Houthis attacked a desalination plant on the west coast of Saudi Arabia. 

It's funny, Aimen. You – you warned us three years ago that the Yemen War and the – the Houthi threat from the Saudi point of view was all about water, all about those desalination plants. And still, boom. It's happening. 

Aimen Dean Well, of course, because that is exactly the jugular that the Houthis want to go after. Because the past several months, you know, from June last year onward, I mean, the whole Houthis have been sustaining significant human casualties inflicted upon them by the Saudi Air Force. And that is why they are lashing out, not only at the Saudis, but at the Emiratis as well. I mean, Abu Dhabi was attacked. 

So, this is what worried, you know, the decision-makers, even in Israel, because of the long range of these weapons, the ability to fly low over the terrain or over water, over the sea, and make them difficult to detect. 

So, this is why the summit addressed, you know, this technological advance that a – a non-state actor, a third-party here, the Houthis, possess. They attacked all oil and petroleum storage facilities for the Saudis, which, of course, affected the oil prices. Already, the world is suffering from it. 

Thomas Small And the Saudi response was totally unforgiving. I mean, they pounded Yemen. They pounded, especially the port of al-Hudaydah. 

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. The port of al-Hudaydah. The port of—. The airport of – in Sana'a. The port of Sarif. So, of course, they attacked, you know, without mercy. And that actually led to the Houthis to say, "Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. You know, three days, you know, cessation of hostilities from our side. Now, meet us halfway."

So, this is—. Now, we have some glimmer of hope finally with the Houthis deciding—you know, of course, with some instigation from Iran—to deescalate with the Saudis and have a two months ceasefire. I don't think it will last two months, but at least it might—. 

Thomas Small And how many ceasefires have there been? And they – they don't—. 

Aimen Dean [crosstalk].

Thomas Small Ceasefires mean nothing as we are – as we are finding out in Ukraine as much as we've been finding out in Yemen for years. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. Exactly.

Thomas Small Well, Saudi is not the only country that was attacked during the summit. And over the days following, a number of terrorist attacks were carried out inside Israel itself, the first wave of attacks like this for some time. On the 22nd of March, a few days before the summit, a Bedouin in the Negev stabbed and ran over people in the southern Israeli city of Beersheba. The perpetrator, the guy who carried it out, he had actually been in prison for a supporting ISIS and was released in 2018. 

On the 27th of March, the day of the summit, ISIS gunmen attacked a bus stop, killing two people and injuring twelve. And then, two days later, a couple of drive-by shootings carried out by a Palestinian militant killed five people. 

So, you know, Israel is still not going to be feeling secure. The Palestinian issue is still capable of redounding into, you know, violence upon them.

Aimen Dean Well, there is no question. This—. You know, this issue has been exploited again and again by multitude of Islamist groups, whether Shia or Sunni, as well as jihadist groups, as well as, you know, by other dictatorial regimes in the region. So, Israel is just the flavour of the month. 

Thomas Small What I found quite interesting—and even moving—was that among the dead in those attacks were two Arab Israelis. I mean, that means Palestinian Arabs who live inside Israel proper. 

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small This community is often forgotten by people. So, two of the dead were Arab Israelis. Both were police officers, which is rather interesting and telling. Even more interestingly, one of the Arab Israeli victims was a Christian and the other was a Druze. 

A reminder, if you need one, that the patchwork of ethnicities, religions, and cultures goes far beyond anyone. Binary, if you like. I mean, certainly, it's not just Jews on the one hand and Muslims on the other. It's way more complex than that. 

Aimen Dean Definitely. Way more complex. 

Thomas Small So, Aimen, what does all this mean? Do you think things are really changing in Arab-Israeli relations? Is the Arab world growing more comfortable with Israel's existence for real? Or are the Abraham accords and all of this recent peace-making between Arabs and – and Israelis, is it – is it all just a temporary marriage of convenience? And do you think the future will be just like the past, marred by terrorism, injustice, and intractable conflict? 

Aimen Dean I've spoken to a senior policy maker in the GCC, in one of the GCC countries, which signed a peace deal with the Israelis, and what he said was illuminating. He said, "Look, Israel is a country of six million inhabitants. Yes. It is military advanced. Very powerful. But they cannot even invade Jordan. You know, they could invade Jordan, but they cannot keep it. They could invade Sinai, but they can't keep it. They can invade Syria, but they can't keep it. They are no threat to the region, because they couldn't even control Gaza. So, why would they invade Saudi Arabia? Why would they invite the Gulf? Why would they invade all the way there? They don't even have the manpower to do it.

"However, we have, on the other side of the Middle East, a regional power with eighty-seven million inhabitants, with armies upon armies of people who have been brainwashed religiously to believe that we are the enemies, we are the mortal enemies, and that they want to go all the way to the Hejaz and to Mecca and Medina to liberate it from us." 

He was talking about Iran, of course. So, he was saying, "We can't take our eye off the real enemy and focus instead on an imaginary enemy, because that imaginary enemy is"—which is, you know, well, he meant to the Israelis—"suits the narrative of a bygone era, of the time when Arab nationalism was reigning supreme."

Thomas Small I think what you've just expressed, the shift that this policymaker at least has felt is going on, I think that it really has massive implications, and it's very interesting. So, let's get back to it. And instead – instead of talking about the future, we're going to do what we always do on Conflicted and talk about the past. The past is complicated, nowhere more so than in what I'm going to try to call the Holy Land in this episode. Okay? So, at least when discussing its ancient and medieval history, I'm going to use the term "the Holy Land" as much as possible, because the words Israel and Palestine are both very loaded as we'll see for – for interesting historical reasons.

Stay with me, dear listener. There's going to be some history now. But I promise it's going to be as brief as possible and, I hope, very interesting. To get started, we've got to go way back in time, back to our favourite age, Aimen: the Bronze Age. 

Aimen Dean Sometimes, I feel like I am, you know—. How can I say? Like, I am Sherman and you are Mr. Peabody when you say "way back." 

Thomas Small Now, listen. Obviously, everything that follows is a gross oversimplification. The Holy Land is basically a highway connecting Egypt with Mesopotamia via the Levant. So, over the centuries, it witnessed a huge amount of migration and conquest. Ethnically, culturally, linguistically, it was a much more complex patchwork than any simple historical narrative can do justice to. 

With that said, we've been talking about some really old places this season. Persia, pretty old. Arabia, really old. Egypt, effing old. But the Holy Land, in some ways, it takes the cake. The city of Jericho, in what's today called the West Bank—meaning the western bank of the river Jordan, which flows north south from the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea—the city of Jericho is often called the oldest city in the world. Archaeologists have traced a continuous pattern of settlement there for eleven thousand years. 

Thomas Small Wow. 

Aimen Dean That means, when the first pyramid of Egypt was built four thousand and six hundred years ago, Jericho was already over six thousand old. 

Thomas Small Wow. 

Aimen Dean By 3000 BC, what would become the Holy Land was known as Canaan. This is what it's called in the Old Testament, and it's to Canaan that God tells Abraham to go. We touched on this history in episode three of this season. In the Book of Genesis, God promises the Holy Land to Abraham and his descendants. And that promise is repeated to Abraham's son, Isaac, and then to Isaac's son, Jacob. Jacob would later on wrestle with an angel and be given a new name, Israel. The sons of Israel, or so the story goes, are promised the land of Canaan for their eternal inheritance. 

Aimen, does the Quran echo this story? What does the Quran have to say about the Jews being promised the Holy Land? Anything?

Aimen Dean Well, yeah. I mean, when Moses was trying to persuade his people who escaped from Egypt, he said, "[speaks in Arabic]" You know? "You, my people, go storm that land, the Holy Land, which God promised you." 

So, it is actually enshrined in the Quran that that land was promised to Bene Israel, to the children of Israel. Although all Muslim scholars would say that promise had an expiry date, so. You know? 

Thomas Small Well, Christians throughout the ages have argued about this, too. Are the Jews still the chosen people? Is the Holy Land of Israel still theirs for eternity? Christians don't always say yes to that. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. So—. You know? So – so, from a Muslim point of view, you know, yes, it was promised. This is why even Muslims to this day, they celebrate, you know, the Passover from Egypt. You know, the exodus from Egypt. You know, the holiness, you know, of that land and the holiness of that promise stems from the holiness of those generations. The generations of, you know, Jacob, you know, Joseph, you know, Moses, Aaron, and, you know, David, Solomon. All of these people. This is where the holiness of those generations come from. 

Thomas Small The religious idea that Jews are still the sons of Israel and, therefore, still the rightful inhabitants of the Holy Land informed some of the claims made for a modern Jewish nation state there. But there's a secular version of this claim, which is that the forefathers of modern Jews lived in the Holy Land for two thousand years or so before being brutally expelled by the Romans, following which, exiled from their native land and always on the move, they suffered statelessness marginalisation, persecution, and attempted genocide. And, therefore, it is only right and natural that they should return to the Holy Land and build a nation state there all of their own. 

The political side of that argument has obviously been hotly contested. But the basic claim— that Jews are descended from the Bronze Age inhabitants of the Holy Land—is basically true. However, the same is also basically true of the Palestinians. 

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small DNA studies have shown that Israelis and Palestinians are both fairly equally descended from those Bronze Age Holy Landers, i.e., the Canaanites and their neighbours. 

Aimen, you're a fan of DNA, fact, and fiction. What – what do you make of what I've just said?

Aimen Dean Well, I mean, it is true. I mean, the land of Canaan, as you know, it is known in Arabic, in Aramaic, Canaan—it's called Canaan in English—you know, was always inhabited by, you know, people who were always there. Even when the Jew – when the Jews conquered the Holy Land, they just went into the periphery. I mean, the east bank of – of the river Jordan became the land of Canaan there for a – for very long time. And some of the coastal areas, especially from, you know, Aker, you know, in the north of modern-day Israel, you know, all the way to Ashkelon, many of the coastal areas were still controlled by the Philistines, you know, Phoenicians, and Canaanites. 

You know, it is the heartland. It's what is known today as Judea and Samaria, which was mainly the domain of the Jewish people for a very long time.

Thomas Small So, what I guess we're saying is that, despite their different historical trajectories over the millennia and despite the incredibly fraught political conflict that has swallowed them up, Israelis and Palestinians have a lot in common genetically, ethnically, and culturally. 

Right. Okay. Let's move on with our historical summary. I can't tell the whole story of the Bible. God knows I wish I could, but I can't. So, let's just start the story from where the twelve tribes of Israel, in one way or another, have subjugated the Holy Land to their domination. There are still Canaanites, as you said, Aimen. Others—. Other peoples are there, too. But the Hebrew-speaking twelve tribes are dominant. 

They are—. This is about 1000 BC. They are eventually politically united by King David with his capital at Jerusalem. But that union doesn't last long. And after the death of David's son, King Solomon, the Davidic kingdom is split into two: the Kingdom of Israel in the north, in Samarria and the Galilee, and the Kingdom of Judah in the south, centred on Jerusalem. Now, the northern kingdom is destroyed by the Assyrian empire in 720 BC. The southern kingdom is destroyed by the Babylonian Empire 586 BC in Jerusalem, its beautiful temple built by King Solomon, is completely destroyed by order of the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar. And all of the royal and priestly elites are forcibly removed to Mesopotamia. 

Until fifty years later, when our friends from episode four, the Persians overthrew the Babylonians, and the Persians shah Cyrus the Great allowed the Jews to return. And – and they were now Jews. Properly so-called Jews, i.e., people from the southern kingdom, the Kingdom of Judah. These returnees from Babylonian exile re-established political rule and rebuilt the temple in Jerusalem. This is the so-called Second Temple. 

Persian overlordship was followed by Greek overlordship, then a brief return to self-rule under the Maccabees before returning to imperial subjugation again, this time to the Romans. Roman client kings, such as King Herod, worked alongside the priestly hierarchy in Jerusalem and the Roman political governor to keep the Roman province of Judea in line. It was during this period that Jesus was born and Christianity began to flourish. 

You still with me, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Oh, absolutely. 

Thomas Small You know what happened next, right? 

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. I know what happened next. Nothing but rebellions and rebellions and rebellions. And that caused the whole city to be destroyed, including the temple of Herod. 

Thomas Small The Jews were frequently rebelling against Roman rule, climaxing in the horrific Jewish-Roman wars. In 70 AD, the Romans sacked Jerusalem and destroyed the second temple. Then, sixty years later, they finished the job, slaughtering an unholy number of Jews and expelling most of the rest. Jews were forbidden from entering Jerusalem, which had been basically destroyed and rebuilt from scratch along Roman lines and given a new name, Aelia Capitolina. A massive temple to the Roman god Jupiter was built on the site of the old Jewish temple. 

It had been an unimaginable tragedy for the Jews. The Jewish diaspora, which was already long established and extremely strong across the inhabited world, became the bedrock of Jewish life. A number of Jews settled in the vicinity of the Sea of Galilee, where they remained until the modern period. But Jerusalem was a Roman city. And to stress the fact, the emperor changed the name of the province from Judea to—wait for it—Palestine, named after a people—you mentioned them before—called the Philistines, who had been archenemies of the Jews …

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … a thousand years before. 

Aimen Dean I think Emperor Hadrian more or less wanted to humiliate the Jews as much as possible, you know, by naming the province, you know, Palestina, after the Philistines, who were the enemies of the Jews, especially, like, you know, with the story in the Bible about the temple of Gaza and Samson, you know. And this is why the Jews, to this day, whenever they mentioned the name Hadrian, they say, "May his bones be crushed." 

Thomas Small Well, what's a tragedy for the Jews, though, became a triumph for the Christians. In fact, at the time, the distinction between Jews and Christians wasn't nearly as large as it would become. One of the effects of the Roman turn against the Jews was that it stimulated conversion to Christianity. Christians did, after all, worship the same God. So, over the next couple of centuries, the Holy Land became significantly Christianised, and many, many people who today call themselves Palestinians were, in fact, native Holy Landers, who converted to Christianity and would later on convert to Islam. 

In the fourth century, the Roman emperor, Constantine the Great, himself converted. And in time, he converted the whole empire to Christianity. He and his mother Helena began a huge building works program in Jerusalem, erecting enormous, lavishly-endowed churches across the city at sites associated with the life of Christ. And the temple to Jupiter, up where the Jewish temple had been, was reconsecrated as a church. 

Now, I'll hand it over to you now, Aimen. And thank you, listener, for your patience. I hope that was a useful precis of historical events. But – but I'm going to hand it over to you now, Aimen. Because three hundred or so years later, religious newcomers rocked up to the gates of Jerusalem. 

Aimen Dean Oh, absolutely. The armies of Islam, the armies of the Rashidun Caliphate stormed—. 

Thomas Small The – the Ishmaelites. 

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small The Ishmaelites, the Hagrites as the Christian inhabitants of the Holy Land called them.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Yeah.

Thomas Small Of course, it's the Arab Muslims. 

Aimen Dean One of the things that the caliph Omar, the successor of the Prophet Muhammad and Abu – and his companion, Abu Bakr, when he went to Jerusalem and, of course, basically, like, you know, I mean, when the Muslim army surrounded Jerusalem, the patriarch of Jerusalem demanded that "I'm not going to give, you know, the keys of the city to just a mere general. Let your own, you know, top leader come." Like, you know. So, this caliph in Medina, you know, he must come and take the city. So, of course, like, you know, he made the journey. 

And he said, you know, when he entered Jerusalem, that the God's promise that Jerusalem and the surrounding areas, the Blessed Land, the Holy Land, would remain, you know, within the Rome. The Rome of the descendants of Abraham is still being fulfilled, because we are, too, the descendants of Abraham, just from his, you know, elder son Ishmael.

So, when he entered there, he was accompanied by a Jewish rabbi who converted to Islam, you know, known in Islamic history as Ka'ab al-Ahbar. And he guided Omar, the caliph, to where the Dome—. Well, the – the rock in which, right now, the – stands the Dome of the Rock where Muhammed, it was told that he was – he ascended to heaven from that rock.

Thomas Small Yeah. So, there's a story in Islam. It's called the night journey of the Prophet Muhammed. He – he – he—. 

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small He woke in the night to be greeted by a mystical flying horse who transported him from Mecca to Jerusalem. And getting off the horse at the – at the spot of the – of the rock where the Dome of the Rock is, he ascended into heaven to the throne room of God.

Aimen Dean Yeah. And this is where the Jewish rabbi showed him where that rock is and then he took him to where the remains of the temple of Solomon were. And so, Omar decided to establish a mosque there, and he called it al Masjid al-Aqsa. 

Thomas Small The al-Aqsa Mosque as it's known in English. Yup.

Aimen Dean Exactly. So—. And this is how the transformation of what we now know as the Temple Mount, you know, where the Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa Mosque stand, you know, came into completion from the Islamic point of view. They have taken over, you know, this four acres of land except for the western wall, which is known also as the Wailing Wall, which is the last remaining part of the temple of Herod. You know, he left it there based on the advice of Ka'ab al-Ahbar as it is still a sanctified place for Jews, even though Jews were forbidden from visiting the city or coming for many, many, many years.

In fact, Sophronius, the patriarch of Jerusalem, when he gave the city to the Muslims, he, you know, asked for terms, you know, like, you know, freedom of worship, freedom of, you know, religion for the Christians. You know. certain other terms. But one time in particular, the Muslims rejected immediately. Sophronius asked for the Muslims to bar the Jews from entering the city or living in it or dwelling in it. And, you know, Omar al-Khattab said no. You know, Jews will have as much rights as Christians and Muslims in the city. 

Thomas Small In the west, I think we often look at pictures today of the Temple Mount with the Dome of the Rock and Al-Aqsa Mosque there, and we – we sort of don't know how to interpret what we're seeing. I think even – even, you know, well-educated, well-informed Westerners will often see those Islamic monuments there and sort of think of them as – as outside invader. Like, they don't really see them as situated naturally in that space. 'Cause we imagine that's where a temple should be. We imagine, "Now, this is where Jesus lived. What does this have to do with Islam? Muhammed was living far away. What—? Why are these, you know—? Beautiful, though, they are, why are these Islamic buildings on the Temple Mount?" 

But – but you were telling me the other day that – that it's, you know – that in the fourteen hundred years or so since Jerusalem became an Islamic city, it has really featured heavily in – in Islamic – the Islamic imagination, Islamic theology, especially in terms of the end of time.

Aimen Dean Yes. I mean, for, you know, for Muslims Jerusalem is the place where the souls, you know, near the end of time or basically when the Day of Judgment happened, the souls of people who are there, here on earth, will ascend to heaven from where [crosstalk]. 

Thomas Small From Jerusalem?

Aimen Dean Not only from Jerusalem. From – from, actually, a cave beneath the rock, you know, where the dome is. So, I visited there in 2018. It was a deeply spiritual experience. And I was so happy to be there to be honest. And I remember when I went there, it was such an, you know, an overwhelming feeling of spirituality. And, you know, below the rock, which the dome stand, there is that rock, you know, which many Christians believe that it's a rock in which Jesus was sentenced by Pontius Pilate and … 

Thomas Small That's right.

Aimen Dean … his footprint is supposed to be there. So—. But if you go under the rock, there is a cave, and that cave is called [speaks in Arabic] Arwah in Arabic, which means "the cave of the souls." This place is where the souls will be gathered before they are ascended to heaven. 

It's incredible, because I remember when I was reading some Muslim scholars, it's like why Muhammed never ascended from Mecca? You know, why does he have to go all the way to Jerusalem, you know, on a winged horse all the way there, and then ascend from Jerusalem to heaven? 

It's because Jerusalem was so special, because there is that portal there, which enables, you know, people or souls or physical or – either physical or metaphysical, you know, beings to actually ascend to heaven. Because that is the place.

So, that is the—. I think this is, you know, in the Bible, the, you know, the vision of Jacob where he, you know, was in that land, you know, somewhere near Jerusalem, I think, and he saw [crosstalk]. 

Thomas Small Yeah. In Bethel. He – he saw the …

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … a vision of angels ascending and descending upon a ladder. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. 

Thomas Small Yeah.

Aimen Dean I mean, it could be. Yeah. 

Thomas Small I mean, there are lots of – lots of hilltops in that – in the Holy Land from which people ascended and descended. It's a kind of—. It's a land of – of magical elevators, really. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. It could be. You know, why not? But this is the holiness of, you know, Jerusalem in terms of, you know, the imagination of Muslims. And that is why it is actually so intertwined, you know, into the prophetic, messianic, and eschatological texts of Islam, as well as that of Christianity and Judaism.

Thomas Small Well, it's—. I mean, this is Jerusalem. It's – it's—. In a way, it's like the linchpin of the whole – of the whole universe. 

Aimen Dean Indeed.

Thomas Small Anyway, we've – we've got to move onward now towards something nearer to the present day. And it's a shame, because, you know, Aimen, think of what we're jumping over. The crusades. 

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. 

Thomas Small Saladin. The Mamluks. They all left their mark. And in the end, like the rest of the Middle East outside Iran, the Holy Land was absorbed into the Ottoman Empire. Century after century, the Holy Land, which was part of the Ottoman province of Syria, lived its life. The Holy Land lived its life. Its inhabitants were mainly Arabic-speaking. Mainly Muslim, but also Christian. And yes, there were a fair number of Jews, too, but they were very much a minority until, in the 1880s, when Jewish migration to the Holy Land began in earnest, mainly from Europe. Among Jews who would become known as Zionists. 

So, Aimen, when you hear that word—Zionists—what does it make you think of? Because, you know, it's sort of a bad word in Arab circles, isn't it?

Aimen Dean Growing up as a child in Saudi Arabia, in that tumultuous Arab world, yes, the word "Zionism" invoked, at the time, the enemy, the other, the people who want to suck our blood. The vampires who are raping the lands of the Palestinians. You know, the Pales—. The poor Palestinians who are, you know, soul-suffering and they need our help. So, Zionism, it was equal to colonialism. It was equal to fascism. It – it was that menace that is out there, planning, more than anything else, to ruin our lives and to keep us subjugated to the West. And it is behind every conspiracy theory, every calamity, every problem that we have. If I lift a rock, I will find a Zionist under there. So, that is how Zionism was, you know, envisioned in our minds when we were young, 

Thomas Small Jewish migration continued throughout the late nineteenth century and the early decades of the twentieth century, causing more and more consternation among the Arab inhabitants of Palestine. This reached a head during the First World War, when the British arrived and [wrestled] control of the area from the collapsing Ottoman Empire. It was at this time that the infamous 1917 Balfour Declaration was made, where the British guaranteed a national homeland in Palestine to the Jewish people.

Aimen Dean Don't forget Sykes–Picot. I mean, Sykes–Picot, the famous agreement between the French and the British to divide the – what is leftover of the Ottoman Empire. I mean, they took the Levant. Really, they split it in half. The northern side, which was Syria and Lebanon, was a French zone, and the southern side, the Holy Land as well as Jordan, they call it the Transjordan, was a British Mandate. So, it was a British zone. And this is where the British started, you know, a festival to allow Jewish migration to happen, all the way until 1929, when they started to see that there is a problem. It's causing more trouble than it is worth. And this is when they reneged on their Balfour promise. 

Thomas Small That's right. The Mandate, the British Mandate, in Palestine was explicitly charged with facilitating Jewish migration to Palestine. This was obviously provocative to the Arabs of Palestine and, in fact, was – was generating, was leading to, for the first time, a Palestinian national feeling. 

Aimen Dean Well, until then, there were no Palestinians, because the province of Palestine wasn't named after a certain ethnicity or a tribe or a culture or anything. It's just an old Roman name. you know, it's like saying – calling, like, you know, well, Libyans Cyrenaica. I mean, really. I mean – I mean, the Libyans will never be – accept, like, you know, the word Cyrenaica as – as – as a formal identity. 

So, for the Arabs of Palestine, they were always called the Arabs. Until – until, really, you know, later. They were called always the Arabs of Palestine, the Arabs of Palestine. Until after 1948, then they—. You started to see the formation of, "Well, I'm a Palestinian. It means I am an inhabitant of the land that once was called Palestine." 

Thomas Small One of the problems that the Arabs of Palestine, later known as the Palestinians, had in resisting a Jewish national ambitions over the same land, was their lack of a profound and deeply-rooted national consciousness. They were regionally-based. They associated with their families, with their clans, and with their villages, or their towns, but they didn't have, to the same degree, a sense of unity. And this played out, you know, down the line during the – the Israeli War of Independence, the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, when the Jews were able to take advantage of Arab disunity and really win the field.

Aimen Dean I understand, Thomas, that the Jewish migration caused a lot of, you know, provocation. You know, among the Arab inhabitants. But the question here is—. And this question is really valid. Even many Arab quarters always voice this. Who sold the lands? Who sold their homes, farms, and lands to the newcomers, to those who came from Europe with – with cash and gold, and they sold the lands and they moved to Syria, to Lebanon, and to Jordan and to Egypt?

Thomas Small My guess is, first, wealthy Ottoman landowners and then wealthy Arab landowners in the area.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Many, many, many Arabs, you know, sold hundreds of thousands of acres of land, you know, to – and houses and, you know, farms and, you know, dwellings to Jewish migrants. 

Thomas Small And a lot of – a lot of that land was in areas that were – were under-inhabited. They were swampy or they were very arid. They – they weren't overly inhabited, because they were very difficult to live in. And the new immigrants, they did an amazing job, actually … 

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … transforming that land into productive land that was amenable to habitation. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. And this is where, you know, we have, you know, the character of al-Hajj Amin al-Husseini enters the picture here. 

Thomas Small Hajj Amin al-Husseini, this was a man who would eventually become the grand Mufti of Jerusalem, placed in that role by the British and – and was really the founding father of Palestinian nationalism and an infamous character, because he would spend the years of the Second World War in the Axis countries, working as a propagandist for Hitler. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. In Berlin. I mean, he was in Berlin, you know. And he escaped Berlin just before the Russian army invaded Berlin. But the reality is that al-Hajj Amin al-Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem, he issued a fatwa, you know, in the 1930s, saying, "Any Palestinian who sell any of his properties, any of his real estate, to any Jewish migrant is a kafir." 

I mean, he excommunicated for a legitimate transaction. This is a pure political, you know, fatwa. I mean, the idea that "I'm free to sell to whoever I want." I mean, there is nothing in Islam that says I can't sell to whoever I want. The right of property is very much enshrined there. I can sell to whoever I want. And so, you know, al-Hajj Amin al-Husseini resorted to twisting Islamic theology to say anyone who sell any piece of land or a house, you know, or a square inch to the Jews who are coming from Europe is a non-Muslim, is a kafir. He excommunicated them. 

Thomas Small So, during the 1920s and the 1930s, the phenomenon of terrorist violence arose in the Holy Land. This is something that is now sadly associated with Israel and Palestine in their conflict. On the Jewish side, paramilitary groups were founded to defend themselves from attacks by Arabs. Also to facilitate the smuggling of Jewish migrants once the British opposed migration. And they—. These paramilitary groups eventually coalesced into three groups: the Haganah, Irgun, and Lehi, of varying degrees of radicalism more or less corresponding with the three types of Zionism that were prevalent among Jews. 

I mean, it's very interesting and it's important to remember that the Jews hardly agree about anything. You get a group of Jews together, and they're all going to fight. And there's not just one form of Zionism. And Zionist themselves never really agreed on their goals. So, there was one form of Zionism, which was known as Practical Zionism, and – and its paramilitary group was the Haganah. It supported immigration and settlement as a precursor to a state. So, it's called Practical Zionism, 'cause it's like, "We want a state. We got to move people there, 'cause at once we have a lot of people there, they'll have to give us a state." Very practical. 

Then, there was something called Revisionist Zionism, and its military group was called the Irgun. This form of Zionism supported a Jewish state, which was supposed to be coterminous with the whole of ancient Israel, which, in their view, included what is now Jordan and even parts of Syria. So, this was a much more radical form of Zionism. They wanted a state to correspond with the ancient borders of Israel. 

Finally, a third kind of Zionism: Revolutionary Zionism. This is the most radical of them all, and its paramilitary group, which was the most brutal, was known as the Lehi. Like Revisionists, they also sought to bring back the whole of ancient Israel. But in addition to the state itself, they wanted to bring back the kingdom. They didn't want a secular state. They wanted all Jews everywhere to migrate to this new kingdom, with a new king of the Jews. This was very radical. 

And so, these three forms of Zionism, each had their own kind of paramilitary network, which began more and more to work together as the Zionist Project emerged.

Now, while all this is growing, the Arabs have paramilitary networks of their own. 

Aimen Dean Indeed. The Black Hand, you know. And Izz ad-Din al-Qassam, a Syrian cleric who dabbled in international jihad, actually, in 1916, 1917, when he started recruiting people from Syria, from Egypt, and raising funds to help the – the Libyan jihadist, the Libyan Mujahideen under the leadership of Omar al-Mukhtar to fight against the Italians. You know? So, he was based in Alexandria, in Egypt, in order to support the Libyan jihad, the Libyan campaign against the Italians. He then left Alexandria to go back to the Levant and go to the West Bank in order to fight against not only, you know, the Jewish paramilitary groups we're talking about, but also to fight against the British Mandate. And he fought and fought until 1935 where he was killed. And then, after that, it was al-Hajj Amin al-Husseini who took over 

Thomas Small This history reveals again that – that the – the struggle of the Arabs in Palestine at the time was really part of a larger pan-Arab struggle, a kind of—. The struggle of a growing Arab nationalism. And so, that's why a Syrian like Izz ad-Din al-Qassam is fighting for Arabs in Palestine. There wasn't, to the same extent as there is now, an idea of Syrian-ness, of Palestinian-ness, et cetera. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. And, you know, the fact that he was actually busy before the British Mandate over Transjordan, he was busy, you know, supporting the Libyans, fighting against the Italians. You know, by recruiting Syrians and Egyptians. So, you know—. And to this day, actually, you know, his memory still lives in, because Izz ad-Din al-Qassam is the name of the military wing of Hamas. 

Thomas Small Yes, indeed. The Palestine question was beginning to grow very tense, and the British wanted to get shot of it. They were sick of it. They drew up several plans to solve the problem, but none of these plans got anywhere. And the situation between Jews and Arabs worsened. It was a chaotic, very violent period. For example, between 1936 and 1939, there was something called the Arab Revolt in Palestine, where the – the Black Hand and other Arab paramilitary groups revolted against the British Mandate, attacked Jews and Jewish settlers. The British succeeded in putting it down. The Palestinian leadership was expelled. This forced the Palestinian nationalist politics, such as they were, underground, and would hobble Palestinian politics and state craft for years. So, in the 1930s, the Arabs rose up, trying to solve the problem themselves, and they were smacked down by the British.

And then, beginning in 1944, as the Second World War was nearing its end and the Zionists, who were, of course, you know, experiencing the Holocaust in Europe, thought, "It's now or never. We need to get our own state to protect ourselves from genocidal maniacs." 

The Jewish groups in – in Palestine, in 1944, started to rise up against the Mandate as well, which forced British policing to grow extremely brutal. In – in cases, the British needed to adopt even more brutal methods, which only alienated people more.

This—. The climax of this in a way where the horrific King David hotel bombings in 1946. On the 22nd of July 1946, bombings carried out by Jewish political terrorists, really, in which ninety-one people were. 

Aimen Dean Indeed. That is exactly which finally led to the British to say, "Let's wash our hand of all this mess and do what we do best: partition that country"

Thomas Small Yeah. Fed up, Britain essentially dumped the problem in the UN's lap. So, as the Second World War was ending, America got involved, because the American public's sympathy—you know, largely pious, Bible-believing Protestants—their sympathy for Jewish people in general, following the horrific revelations of the Holocaust caused the US to put pressure on the UK to sort out Palestine for good.

So, as I say, Britain turned to the UN, which drew up a plan to partition Palestine. More or less fifty-fifty, though the Israeli half was slightly larger, which was provocative given that there were fewer of them than the Arabs. But it was more or less fifty-fifty between the two groups in terms of land. 

Opening it up into the sort of growing Cold War zone, the Soviet Union supported the UN's partition plan, because it thought the plan would piss off the Arabs, who would then revolt against Britain. So, Stalin wanted to hurt Britain. So, he supported the plan and compelled his communist satellites to support it in the UN. The US government lobbied heavily for the plan, too. Several countries, in fact, agreed to support it after Washington gave them financial incentives to do so. 

President Truman himself was only so-so on the plan, but he certainly supported a Jewish state and was facing an election. There were big groups in the US lobbying in favour of Zionism for different reasons. This political player, which would go on to be called the Israeli lobby, would certainly grow over time.

So, on the 29th of November 1947, the UN votes on the partition plan. It's very interesting, Aimen. Basically, all non-Muslim countries supported it and all Muslim countries didn't. Surely, we see a clash of civilisations component here. 

Aimen Dean There is no question in my mind that, if the Muslim and Arab countries acted pragmatically at the time and decided, "Well, we're gonna lose – we're gonna lose any way. Let's cut the losses and let's, you know, vote in favour of this," things would have been very different by today. 

Thomas Small Well, as it happened, Arab antipathy to a Jewish state in the Holy Land is what led the Arabs to reject the UN partition plan and immediately oppose it on the ground with force. This doubled down several months later when, on the 14th of May 1948, the British finally withdrew from Palestine. The Mandate ended, and Zionist leaders in Israel voted to establish an independent nation state. The first prime minister of Israel, David Ben-Gurion, announced that, for the first time in two thousand years, a Jewish state had been founded in the Holy Land. And on the very same day, a coalition of Arab states invaded this new state of Israel.

Aimen Dean The 1948 War is a war in which several Arab countries—Jordan, Egypt, Iraq, even Saudi Arabia, Syria—all of these countries decided that, "No. No. No. No. No. No. We're not going to have a Jewish state on our border." And they invaded immediately. 

And, of course, seven, I think, armies, you know, invaded. And no coordination between them whatsoever. Actually, forget coordination. They were actually fighting against each other at some point. Because King Farouk of Egypt wanted Jerusalem, so he can gain more legitimacy, you know, because he was always, you know, insecure about being an Albanian ruling Egypt, and he's not a Arab even, and wanted to show, "Hey. I'm controlling the holy city, and I have a legitimacy." 

And then, you have the king of Jordan who is Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein. He, you know—. His ancestors lost just recently, just twenty-five years earlier, lost the kingdom of Hejaz, Mecca, and Medina to the House of Saud. And so, he wanted to gain Jerusalem. So, to gain legitimacy. And the two were racing towards Jerusalem rather than racing towards, you know, the Jewish units of the state of Israel. 

And the outcome? Well, apart from the incompetence, the lack of coordination, they were buying weapons from Italy and other European countries in the post-World War II, and most of these weapons were past their expiration date. So, they were soundly beaten, all of these countries, by the new-found – by newly founded the Israeli state.

Thomas Small Whereas the Jews had prepared for the war. They were much better organised. They were really fighting for their lives. At least that's what they thought. Having recently experienced the Holocaust, they thought, "Oh, my God. Here's another consortium of people who hate us for being Jews and want to destroy us. We're going to fight them off this time. We're not gonna – we're not gonna allow it to happen again."

So, they were very, very motivated to win. They had negotiated an arm sale from the Soviet via Czechoslovakia. 

If you remember, dear listener, in the – in the previous episode on Egypt, that's exactly what Nasser did seven years later when the West …

Aimen Dean Ironically

Thomas Small … when the West wouldn't sell him any weapons. So, the – the Jews had a more modern weaponry. They were better organised. And though they were the underdogs in the fight, they trounced the Arabs and punched them in the eye, really. And, you know, it was a huge knock to Arab pride.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. And, of course, that defeat led to many outcomes in the Arab world, you know. The—. King Farouk lost his popularity and, of course, lost his, you know—. Thrown just four years later. 

Thomas Small I won't say the name of the operation that overthrew King Farouk, because, no, we're not going to say any swear words in this episode.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Indeed.

Thomas Small Of course, there's the other big, big lasting problem of the 1948 War, which is the existence of Palestinian refugees. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. I mean, we have seven hundred and fifty thousand Palestinians who were expelled or left, depending on where they come from. And—.

Thomas Small Yeah. That's a contested thing. Were they expelled? Did they leave their homes, hoping to return later? Were they enticed to leave their homes by Arab politicians and commanders? It's a swirling kind of vortex of chaos there. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. But, of course, there was also the element of fear. There were several massacres, you know, from Deir Yassin and [place] and others, you know, which, you know, served as a – as a catalyst for, you know, the politics of fear. That—. The fear that there could be next. That they left in massive numbers towards, you know, Jordan, to Syria, towards Lebanon, and towards Egypt.

However, whenever, basically, people always talk about the Palestinian exodus, you know, from the Holy Land, they always forget that the Arab countries retaliated in kind and started to expel Jewish population. Jewish people who lived there for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years, they were expelled from Iraq, from Syria, from Jordan, from Egypt, from Yemen, from Libya, from Algeria.

You know, the expulsion was so big that the numbers are anywhere between four hundred and twenty-five thousand up to five hundred and fifty thousand. And many of them were kicked out without any compensation for the homes they lost, for the businesses they lost, and for the money and jewellery and work of art they left behind. And they were just, you know, sent to the state of Israel with only the clothes on their back.

So, seven hundred and fifty thousand, you know, Palestinians, you know, ended up being refugees due to the 1948 War. But also on the other side, you know, between four hundred and fifty to five hundred and fifty thousand Jewish people were expelled from the Arab world and were then made the refugees, and they were sent to the new established state of Israel. So, it is difficult to say that there was only one victim here.

And again, we come back to always saying here on Conflicted, we don't always talk about good guys and bad guys, you know. There are no good guys in the story again, you know, because nations are not funded, you know, unfortunately, like, you know, especially in the Middle East, through, you know, happy circumstances. And when there are no happy circumstances, there are no good guys, 

Thomas Small One further thing about the refugee issue, which is important to keep in mind, is that the Jewish refugees from Arab states following the 1948 War, when they went to Israel, resettled there, they were granted citizenship and started new lives as fully paid-up members of the state of Israel. 

One of the tragedies of the Palestinian refugee phenomenon is that the countries that they went to as refugees did not grant them citizenship, did not allow them to integrate properly into the new Arab nation states that were growing in the region. Quite the contrary. Often it suited the leaders of those states to prevent Palestinians from assimilating to maintain a network of Palestinian refugee camps, to keep the Israel-Palestinian problem alive, 'cause it suited their political interests as Arab leaders. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. This is why I always say that, you know, no nation or a cause in modern history was used and abused like the Palestinian cause. Yet it is very interesting that, more than seventy-four years later, three generations later, the grandsons of those who fought the Israelis in 1948, were so comfortable to go to the same battlefields of the Negev, to go and have a summit with the Israelis, to discuss common mutual, you know, peace, defence shield, and cooperation. 

Thomas Small If the 1948 War was, to some extent, informed by a clash of civilisation—one; Arab, Islamic, Middle Eastern; the other Jewish, Zionist, European, to some extent—then that clash of civilisations seems to be easing. 

I mean, the 1948 War from the Arabs' perspective was a war of religion as much as, if not more than, a nationalist war over territory. To put it another way, back in 1948, for the Arabs, territory was sacred, and its violation by infidels was sufficient grounds for launching a holy war, and its conquest or reconquest was a divinely ordained necessity. 

This is how the Arabs, the Muslims at the time, were thinking about the Palestinian issue. They were thinking like traditional Muslims. 

That's no longer the case. Arab leaders now, they meet with their Israeli counterparts in Israel and they speak of a secular statecraft like any other leaders anywhere in the world. 

So, it kind of brings back what I was talking about a couple of episodes ago about this – about this sort of tension in the heart of the modern Muslim, the modern Arab person. I mean, Islam is still there. Islamic ideals are still there. Islamic history, full of glory, and an Islamic future, full of glory, is still there. But it's coexisting more easily with a less Islamic, more secular way of thinking. 

Aimen Dean I think, because we have grown up Thomas. I think. In my personal life, you know, I was a jihadist. I mean, I grew up as an Islamist, as an imam. You know, I became a jihadist. 

Thomas Small And you were animated at the time, I suppose, by a certain desire that Israel be destroyed. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. I was cheering on Hamas suicide bombers, you know. There—. You know, I was trained in the camps in al-Qaeda there in – in Afghanistan with some of Hamas members coming to train with us. So, you know, there was no question that I, at the time, supported the Palestinian cause based on the Palestinian narrative from an Islamic point of view. The Hamas narrative. The Muslim brotherhood narrative. 

However, what happened to me? I grew up. I mean, this is exactly what happened. Mentally, you know, as well as intellectually. Like, you know, I decided that, you know, where we are heading is the path of blood, is a path of destruction, is a path that will lead no one to win but to lose. We will all be losers. And so, I ended up actually being a personification of the clash of civilisations. You know, from a jihadist, you know, to a Western, you know, spy.

So—. So—. And I ended up, actually, you know, in later years, traveling to the state of Israel, in 2018, visiting the holy sites, but also speaking in Herzliya, at a Israeli security and counter-terrorism summit. People were asking me, "Have you ever thought you will be here, you know, twenty years ago?" 

I said, "If – if you told me twenty years ago I will be here, I will say, 'Whatever you are smoking, get a refund. It's really not good.'"

Thomas Small Well, dear listener, there you have it. We've done our best in this episode to talk about the Israeli Palestine issue, to establish its historical context, the ideological clashes that underlie it, as a way of moving forward toward our ultimate goal of narrating the 1967 and 1973 Arab-Israeli wars, climax points of the Cold War in the Middle East. We could have talked for hours and hours and hours on – on the Holy Land, on the theological and mythological dimension of the Arab-Israeli crisis, on the – the plight of the Christians of the area. I mean, everyone [unintelligible]. Everyone forgets that were … 

Aimen Dean Exactly. 

Thomas Small … and are a lot of Christians there. But anyway. Christians are nice and humble. We'll just, you know, overlooked. 

Aimen Dean Oh, yes. Indeed. Indeed, Thomas. Like, you know, I feel for you, bro. I feel for you.

Thomas Small The next time, you know, having talked about Israel this time, next time we're talking about Arabs. We've got Lebanon. We've got Syria. We've got Jordan. We've got Iraq. We're going to talk about their perspective, their historical experience in the 1950s and then the sixties, where they play a role in the Cold War as they're all inclining towards re-invading Israel and getting their revenge.

This is your biweekly reminder that, if you're not doing so already, you can follow the show @MHConflicted on Twitter and Facebook. You can find that by searching "Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group" over on Facebook. 

Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Sandra Ferrari. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

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Conflicted S3 E6 - Nasser: The Arab Strongman Cometh

Thomas Small Aimen, could you please tell me your precise location and where you're going to be for the next three or four days? A guy with a funny accent called earlier and asked me if I knew.

Aimen Dean Really?

Thomas Small No. Okay. This joke doesn't work. I want it to sound like – like an assassin is trying to find out where you are.

Aimen Dean Yeah. For me, like, you know, "Oh, really?" Like, you know, because what happened is you're not the first one. Some associate, like, you know, was calling and was saying, like, "We know who you associate with." Like, you know, I mean, "Tell him his days are numbered." You know? And—. Yeah.

Thomas Small Oh, my God. Well, you're still alive. That's what matters.

Aimen Dean Yeah. You know, the guy ended up being picked up by the UK services. It turns out like, you know, he—. You know, he's just—. And his [unintelligible] is from Blackburn. No. Oldham. Sorry. Oldham, which is near Blackburn.

Thomas Small Let's get into it.

Aimen, I realised the other day that, in our last episode, I was so excited to tell the story of Mohammad Mosaddegh that I forgot to address the clash of civilisations' dimension of the episode. This season is supposed to be about the clash of civilisations and does that help us understand modern Middle Eastern history at all.

Maybe we can quickly talk about that to kind of see how we are so far in the series. 'In the last episode, we explored Iran's painful experience of modernisation—first by being caught between two large European empires, the British and the Russian, and then by being an early Cold War ideological epicentre. This has been Iran's experience over the modern period, and it's not so different from what most Muslim countries have gone through for the past two centuries, really.

So, Aimen, what do you think? Is there a clash of civilisations going on here? Is Western modernity essentially incompatible with the Islamic tradition? And so, are Muslims today burdened with a sort of civilisational split personality?

Aimen Dean Well, again, we come back to "How do we define civilisation here?" If you mean by modernity—you know, modern equipments, modern education, modern science—I don't think there is any clash. The clash comes with modern values.

Thomas Small Sure. But are they separable? Modern values informed modern technological development, didn't they? Values like individualism, scepticism, rationalism. It's by these values that Western scientists and engineers built up the modern world.

Aimen Dean Look at Japan. They shed some of their antiquated systems of governance and they got rid of some of the antiquated ways of running their society, but they kept their tradition, and they were able to industrialise without being too westernised.

However, I think in the current, I would say, geopolitical, socioeconomic atmosphere of the Middle East and the wider Muslim world, the clash was not always with science, technology, engineering, as well as the ideas of free market and individualism, because these are Islamic values. Islam is as capitalistic as it could be. It is the problem with Islam generally being always socially conservative, as well as fiscally conservative. You know, there is a room for scientific experimentation. There is a room for scepticism. There is a room for research and development. The problem comes with the social norms being, you know, more or less shaken and challenged.

Thomas Small Well, you know, you and I have argued about this a lot over our steak dinners and over our phone calls. Can one separate entirely the ethos of the West from its scientific and technological development?

I mean, you mentioned Japan. I can't speak for the Japanese, but I, sometimes, wonder, you know, "Are the Japanese, you know, burdened with a sort of civilisational split personality as well?" I'm not – I'm not entirely sure they aren't. I don't know.

That's what this series is about. We want to explore these questions while we tell a fascinating story of modern Middle Eastern history. And today, we're pivoting from Iran in the Cold War to Egypt in the Cold War. Specifically, we want to tell the story of the Suez Crisis of 1956, the event that, perhaps more than any other, signalled the changing of the guard from the old European colonial empires to the new American one.

The Cold War connection between Iran and Egypt is actually closer than you might think, Aimen. As we discussed in the last episode, in 1953, the CIA worked together with Iranian power players to launch Operation Ajax, a coup that overthrew Mosaddegh. Well, Aimen, have you ever heard of—I promise you this is the name—Project Fat Fucker?

Aimen Dean What? Fat what?

Thomas Small Project Fat Fucker.

Aimen Dean No. No. You're joking. Yeah? You know. You're just pulling my …

Thomas Small No.

Aimen Dean … pulling my leg here.

Thomas Small No. The year before Operation Ajax, in 1952, the CIA did the exact same thing, but in Egypt. They worked with disaffected Egyptian army officers to overthrow the king of Egypt, King Farouk. And due to the king's corpulence, the CIA codenamed the operation "Project Fat Fucker."

It's – it's weird that people don't know about this. Maybe because we're cool with it when the CIA overthrows kings, but – but not elected prime ministers. I don’t know.

Aimen Dean Poor Farouk. Like, you know, I mean, he had so many bad things happen to him in life. Like, you know, just to add insult to injury.

Thomas Small Anyway, more on that later. First, Egypt in general. Egypt. Um al-Dunya. The Mother of the World, Aimen. In a book published in 1997, the author wrote, "Egypt has been and continues to be the most important Arab country."

That was written in 1997. Aimen, would that sentence be written today?

Aimen Dean First of all, I don't know, Thomas, if it is accurate or not. And we're going to discuss this throughout the episode, but all I want to tell you is that Egypt is my favourite country in the Middle East.

Thomas Small Really?

Aimen Dean It is—. First of all, it is the place where I love to go for holidays. It is a place where I love to go for a break. It is, you know, my love. Especially, you know, Alexandria. I love going to Alexandria and just marvel …

Thomas Small Wow, that's excellent and—.

Aimen Dean … in its cultural, you know, scene. Its food, its atmosphere. The vibe. The northern shores just to the west of Alexandria all the way to Mersa Matruh has one of the bluest beaches in the world, the whitest sand you could ever imagine. It's—. Yeah.

Thomas Small It's so funny that you say that, Aimen, because, you know, when I first went to Egypt, I couldn't wait to go to Alexandria, because I was – I was imagining, you know—. I had a romantic notion of what Alexandria was based on books I've read, based on, you know, stories that you hear about Alexandria and about the Greeks and the Italians, and about the elegant architecture, and about Alexander the Great, and about the famous library. I just had this idea of what Alexandria would be. And when I arrived—and this was in the early noughties—I was totally disappointed, because it – it seemed like—.

Aimen Dean Not well looked after, I would say.

Thomas Small It was not well looked after. It—. The glories I was expecting to see were – were definitely gone.

Aimen Dean You should visit again, because there is a renaissance happening there.

Thomas Small Wow. Okay. Well, I will. But that – that kind of gets to the point that I'm trying to say, you know, 'cause Egypt—.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small I mean, has – has Egypt not been in decline, in some cultural sense at least, from its heyday in the – in the first half of the twentieth century when it really was a glittering, glittering place? You know, all eyes were on Egypt. All of Africa, not just the Middle East, looked to Cairo as a sort of cultural capital.

Thomas Small Do you know why it's in decline? Again, because what we said before in season one, monarchies. Monarchies tend to look after countries better than, well, you know, militaries or autocratic dictatorships. So, the CIA did really fuck up Egypt when they – when – when they removed the Fat Fucker from power. I think the Fat Fucker was the CIA here. I think.

Thomas Small Egypt has been a distinct geographical unit—a distinct nation, really—for over five thousand years. The first Egyptian dynasty is dated to 3150 BC. This is impossibly old. So many dynasties. So many capital cities all built along the banks of the Nile, which is always shifting and turning as it winds its way through the desert. So, they always had them build new capitals. Thebes, Memphis, Tanis, Alexandria, Fustat, and, of course, Cairo. All of these capitals, all up and down the Nile River, the Nile Delta.

And in fact, that history continues, because, right now, east of present-day Cairo, between it and the Suez Canal, the Egyptian government is building yet another new capital. They announced it in March 2015. All government agencies will be relocated to this new capital. The plans that they've drawn up are unimaginably large.

Aimen Dean Well, guess what. It is actually becoming a reality. If you look at the new satellite imagery, if you look at the new documentaries, if you look at the planning, goodness, it is really becoming a reality. In fact, I was talking to a friend of mine from Egypt, and he was telling me, "You know what? You can come and buy, you know, apartments and shops or whatever. You can invest."

And I said to him, "Well, actually it is not out of the question. Egypt is a up and coming economic power." Definitely, Egypt is experiencing a economic revival at the moment.

Thomas Small You could say that Egypt is undergoing a renaissance of sorts, which is ironic, given the fact that this renaissance is causing it to enter into conflict with an African country up the Nile, Ethiopia and its grand Ethiopian renaissance Dam.

Ethiopia is building a massive dam, which Egypt opposes. Last August, in fact, Sisi (President Sisi, the president of Egypt) said that all options were on the table to oppose this dam, including the military option, should Egypt's water supply be in any way compromised by this policy of building a dam by Ethiopia. Ethiopia is damming the blue Nile. The Nile River starts in Ethiopia, the mountains of Ethiopia. And that gives the Ethiopians this tremendous sort of leverage over both Sudan and Egypt. If they screw up the waters of the Nile, that has a existential impact on Egypt. And President Sisi is not happy about it.

Aimen Dean Damn.

Thomas Small Oh, man.

Aimen Dean Do you remember? We talked before in the Yemen episode, in season one, about how the future conflicts of the Middle East are going to centre around water.

Thomas Small Mmhmm.

Aimen Dean Water is becoming more and more scarce commodity. And with food security threatened all over the world, you know, with this crazy, insane war between Russia and Ukraine, goodness, I don't know where we are heading. You know, water security, food security. Yeah.

Thomas Small Egypt is really in the firing line. Only around five percent of Egypt is habitable.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small The rest is brutal desert. And Egypt's huge population of over one hundred million people, they all live along the banks of the Nile.

This is very different from Ethiopia, which is extremely mountainous, comparatively very fertile, and is, as I said, the source of the rivers up and down northeast Africa. Ethiopia's population is even larger than Egypt's. It's now pushing a hundred and twenty million, and it's growing fast. But because of this population growth, Ethiopia needs to overcome an electricity shortfall. And the new dam that it's building would quadruple their electricity supplies. And to add sort of to the geopolitical intrigue, China is actually building the dam.

So, I don't know. Is this going to lead to war, Aimen? Ethiopia has already started filling the reservoir, and Egypt feels that it really has to delay this filling. And to that end, it's acquired new missiles. Might they even attack the dam?

Aimen Dean Well, look, we come back again to the politics of water and the geostrategic importance of water. When we talk about one hundred and five million in Egypt, we have to add another thirty, thirty-five million people in Sudan. And you know, this population combined (almost a hundred and fifty million people in Egypt and Sudan) are united in their opposite, you know, against this dam and the negative impact it's going to have on Egypt – Egypt.

The problem is, since the British influenced, you know, the khedive of Egypt at the time to switch many of the lands that were producing wheat and barley to producing cotton, Egypt, at the time, of course, with only a population of twenty million, said, "Okay." You know? "We already produce a surplus of wheat. We might as well switch to cotton," which is a very precious, you know, commodity at the time.

However, as Egypt's population exploded, there wasn't enough wheat, quantities of wheat, that needs to be imported to make bread, which is the main staple for Egyptian people. The quantity became a burden, an exceptionally a huge burden, on the Egyptians' finances to the point where, at any given time, the amount of wheat that Egypt can store is only enough for six months. And if there are any crisis in the supply of grains in the world, like what's going to happen over the next few weeks and months [crosstalk].

Thomas Small Yes. The Egypt government will be looking at the Ukrainian war …

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … with a great trepidation, because most of its grain comes from the Ukraine. Is that right?

Aimen Dean Ukraine and Russia. And the problem is the Black Sea is a source of the grains. And at the moment, it's not so much just only there is a shortage of grain, but there is that sentiment gripping the suppliers and the major buyers. It means that the suppliers are holding onto their grains, because the price of grain is going to rise. And guess what. In February alone, the price of grains rose by thirteen percent per metric ton. Thirteen percent.

Thomas Small Things never change, really. I mean, all of modern Egyptian history—all of Egyptian history from the very beginning—has revolved around dams, wheat, and waterways, whether the river or the canal.

Now, we're going to start our brief precis, our brief summary of modern Egyptian history at the very beginning, in 1798, when French general, Napoleon Bonaparte, invaded. There is a lot we could say about Napoleon's invasion of Egypt, because the story is completely fascinating. It's one of those periods in history that is almost perfectly symbolic. I mean, Napoleon, the incarnation of modernity, of secularism, of faith in reason. So, the invasion overwhelms the imagination. If there is a clash of civilisations between the modern west and the Islamic world, Napoleon conquering Egypt personifies it.

Aimen Dean Remember, Thomas, that Napoleon's campaign in Egypt wasn't the first French attempt to conquer Egypt. I mean, Louis the IX.

Thomas Small Of course.

Aimen Dean You know, the French crusaders. But you see, all of these were called alhamalat alsalibia. You know, the crusader campaigns. However, the Napoleonic invasion of Egypt is not labelled as a crusade. I mean, no, they don't see it like this. The Egyptians always see it—both scholars and, you know, the average people—as the French campaign, because it was entirely French …

Thomas Small Yeah. Of course.

Aimen Dean … with French character, a French desire to challenge the might of the British in terms of trying to have Egypt as an access point from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea, and from there, to the Indian Ocean.

Thomas Small Far from being a crusade, Napoleon actually pretended to convert to Islam when he was in Egypt in order to get the Egyptian population on his side.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Mr. Muhammad Napoleon. I mean—.

Thomas Small 'Cause as you say—.

Aimen Dean But—. Yeah. He didn't fool them, though. He didn't fool them.

Thomas Small As you say, Napoleon did have geostrategic reasons for his invasion. France had lost most of its overseas possessions to Britain during the Seven Years' War a generation earlier, and Napoleon thought he could undermine Britain's control of India by establishing a French imperium in the Middle East.

He was also attracted by the memory of an ancient route connecting the Mediterranean to the Red Sea, not over land, but via ship. The canal of the Pharaohs. The canal of the Pharaohs. There actually was, all that time ago, a canal connecting the Red Sea to the Mediterranean just as there is today. The Canal of the Pharaohs brings up ancient Egypt. And – and Napoleon brought with him French savants, who spread out across the country and uncovered all of the riches, the archaeological riches, of the Pharaonic period.

Before this, people's knowledge of ancient Egypt was – was really limited. Classical writers had told them that, you know, Egypt was impossibly old, that it had been conquered in 525 BC by our friends from the last episode, the Persians, and then by Alexander the Great two centuries later, who was crowned pharaoh, proclaimed the God, and ushered in three centuries of Greek rule. Then, the Romans grabbed Egypt—this is where the Antony and Cleopatra story comes in—and turned it into the bread basket of the Roman Empire, which it remained basically until your friends, Aimen, the Arabs, conquered it from the Byzantines in the 640s.

Egypt's medieval history was pretty well-known, too, since Egypt had remained a powerful cultural and economic centre and played a big role in the crusades, as you said. After the Muslim conquest, it took three or four centuries for Egypt to be fully Islam-ified. It was majority Christian until then. And it – it became the seat of power for a number of important Islamic dynasties (the Fatimids, the Ayyubids, the Mamluks) until it was conquered by the Ottomans and turned into the bread basket of their empire, which is how Napoleon found it.

Aimen Dean But remember something. Throughout all of this, throughout all of this, Egypt always was regarded as a fortress of Islam, because it not only was able to repel the crusades and the crusades attempts to conquer it, but also it stopped the Mongol invasion.

Thomas Small Yes. The Mamluks stopped the Mongols. Man, they were hard, hard warriors, weren't they?

Aimen Dean Well, I mean, they were slaves. They were. Mamluk means slaves. And they were slaves from two distinct regions in Asia. Well, Asia and Europe, if you can call it this way. The Mamluks who were brought from the steps of Asia. You know, they were from Kazakhstan and former Soviet republics. And then, you have the Mamluks who from the Caucasus. So, there were always these two, you know, rival factions within the Mamluks. They were slave soldiers who were then were promoted to, you know, high positions of power in the military.

Thomas Small Now, in addition to factual history, if you like, Egypt had almost a mythological status in the imaginations of both Christians and the Muslims, because Egypt plays a central role in both the Bible and the Qur'an. In the Bible at least—I can speak from experience—you know, Egypt is the ultimate symbol of – of this world as opposed to the next world, as opposed to the spiritual world. It's a symbol of the material world, of worldly wisdom, but also of corruption, sickness, delusion, and death. And it was lorded over by the pharaoh.

In the Bible, the Pharaoh is the archetypical tyrant, the man who believes he is God, the summit of idolatry. Pure egoistic, haughty, fallenness from which people need rescuing salvation. He's almost like a symbol of the devil. And in the Bible, God sends Moses to lead his people out of Egypt and into the Promised Land, which, certainly, early Christian fathers interpreted as the ultimate symbol of salvation, of redemption, of initiation into divine knowledge and virtue.

Is that pretty much how Egypt is – is understood symbolically by Islam and the Qur'an, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Oh, yes. I mean, Egypt symbolises materialism, rejection of the divine, and this obsession with building monuments. But are they monuments, you know, in order to better people's lives? No. They are monuments in order to celebrate death and afterlife only for the pharaohs and their close circles and for the high priests. So, it was almost like a death cult in a sense.

Thomas Small This is how it's remembered. I'm sure—.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Yeah.

Thomas Small I'm sure, you know, Egyptologists would say, "Hey. Hang on a minute. There was a lot more to Egyptian religion than that."

But what we're talking about is how it's remembered by Christians and – and Muslims, I mean. And – and, of course, in the end, Egypt was first utterly Christian-ified and then utterly Islam-ified. So, you know. But it remained nonetheless a symbol in the sacred scriptures of materialism, of death, of delusion, of idolatry.

Aimen Dean Yes. However, since it became Islam-ified, Egypt now, as always—oh, and even to this day—always being regarded as an Islamic fortress. It's the Citadel of Islam. Seriously. This is how it's been viewed by many, many Arabs and Muslims across the Middle East.

Thomas Small An Islamic Citadel, Egypt certainly was and continues to be. And yet, modernity arrived. And it arrived hard.

In the end, Napoleon's adventure in Egypt ended ignominiously. He fled by foot up – back to France and left his – his army behind to – to die there. Not really his greatest moment.

In the end, the Ottomans regained control. Sort of. The Ottomans sent an Albanian warlord, Muhammad Ali, to rule Egypt as their imperial governor, their viceroy.

The era or the Muhammad Ali dynasty. Well, it was during this era that the Suez Canal was built. It was opened in 1869. And building the canal had – had landed huge debts on the shoulders of the – of the Egyptian state, leading to increasing European intervention. They wanted their money back. The Europeans were forcing economic reforms threatened the Egyptian army's interests, because then, as now, the army owned a huge amount of the Egyptian economy.

So, the army actually revolted in 1882, and the French and British warships felt compelled to sail to Alexandria and shell the city. This provoked the Egyptian army even further, and nationalist army officers took control of the government. They actually began nationalising economic assets. This is in 1882. Very similar to the revolution that would happen seventy years later, in 1952.

To protect its interest in Egypt, Britain invaded, with French troops alongside, and quickly routed the Egyptian army. They never formally incorporated Egypt into the British Empire, but everyone knew who was in charge.

This history is fascinating, but I'm just going to quickly go through it. In 1919, there was a revolution, which led, in 1922, to formal recognition of Egyptian independence, although, you know, Britain still retained full military control of the Suez Canal Zone and exerted a lot of influence in the country.

It was in this period that Islamic modernism was born. You know, we've talked a lot about Deobandism and its influence on modern Islamist movements. Deobandism, remember, which was rooted in resistance to the British in India. And in the last episode, Aimen, you remember we discussed the Iranian thinker al-Afghani and his influence on – on the rise of Islamic modernism, on Islamism.

Al-Afghani called for modernisation and reform within an anti-Western Islamic paradigm, like Deobandism, and he would inspire perhaps the most important Egypt Islamist, Hassan al-Banna.

Aimen, Hassan al-Banna, he's your—. He's basically your idol, right? You love Hassan al-Banna.

Aimen Dean Are you trying to provoke me here, Thomas? Seriously?

Okay. Look, look, look, look. I mean, in all honestly, I did actually admire Hassan al-Banna when I was growing up, because his writings and, you know, the movement, actually, he founded was extremely influential as we have discussed many times before in Saudi Arabia. And when I grew up—.

Thomas Small And what was that movement, Aimen, just in case any listeners don't know?

Aimen Dean Well, the movement is called al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin, which means the Muslim Brotherhood.

Thomas Small The Muslim Brotherhood.

Aimen Dean So, the Muslim Brotherhood were founded by Hassan al-Banna in the 1920s. And again, just like the Deobandis, you know, it was in opposition to the British control of not only economic and political life, but also cultural encroachments, you know, of what they called creeping Westernisation of Egypt.

Thomas Small Absolutely. And because we're talking ultimately about the Suez Crisis, there's a connection here. Because Hassan al-Banna, who was born in the Delta, once he graduated from university, he moved to Ismailia, in the Suez Canal Zone, where the Suez Canal Company was headquartered. And Ismailia, at that time, in the 1920s, was infamously multicultural, cosmopolitan, and heavily Europeanised. So, Hassan al-Banna saw with his own eyes what was happening to Egypt. It was being transformed. And he didn't like it. He began to preach against this in cafes, and this attracted a following. And that following, he soon turned into a formal organisation, the Muslim Brotherhood.

Now, Aimen, the Muslim Brotherhood, it was opposed to the Egyptian elite and their commitment to secularism and nationalism. And we have to remember, at this point, in the tens and twenties of the twentieth century, the Egyptian elite was heavily secularised, heavily modernised. They had adopted almost wholesale European customs and manners. Very, very, very provocative to a traditionalist like Hassan al-Banna.

Aimen Dean If you watch movies from the 1930s and forties and fifties Egypt, I mean, you would think basically you are just watching movies that were shot in, you know, in Greece or Italy or Spain. You wouldn't distinguish Egyptian, you know, downtowns, you know, from, you know, cosmopolitan places like Athens or Rome or Barcelona. I mean, they [crosstalk].

Thomas Small It was a very Mediterranean society.

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small It was a very Mediterranean society, and more European than Middle Eastern in many respects, especially in the urban centres.

Another huge thing had happened a few years earlier, which had rocked the Middle East and was very important to the development of Hassan al-Banna's ideology. We've discussed this before. In 1924, the caliphate, which had had its centre in Istanbul for centuries, was abolished. So, the caliph, who claimed at least to be the leader of the whole Muslim world, was no more.

How deeply resonant would this have been, Aimen, for an Islamist like Hassan al-Banna?

Aimen Dean For people who idealised, you know, the office of the caliph, it was the ultimate calamity, because for as long as Islam existed, since the death of the Prophet Muhammad, there has always been a caliph. Yeah. Sometimes, basically, you have three caliphs that's, like, you know, existing at the same time.

Thomas Small Not so different from the Pope of Rome. I mean, at points, there were popes in Rome. There were anti-popes in Avignon. You know, it's kind of a – kind of a similar position.

Aimen Dean Exactly. But, you know, generally speaking, there was always one caliph in either Damascus, Baghdad, Cairo for as long as people remembered. And then, the Ottomans came. And for the first time, the caliphate position was transferred, in 1517, from an Arab to a non-Arab Turkic, you know, dynasty, which is, you know, the Ottomans. And they kept up that office from 1517 all the way until 1924. It was abolished.

Now, for the Muslim Brotherhood, it's all about restoring the caliphate. For the Salafist Egyptians who emerged also at the same time, it was about restoring the caliphate. And for a Jordanian scholar—. His name is Taqi al-Din al-Nabhanil. He is the founder of the Hizb ut-Tahrir. It's also a – a movement that wanted to restore the caliphate and established in the 1920s and thirties.

Thomas Small It's something that unites most Islamists, restoring the caliphate.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Abul A'la Maududi and the Jemaah Islamiyah in Pakistan and India and the Muslim League in India is all about the restoring the caliphate.

So, really, when people ask me, you know, "Did really people care about restoring the caliphate?"

And I will say, "Just look at how many groups, you know, emerged, you know, trying to restore the caliphate."

Thomas Small Certainly, in Egypt, a lot of people were attracted to Hassan al-Banna's ideas, because, by 1948, the Muslim Brotherhood had half a million members in two thousand branches across the countries. Quite a remarkable explosion of membership. And the Muslim Brotherhood lent its voice, its organisational powers, and, ultimately, its fists to the cause of Egyptian nationalism, to the anti-British cause in Egypt.

In 1936, the British and the Egyptian signed the Anglo-Egyptian Agreement, which limited the number of British troops in Egypt to ten thousand, and they were only there to defend the Suez Canal. The Suez Canal, I think it should go without saying, is incredibly important. All of the world's oil basically flows through it. Huge amounts of sea traffic, in general. And apart from ensuring oil and food security for the world, it also generates huge revenues, because to use the canal, you've got to pay.

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

Thomas Small So, it was a very important feather in the – in the British Imperial cap, and they didn't want to give it up.

So, as I say, in 1936, they signed an agreement that they would keep their troops in the canal zone. And this really irritated Egyptian nationalists and the Muslim Brotherhood, forcing a renegotiation in 1945. But Britain refused to compromise. It would not give up military control of the canal.

Throughout this period, the British were working as close as they could with the Egyptian government and its king, Fat Farouk, and the Muslim Brotherhood was increasingly seen as a threat. So, the prime minister outlawed the group in 1948. But then, this prime minister was assassinated by a Muslim Brotherhood member. And in retaliation, after luring him with promises of a peaceful negotiation, the Egyptian secret police assassinated Hassan al-Banna on the 12th of February 1949.

Aimen Dean Well, that assassination is what led to a series of events that will culminate in the ousting of the king.

Thomas Small That's right. So, in 1950, elections were won by the Wafd Party, who were nationalists. The Muslim Brotherhood had boycotted the election, which is probably why the Wafd Party won. At this point, the situation was tense, and the US got involved, which is where Operation Fat Fucker comes in. It was all about Suez, all about the canal and keeping shipping free of communist influence, especially the free flow of oil from the gulf to the West.

But the West had a problem. The country was in turmoil. Absolutely everyone (nationalists, communists, the Muslim Brotherhood) loathed the king, Fat Farouk.

Poor Farouk. I mean, we keep calling him Fat Farouk. Aimen, how is Farouk remembered today by the Arabs? I – I know of him. He's almost like a cartoonish character. Plump like a big overgrown baby, really, with his little fez, eating oysters. Apparently, he ate three hundred oysters a day.

Aimen Dean Oh, my God. I mean, I – I don't know, like, you know, I mean, how he was able to live for as long as he did. And in the end, actually, he died while eating. He died.

Thomas Small He was in a restaurant.

Aimen Dean Yeah. In 1970, in Rome.

Thomas Small Oh, poor Farouk.

Aimen Dean But, you know, for all, you know, what people say about him, for a while, of course, the [unintelligible], you know, and the Arab nationalists, they were always calling King Farouk, like, you know, the glutinous. You know, the greedy. The foreigner. He never belonged.

Thomas Small Corrupt.

Aimen Dean Corrupt. All of this thing. You know, that stood to the British. They – they never left anything, you know, that wasn't said about him. But in modern history, he is more fondly remembered.

Thomas Small You mean, more recently, his image has been rehabilitated?

Aimen Dean Yes. It's been habilitated. People remember him as gentle, cultured, and wasn't a tyrant.

Thomas Small Well, he wasn't a tyrant, actually. He really wasn't.

Aimen Dean He wasn't.

Thomas Small Well, at the very end, he started to be [unintelligible].

Aimen Dean Well, I mean, he was trying to keep the country together, because he felt that his gentle demeanour and his attempt to always rule by consensus, because he was just too lazy to rule to be honest, did actually lead to the state in almost descending into chaos.

So, he was trying too little too late, in the end, to put the country together and applying some measured force there. But in the end, when there was an uprising against him by the army, how did he respond? Did he shoot back? No. He, like a gentlemen …

Thomas Small True.

Aimen Dean … abdicated with honour and left in his yacht to go and hunt down the best restaurants in the Mediterranean.

Thomas Small Well, Fat Farouk's overthrow happened in 1952. It began early that year. The US was becoming especially concerned. British troops in the canal zone were being attacked by communists and by the Muslim Brotherhood. And there were horrific riots in Cairo that were targeting foreigners. It wasn't a good scene at all.

In this rising chaos, King Farouk began ruling increasingly by decree. And the US feared there might be a popular revolt against him, which would lead to Egypt being in the Soviet camp.

So, as in Iran, a year later, the CIA turned to the army. The Egyptian army already harboured within itself a group of young officers known as the Free Officers, who were very upset with King Farouk's rule, who felt utterly humiliated by the performance of the Egyptian army in 1948 against the nascent state of Israel, which we will talk about in the next episode. So, we can't really go into it now.

So, there was already a talk of revolution in the air within the army. One of these officers was a man who would grow to be an absolute titan, an iconic Arab, Gamal Abdel Nasser. When I say that name, Aimen—Gamal Abdel Nasser—what do you think?

Aimen Dean I—. You transform me back to the age of Arab nationalism, anti-Western sentiment, anti-Israeli sentiment. You transform me back to the age when it was all about nationalism. It was all about the Arab unity.

Thomas Small But Nasser the man, Aimen …

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … Nasser the man.

Aimen Dean Well, you know, basically a giant who fell from grace.

Thomas Small Don't – don't skip to the end. Let's start at the beginning. We're in the fifties. We're—. This is Nasser in his prime. He's so handsome. He's so elegant, tall. Immaculately dressed. Those eyes. Those eyes. He was like a screen idol.

Aimen Dean He looked like Omar Sharif. I mean, he really looked like an actor.

Thomas Small Yeah.

Aimen Dean And he – he – he – he was elegant. Effortlessly elegant. The way he talks. His – his charisma gripped millions upon millions from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean and beyond, I mean, to the point where he had a fan club among world leaders. Nehru of India. Sukarno of Indonesia. All of these people.

Thomas Small Tito in Yugoslavia.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. People were just looking at him and thinking, "Wow, what a titan. What a giant."

The man spoke English nicely. Arabic, nicely. You know, when he dressed and he talks to the people, people just gravitated towards him.

So, was he a good speaker? Yes. Was he a good orator? Yes. Was he a good leader? That is yet to be discussed.

Thomas Small Well, his rise to power began on the 23rd of July 1952, when Project Fat Fucker was put into effect. The night before, the conspirators had taken over defence positions in Cairo secretly. Well, they didn't—. Without—. With no fighting. There was no blood spilled. The US knew all about this. They had warned the British beforehand not to interfere. Any movement of British troops from Suez would be opposed with force. This was a serious – a serious coup.

Aimen Dean Well, Truman wasn't kidding around. He already, like, dropped two nuclear bombs on Japan. Like, you know, I mean, and the British were not going to oppose him.

Thomas Small Poor Farouk. It must have landed like a nuclear bomb in his lap, because there, he found himself ushered onto a boat and he swam away, never to be seen in Egypt again.

Aimen Dean I—. Actually, I was—. In 2011. I stayed in the hotel, which was his palace. It's called the Palestine Hotel—now, it is the Hilton Hotel—in al-Muntazah Palace in Alexandria. So, it was there where he was, you know, cornered by the army and was told, you know, "Hey. It's over."

And so, he said, "Okay." You know? "I will abdicate in favour of my son, Fuad III. And, of course, he will basically abdicate, too."

And then, that's it. Like, you know, the rule of the Muhammad Ali dynasty came to an end. But it was so civilised. Not a single drop of blood, you know, was spilt. And actually, he was allowed to take his royal yacht. He was allowed to take a huge amount of cash and jewellery and money with him. And they gave him the twenty-one-gun salute, national anthem, you know, singing for the last time. And goodbye. Go enjoy your life in Europe.

Thomas Small It wasn't just goodbye to the Muhammad Ali dynasty. It was a goodbye to five thousand of royal in Egypt. And for the first time, Egypt was a republic. And for the first time in two thousand five hundred years, an Egyptian ran the show.

Aimen Dean Exactly. For two and a half thousand years, not as single native Egyptian ruled the country. Since the Persian invasion in the mid-550s by Cyrus the Great, the country was never controlled by its native population. Two and a half millennia.

Oh, and don't forget, Thomas, that, actually, the Muslim Brotherhood lent their support to the Free Officer Movement. Actually, for roughly two to three years, after the 1952 uprising, there was a honeymoon period actually between the Muslim Brotherhood and the Free Officers Movement.

Thomas Small What was in it for the – for the Muslim Brotherhood? Why did they support the Free Officers? I never quite understood that.

Aimen Dean The support for the Free Officers is that idea that the Free Officers would expel the British influence and with the promise that they will nationalise assets, including the canal, that belong to Egypt. Because the Free Officers already had in the programme these aspirations. It's just they didn't want to share power with a group of fanatics. That's how they view it. So, the nationalist military officers had their alliance with the Islamists and their wide base within the population. So, it was a marriage of convenience. But at some point, you can't share power. Because the Muslim Brotherhood were calling for elections, you know. There is the tiny, teeny, little detail of, "Yeah. Excuse me, officers. When can we have the elections?"

Thomas Small Nasser, especially, was opposed to elections.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small And he conspired to become the undisputed leader of the revolutionary movement. The details are complex. But in effect, Nasser would turn against the Muslim Brotherhood when they turned against his new constitution, which enshrined secularism. Obviously, this was very provocative to the Muslim Brotherhood. They could not accept a constitution for Egypt that enshrine secularism. So, they organised street protests, which turned into riots. And so, Nassar banned the Brotherhood in early 1954.

He's on the rise, and his trajectory is completed on the 26th of October of that year, 1954, when, during a speech broadcast live on the radio, he survived an assassination attempt. Now, this is interesting. He blamed it on the Brotherhood just like, if you remember the shah, in 1959, had blamed his assassination attempt on communists. But in fact, it may have not been the Brotherhood.

Aimen Dean There are some suggestions that it wasn't the Brotherhood, because, to this day, they deny it and, to this day, they say, "Really. We had nothing to do with it." And the evidence based on some, you know, documents released from, you know, the British, you know, intelligence and diplomatic archives suggest that it might have been a communist plot all along.

In Iran, however, it was the Islamists who wanted to assassinate the shah. But he blamed it on the communists. So, there you have it.

Thomas Small Well, yeah. Certainly, Nasser blamed the Muslim Brotherhood. He ordered a massive crackdown against them. It's at this point that the infamous Muslim Brotherhood idealogue, Sayyid Qutb, is – is jailed.

Aimen Dean Nasser's crackdown on the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood at the time was so brutal that the ramifications of that, you know, crackdown still lives with us today. To the point—.

Thomas Small And I hang my head in shame, Aimen, because my country had so much to do with it.

Aimen Dean Exactly. You know, CIA used Germans who used to work for the Gestapo and for Hitler's security apparatus and who switched sides to the Americans afterward. They brought them to Egypt in order to help Nasser up the brutal crackdown apparatus on the Muslim Brotherhood. Four thousand Muslim Brotherhood members died – died in jails, because of the torture.

And I can't go into details, because it's so graphic, but what I'm saying here is that, in these jails, the beginnings of the ideology that is the root of ISIS and Takfir and al-Qaeda and all the other jihadist groups began. Mustafa Shukri and others who started excommunicating the entire societies.

I mean, this is where, you know, Nasser's prisons give rise to ugly Islamism as opposed to the, you know, more malleable Islamism with the Muslim Brotherhood.

Thomas Small And yet, after the Muslim Brotherhood cracked down, Nasser was supreme. The week before, he had actually finally got Britain to sign an agreement promising to evacuate their troops from the Suez Canal Zone in twenty months' time. He gave them twenty months to leave. A new era was opening in Egyptian history.

Nasserism is the name that we give to the political ideology that informed Nasser's rule. Nasserism. It was a revolutionary regime. He abolished parliament and political parties. He associated political parties with corrupt monarchical rule. He thought political parties served the interest of landowners and the liberal upper classes. He thought political parties and the liberal upper middle-class only.

Nasser thought that a multi-party system would lead to "one party acting as an agent to the American CIA, another upholding British interests, and a third working for the Soviets."

Aimen Dean Isn't this ironic?

Thomas Small Which is actually true.

Aimen Dean Isn't this ironic, actually, Thomas? You know, since he himself was helped by Fat Fucker, like, you know, I mean, to come to power. Or the CIA.

Thomas Small It's true. But – but it's – but it's also shrewd, because it had – it is basically what had happened in Iran in the for- – in the late forties and early fifties. He had watched this exact thing happened within Iran. One party, a pro-British. One party, pro-American. One party, pro-Soviet. So, he was no fool, Nasser.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small The revolution first focused on attacking landowners, whom he called feudalists. The officers saw these people as opposed to modernisation with reason. And so, they broke up their large estates into smaller parcels and distributed them to their tenants or – or to other landless peasants.

But at first, the revolution was kind of moderate. It didn't attack businessmen. It didn't attack industrialists. It wasn't like a full-blown Bolshevik revolution or anything. Because businessmen and capitalists were urban. They were westernised. They supported modernisation. So, Nasser supported them, but he wouldn't always do that, you know. Eventually, he turned against them, too. The country adopted a much more Soviet model of modern of economic modernisation.

In 1961, for example, all financial institutions and all industrial concerns were nationalised. I mean, that is quite an extreme move.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. Not, you know—. Do you know what happened, actually? That move, you know, lost Egypt one of its most important communities, which was the industrialists, as well as business and trade communities. The Italians and, most importantly, the Greeks. There were almost …

Thomas Small I know.

Aimen Dean … one-point-three million Greeks and Italians living in Alexandria and surrounding areas. And they were all forced to leave. They migrated to Australia, to New Zealand, to America, to Canada.

You know, like, you know, when you go to Melbourne, in Australia, they have one of the largest Greek communities in the world. In fact, the second largest Greek community in the world after Greece itself. And what they will tell you is that most of them came not from Greece directly. They came from Egypt. They came from Alexandria. And they remember Alexandria with such fondness, you know, as if—.

Thomas Small They remember it …

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … as I thought I was going to experience it when I visited. And I was—. I wanted to see Greek Alexandria.

Aimen Dean Yeah. You missed it by thirty years, mate.

Thomas Small Nasser's ideology eventually grew into something called pan-Arabism. He thought that all the Arabs should be united under one large nation state with Cairo as its capital and him as their president.

Now, Aimen, you're always saying that you're a supporter of the nation state. Is there any universe where Nasser's dream of uniting all the Arabs under one banner, in one big nation state, would be, for you, an – an ideal?

Aimen Dean No. And I'll tell you why. Because, first of all, every nation has their own priorities, has their own national character, distinct traditions. You cannot just basically force this kind of union. You can have a confederation. You can have a – a sort of a trade, and to some extent, diplomatic union just like the EU, but you can't force them, you know, to be under one—.

Thomas Small But – but define nation, Aimen. Define nation. In the – in the fifties, people were saying the Arabs are one nation.

Aimen Dean That was a little bit of a stretch, because the Arabs were never one nation to begin with, except under the caliphate of the Umayyads and, to some extent, the Abbasids. And then, they were fragmented. The reality is that you can say that the North Africans, with the exception of Libyans—. Libyans are mostly Arab by DNA, because they're Arab tribes who settled there, mostly. But if you talk about Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, they're not Arabs. They are Berbers. You know, the number of Arab tribes who are originally from Arabia there, they are a minority. The majority are Tamazight. And if you look at Egypt—.

Thomas Small And Lebanese, Syrians. You're going to tell me their Phoenicians.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Well, not all of them, basically. But—. So, Lebanon, yes. But I would Syria, because there are so many Bedouin Arabs there. Jordan also. So many Bedouin Arabs. The Palestinians are a mix of Arabs and Phoenicians and the, you know, Philistines.

But if you look at the Egyptians, there was a study that says basically that only seventeen percent of the Egyptian population is actually Arab by DNA.

Thomas Small But are nations forged by DNA, by genetics? I mean, I thought nations are equally a question of culture, religion, and certainly language. I mean, this is the big thing. All of the Arabs speak Arabic. So, aren't they one Arabic nation?

Aimen Dean I'm sorry to my Algerian and the Moroccan listeners. And Tunisians also, I don't understand a word you say. So, you are not Arabs. Sorry.

But—. Yeah.

Thomas Small Harsh, Aimen. Wow. Below the belt.

Aimen Dean Hey. I'm just kidding.

Anyway, what I'm saying here is you just cannot lump nations like this together without having to address, you know, significant difference and subcultures here. And this is what he was trying to do. He was trying to unite Syria with Egypt, but that was a short-lived, you know, union. He was trying to not Yemen with Egypt by force. It just didn't work. And the same thing. The—. You know, the Saudis loved the idea of monarchy. People of Arabia loved the idea of monarchy, that a king can rule and have legitimacy more than, you know, basically someone who appointed himself, because he know how to speak and dress.

Again, we come back to the one-man show, you know, was working on the Egyptians, on the Syrians, on the Iraqis, but not on the people who actually wanted to be ruled by monarchs. It's the clashing ideas of how governance should be, you know, implemented.

Thomas Small A clash of civilisations, even. Who knows? Maybe we'll—. Maybe. Maybe. I mean, in fact, this idea of – of a pan-Arab nationalist seeking to use the military to unite people he thought shouldn't be divided has some echoes down to the present, wouldn't you say, perhaps in the battlefields of Ukraine?

Aimen Dean Absolutely. I mean, "Oh, you know, I have Russians there." Just because they speak Russian doesn't mean basically they belonged to Russia. Excuse me. Just because Kuwaitis are exactly the same tribes as the Saudis that Kuwait should be absorbed into Saudi Arabia. Otherwise, where does it stop? Where does it stop?

Thomas Small Nasser's pan-Arab nationalism would have big Cold War consequences. And as we're racing towards the Suez Crisis now, let me just lay out the Cold War regional chess board at the time.

I know I have these long historical rants, but they're useful. They're useful. Stick with me. First, the Soviet Union. It actually had no real presence in the region, but it was looking for a foothold, mainly to upset America's designs. Then, you have Nasser and an Arab nationalism in general. This player of the game hated Britain and France for colonialism and for supporting Israel. Then, you have Britain and France. They were both declining colonial powers desperate to maintain some military control of these newly independent states in the Middle East. France was particularly angry at Nasser's support of revolutionaries in Algeria, which they ruled. As for Britain, Churchill had actually just returned to power there after a six-year absence and he wanted to preserve what was left of the British Empire as best he could.

Oil security and countering Soviet expansion made both Britain and France allies of the US. But the US, under Eisenhower, who had just arrived on the scene, was anti-colonial. It supported nationalism instead. And this put the US at odds with its British and French allies.

Now, this is interesting. Churchill and Eisenhower actually met in New York in early 1953 to discuss Middle East policy. Churchill was looking for an agreement from Eisenhower that in any Middle East conflict, the US would act jointly alongside the UK. But Eisenhower said no, the United States would be supporting Arab nationalist ambitions.

Eisenhower referred to how the British had screwed up the situation in Iran under Mosaddegh. At this point, Iran is in the midst of its downward spiral, which led to the coup. And Eisenhower said, "Nationalism is on the march, and world communism is taking advantage of that spirit of nationalism to cause dissension in the free world. Moscow leads many misguided people to believe that they can count on communist help to achieve and sustain nationalistic ambitions."

So, Churchill did not get the agreement he was looking for from Eisenhower. And in May of 1953, with all that in mind, his new secretary of state, John Foster Dulles, traveled to Cairo to talk to Nasser about joining a new military pact, one like NATO but for the Middle East. In time, this would be called the Baghdad Pact, and Nassar wanted nothing to do with it. In his mind, Britain was the target. He didn't want to be in a military alliance with the US and Britain, because Britain was an occupying power. What did Nasser care about the Soviet Union? It was five thousand miles away. How would such a pact with America be different from what Britain was already doing to Egypt?

Nasser said to Dulles that he wanted to be neutral in the Cold War. Well, Eisenhower might have supported nationalist ambitions, but he didn't support anyone's neutrality in the Cold War. And so, the US reacted exactly as you would expect: badly. They were pissed off and made two massive errors with big geopolitical consequences. First, the US refused to sell Nasser any arms to help him modernise the Egyptian army.

So, instead, Aimen, who do you think he turned to for his arms?

Aimen Dean You know, there are only four vendors at the time: the US, France, UK, and the Soviet Union. Of course, we can exclude the first three. So, there is only the Soviet Union.

Thomas Small Indeed. He turned to the Soviet Union, which helped him broker an arms deal with Czechoslovakia in September of 1955. This must resonate down to the present. I mean, the Middle East is still a good market for Russian weaponry, isn't it?

Aimen Dean Not as it used to be. I mean, there has been a significant decline now. But yes, up until twenty years ago, it was a good market. But not anymore.

Thomas Small But what about all the infamous weapons markets in Yemen, for example, selling, you know, selling a cut rate Kalashnikovs and things? I mean, in the old generation, there are still lots of Russian guns floating around.

Aimen Dean If you are talking about small firearms, yes. You know, they are popular and they are reliable and they are good. But also, they've been declining, because the American war in Iraq and, of course, the fight in Syria and other places opened up the market for American small firearms. They are as popular now as AK-47s.

Thomas Small Oh, that's good news.

So, the second massive blunder that America made with Nasser was in relation to a major prong of Nasser's development programme, which, I said, was modernising agriculture. And he wanted to build—and here we go—a massive new dam in upper Egypt, in the south, at Aswan. The Aswan Dam. It would allow Egypt to fully control the flooding of the Nile River, enabling what Nasser thought would be better irrigation and higher yields. Sadly, in fact, it's turned out to be a massive tragedy for Egypt.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. Because, actually, the natural minerals and the sediments that the river actually brought with it all the way uninterrupted by any dam is what made Egypt more fertile. Actually, the dam caused, you know, a significant drop in the ground fertility since then.

Thomas Small Well, the 1950s were all about big projects that were going to overcome nature.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small And when Nasser turned to the World Bank, asking for a loan to help him build his dam, the US imposed conditions, which, in his eyes, amounted to controlling the whole Egyptian economy, i.e., the same sort of deal that the French and British had demanded from the khedive a hundred years earlier for building the Suez Canal.

So, Nasser said, "Look, if the World Bank isn't going to finance the dam, I'm going to have to raise money elsewhere." And on the 26th of July 1956, he nationalised the Suez Canal.

A massive, massive punch in the face to the British.

Aimen Dean And it was all very well staged on TV while he was doing a TV address. He was addressing a group of ministers and a group of politicians. And then, you know, he gave the secret word, you know, to his secret service to go and occupy all the sensitive parts of the zone, of the canal zone, and then, they took it over. And then, once the signal came to him that the complete takeover of the canal has been achieved, he said to the people he was addressing that, "Now, I can address that the canal has now fallen into Egyptian hands." And he announced the canal to be a public Egyptian company.

Thomas Small It was also perfectly timed, because only one week before, Britain had completed its promised evacuation of the canal zone.

Aimen Dean Exactly. So, it was the engineers. It was civilians.

Thomas Small It – it had withdrawn all its troops.

Aimen Dean Yeah. But the engineers were there, still. It was completely run by engineers and by, they call them, pilots. They're not pilots. You know, aviation pilots. They are actually water canal pilots who, you know, can guide the ships through the canal. Secretly, he was already training Egyptian pilots, Egyptian canal pilots, basically, to guide the ships through the canal. So, the takeover was seamless, almost.

Thomas Small Well, Nasser's nationalisation of the canal was provocative both to Britain and France. And the two countries initially planned separate Egyptian invasion campaigns. And this is because France wanted to include Israel in the invasion, but Britain didn't want to do so. It – it didn't want to offend Arab opinion in Iraq and Jordan. So, initially, Britain refused to work with France on that plan.

Israel—. And again, what we're going to talk about Israel in the next episode, so I don't want to go too much into it here, but they wanted the Gaza Strip. It was then held by Egypt, and the Egyptians had been attacking Israel from it. So, they really wanted the Gaza Strip and they also wanted, if possible, to get their hands on the Sinai peninsula to protect the Gulf of Aqaba, through which Israeli shipping was going from the Port of Eilat.

So, Israel was onsite. They were, you know, itching to invade along with the French. And it took some time for Britain to be talked into it. But on the 24th of October 1956, the three countries signed what's called the Protocol of Sèvres in France. They agreed to work together. They agreed an invasion of Egypt.

The 29th of October 1956, they launched. This is—. In the West, it's known as the Suez Crisis. In the Arab world, it's called the Tripartite Aggression.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. Yeah.

Thomas Small A much more – a much more accurate name. It had three stages. First, Israel invaded through the Gaza Strip and into Egypt proper. While they did so, the British and French provided air support from aircraft carriers in the Mediterranean and then began to bomb Egyptian positions. The goal was to destroy the Egyptian economy.

I mean, it was really brutal. In response, Nasser closed the canal, which obviously made the whole world sit up and notice. World shipping was dependent on the canal.

Britain and France, to the last minute, assumed that when push came to shove, the US would support them. However, they were disappointed. Eisenhower did not stand by his allies. He condemned the invasion of Egypt, because he felt he couldn't risk alienating the Arabs and pushing them into the hands of the Soviets. So, the US drew up a resolution in the UN Security Council. And get this. Look at this politics, security council politics. You won't believe it. The US draw up a resolution demanding that Israel withdraw its troops from Egypt. But this was vetoed by Britain and France. This is not how the Security Council usually works.

Aimen Dean Yeah. And actually, this is the first and maybe the last time, you know, the US stood against Israel, so.

Thomas Small the UN Security Council route didn't work. And so, the – the Soviet Union got involved. Khrushchev, the premier, actually threatened to – to use his newly acquired nuclear weapons, which was really too far for Britain and France, for the invaders. And so, they cancelled and withdrew. The fighting had gone on for just over a week. Four thousand Egyptians died, including one thousand civilians. The Israeli-Britain-French side had far fewer casualties.

So, the Suez Crisis. Not a shining moment for Britain and France, would you say?

Aimen Dean Well, I mean, I think also, at that time, if Churchill was in charge, maybe he would have been more cautious. But because it was Anthony Eden, you know, his protégé.

Thomas Small Yes. Churchill had been – had had resigned and been replaced by Anthony Eden.

Aimen Dean Yeah. And he had a promising career. And it was Suez which ended him.

Thomas Small Suez really redounds into the present day. It's become almost a byword for a late imperial overstretch. The sort of last gasp attempt of a dying empire to – to shore up its interests. It – it was certainly the – the – the point when the US was firmly situated in control of the Western world's affairs. If the US said no, you didn't do it.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Totally.

Thomas Small But on the Egyptian side, Nasser emerged from the Suez Crisis more powerful than ever. He was in his glory. And he moved from one success to another. I mean, he – he had undermined the Baghdad Pact. He had negotiated his Czech arms deal, basically wrestling out from under any Western military oversight. He nationalised the Suez Canal successfully. And then, he won a war against Britain, France, and Israel.

I mean, this is amazing. The Arab world erupt in jubilation and joy. They think, "We're on our way. We are going to be, you know, shoulder to shoulder with – with the West and with the Soviets." It was a heady time.

Now, the Suez Crisis had a huge impact on the Cold War. On the one hand, Nasser turned against the West more or less decisively, which gave the Soviet Union that foothold they had always been hoping for in the Middle East. And for the next twenty years, informally at least, Egypt was a partner of the Soviet bloc.

America had really shot itself in the foot. I mean, they should have worked closer with Nasser. They should have done what they said they were going to do to Churchill, i.e., support nationalist ambitions. But in the end, they didn't. They really supported their own Cold War interests. It meant that that where they weren't before, the Soviets now were, the Middle East.

And then, what's ironic is that the Soviet presence in the Middle East led to what's called the Eisenhower Doctrine. In 1957, Eisenhower said that the United States army would do whatever it took to "stand against overt armed aggression from any nation controlled by international communism."

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small So – so, five years earlier, he is telling Churchill, "We are not interested in any imperialism. We – we – we support nationalist ambitions." But suddenly, they're going to intervene militarily if any independent nation allies with the Soviet Union. The logic of – of empire is very hard to avoid, I think.

And so, as a result of Nasser's actions, the Cold War is hotter than ever right in the Middle East. We are going to continue this story next time with when we talk about Israel and Palestine and move into the 1960s. Nasser will come back, but we – we're leaving him in his glory. We will next tell the story [crosstalk].

Aimen Dean Let them enjoy it a bit. Let them enjoy it.

Thomas Small I think based on what we've been discussing today, we're now in a position to see the Cold War, not so much as an East versus West conflict, which is how it's usually understood, but as a conflict between different colonial powers over the colonised world. You have the old colonial powers on their way out and new colonial powers on their way in. And I must say, especially the United States. The Soviet Union was more opportunistic, more reactive. It was the United States that felt it needed to ensure that the Middle East and other states that were bordering the Soviet Union remained outside of Soviet influence, and would inexorably adopt imperialistic techniques and imperialistic strategies to achieve that end.

The great game between Russia and the British was just continuing between the Soviets and the Americans.

Aimen Dean And who, in the end, pays the price? The ordinary people. As always.

Thomas Small And that makes me think of the present, Aimen. And I—. You know, my thoughts aren't particularly well formed about this. But I do see, in the Suez Crisis, so many echoes of the current conflict between Russia and Ukraine and, really, between Russia and the West, you know, where on the one hand—.

I mean, here's what I want to say, Aimen. Frankly, the sort of language that Eisenhower is using to Churchill in that meeting in 1953 in New York is sort of similar to the contradictions of American rhetoric today. You know, America says that it supports independence. Big empires or big hegemonic powers, they claim to support the independence of countries when it suits their aim.

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

Thomas Small And when it doesn't suit their aims …

Aimen Dean Totally.

Thomas Small … they – they don't. So, right now, the United States is making a lot of fuss about this sovereignty of Ukraine. Similarly, in 1956, the Soviet Union made a big fuss about the sovereignty of Egypt, and it said, "We – we cannot have this – this unlawful invasion of Egypt by Israel, France, and Britain."

But that very same year, the Soviet Union, had rolled its tanks into Hungary and crushed an uprising there.

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

Thomas Small So, what does this tell us? I mean, it makes me quite cynical, I must say.

Aimen Dean First of all, if you are looking for honesty, you know, with politicians, I mean, I don't know. Like, you know, I mean, you're – you're—. I mean, one must be deluded to think basically that you can trust world leaders. I mean, look, in my opinion, what Putin is doing right now, he is actually maybe repeating the Suez Crisis. The Ukraine crisis are going to be maybe his undoing.

Thomas Small Totally.

Aimen Dean He is actually—. And there is another Nasser rising, you know. Zelensky, you know, which is the president of Ukraine. An aggression against his country could actually turn them into a symbol of resistance, a symbol of independence, a symbol of nationhood.

Thomas Small I agree. I think …

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … the Suez Crisis really is a good …

Aimen Dean Metaphor. Yeah.

Thomas Small … symbol of what's going on now.

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

Thomas Small Yeah. A good metaphor of what's going on. I've been thinking that one way of understanding Putin's move here is as the last gasp of the Russian empire. You know, a five-hundred-year-old state structure. The last gasp of an empire on the way out. Just like Britain and France invading Egypt was [crosstalk].

Aimen Dean Absolutely. He is living in a world of delusions.

Thomas Small Well, there he is, dreaming of bringing the Tsar back. And in 1956, in Nasser's prisons, Islamists dreaming of bringing the caliph back.

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small The echoes are – are—. The echoes are almost creepy.

As far as our clash of civilisations theme goes, you know, Islamism versus modernism, there you have it right there. Nasser is in his glory, but in the bowels of his increasingly despotic regime are men nursing a ferocious ambition to throw off the West and bring back the caliphate.

Next time, we're going to talk about Israel. My goodness, there's a massive clash of civilisations dimension to – to that conflict.

Aimen Dean It's a multidimensional clash of civilisations there.

Thomas Small A clash. It's a fist fuck of civilisations. That's my last time I'm using the F word, I swear, in this – in this series.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. Absolutely.

Thomas Small This is your biweekly reminder that if you are not doing so already, you can follow the show @MHConflicted on Twitter and Facebook and argue over the finer points we've raised with other fans of the show on our Facebook discussion page. You can find that by searching "Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group" over on Facebook.

Finally, I wanted to let you all know that at the end of each episode, Aimen and I choose a question from a listener and answer it in our exclusive extended bonus feed. If you would like to be featured, ask us your questions on Twitter or Facebook. And then, to hear your name on the podcast and get your answer, subscribe to ad-free listening and extended bonus content for just 99p on Apple Podcasts. Or if you listen on Spotify, you can find Conflicted Extra also for just 99p per month.

And that, as they say, is that. Please join us in two weeks' time for another exciting episode of Conflicted.

Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Sandra Ferrari. Sandra Ferrari is also our executive producer. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

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Conflicted S3 E5 - The Soul of Iran

Thomas Small You've seen Dune, haven't you, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Loved it so much. 

Thomas Small You know what? As I've been preparing for this episode, I've been listening to the Dune soundtrack on repeat. Just constantly. You know, that amazing, weird soundtrack. Do – do you think that makes sense? I mean, it has a kind of – a kind of Islamic style, a kind of Middle Eastern-style soundscape. And the whole story is pretty – pretty Muslim, isn't it? 

Aimen Dean Well, yeah. I mean, talking about the Mahdi and Lisan al-Gaib and, you know, Muad'Dib and all of that. But the secret to a good adaptation, just do not cram the whole damn novel into just one movie. Just split them. 

Thomas Small I was thinking that Dune is basically projecting thousands of years into the future into this kind of Islamic universe, this sort of Islamic galactic empire or something. And, of course, in Conflicted …

[THEME IN]

… we're trying to, like, go back thousands of years to explain the present. It's like a little—. It like looking in the mirror. With Dune, it's the opposite of what we're doing.

[THEME OUT]

In episode three, we showed how America's first foothold in the Middle East was in Saudi Arabia, with its largest oil reserves in the world managed by an American company, Aramco. And last time, we explained how geostrategic realities have informed Russian geopolitics for centuries. 

In this episode, we shift our focus to your favourite country, Aimen: Iran.

Aimen Dean Oh, it is my favourite. 

Thomas Small Nobody could have known this at the time. But with hindsight, we can see that, at the beginning of the Cold War, Iran had somehow become a whirlpool, swirling with all of the twentieth century's clashing ideological and political forces. All the players are there—an autocratic monarch in the old style; a newly formed communist party conspiring revolution; aristocratic liberals demanding economic and constitutional reform; Islamist terrorists; big oil; a declining European empire; the Soviet Union reviving Czarist geopolitics; and, of course, America, the new superpower. It's a big episode. We've got a lot to cover. 

But I keep meaning to ask you, Aimen. It's been two years since the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, the – the head of the Quds Force. And we did a bonus episode on – on his assassination at the time. Two years later, what's your estimation of the impact that his assassination has had on – on the region?

Aimen Dean Well, of course, it's very clear that, since he's assassination and removal from the picture, the fortunes of the groups that Qasem Soleimani used to be the godfather of—. 

Thomas Small Groups like Hezbollah and, you know, even the Houthis.

Aimen Dean If you see that the Houthis are now having trouble maintaining their grip on power in the territories where they control and they failed in their offensive to take the historic city of Marib, you know, where the oil fields are located and the hydro – hydroelectric dam is located. On top of this, it seems that there—. You know, well, Qasem Soleimani's favourites group in Iraq, the [unintelligible 0:03:20], lost a considerable amount of power in the last elections. They went down from forty-eight MPs in the parliament to only seventeen. They lost thirty-one MPs. It shows his absence really, you know, present itself very clearly in the politics of the group – countries where Qasem Soleimani was active in. 

Thomas Small Amazing how the Americans, by taking just one man off of the field, could have affected such a big change. 

Aimen Dean If you remember, we described Qasem Soleimani as the hard disc that contains the secrets, you know, of Iran's external strategic operations in the region. Take him out, and he is offline completely. That hard disc is completely offline. And it is very visible how his absence has created this gap that cannot be filled by anyone else in the Iranian regime circles. 

Thomas Small Iran. Aimen, you know, I studied Arabic and Islamic studies, which is why I know a thing or two about that wacky religion of yours. And I—. 

Aimen Dean More than one and two. 

Thomas Small And I – I – I could never say I regret studying Arabic, because Arabic has opened up tremendous cultural and historical and, indeed, theological vistas to me. That said, if I do have a regret, it's that I didn't study the language that has been described as the language of poetry, par excellence. And, of course, I'm talking about Persian or Farsi. 

Someone once wrote, "What Persian poetry expressed was not an enigma to be solved, but an enigma that was unsolvable." And at the risk of sounding like an unreconstructed Orientalist, this really resonates with me as a kind of Westerner. Because for us, in the West, Persia has always been, like, the great enemy, the essential other. It's always been there, but we – we struggled to imagine it. It's like a mirage.

The ancient Persians are almost the mirror image of the ancient Greeks. You know, they're both Indo-European peoples, originally from the Eurasian steps. They were both newcomers to an already very old Bronze Age civilisation in Mesopotamia and the Levant. They were both destined in ways to inherit that older civilisation. Persia first, then Greece, when Alexander the great sacked the monumental Persian capital of Persepolis and set up court in Babylon, not as a Greek emperor, really, but as the last Persian emperor. 

And the Persians had a tremendous impact on the Bible. The three magi, the three Kings from the orient who visited Jesus and gave him gold, frankincense, and myrrh. I mean, they were Persians. They were Zoroastrians. 

Ideas like creation in six days or at least six categories, ideas like paradise, which is just the Persian word for "a walled garden." The—. The—. A strict distinction between good and evil. Characters or realities like angels. The fact that moral behaviour is the criterion for some kind of post-mortem blessedness or punishment. All of these things actually were in Zoroastrianism and were carried out into the worlds that they conquered by the Persians. 

So, I want to ask you. I mean, that's my perspective as a Christian thinking about Persia, as a Westerner thinking about Persia. But you, Aimen, as a Sunni, and given everything you've said about the Iranian regime on Conflicted, I mean, I imagine you basically hate Iran. Isn't that right?

Aimen Dean No. I don't hate Iran as a whole. I love the people. I love the culture. I love the music. I love the food. You know, there is so much to love and so much to admire about Iran and about the Persian people. 

And remember that, you know, even though I have, you know, no qualms whatsoever with my fellow Muslim – Muslims who, you know, follow the Shia faith, the reality is that, you know, we cannot even associate Shia faith with the Persians, because their conversion to Shia Islam happened only four hundred and fifty-five hundred years ago. That's it. And that doesn't even make them less Muslims. 

The reality is, for me—and I always say this to all my friends from Iran and of Persian descent—I say, I tell them two things. First, I dislike the regime. But everything else, you know, I adore and admire. That's the first thing. The second thing is that DNA doesn't lie. I am thirty-three percent Persian and I'm very proud of it. 

Thomas Small Now, is – is this from your Dirani heritage? Because, you know, greater Persia and all the Persian peoples of – of Central Asia, they're all sort of basically the same stock, aren't they?

Aimen Dean Exactly. So, I have, you know, no qualm. I have—. I have—. I have—. You know, I can almost say I am half-Persian and half – half-Arab, you know, with some, you know, Turkic blood mixed in here and there. And, for me, you know, to hate Iran or to hate the Persian race or culture or traditions is to hate half of me. 

Thomas Small Well, especially as a Muslim, you know, you – you – you – you were right to raise the – the topic of – of the way in which Islam developed in – in Iran. Because, in fact, you know, the Iranian influence over Islam in general has been immense. It's been said that the conquered conquered their conquerors so much that the Persians end up having an impact on Islam. 

Aimen Dean Tremendously. In fact, the Abbasids, they were able to topple the Umayyad dynasty, thanks to the support of the Persian armies. It was then the Persianisation of the government, of the systems, of the departments of governance. The divans, as we used to call them. And the golden age of Islam started when the Persians, led by the Abbasids, were able to merge and incorporate what the Umayyads built in terms of civilisation and in terms of foundation of the state, and merged with it the science and technology and learning that the Persians brought with them. And then, the age of discovery and the age of translation started. And the contribution of Persian scholars to this is immense and cannot be eclipsed at all

Thomas Small That period of history is known as the Iranian Intermezzo or the Persian Renaissance. It began in the sort of the early ninth century and it continued until the arrival of the Seljuk Turks in the early eleventh. We discussed the Seljuks in episode two, because the Azeris consider themselves to be descendants of those Turkic conquerors. 

It was during the Iranian Intermezzo that Iranian poetry really came into its own. You have Rudaki, Ferdowsi, whose epic poem, the shahnameh or The Book of Kings, recounting the Persian past, perhaps more than anything, revived an Iranian national conscious.

Aimen Dean Indeed. Not to mention that, ironically, the Arabic language were preserved and codified, I would say, you know, thanks to the efforts of Persian linguistic scholars, such as Sibawayh. 

Thomas Small I suppose if you – if you're converted to Islam, the – the religion of Arabic, you have to know Arabic in order to worship. So, the Persians were very invested in getting to know Arabic very well. 

Aimen Dean Indeed. Sibawayh wrote the most comprehensive dictionary in Arabic.

Thomas Small Once Islam had sort of grabbed the heart of Iran, there was a sudden explosion of mysticism and visionary theology for Muslim Iran. Al-Hallaj, Suhrawardi, Rumi, Hathas, Omar Khayyam, Jami, Mulla Sadra. These names are immense in the history of Islam. Iranians contributed so much to the development of that religion.

Aimen Dean Talking about Rumi, he is my favourite. Really my favourite Islamic philosopher and poet. However, one of the funny memes that I've seen online, I see his picture and he is saying, "My poetry is not about your ex-boyfriend." So, I thought it was so funny. 

Thomas Small For the listeners who don't understand that meme, Rumi is famous for his extremely romantic, love-infused mystical poetry. Of course, it's all sort of about the love of God. But I think a lot of people today, especially in the West, think that it's – it's sort of like Valentine's Day card stuff. 

Anyway, I could wax lyrical about what the idea of Persia means to me and all that stuff forever. But I think we need to get back on track. You know, the last—. In the last episode, we talked about Russia and Russian geopolitics. Well, Russia and Persia have a very long relationship. 

As a result of wars between Russia and what was then officially called the Sublime State of Iran in the early nineteenth century, Azerbaijan was divided in two. We mentioned this in episode two. The northern part was occupied by Russia and the southern part remained part of Iran, which is the reason why there are millions of Azerbaijanis in Iran today. Now, after capitulating to Russia, the shah and the ruling dynasty then were the Qajars, who were, in fact, Azeri Turk in origin. The Qajar shah turned eastward. He focused on retaking territories in present day Afghanistan, which he'd lost to local rivals—i.e., your ancestors, Aimen, the Diranis. This pissed off the British, who were firmly in control of India and needed to protect their north-western frontier, prompting the Anglo-Persian War of 1856. Eventually, the British compelled, the Qajar shah to agree to a number of demands, including never to invade Afghanistan again and then, later, to two notorious economic concessions, as they are called, the Reuter concession, in 1872, and the D'Arcy Concession, in 1901, giving foreigners near total control over the Iranian macroeconomy. 

Now, because it found itself stuck between two imperial rivals (Britain and Russia) Iran, particularly struggled to withstand the onslaught of modernity, more so even than their Ottoman rivals to the west. This resulted in an almost cartoonish smack in the face when, in 1907, the British and the Russian signed the Anglo-Russian Convention, unilaterally decreeing Northern Iran part of Russia's sphere of influence and Southern Iran part of Britain's. They hadn't even bothered to inform the shah about this.

Aimen Dean Typical.

Thomas Small Two years later, in 1909, oil was discovered in Iran. But because of the D'Arcy Concession, this fell into British hands by the Anglo-Persian Oil Company. As you can imagine, this foreign interference was deeply resented by the religious clerics for obvious reasons (Westernisation, secularisation, evil heathens coming to conquer us), but also by those known as bazaaris, the merchant middle-class who watched as profits, usually reserved for themselves, flowed to outsiders instead. In a remarkable precursor to the Iranian revolution of 1979, in 1906, an alliance of clerics and bazaaris, supported by the British as it happens, resulted in what's called the constitutional revolution. The Qajar shah was forced to agree to the formation of a national parliament called the Majles, which then drew up a constitution modelled, strangely enough, on the Belgian constitution. Voting took place, and representatives from around the country were elected, including one Mohammad Mosaddegh, about whom we've got more to say later. 

The constitutional revolution wasn't a great success. The clerics quickly began to fear the liberals who aimed at the secularisation of society. So, they threw their support back towards the shah, who was supported by the Russians, who shelled the Majles in 1908. 

The next decade was politically chaotic. The central state lost control of its provinces. The local economy continued to crater, not least because trade with Russia had been undermined by the catastrophic Bolshevik Revolution there, but also because famine broke out during the First World War, which shredded what remained of Iranian sovereignty as Britain basically took full control. It was not good.

Now, given this history, Aimen, putting yourself in Iran's shoes, it's not hard to see why you Iran's attitude towards Western powers is so mistrustful.

Aimen Dean In fact, I see a lot of similarities between the Iranians and the Chinese here. I mean, basically, the resentment after the Opium Wars between, you know, China and the Western powers and the imposition of trade, sanctions, and unfavourable trading terms on the Chinese by the Western powers, it's almost mirrored exactly. That is in Eastern Asia. Now, in Western Asia, you see that exactly being imposed in the Iranians. 

Thomas Small Yes. And like Iran, China is also a great, an ancient civilisation who felt totally offended by being treated like that. You know, they thought, "Well, we deserve better. We are a great people." 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. I – I – I think it is the unfortunate position that Iran found itself in, especially after the First World War. It was never a participative power in the First World War. But, nonetheless, they lost between twelve to fifteen percent of the entire population, thanks to famine, drought, as well as the Spanish influenza. So, the economy was in tatters. And at the same time, the oil wealth, which became so immensely important to the rest of the world, and especially when it comes to military, you know, strategy. And yet they can't benefit from it because the terms of the Anglo-Persian Oil Company was so unfair that they were receiving nothing but peanuts. Peanuts. 

Thomas Small Definitely, Aimen. Iranian oil would prove a curse as much as a blessing. 

Jumping forward a bit to the Second World War. In 1941, Nazi Germany launched Operation Barbarossa, the largest military operation in history, a full-scale invasion of the Soviet Union. Now, this is interesting. This relates to what we talked about in the last episode about Russian geography and its geopolitics. A major prong of the Nazi advance was toward the Volgograd Gap in the Caucasus—i.e., in the direction of Iran. To protect its oil interests there and to maintain a line of supply to its ally, Stalin, Britain occupied Iran. To protect its oil interests there and to maintain a line of supply to its ally, Stalin, Britain occupied Iran, landing troops in the south who marched northward while Russian troops invaded from the north and marched southward. The two sides met in Tehran. Thirty thousand troops would arrive later after America joined the war. It was particularly humiliating for Iran. The shah at the time was not a Qajar, but rather the man who had, with Britain's help, overthrown the Qajar dynasty in 1925, Reza Shah Palavi. Dun dun dun. 

I mean, Aimen, it's so funny. When I – when I say the name, I just get this sort of, you know, shock of fear through me. He was such a – a powerful personality, known as the Iron shah.

Aimen Dean However, he was still a failure, 

Thomas Small Oh, poor man. But, Aimen, he was powerful. You see pictures of him. And his eyes, his eyes, they're sort of hypnotic. They'll—. You look at – you look at them and you'll do whatever he says. Reza Shah, a commoner, a mere soldier, and yet immensely formidable. He founded the Pahlavi dynasty. Now, this is the dynasty that would itself be overthrown in 1979. 

He had done much to limit British control and get back Iranian sovereignty. He – he was a moderniser like his hero, Ataturk in Turkey, and he was a Persian nationalist, something new in Iranian history, which had always been a traditional, multicultural, imperial state. He pursued a policy of Persianisation and helped to deeply integrate the idea of Persian nationhood in the people of Iran. 

That – that sense of Iranian ethnonationalism, it – it really remains to this day. Wouldn't—? Would you say that, Aimen? 

Aimen Dean Yeah. I mean, it gives them a sense of imperial nationalism to an extent. I mean, because they are always looking back at the history and the extent of the Persian empire. I mean, sometime, I see RIGC-linked accounts on Twitter and other social media platforms, you know, putting what is the ideal map of Iran today. And, you know, to my surprise, I see the map encompassing parts of Afghanistan, parts of Pakistan, Azerbaijan, parts of Turkey. But then, I see all of Iraq, all of the eastern province of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait and Bahrain and Qatar, and, you know, the entire Gulf, you know, Coast on that side, which is oil rich, funny enough, Syria and Lebanon. And to my horror, I see the Israel-Palestine plains or extending all the way to Egypt. And then, I see out of nowhere, Yemen being part of that, you know, map.

Thomas Small Yemen?

Aimen Dean Yes. Yemen. Because—. And not many Middle East listeners will know this, but, actually, Yemen, for a brief time, maybe seven, eight decades, you know, between the late five hundreds and mid-six hundreds, were, in fact, a – a Persian province. 

Thomas Small This is during the Sasanian Empire, the Sasanian period of Persian history.

Aimen Dean Indeed. When the Prophet Mohammed sent his messages to the Kings of the earth at the time in order to accept Islam, one of the messages went to the Sasanian Persian governor of Yemen. By then, Yemen was already a Persian province for roughly seventy years. Yet even though it was only seventy years over the past two and a half thousand years of the long life of the Persian Empire or the Persian people, yet they still believe or, at least, like, the RICG-linked people, still believe in this ethnonationalistic, imperial fantasy of incorporating Yemen into it and incorporating all of these lines I described. 

Thomas Small That's fascinating. It really shows how – how ancient history is still informing the present, for sure. Now back to Reza Shah, one thing that I found interesting about Reza Shah is his modernisation programme involved him doing something very similar to what King Abdulaziz was doing in Saudi Arabia at the time. And this is forcibly settling the nomads. 

We talked about this in the last episode. Iran, like Saudi Arabia, like all of the Middle East in the early twentieth century, still had a very stark distinction between the urban-settled and the agricultural peoples and nomads, who lived a nomadic life. And Reza Shah put an end to it just like King Abdulaziz was doing across the gulf.

Aimen Dean Oh, yes. Because, at the end of the day, these nomads are a source of instability. They could be the fifth column that could be hired by any invading power, whether the Soviets or the British or any other invading power.

Thomas Small Yes. And if you're – if you're involved in the – in the process of updating your state to modern norms, you know, where borders are fixed and the state rules absolutely within those borders, nomads don't fit in very well, because they don't really believe in borders. 

Aimen Dean Or settlement or laws or regulations or anything. And, of course, you know, if they remain nomads, they will not be paying taxation. 

Thomas Small As we said, Reza Shah was a moderniser and he had focused especially on modernising and strengthening the Iranian army. This is why the Anglo-Soviet invasion of 1941 was so humiliating. His army had folded very quickly. And Reza himself was sent into exile. His son, aged only twenty-two, was installed as shah by the allies, though he was not really allowed to rule and remain confined to the palace for the duration of the war. This young man, Mohammad Reza Shah, would, in time, become an iconic figure. He is the shah whom the Ayatollah Khomeini would overthrow thirty-year years later. 

Mohammad Reza Shah, he truly was iconic, wasn't he, Aimen?

Aimen Dean He was iconic, yes, but for all the wrong reasons, you know. Extremely extravagant in a nation that was generally languishing in poverty. He was extremely pro-Western in a society that was still plagued by religious dogma. And he was cruel in his application of the state security force in order to crack down on opposition using the infamous SAVAK, trained by, you know, none other than the Israelis, in order to crush dissent in his domain. 

And yet he was a weak-willed individual. Nonetheless, his extravagance drove everyone to the edge of despair in Iran, which led, of course, later to his eventual demise.

Thomas Small It's really hard to see in the image of that iconic shah from the 1970s that twenty-two-year-old who ascended the Peacock Throne in 1941, installed by the allies. He—. He's so young. He's so – he's so nervous and gentle. And his experience of the war could not have been easy. 

While Iran was occupied by the allied powers, a historic meeting took place in Tehran between Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin. This was the first time that all three had been around the same table. It was during this meeting that Operation Overlord was agreed. That's the 1944 invasion of Normandy, including the D-Day landings. But, more importantly, for our purposes, the allies signed a treaty, agreeing that they would all withdraw their troops from Iran within six months of the end of the war.

Well, we all know how that terrible war ended, with two nuclear bombs ushering in a new Nuclear Age. Everyone has heard of the Manhattan Project, the American programme to develop the bomb during the Second World War, and we all know what the consequences that had, not least on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. 

Aimen, give us an overview of how the Nuclear Age has impacted geopolitics in the Middle East? Which countries now in the Middle East have the bomb?

Aimen Dean Well, at the moment, there is only one country that is known to possess the bomb, at least as an open secret, which is the state of Israel. 

Thomas Small What about Pakistan?

Aimen Dean Can we include Pakistan in the Middle East? 

Thomas Small This is a vexed question. I couldn't—. I – I think for the purposes of this podcast, we include Pakistan in the Middle East.

Aimen Dean If we include Pakistan in the Middle East, and the fact that Pakistan is a staunch ally of Saudi Arabia, militarily speaking, then, yes, we can say that Saudi Arabia is, in theory, covered by the Pakistani nuclear defence umbrella.

Thomas Small So, Israel has the bomb, Pakistan has the bomb, and – and, through Pakistan, Saudi has the bomb. In fact, I've read that Saudi has a couple of warheads in Pakistan, really, with its name written on them. It's – it's theirs.

Aimen Dean Just a couple. Actually, it's twelve. Twelve nuclear warheads that the Saudis have access to. And, at any given moment, if Iran tests a workable nuclear device and it become a solid member of the nuclear club, then Saudi Arabia, the next day, will have a twelve nuclear bombs ready at its disposal, should anything, you know, well happen like this, so. 

Thomas Small We did a whole bonus episode on Iran's nuclear ambitions when we discussed another assassination, this time by the Israelis, of the Iranian nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh. Go back to your listener and give that episode a relisten for a refresher course. 

In that episode, we discussed the Iranian nuclear deal, the JCPOA, which President Trump withdrew from in – in 2018. Now, Aimen, President Trump's gone, Biden's in, and his administration is now trying to get America back on board the deal. How is that going? How are those negotiations going in your view?

Aimen Dean The reality is that the Iranians, you know, stretched as much as possible the length of talks between them and the Biden administration almost to thirteen months now, and the reason is because they wanted to buy as much time as possible in order to enrich as much weapon-grade uranium as possible in order to blackmail the West and the rest of the world, into believing that they are about to produce a workable nuclear device.

Thomas Small As a way of getting better terms. 

Aimen Dean Yes. The whole idea is to get as better terms as possible. But also, at the same time, the fact that once you reach that critical mass, that critical threshold, I would say, you know, you have come so close that, at some point in the future, if you want to restart, then, instead of waiting four years, you only have few months and you will achieve your goal. 

So, in reality, the Iranians were achieving two aims here. One, they are in a position to blackmail the world powers into saying, "Look, we are only weeks away or a few months away from having enough weapon-grade fuel to build nuclear devices." So, the West start to panic and agree to some of their outrageous demands. And on top of that, the ability in the future that even if they sign it right now and stop all the enrichment, that, in the future, once they resume enrichment, they will be much closer to achieving their goal, because they will be starting from a more advanced position than they did in 2018, when President Trump withdrew from the, you know, the nuclear deal. 

Thomas Small Given the negotiations that are ongoing, it was surprising that, a few weeks ago, to – to read that America had – had actually lifted all of the sanctions on Iran related to non-military nuclear usage, their non-military nuclear programme. Why would they have done that? I mean, that seems to be a very dangerous thing to do right in the middle of these negotiations.

Aimen Dean They had nothing to do with the negotiations. I have it on good authority. And, you know, I always have access to good authority anyway, so. 

Thomas Small That's why I'm talking to you, Aimen.

Aimen Dean I have it on good authority that, actually, it's nothing to do whatsoever with the current negotiations that are taking place in Vienna. The reality is that the Iranian nuclear reactor in Bushehr, which is just on the Gulf waters and surrounded by the Zagros Mountains—. 

Thomas Small This nuclear reactor built by the shah with German and French help. Is that—? That's right? 

Aimen Dean Yes. But they were never finished. And so, in the mid-nineties, the Russians came and they finished it. So, we have a somewhat bastardised nuclear reactor there with German and French parts, with a reactor made in Russia on top of them. 

Thomas Small Oh, my goodness. That does not sound very stable.

Aimen Dean Forget stability, man. Like, you know, forget the technical and the engineering stability. We're talking about the fact that the reactor is sitting on a seismically-active fault line, you know, with frequent earthquakes reaching sometime the, you know, levels of six and seven degrees on the Richter scale. Now—.

Thomas Small Why the hell was a nuclear reactor built there in the first place?

Aimen Dean Because the shah looked at the map and he thought, "Okay. This is the most remote area away from the Persian-Iranian settlements and cities, surrounded by mountains. If there is a nuclear fallout, then the mountains and the prevailing wind direction, you know, will make sure that it's the Arabs, you know, across the Gulf."

Thomas Small Goodness.

Aimen Dean "The Kuwaitis, the Saudis, the Bahrainis, the Emiratis, the Qataris. They are the ones who are going to be screwed up." I mean, so, you know, so charming. Very charming of the shah.

Thomas Small So, what does this nuclear reactor have to do with the recent lifting of sanctions on non-military nuclear usage in Iran?

Aimen Dean Because that nuclear reactor, as I said to you, sits on a seismically-active fault line, lots of earthquakes between now and then, it needs repairs and it needs spare parts. And there are some—. Let's say, you know, I—. You know, no pun intended. But there are some intelligence leaks about some radioactive leaks, you know, from that reactor in recent weeks, which suggest that there is the need for repairs, urgent need for repairs and spare parts to come from certain European countries. So, the need for a waiver to these sanctions was necessary. Otherwise, we could have a Chernobyl on the Gulf. 

And that could spill disaster for the Gulf states. Why? Because Kuwait as well as the Eastern province of Saudi Arabia as well as Bahrain, Qatar, and, to a greater extent, also the UAE rely on desalinated water, water produced from, you know—. Well, you know, they – they suck the, you know, water from the sea. They remove the salt. It become a drinking water for the people who live in the desert, where there are no lakes or rivers, or even, you know, significant amount of rainy days. So, if the waters of the Gulf are to be contaminated with radioactive materials from that nuclear reactor on the Iranian side, say goodbye to the fisheries there. You can't eat, you know, the famous Gulf Hamour fish or the shrimp there, unless if you want to become Aquaman, a radioactive Aquaman. And the reality also is that you can't desalinate the water, because the water, while you can remove the salt from it, you can't remove, you know, radioactivity from it, I mean. So, yeah. It's a disaster waiting to happen.

Thomas Small All this talk about radiation, nuclear reactors melting down, nuclear bombs being developed, it really does put us right back into the beginning of the Cold War. And let's – let's go back to our story of the Middle East and the Cold War. America dropped the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as we said. Stalin was already actually developing a bomb of his own, which is a fascinating spy story in its own, right? Because infiltrators within the Manhattan Project had been passing secret info to the Soviets. The first successful Soviet bomb test was carried out in 1949. And from that point on, the nuclear arms race began. 

However, for those four years in between the atomic attacks on Japan and Stalin's first bomb, America's monopoly on nuclear weapons gave it tremendous leverage at the outset of the Cold War. And this was first demonstrated in Iran. As I said, the allies, who were then occupying Iran, had signed a treaty, agreeing that they would all withdraw their troops within six months of the end of the war—i.e., the 3rd of March 1946. In January of '46, the US and Britain followed through. But it soon became clear that the Soviets weren't going anywhere. Thus, began the Cold War. It began in Iran, specifically in Iranian Azerbaijan. 

Really, Aimen, all roads seem to lead to Azerbaijan this season. Why is that?

Aimen Dean Well, because of all the complexities. You know, it has all the ingredients. It has an ethnic minority. It has, you know, an active communist, subversive, you know, elements and separatists. It has oil. And it's sitting on a crossroad between civilisations. The Persians, the Turks, the Russians, the Arabs, the English, the Americans. Yes. 

Goodness. I mean, what more do you want?

Thomas Small So, let me try to sort of set the scene. We're in – we're in Iran 1946. The first player here that we want to talk about is the Tudeh Party. So, the Tudeh Party is the communist party of Iran. It was founded in 1941. It had offices all around the country, but it was most strongly represented in Iranian Azerbaijan. 

Let's call it south Azerbaijan from now on. It's clearer that way. So, south Azerbaijan's capital of Tabriz is an absolute icon of Islamic splendour and power and Persianate culture. Tabriz had featured heavily in the Persian-Russian wars that we discussed before. And, thus, the province, as a whole, had fallen within Russia's sphere of influence in Iran. And so, it was, let's say, the most modernised part of Iran. 

Anyway, the Soviets took advantage of the Tudeh Party's organisation in south Azerbaijan to encourage two secessionist movements there, one Kurdish and the other Azeri. In addition to communist partisans, local Azeris and Kurds were angry at the Persianification policy, which the exiled Reza Shah had imposed on them. So, these two secessionist movements resulted in the foundation, with Soviet help, of the Republic of Mahabad, a Kurdish Republic, and the Azerbaijan People's Government. Now, the Republic of Mahabad was defended by none other than the Peshmerga, those valiant Marxist Kurdish warriors who, to this day, are defending Kurdistan from ISIS, from Turkey, from all of the players in the region. It's still there today.

Aimen Dean Well, you know, it just shows you basically, not only is a small world, but a small history also. Like, you know, I mean, the – the Peshmerga, which means, you know, "the men of death" or devout people who are willing to die, you know, for their cause, yes, their roots are Marxist. And that remains so for a very long time. And I think, because of the fact that they were always opposing, at one time or another, you know, either a pro-Western nation or a pro-Western power like Iran or a pro-Western power like Turkey, because, you know, Turkey was a NATO member and the shah was always perceived as a pro-Western. And, therefore, their adoption of Marxism was, you know, inevitable at some point. 

To this day, they are still loyal to some extent, to some extent, at least, to their, you know, Marxist, you know, communist roots. 

Thomas Small Well, because the northern half of greater Azerbaijan was already Soviet and was comparatively richer and more developed than the southern half, it's no surprise that communist ideas were circulating in the south. 

As far as Stalin himself, ideological motives played a role. But I'm afraid it was also, and mainly, about oil. He had been seeking a concession to Iranian oil in the north of Iran. And the UK and the U S were actively seeking to prevent this. 

The situation was very tense. So, the United Nations Security Council met. Interestingly, the United Nations Security Council's first resolution was to set up the security council and its second resolution, passed only a week later, was to demand that the Soviet Union withdraw from Iran. 

So, it really is part of the history books here. The Security Council's first move was to demand the Soviets to withdraw from Iran. And because, at that time, America had the bomb and had a monopoly of nuclear force, the Soviets were compelled to do so. And they – they did so in May. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. But it wasn't just pure muscle by the Americans. Also, they were trading with Stalin. "Okay. Get out of Iran. And, in return, we will reduce the amount of military aid we give to the Chinese nationalists who are fighting your allies." You know, Mao and his forces.

Thomas Small It's amazing, you know. It just – it just goes to show that in the Cold War, no event happens in a vacuum. Something in Iran is actually linked … 

Aimen Dean No.

Thomas Small … to something that's in China, that's something in Moscow, that's something in God knows where. The Cold—. In the Cold War, everything is connected. 

So, that's the Tudeh Party and the Azerbaijan crisis of 1946. 

As the forties unfolded in Iran, other players, you know, arose onto the scene, one of whom, very interestingly, is a group called Fada'iyan-e Islam. This group, which actually still exists in Iran, is a precursor to the sort of Islamic terrorist movements that we know today. They were nationalists. So, they weren't a globalist Islamic movement, but they were nationalists. And they assassinated several Iranian politicians in the late forties and the early fifties. And though the shah would blame it on communists, in 1949, Fada'iyan-e Islam actually tried to assassinate him. 

So, Aimen, this raises the question: What has Iran's impact been on the development of Islamic radicalism in general? I'm thinking in particular of the name Jamal al-Din al-Afghani, a nineteenth century political thinker, who has been called the Father of Islamic Modernism. He advocated pan-Islamic unity against Western domination. And, in fact, in 1869, one of his followers assassinated a Qajar shah. 

Aimen Dean Indeed. He is one of the most influential figures who, of course, resided in Egypt at some point and taught at Al-Azhar University. And there, he taught the principles of pan-Islamism to oppose what he see, the British-French colonial domination of the Muslim world. All the way from the British Raj and its influence in Afghanistan and Persia, all the way to Iraq and Egypt, and the French involvement in north Africa. He was seeking to build that pan-Islamism. And he saw, in Cairo, an important centre for this, because it sits right in the middle, between the influence of the British and the French in the colonial era. 

Among his students was Muhammad Rasheed Rida, who had a great influence on Hassan al-Banna, who would later establish the Muslim Brotherhood movement [unintelligible 0:41:56.8] in Egypt in 1928. 

And the funny thing is that, the ironic, is that the Fada'iyan-e Islam would have, as one of its members, a man called Navvab Safavi. Navvab Safavi went to Egypt and was actually trained by the Muslim Brotherhood there and brought with him a group of the Fada'iyan-e Islam. Some – some of them were trained in Egypt by the Muslim Brotherhood and then went back to Iran to carry out their assassinations and acts of sabotage. 

What is more interesting about Navvab Safavi is that his nephew is none other than Musa al-Sadr, the founder of the Amal Movement in Lebanon in the 1970s, which would later then give birth to the infamous Hezbollah in Lebanon. 

And also one of the greatest influences on Navvab Safavi is the fact that he met Sayyid Qutb in the early fifties in Egypt and was influenced by him. 

Of course, later, Navvab Safavi would be executed by the shah in 1955. But twenty-four years later, Iman Khomeini would describe Navvab Safavi as the first martyr of the Islamic revolution in Iran. 

Thomas Small It's a reminder of how the phenomenon of Islamist terrorism, of Islamist globalist jihadism, is much older than we think. Much older than 9/11, much older than the Iranian revolution. I mean, a hundred years before Khomeini, you have characters like al-Afghani already fomenting similar ideas that would ultimately, as we, you know, as we learnt, you know, result in the world that we have today. 

So, that's—. So, we have the Tudeh Party. We Communist Party of Iran. We have Fada'iyan-e Islam, an Islamist party of – of terrorists, of assassins in Iran. And, of course, we also have the shah himself. There's a lot we could say about him. We've already talked about how iconic he would become. At this point in history, though, he was basically a refined young man. He wasn't yet the aloof autocratic target of Khomeini's invective. 

When he came to power in 1941, he agreed to rule in accordance with the constitution from 1906 that his father had largely ignored. He reopened the Iranian Parliament, the Majles, on genuinely representative lines. And in the 1940s, for the first time, Iran experienced a genuinely pluralistic democracy, with different parties pursuing different ideologies and all vying equally for power. 

The shah would end up favouring American power over the Soviets, for sure. In fact, he was genuinely spooked by Stalin, convinced that he had designs on Iran. The events of 1946 did not convince him otherwise. This is why he blamed the communists when he was almost assassinated. And he banned the communist Tudeh Party, which then went underground. 

It's all very Cold War, isn't it, Aimen? I mean, what must spy craft have been like in Iran at the time? And we were talking the CIA was there. MI6 must have been there. The KGB, or the MVB as it then was.

Aimen Dean Yeah. And the KVND. And, you know—. So, there were so many different intelligence agencies and spies operating there. And behind them, you have the machinations and the intrigue of the oil industry.

Thomas Small Absolutely. Before too long, all of these players would be implicated in a Cold War event so notorious that it's still informs Iranian attitudes to – to Western powers. I'm referring, of course, to the infamous coup that overthrew Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh in 1953.

Aimen, what resonance does the name Mohammed Mosaddegh have in the Middle East today?

Aimen Dean For Iranians, he – and – and the other people in the Middle East, he represent, you know, the symbol of defiance against greedy, you know, Western power seeking to rob a nation of its natural resources and the profits of that national resources. He wanted to negotiate a fair settlement. And the powers that be—I'm talking about the British here—you know, rebuffed him. So, for many Iranians, he is a symbol of defiance. He is also the ultimate symbol of grievance against the West and against the Americans and the British for what happened next. 

Thomas Small Mohammad Mosaddegh was born in 1882. I mean, can you imagine that, when he came to power in 1951, he was almost seventy years old? And he had lived through all of the history that we've been talking about. The Russian, British, Soviet, and now American interference in the country. He was related to the Qajars. And, in fact, he married the granddaughter of the Qajar Shah, who had been assassinated by the follower of al-Afghani. It's really—. Everyone's connected. He was indeed well connected. He was educated in Switzerland and had always opposed Reza Shah, because the shah ignored the constitution. At heart, Mohammad Mosaddegh was a nationalist. 

Now, in 1949, after the failed assassination attempt against the shah, the shah began a move toward greater authoritarianism. He managed to push through reforms to the constitution, diluting the power of parliament and increasing his own power, followed by new elections that summer, which were compromised by claims of fraud and corruption. Newsflash: All of the elections that take place over the course of this story are compromised by fraud and corruption. It was endemic. 

But here's something really interesting. Mosaddegh responded to that rigged election in the summer of 1949 by organising a mass protest movement. In a sign of the revolution, really, later in the seventies, students were mobilised and a sit-in was organised. The whole panoply of modern peaceful mass protest. The shah capitulated. He promised fair elections in the future. And the protest movement coalesced into a new coalition of political parties called the National Front with Mosaddegh as its leader. They sought liberal reforms. And at the top of their policy platform was a demand that would cause a political earthquake, really globally. And that was oil nationalisation. 

Aimen, paint a picture of how the oil concession in Iran was being managed at that time and why that would have made Mosaddegh and the nationalists so angry. 

Aimen Dean As you mentioned, Thomas, before the D'Arcy agreement, the treaties that were signed regarding the concessions of trade and national resources meant that the vast – the vast majority of the profits, you know, would go to the company that is actually doing the excavation, the extraction, and the transportation. 

So, you know, in modern – in modern times, you know, a company like Shell or BP or any other company or ExxonMobil would come to a country, would sign the deal in which there will say, "Okay. We, you know, we explore the oil. We dig up the oil. We refine it. We, you know—. And we split the profits, you know, thirty-three/sixty-seven, thirty-five/sixty-five, forty/sixty. But the majority, you know, goes to the country, you know, where the resources, you know, are located."

However, in the Iranian question, you know, something like more than ninety percent of the profits—in fact, more than that—were going to the Anglo-Persian Oil Company. 

Thomas Small And fifty-one percent of that company was owned by the British state. So, really, the profits were going to the British government and not to the Iranian government, 

Aimen Dean Not at all. Whatever that was going to the Iranian government were just mere basic royalties. I mean, we're not talking about five or six percent, you know. And which was absolute peanuts. Minimal. 

Thomas Small Especially when Mohammed Mosaddegh would have looked around and seen the – the other sorts of deals that oil companies had struck with other governments. Venezuela, first, successfully negotiated a fifty-fifty deal. And then, in 1950, your friend King Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia managed to negotiate the same deal with Aramco, a fifty-fifty split. Mosaddegh was actually seeking precisely that. And yet the British said no. 

Aimen Dean Yes. This is one of the darkest, darkest episodes of the history of the British empire, you know, post-World War II, in which they squandered, you know, an opportunity and caused a massive rift that – and a grievance that's lasting all the way until now. If they accepted, just accepted, just like Americans in Saudi Arabia accepted, that we split the oil profits fifty-fifty, you know, the question is that Mosaddegh would have succeeded, that the cause of the communists and the religious fanatics would have been contained, and a more modern, democratic, pluralistic Iran would have persisted. 

But guess what? As usual, we are now living the consequences of the mistakes of the past.

Thomas Small That's true. I think we – we owe it to the British to put ourselves in their shoes for a second. And after the Second World War, the British state was effectively bankrupt, haemorrhaging money. They really, really relied on the monies from selling Iranian oil to keep their own country going. And this doesn't defend their decision, but it – it explains why they were so unwilling to grant a fifty-fifty deal to the Iranians. 

Mosaddegh's chief policy was the nationalisation of Iran's oil. And this presented him with a political problem, which, in fact, you know, Aimen, to be honest, has been presenting me with the political problem—i.e., wrapping my mind around Iranian politics in the early 1950s. The—. All of the events—the political events, the elections, the backstabbing, the coalitions, the fallings out—all of these things that happened during the rise and fall of Mohammed Mosaddegh, they really are a brain buster. I swear to God.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. That's why the, you know, the – the ruling class in Iran right now, the Mullahs, they have turbans wrapped up around their heads in order to wrap the Iranian politics around their heads.

Thomas Small Right. So, Mosaddegh is leading this new party, the National Front. But it has nothing like a majority in parliament. And so, only has minority influence. Nonetheless, Mosaddegh is a capable political operator, a good manipulator of the modern media, and becomes the chair of the parliamentary committee overseeing the oil question. His emphasis on nationalism and oil nationalisation resonated with the masses, and his personal popularity was growing. 

However, he had a problem. Mosaddegh was a liberal, but the vast majority of Iranians were conservatives. I mean, they generally favoured nationalism. They wanted Iranian sovereignty to be secured, but they were conservative. They were generally loyal to the monarchy and they were certainly religious. 

There was a man in parliament, Abol-Ghasem Kashani, who sort of represented the religious interests of the country. He was, in fact, allied to Fada'iyan-e Islam. Mosaddegh hoped he could manipulate Kashani into getting his oil nationalisation policy passed. So, Kashani was a nationalist, right? 

Mosaddegh said, "Okay. I'm going to appeal to his nationalism to get my oil nationalisation bill passed." 

Kashani was an Islamist and he wanted Sharia law to be the law of the land. So, he hoped he could manipulate Mosaddegh into imposing Sharia law. 

Then, in March 1951, a Fada'iyan-e Islam fanatic assassinated Prime Minister Ali Razmara, angered by Roz Mara's pro-British stance. One week later, with Kashani's help, Mosaddegh was able to get a bill passed, nationalising the oil industry. And then, a month after that, parliament told the shah that Mosaddegh was their nominee for prime minister. To his credit, the shah agreed and even signed the nationalisation bill. He supported nationalisation now, mainly because he hoped it would increase his popularity with the people. He was afraid he was losing popularity as Mosaddegh gained popularity. 

As we said, Mosaddegh was seeking a fifty-fifty deal. Well, Britain went nuts. They withdrew their personnel from the oil fields of Iran, which meant that oil production stopped. They imposed sanctions on the country, preventing imports of staples like sugar. Iran didn't have a tanker fleet of its own. So, without British help, they couldn't produce or even export oil. It was a total shitshow. Negotiations with the British were going badly. The economy was in a freefall. There was political violence on the street as nationalists clashed with communists clashed with religious enthusiasts. It was chaos. 

Conservatives began to waiver in their support for Mosaddegh and nationalisation, especially after Mosaddegh, in a series of brilliant tactical moves, was granted emergency powers by parliament, effectively side-lining the shah. Mosaddegh was making his liberal anti-monarchical position play. The shah began to turn against him as did Kashani, who realised that Mosaddegh was a secularist with no intention of imposing Sharia law. 

This, Aimen, is where your friends, the spies, come in. As soon as the oil nationalisation bill had passed, Britain had been doing what it could to remove Mosaddegh from power. MI6 were bribing parliamentarians, religious clerics, and other conservative groups. Mosaddegh had hoped the US might support him, but Cold War politics got in the way, especially after President Eisenhower came to power. The Soviet Union's reach had recently expanded in Central Europe, China, and Korea. And because the Tudeh Party had supported Mosaddegh, Eisenhower feared losing Iran to the Soviets, too. So, the CIA began working with MI6 to undermine Mosaddegh's grip on the government. 

So, in the midst of all this, Mosaddegh felt that the only way he could get his political programme through was if he basically could rule by executive fiat. So, he called a referendum to dissolve parliament and give himself dictatorial powers. This referendum resulted in a ninety-nine percent yes vote. Now, we all know what a ninety-nine percent yes vote means: fraud. Mosaddegh had rigged it, for sure. It wasn't a secret ballot. It was definitely transparent. I mean, you know, you had to vote in the open, and there were thugs standing next to you to make sure you voted the right way. So, it wasn't a fair referendum at all, but it gave Mosaddegh the result he was looking for: permission as he saw it to rule as a dictator. 

This was bound to freak his opponents out. The conservatives, top generals in the army, MI6 and the CIA, and the shah, none of them could accept Mosaddegh as a dictator. So, they pressed go on a plan that they had been cooking up for a while, a plan known as Operation Ajax. The plan was quite simple. The shah was going to use his powers to dismiss Mosaddegh unilaterally, without there being elections, and replace him with a man of their choosing, a general called Zahedi. This was the plan. 

On the 15th of August 1953, they pressed go. The shah signs the firman, dismissing Mosaddegh and installing General Zahedi as prime minister, knowing that the CIA had given him assurance that the Americans would support this move. But the Tudeh Party—the communist party of Iran, which had been made illegal, which had gone underground, and which had been an on-again, off-again ally of Mosaddegh and the National Front, and, over the last few years, had infiltrated the Iranian army—the Tudeh Party found out about the plot in advance and warned Mosaddegh about it. So, as the shah's men were going to Mosaddegh's palace with the firman dismissing him, suddenly, Mosaddegh's supporters burst into the streets, and there was a sort of riot preventing this from happening. This freaked out the shah even more. Spooked, he fled the country. 

I mean, it's actually quite a remarkable and cowardly thing. He just up and fled the country. Some coup. He flees the country and ends up in Rome. The CIA meet him there. Probably—. I don't know. They gave him a hug. What do – what do you do when the strongman you thought you were going to support to take power just runs to Rome? 

So, Mohammad Mosaddegh thinks, "I've survived. The coup has failed." So, he sends the supporters back home. 

However, the generals, the clerics, the conservative forces inside Iran that had conspired against him with the CIA, they were not. They paid a mob to dress up like Tudeh Party members, come out into the streets, and declare a communist revolution. This attracted actual Tudeh Party members to join them. A riot broke out along with street violence, all of this giving the conservative generals the excuse they had engineered to remove Mosaddegh from power, which they did on the 19th of August. They arrested him and, in his place installed, General Zahedi as prime minister. 

The shah flies back, with the CIA director in tow, determined to rule in a much more authoritarian way. He's had enough with pluralism. He's had enough with party politics. As far as he's concerned, it resulted in economic collapse, chaos, geopolitical turmoil, the offending of important allies. Et cetera, et cetera. This is where the shah becomes the strongman that we know, the iconic shah that Khomeini overthrew in 1979.

So, Aimen, after listening to me narrate Operation Ajax and everything else that happened during that pivotal point in Iran's history, what do you think? Was it as people usually think? Certainly, Iranians think this. Were MI6 and the CIA the puppet masters, secretly controlling everything from behind the scenes?

Aimen Dean Look, Thomas. I think I want the listener to indulge me a little bit here. When I say that all this talk about the CIA organising military coups here and there, whether it is in Iran, in the Congo, in Latin America, wherever it is, the reality is that, you know, MI6 and the CIA and the French intelligence or any other powerful agency, they cannot do any of this without a fertile ground already being present in the country they want to interfere in. In other word, that the circumstances in the country were ready for a coup. It's just a question of having the direction. 

So, in essence, nothing happens in a vacuum. Now, you know, the CIA does not take a one stable country, completely happy with itself, and then turn it upside down. No. There are always other set of factors, which would contribute to the greater powers of the world at the time, you know, which includes, you know, not just only the British, the French, and the Americans, but also the Soviets when they want – when they want to do something, you know, in their interest. They would basically come and say, "Okay. This country, I can change. I can exact change, because the change – there is a fertile ground for change."

Thomas Small In Iran, at that time, there were too many forces at play. Too many interests, too many political parties constantly changing sides, too many class-based issues. It was too complicated. And, you know, ultimately, Mohammed Mosaddegh, for all of his genius as a politician, he kind of dug his own grave.

Aimen Dean Yeah. He alienated so many of his traditional allies, including shah himself. He could have gained these powers if he just went to the shah and said, you know, "Your majesty, I need to enact these policies. Please. Could you help me?" 

I mean, you know, he could have, you know, heads behind the shop, behind the legitimacy of the shah, and the two could have worked things out together. But guess what? When you are trying to give the appearance of, well, being a backstabber, well, guess what? People with stab you in the front.

Thomas Small Well, there you go. That's our best attempts to explain the chequered political history of Iran in the early part of the twentieth century and at the very beginning of the Cold War. 

Mohammad Mosaddegh, as we said, his memory resounds until the present. Iranians, to this day, convinced that their one chance for a proper liberal democracy was thwarted by the CIA, still invoke Mosaddegh when they shake their fists at America and at the West. Reasonably to some extent, but I do think that it's a little bit overegged. I think that there—. Well, as I say, it was much more complicated than that. 

Nonetheless, as we'll see in the next episode, very soon after Mohammad Mosaddegh's downfall in Iran, an Arab leader of immense historical importance, learning from Iran's failed experiment of oil nationalisation and negotiations with the west, would create an even greater geopolitical earthquake. I mean, of course, the president of Egypt, Gamal Abdel Nasser.

Aimen Dean Very ominous.

Thomas Small On the next episode, we'll tell you all about Gamal Abdel Nasser and his impact on the Middle East. 

This is your biweekly reminder that if you're not doing so already, you can follow the show @MHConflicted on Twitter and Facebook, and argue over the finer points we've raised with other fans of the show on our Facebook discussion page. You can find that by searching "Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group" over on Facebook. 

Finally, I wanted to let you all know that, at the end of each episode, Aimen and I choose a question from a listener and answer it in our exclusive extended bonus feed. If you would like to be featured, ask us your questions on Twitter or Facebook. And then, to hear your name on the podcast and get your answer, subscribe to ad-free listening and extended bonus content for just 99p on Apple Podcasts. 

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Or, if you listen on Spotify, you can find Conflicted Extra, also for just 99p per month. 

And that, as they say, is that. Please join us in two weeks' time for another exciting episode of Conflicted.

Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Rowan Bishop. Sandra Ferrari is our executive producer. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

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Conflicted S3 E4 - Borderline Post-Soviet Disorder

CONFLICTED
S03E04

Thomas Small Dear listener, this episode of Conflicted is going to be a bit different. You see, it was always our plan to talk about Russia in this episode as a way of laying out some aspects, at least, of the geopolitics of the Cold War, which is what this season of Conflicted is all about. When we recorded it four weeks ago, Russia had sent over a hundred thousand troops to the Ukrainian border, which we thought made the discussion especially topical. But we didn't know then that, by the time this episode came out, President Putin would have ordered a full invasion of his neighbour and put his nuclear forces on high alert. 

Like a lot of people did four weeks ago, when Aimen and I discussed Vladimir Putin's aims and objectives, we did so under the assumption that Putin's sanity was basically intact. After what's happened since, Putin's sanity can no longer be taken for granted. It looks like that old adage about absolute power corrupting absolutely has been proved true once again. 

As you can imagine, this is a busy time for a professional security analyst like Aimen. And so, though we considered rerecording this episode entirely in the light of recent events, we haven't been able to. Instead, I am recording this new introduction and, at the end, I'll add some new thoughts as well. As you listen, please bear in mind that we've tried to do what we always try to do: tell the story as best we can, as objectively as we can. 

My worry is, by outlining the way Putin sees the world, you'll think we think his assault on Ukraine is justified. We do not. Geopolitics is a diabolical game, hardly ever played by good guys against bad guys. But no one is ever forced to launch a war. And though every decision must be seen in context, Putin's decision to launch this war was his alone to make, and he alone bears responsibility for it and for its tragic consequences. 

Right. That's what I've got for you by way of introduction. I'll be back at the end for some final thoughts. Enjoy. 

Welcome back, dear listeners, to Conflicted. You've reached episode four of series three. And as always, I'm joined by my right-hand man, the incomparable Aimen Dean. Or am I your right-hand man, Aimen? What do you think? 

Aimen Dean Well, you know, the Dark Lord doesn't share power. 

Thomas Small Oh. So – so, what you're saying is you're the master, I'm the apprentice. But you know what that means? 

[THEME IN]

I mean, one day, I will rise up and slay you.

Aimen Dean Oh, dear. Oh, dear. Oh, dear.

[THEME OUT]

Thomas Small In the last episode, we talked about how the American half of the Cold War was established in Saudi Arabia. Today, we're shifting our focus to the other half of that epic conflict: the Soviet Union. What were the Soviet Union's designs on the Middle East? And, now, as the spectre of war between Russia and Ukraine hangs over Europe, to what extent can Soviet history and, indeed, the earlier history of Imperial Russia help us to understand what's going on?

This episode can be considered a follow-up to the third episode of season two. So, if you haven't listened to that or – or haven't since it came out, I recommend you go and listen to it now, then come back to us. It lays the foundation for much of what we're going to discuss today: the collapse of the Soviet Union; Russia's quick descent into economic anarchy; the rise of Putin; the crushing of the Chechen jihad; and Russia's return to the Middle East as an important player in the Syrian civil war, commanding its own armies of Sufi jihadist mercenaries. It was a great episode. 

At the end of the episode, I said this: "There's obviously a lot more we could have talked about in this extremely complex episode of Conflicted. We could have talked about Russia's war in Georgia in 2008 or we could have gone into greater detail about the annexation of Crimea in 2014 or, indeed, about the ongoing Ukrainian civil war." 

Well, at the time of this recording, Russia has mast one hundred and thirty-five thousand troops along the Ukrainian border. And everyone is wondering, "What will happen? Will Russia invade? Will NATO defend Ukraine?" 

Here on Conflicted, we don't forecast the future. And who knows? By the time this episode airs, the conflict may have completely gone away. But I doubt it. 

Now, here on Conflicted, we talk about how the past sheds light on the present. Beginning with the present, then. Aimen, can you give us a quick update on Russia's position in the Middle East at the moment? Where are its Chechen mercenaries currently being deployed? 

Aimen Dean Well, they are deployed in Syria.

Thomas Small Still in Syria?

Aimen Dean Yeah. Four or five thousand of them. They – they are actually called or designated the Russian Military Police. Their mission is to patrol and to police so-called liberated areas, you know, which were under jihadist control in the past. Also, they are deployed in Libya. And, you know, to some extent, also, they are deployed in Donbas in the Ukraine, on the eastern front. 

Thomas Small Well, we'll get to that, for sure. But what are they doing in Libya? What's their agenda there? 

Aimen Dean Well, during the Libyan civil war or the recent one, you know, in 2020, 2021, they were siding with the forces of the infamous general, Khalifa Haftar, a remnant of the old regime, someone, basically, who is a self-styled neo-Gaddafi. And, funny, enough an American citizen. 

So, yeah. However, he – he got the backing of the Egyptians, the Russians, the Greeks even, and, to some extent, the Saudis and the Emiratis. So, he is, you know, the person who wanted to rid Libya of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Thomas Small Yeah. He's a sort of anti-Islamist general. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. He is an anti-Islamist general. And then, on the other hand, of course, although, like, you know, he has lots of Salafists, you know, fighting for him. 

Thomas Small Yeah. Absolutely lots. You might be anti Islamist, but you're never rid of Islamist. They're everywhere. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. So, it's like, "Okay. These are Islamists, but I have my own Islamists." You know? "I'm fighting Islamists with my own Islamists." 

And then, you have—. So – so, in Libya, they were, you know, serving the foreign policy objectives of Putin in trying to restore Libya into a strongman republic. You know, similar to what Gaddafi used to do, although like, you know, I mean, with more sanity. Although, like, you know, basically, no one can, you know, outdo Gaddafi when it comes to insanity.

But, nonetheless, you know, I remember, you know, I met a few Libyans, you know, in the airport, in Beijing, and they were asking me to help fill in their landing cars. cards. And I said to them, "Guys, you know, we have a saying in Arabic, you know, don't get rid of your insane monkey. You might get even a more insane monkey." You know? So, this is Gaddafi. 

Like, you know, I mean, they said, "Yes, because, you know, with him in power, we had one insane monkey. Now, we have an entire insane zoo competing."

Thomas Small It's the age-old tension between authoritarianism and chaos. 

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small Well, in this series of Conflicted, we're focusing on the Cold War in the Middle East. Do you know, Aimen, where the first recorded instance of the expression "a cold war" comes from?

Aimen Dean No. In Latin?

Thomas Small Here's the quote: "War that is very strong and very hot ends with either death or peace, whereas cold war neither brings peace nor gives honour to the one who makes it." 

Those are the words of Don Juan Manuel, an early fourteenth century Castilian nobleman, in Spain, referring to the war between the Christians and the Muslims there. Now, it's easy for a fourteenth century Spaniard to prefer hot to cold wars. But, by the twentieth century, developments in military technology made such a preference appear romantic in the extreme. 

We are talking about Russia and Ukraine today, and both trace their histories back to a state that formed in the late ninth century A.D. A state—and this is key—that was situated in present day Ukraine with the same capital city, Kyiv. This state, which is known as Kyivan Rus', was actually founded by Scandinavians, by Vikings who were traveling up and down the Dnieper and Volga rivers, bringing furs and slaves to the great empires of Byzantium and the Abbasid Caliphate. 

The people living along the rivers were mainly Eastern Slavs who, in fact, made up the bulk of those slaves. The English word "slave," it comes from the word Slav. But the ruling class were Norseman, Germanic warriors with Germanic names, like Oleg and Rurik. And even Vladimir, a Slav-afide form of the Norse name Waldemar. 

Kyivan Rus' converted to Orthodox Christianity in 988 and, thus, became part of what's known as the Byzantine commonwealth. The Kyivan state looked to Byzantium as a sort of cultural ideal. And this would characterise Russia later. Kyivan Rus' eventually fragmented and weakened, succumbed to the Mongol invasions in the 1240s. It was incorporated into the realm of the Golden Horde, which in Russia, is called the Tatar Yoke, and it lasted for two hundred and fifty years. 

Aimen, how are the Mongols and their Turkic successors remembered by Middle Easterners? I mean, we Westerners have an almost totally negative view of them. 

Aimen Dean The Mongolian invasion is remember reading negatively for lots of reasons. I mean, it has blamed partly for the collapse of the Islamic civilisation, the sack of Baghdad, the burning of the House of Wisdom. You know, the biggest library at the world at the time. Five million titles were lost. So, all of this, you know, means that, like, you know, to this day, you know, the Arabs remember the Mongol invasion as the worst calamity to have ever befell, you know, the Middle East. Worse than the crusades. 

Thomas Small Because the Mongols and the Turks who followed after and eventually did convert to Islam and re-established Islamic civilisation in a way, along – on new foundations, almost, the Mongol – the Mongol heritage in the Middle East is perhaps remembered a little bit more ambiguously at least than in the West, where they just were always the, you know, the absolute worst.

Aimen Dean Not by the Arabs, though. And the reason is because even when the Turkic-Mongol, you know, conversion to Islam happened, they still fought, you know, had so many wars. 

Ibn Taymiyyah, you know, the famous grandfather of Salafism, he fought against King Kazan and the Ilkhanate Mongols and issued fatwas that they were not proper Muslims, because they were incorporating parts of the Yassa—you know, Genghis Khan, you know, law—into Islam. And so, he declared them to be, you know, non-proper – not proper Muslims. He excommunicated them and then he fought against them. He declared jihad against them. So, no. 

And even then, when the Ottoman empire was established, you know, on the back of the Mongol invasions, although they are Turkic rather the Mongol, still, the Arabs were, you know, considered to be fourth or fifth citizens. No. That era is never remembered fondly.

Thomas Small Well, that's something that the Arabs have in common with the peoples of Kyivan Rus', who languished under the Tatar Yoke for two hundred and fifty years. The Mongols were eventually rolled back in waves by a number of rising Christian powers. The Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania conquered much of the heartlands of what had been Kyivan Rus'—i.e. modern-day Ukraine—which they jointly ruled for centuries and which they called Ruthenia, a Latinised form of Russia. 

This means that the word "Russian" has different meanings, depending on when you're talking about it. And one of those meanings is "all the people who lived in Ruthenia, in Kyivan Rus'," which includes both modern Ukraine and modern Russia. 

Ukraine means "border land." And, indeed, that part of Ruthenia was torn between competing powers, including the Ottomans and the Habsburgs. But it was a new power to the northeast that started taking bigger and bigger chunks of it, beginning in the seventeenth century, that is most relevant today: the power of Muscovy. 

The Grand Duchy of Moscow was a vassal of the Mongols until it threw them off in the mid-thirteen hundreds. This Muscovite state was actually founded after the fall of Kyivan Rus', but it believed that it was an heir to the tradition of that earlier state. 

Wars of expansion characterised the Moscow state, which, in 1547, became an empire proper when its infamous leader, Ivan the Terrible, was proclaimed czar, which is just the word for "Caesar" in Russian. 

The Tatar Yoke left its mark in the Russian Empire. It was part-Byzantine, part-Mongol in its statecraft, where the rule of law was always second to the iron rule of power. The empire was autocratic, centralised, Orthodox Christian, and committed to territorial expansion. This, it pursued with ruthless gusto, eventually swallowing up the entirety of northern Eurasia, including most of what is now Ukraine, a monumental achievement. The Russian Empire was a behemoth. It haunted the dreams of Western imperial powers, especially Britain, whose global maritime empire was the exact opposite of the czar's transcontinental empire. 

The long imperial conflict between them is called The Great Game, which we've discussed before on Conflicted. And if you're interested, check out our episodes on Afghanistan and Russia. You'll hear all about it. 

The First World War did not go well for the Russian Empire. It ended with revolution, the communist takeover, and a peace treaty with Germany that saw the empire's borders contract massively. One territory at loss was Ukraine, which was itself plunged into chaos. Different Ukrainian nationalist groups competed for power, and Ukraine became a battlefield in the larger Russian civil war, which included Western armies terrified of communism, trying to restore the czar. 

In the end, the Bolsheviks won the field. And, in 1922, the Soviet Union was founded, whose borders were basically the same as the Russian Empire's. But Ukraine wasn't just a province as it had been. It was a proper constituent republic, an implicit acknowledgement of Ukraine's claims to statehood. 

Anyway, as we all know, though it haunted the dreams of America just as its imperial predecessor, it haunted the dreams of the British, the USSR eventually fell apart. Ukraine achieved its full independence in a referendum in 1991. And as capital of the newly formed Russian Federation, Moscow found itself ruling less territory than it had for centuries, a situation that, in the eyes of Russian leaders, was essentially untenable in the long run.

There's a reason for that: Russia's geography. I'm going to give a – a description of Russia's infamously porous borders, Aimen. What do you have to say in general about Russia's geographical position, and how important is it to understand it to understand what's going on? 

Aimen Dean Well, Russia is extremely lucky and unlucky in its geography. It is extremely lucky, because of all the natural resources that they, you know, acquired, you know, unknowingly when they just expanded all the way to the east and to the wilderness of Siberia.

Thomas Small Where the natural gas fields are vast and extremely lucrative. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. And the oil, also. And the coal and many other minerals. The problem here is, you know, Russia is the biggest country in the world. Yet, ironically, you might as well consider it to be almost landlocked. And the reason for that is because they don't have any warm water ports, with the exception of the Black Sea. 

Thomas Small The infamous warm water port problem of the Russians.

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small It's—. They've been pursuing warm water for longer than anyone remembers. Russia has twenty thousand kilometres of borders. Twenty thousand kilometres of border to police. It borders sixteen independent states. Twelve used to be in the Soviet Union. And all of that border territory is an immense liability. Just policing it, ensuring that no one invades is a huge cost to the Exchequer. This vulnerability is deeply embedded in the Russian state's psyche. From the beginning, the Grand Duchy of Moscow was extremely vulnerable due to geography. It needed to expand. 

I mean, geography is destiny. Try to imagine Russia. Invasion from the north, it's basically impossible because of the Arctic waters. They're frozen most of the year. In the east, Russia's strategic control of the northeast Asian coastline, down to Vladivostok, including the Kuril Islands, gives it the upper hand there. Two mountain ranges north of Mongolia and China, the Stanovoy and the Sayan ranges, give Russia some protection from invasion from that direction. 

But the European plane is like a flat funnel. It has a narrow mouth at the low countries of Belgium and the Netherlands. And then, it just widens, expanding eastward, its southern side rapping along the Carpathians to the Black Sea, and its northern side, along the Baltic Sea, all the way to the Euros. It's a vast, flat plane containing few natural defensible barriers. Russia's western border snakes down the middle of it for two thousand kilometres. There is no border like it in the world. No border as long or as exposed. 

What adds to this geo-strategic nightmare for Russia is what's called the Volgograd Gap. Aimen, tell us about the Volgograd Gap, a seven-hundred-and-fifty-kilometre stretch of flat land between the Sea of Azov the northeast of the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. How important is the Volgograd Gap? 

Aimen Dean Well, of course, it is very important, because, you know, Hitler wanted to go all the way through that – through it, all the way to the oil fields in the Caspian. For him, he knew that this is a flat plane that is easily invadable, that you can just basically roll through the tanks, the panzers, all the way to the Caucasus. 

And that is why it is one of the biggest vulnerabilities of Russia as far as, you know, European powers are concerned, whether they are the French and the Napoleon invaders. And before—. And after that, Hitler tried again.

Thomas Small And before Napoleon, the Poles invaded it. Before that, the Swedes invaded it. It was an endless succession of invaders from the West.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. But, you know, nonetheless, I think the particular invasion that will always live in the memories of all Russians will be the Second World War or, as they always call it, the Great Patriotic War. 

Thomas Small Yes. During the Second World War, Hitler's troops tried to control the Volgograd Gap. And from Russia's point of view, if a foreign power grabs control of this gap, which is, you know, it's flat—there's no easily defensible area there—if a foreign power controls it, it effectively cuts Russia off from access both to vital trade routes, to its only warm water access on the Black Sea. This is an existential threat to the Russian state. 

And, incidentally, this goes some way towards explaining why Russia crushed Chechen separatism so mercilessly. Moscow considers the north Caucasus region to be integral to its existence as a state. The Caucasus Mountains are Moscow's first line of defence against incursion from the south into the Volgograd Gap. 

Now, Russia's southern Central Asian border is also vast. It is also flat and it is also indefensible, which is why Russia needs to keep the Central Asian republics within its security fold, Central Asian republics now built on top of land that was conquered and pacified by the czars in their never-ending quest for security. 

So, that's the geopolitical geographic situation. And – and I think it's important, sometimes, at least, to, you know, imagine yourself in Vladimir Putin's shoes, sitting on his throne there in Moscow, looking out at the world. We're not trying to advocate or defend his perspective, but at least we can understand it. He rules this vast country with these three easily penetrable borderlands, enormous borderlands, and he's instinctively going to feel vulnerable. And what makes him feel most vulnerable is NATO's expansion eastward.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, NATO has continued to acquire or to add to its ranks new countries, countries that used to fall squarely within Moscow's sphere of influence. East Germany joined immediately upon reunion with West Germany in 1990. In 1999, Hungary, Poland, and the Czech Republic joined NATO. In 2004 Slovakia, the Baltic states, Slovenia, Romania, and Bulgaria joined NATO. 

Now, Aimen, remind us. During this first wave of NATO expansion, Putin remained a potential partner to the West. But that relationship began to break down. Quickly remind us why. 

Aimen Dean Well, several things. The first thing is the Iraq War, because Putin didn't like the idea that the Americans are going to put their hand on the fourth largest oil reserves in the world in Iraq, and threatening, you know, the second or the third largest oil reserves in the world, which is Iran next door. And also, at the same time, from their position in Iraq, where they can have a hegemony on Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE, and Iran and Iraq, which, basically, will put them in charge of roughly about sixty percent of the world's hydrocarbon reserves.

Thomas Small Meaning, they could manipulate the oil price downward for American consumers. And – and Putin has an interest in keeping the price as high as possible. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

So, here is the dynamics of the buyer and seller, and each trying to influence the events to their advantage. Now, Putin, already after 9/11, offered this, you know, olive branch, saying, "Look, I've been fighting terrorism in Chechnya and the Caucasus. I've been succeeding and splitting the Wahabis from the Sufis. I could help. I could, you know, lend intelligence, you know, air bases, assets in order to assist the war on terrorism from the American side." 

Then, the Americans brushed him aside and said, you know, "Sorry. Thank you. Like, you know, Russia is a broken country. We have no interest, you know, in having help from you or anyone else."

Thomas Small And then, following the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, America reached out to partners throughout the Central Asian republics, established military footholds there. That was obviously very provocative to Putin. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. 

The second thing that was provocative is, you know, remember that the only warm water port that the Russians have is on the Black Sea. So, they already tolerated the fact that Turkey, which, with a long coastline on the Black Sea, is a NATO ally, but—. Oh, it's a NATO member. But it's been a NATO member since the 1950s. I mean, they are fine with that.

Thomas Small Which was always threatening. I mean, that's an essential threat to Russia, because Turkey being in NATO means NATO can close access to the Black Sea and the Sea of Marmara.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. 

Thomas Small And the Bosphorus. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. But then, when Romania and Bulgaria, both are Black Sea nations, joined, you know, it's only a matter of time before the entire Black Sea, you know, almost becomes a – a NATO lake. So, you know—. So, in essence, you know, the Russians were, you know, viewing this NATO expansion with nervousness, and they were thinking, "Ah, okay. Who's next?"

Thomas Small When the Cold War was coming to an end, many people, in Russia, especially, assumed that NATO would be disbanded as Russia was disbanding the Warsaw Pact, because, you know, without the Soviet Union there to defend Europe from, what does NATO exist to achieve? 

Well, NATO exists to defend Europe from Russia. There is something essentially provocative. If the West is in a military alliance that says, "You are our enemy. We are defending ourselves from you," it's already creating that kind of a dynamic. And then, following the appearance of NATO troops in Central Asia—this is, again, from Putin's point of view—provocative. 

There's another side to Putin's perception, that Western policy is threatening. And this is what he calls the US's support for democracy. This is extremely difficult, really, for Westerners, I think, or for people who have a commitment to – to liberal democracy to understand. 

But for – for autocrats, authoritarians, like Putin, who actually believes that authoritarianism is the best thing for Russia—now, we might be cynical about that, but he believes—Putin sees liberal democracy as an essential threat to the authoritarian top-down style of leadership that he himself practices and supports. We might think that this is the logic of a dictator seeking to retain power. And, perhaps, that is true. But this is certainly the way he sees it. 

And it is incontrovertibly true that the US, particularly from the late nineties onward, began, in the words of The Guardian newspaper at the time, who was a champion of this effort, began engineering democracy through the ballot box and civil disobedience. This is absolutely true. Where The Pentagon was trying to impose democracy, if you like, through the military in places like Iraq, the state department, effectively the foreign ministry of the United States government, was trying to impose or at least encouraged democracy by training peoples outside of America on how to mobilise democratically. 

In 2000, the state department put a huge effort into influencing the presidential election in Serbia, and it succeeded. And Slobodan Milošević was voted out of office. In 2001, they tried again, this time in Belarus, and they failed. But, in 2003, the state department intervened in the elections in Georgia, where they, again, succeeded. 

So, having succeeded in Georgia in 2003, we come to the Ukraine. And this is really what brings us up to the present. This is vital backstory to what's going on. So, in 2004, the state department and its NGO allies were involved in swaying the presidential elections in the Ukraine that year. Initially, they failed, and the Russian-backed candidate, Yanukovych, came to power. But, immediately, a mass protest movement broke out, coordinated by this network of NGOs. And this will be called the Orange Revolution of 2004. Eventually, this led to a rerun of the election, and the pro-Western candidate, Yushchenko, came to power. 

Everything really can be traced back to this election in 2004. It showed Russia that the West was trying to install a pro-Western president in the Ukraine. Now, Russia was also manipulating the election and it even attempted to assassinate Yushchenko, the pro-Western candidate, with dioxin poisoning. 

So, you know, we're not saying that Putin is a good guy here. A bit like our episode in – about – about Afghanistan. There are no good guys in this – in this world.

Aimen Dean No. We're just talking about, you know, really bad guys with, you know, different levels of how bad they are. 

Thomas Small It's important to remember that though Putin is anti-democracy, he's not anti-voting. He just sees voting as serving a different purpose from how voting is perceived in a liberal democracy. 

Aimen Dean Like Iran, for example.

Thomas Small Yes. Well, like all these authoritarian places. They try to use elections as a way of controlling public perception and legitimising authoritarian rule. And so, when Putin sees US-backed NGOs teaching political candidates in authoritarian countries how to mobilise the masses, how to campaign, how to use the media to achieve their – their communications objectives, and then, when elections don't go the right way, how to really get mass protest movements moving, when he sees this going on, he obviously feels threatened. He feels angry. 

Let's take a quick break now. Okay, Aimen. Let's get back to our conversation. The next big date in this backstory is on the 3rd of April 2008. NATO held a summit in Bucharest. Putin was actually present. And it ends by welcoming Ukraine and Georgia's aspirations to join NATO. At the time, Georgia and NATO were hoping that the summit would result in the beginning of a formal process for them to join NATO. And it didn't go as far as that. But it did officially welcome their aspirations. 

George W. Bush had wanted to start the joining process. You know, George W. Bush, he was a big fan of exporting democracy. But Britain, France and Germany said that, "No, We need to wait." Perhaps, they recognised Russia's perspective. 

And – and Russia made that perspective immediately. "It was a huge strategic mistake," Russia said. "It would destabilise European security."

I think we know what that means. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. 

Thomas Small And he said that Georgia and Ukraine's joining NATO was a "direct threat to Russia." So, Russia made its opinion absolutely clear. And a few months later, in August of 2008, Russia goes to war against Georgia. So, Russia is showing that it is – it is not kidding around.

Now, Aimen, you were still spying for MI6 in August 2008. Is that right? Or had you already left the service?

Aimen Dean No. By that time, I already left.

Thomas Small Nonetheless, in the years up to that point, you were talking a lot with intelligence experts and analysts. How were America's pro-democracy tactics perceived in that community? And – and tell us a little bit about that war with Georgia. 

Aimen Dean Well, we have to understand that Georgia, once it, you know, it veered in 2003 towards the West, that actually was a negative. It had the negative impact on the Russian effort to pacify and subdue Chechnya and the other. you know, Islamic militants in the Caucasus. 

There was an area just north of Tbilisi. It's called the Pankisi Gorge. The Pankisi Gorge is important here, because that is the place in which militants would use in order to, you know, infiltrate into Chechnya. And, you know, the Russians, prior to that, prior to 2003, were always relying on the Georgians sealing that gorge, making sure no weapons, munitions, logistics, and men were crossing. 

In fact, one of the people who wanted to cross the Pankisi Gorge and was turned away by the Georgians is none other than Abdulaziz al-Omari, one of the 9/11 hijackers. 

Thomas Small Wow. 

Aimen Dean He, you know—. In – in the year—. In February 2000, he was about to cross the Pankisi George and go ahead to fight in Chechnya, but he was, you know, turned away by the Georgians and was deported to Turkey. And from there, he went to Afghanistan. 

So, the reality is that the Georgians were really good at helping the Russians until 2003, when a new pro-American government were, you know, came to power. And that had a negative impact immediately on the amount of logistics and weapons and, you know, traffic of fighters in and out of Chechnya, using the Pankisi Gorge. 

So, the Russians decided, "Okay. You give us the Pankisi Gorge. We're going to give you Southern Ossetia." You know? So, the Southern Ossetian separatist republic in Georgia. So—. And when the Georgians wanted to pacify Southern Ossetia, the Russians used that as a pretext to invade. 

So, the reality is that Putin realised that, "Okay. I offered to help you, you know, pacify Afghanistan. I've offered to help you fight terrorism." 

Thomas Small He's talking to the – he's talking to the United States here? 

Aimen Dean Exactly. 

"And, now, you come to my own backyard, my own backyard, the home of Stalin in Georgia, the home of Stalin, to – to – to turn it into not only a liberal democracy, but a liberal democracy that's giving aid and support to jihadists." 

Thomas Small I can imagine Putin's not happy. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. So, he decided to do what Russians do best: send them the airplanes and the tanks 

 Thomas Small And they—. The Russian army totally smashed Georgia. I mean, Georgia is still smarting today from that – from that invasion. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

Thomas Small But what about America's pro-democracy tactics in general, the ones that were coordinated through the state department? Were intelligence analysts focused at all on this at the time and – and the potential for conflict as a result of those actions? 

Aimen Dean Well, if you talk to those who were Russia desk analysts and officers in, you know, whether the British intelligence or the German intelligence or other services, they will tell you that there is no need to antagonise Russia this way. I mean, after all, the spectre of al-Qaeda, the spectre of the Taliban was still there. We were still fighting a war against terrorism. There are many Chechens who are using the Pankisi Gorge, then later would infiltrate into places like Afghanistan to kill Americans, they would infiltrate into places like Iraq to kill Americans, and they will infiltrate into Syria later. 

So, the reality is that, while the state department enabled, you know, pro-democracy or pro-liberal democracy powers to reach, you know – you know, governance, basically, in Georgia, that did not result in a improved security, you know, for the West and for Western allies. 

I mean, actually it proved to be the opposite. And I think Putin learnt the lesson, that if you see that effort to destabilise one of, you know, my buffer or satellite states intervene immediately. Don't let it fester.

Thomas Small Well, we would see that happen before, too long in the Ukraine. 

So, to return to the Ukraine onto its backstory, in 2010, the Russian candidate, Yanukovych came to power. But he began negotiating with the EU to form an association agreement. Basically, a step on the way to full membership of the EU. 

Putin said, immediately, "This is unacceptable. The Ukraine cannot be in the EU." 

Because the EU and NATO, though they're separate institutions, they are both parts of the liberal democratic order, which Putin does not want to grow into his front yard. Instead, he suggested a separate arrangement involving the EU, but also Russia, the IMF, and the Ukraine. But this was rejected by the EU. And in the end, after putting a lot of pressure on him by Putin, President Yanukovych rejects the EU deal. That took place on the 21st of November 2013. Yanukovych says no to the EU. Only ten days later, in December, large demonstrations, breakout in Independence Square in Kyiv. This is the famous Maidan. And, actually, interestingly, that word, Maidan, is a Turkic word, "a big public square," and that is an immediate echo of the Tatar Yoke. Immediate. It goes and stretches right back to those two hundred and fifty years, when the area was ruled by the Turks.

So, these big demonstrations break out in Independence Square, in the Maidan. Protestors take over the city hall. Yanukovych reacts harshly. Actually, this is precisely what such protests want. They want the leader to react harshly, which will galvanise the protests further, which is, indeed, what happens. 

Sixteen days later, as the country is politically in greater and greater degrees of chaos, Putin announces a fifteen-billion-dollar loan to the Ukraine to help them see through some economic difficulties they were going through. This, again, is proof to the protestors who are anti-Russia that Ukraine is moving too much in the direction of Russia. 

In January and February of 2014, street clashes are – are becoming a very constant thing. Sixty-eight people are killed in the course of them. And the Ukrainian parliament is working with the president, is working with Germany, is working with Britain, is working with Russia to try to find some solution. 

Finally, on the 21st of February 2014, they do reach a deal to hold new elections by the end of that year, which would mean that Yanukovych would remain in power until then.

This was agreed by the Ukrainian parliament, but was rejected by the protesters in the Maidan, which, by this point, included far-right elements. There's no question. There were neo-Nazi-style Ukrainian nationalists, you know, amongst the protesters. Weapons stores had also been ransacked. So, the situation was getting very violent. 

And on the following day, the 22nd of February, Yanukovych flees to Russia, and parliament votes unanimously to remove him from power in a move that Russia calls a coup. 

Now, what is interesting about this whole story in – in Kyiv in 2014, Aimen, is that it has echoes of the Arab Spring. Is that just a coincidence? Or can we see in this pattern the – the consequences of American pro-democracy initiatives, that there's a kind of rule book that's being followed here, and this rule book is leading to strongmen being removed from power?

Aimen Dean Well, if you see that the American administration learnt a lot from the lessons of Tunisia, Egypt, and, to some extent, Yemen. They looked at—. And Libya, of course. They looked at the trajectory of each country and the power play in each country, and they decided that, "Okay. If we want to apply the same here in Ukraine, then we need to follow these steps carefully." 

You know, first of all, you have the – the pretext. From the pretext, come the protest. From the protest, come the provocation. From the provocation, come the reaction. From the reaction, come the propagation. And this is how you feed, you know, this narrative. And until the people are presented or the people in power are presented with two choices, really: civil war or just escape the country. So, what some people call it, that Yanukovych a Ben Ali. 

Thomas Small Ben Ali, the president of Tunisia who just decided to leave. Well, some people say his security officers put him on a plane and sent him away, but. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. Actually, no. They told him that, "Oh, we have information that the protesters are about to storm the palace." You know? "Flee for your safety." So, then he fled. 

It's the same thing had happened with the Yanu- – Yanukovych. He was told that, you know, "if – if the protesters reach the palace, your guard will not protect you anymore."

So, he decided, you know, like, I mean, "I'm not going to end up like Gaddafi." 

So, the spectre of Gadhafi, you know, being knived. 

Thomas Small The ghost of Gaddafi hangs … 

Aimen Dean You know? 

Thomas Small … haunts every strongman.

Aimen Dean Exactly. 

"I don't want to be a Gaddafi. I don't want to be a Saddam. So, thank you so much, guys. I will do a Ben Ali." You know, go into honourable, lucrative exile, a comfortable one, in Russia. And that's it. 

Thomas Small Whatever it was in fact, and it was probably a complex mix of many things, in Putin's eyes, this whole thing was a Western takeover of the Ukraine. And he moved to permanently detach Ukraine from Russia's sphere of influence. 

So, Russian units began seizing checkpoints in the Crimea, which has a majority Russian-speaking population and, as you mentioned, Aimen, is home to Russia's vital Black Sea fleet, at the important naval city of Sevastopol. And by the 18th of March 2014, after a referendum in the Crimea, Russia formerly annexed the peninsula. Two majority Russian-speaking provinces in Eastern Ukraine, Donetsk and Luhansk, a part of a larger Russian-speaking region known as the Donbas, declared their independence from Ukraine. And, well, that's that.

From that—. From then, in – in summer 2014 to now, there's been a kind of ongoing civil war within eastern areas of Ukraine, aided by Russian troops, aided by Russian mercenaries, including all sorts of military adventurers.

Zooming out a bit to – to go back to the entire geostrategic perspective, what does Russia actually want? 

Aimen Dean First and foremost, respect, you know. 

"Don't interfere on my affairs. I'm not going to interfere in yours." You know? 

And that's why, you know, we have to understand that Russia is always defensive, whether, you know, in terms of geography or politics. They are defensive. 

Putin would say to the West, "Please, please, please, please, you know, do not undermine the stability of the Central Asian republics." You know, the Stans. Whether it's Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyztan, you know, Turkmenistan. "Please do not destabilise these countries because I will pay the price if there is a jihadist, you know, uprising in these countries, and there will be millions of refugees, you know, coming into my land from the civil wars that erupt. Do not go into Ukraine and cause disturbances. Please do not go into the Caucasus and cause disturbances, because I will pay the price for all of this." 

Thomas Small Putin's belief in stability and his willingness to intervene in order to protect stability was proved in January of this year, when Kazakhstan suddenly erupted into increasingly chaotic and even violent protests. As a result initially of a rise of gas prices, first in west Kazakhstan, which then they spread to Almaty, which is the country's largest city. And – and they grew. They grew into a large-scale looting, violence in places. The state responded with brutality. And to prevent this Arab Spring-style situation, Russia sent in troops to quell the protests. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. And they were extremely successful in pacifying the country. So, from his point of view, is that the West is playing lots of games, but in his backyard, rather than he is playing his games in theirs.

By the way, I'm not saying that Putin and, by extension, Putin's Russia are the victims here. We're just talking about the dynamics of the game and where the game is being played. Is it being played in America's backyard or is it being played in Russia's backyard? No. Actually, it is in Russia's backyard right now.

Thomas Small Now, we've kind of talked mainly about how Putin sees the West as a threat. But, of course, the West sees Russia as a threat as well. NATO has expanded throughout the last thirty years, largely because, in the eyes of most American military policymakers, Russia is an enemy. And, of course, if you want to spread liberal democracy, it is an enemy. 

But also, more recently, in March 2018, Putin announced a number of new super weapons. These super weapons have been designed specifically to get around American defence systems, which clearly freaks out The Pentagon. If you're Putin and you're looking at America's defence system, what – what – what are its weaknesses or how are you going to get around it?

Aimen Dean Well, Putin decided that he will avoid what bankrupted the Soviet Union. He learnt the lessons of the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union tried to match the American military power. Submarine to submarine, aircraft carriers to aircraft carrier. You know, bomber to bomber. 

He decided that, "No. We – we can't much American arms race financially. So, you know what? Let them build aircraft carriers, but we will build the anti-aircraft carrier weapon."

Thomas Small America's military might is – is founded on aircraft carriers. Is that – is that right?

Aimen Dean Absolutely. Because that's how you project power. It has, you know, air power. And every aircraft carrier group has submarines and Tomahawk missiles and cruise missiles and all of these things, as well as the aircraft's on top of the aircraft carrier. It's a huge power projection. Powerful than many other. Each aircraft group carries the power of a whole nation. Of a whole nation. 

So, that is why, as far as Putin is concerned, "Okay. I'm not going to match each aircraft carrier with an aircraft carrier of my own. I'm going to invent weapons that will sink them before even they come to me." 

Thomas Small And what are these weapons?

Aimen Dean Hypersonic cruise missiles.

Thomas Small Hypersonic cruise missiles? My goodness, this is something out of a 1950s Pope sort of comic book. A hypersonic cruise missile. And what is that? I mean, that sounds like it moves very fast. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. I mean, the American typical cruise missile, like, you know, the Tomahawk, for example, you know, the speed is about eight hundred kilometres. But, you know, the speed of, you know, the Russian new hypersonic cruise missiles could reach anywhere between three and a half thousand to five thousand kilometres per hour. So, it is really fast. And even the velocity of the impact, you know, could destroy the carrier without even having a warhead on it. You know, just the velocity. 

Thomas Small So, hypersonic cruise missiles. What else? What other weapons are – are they developing? 

Aimen Dean Uh-huh. This is where we come to one of the scariest weapons ever created in human history. It's a mini-submarine, but it's a torpedo. But it's a nuclear torpedo with a nuclear warhead and a nuclear reactor to make it going, you know. Basically, it propelled by diesel, you know, or any other, fuel. It is propelled by a nuclear reactor inside it. It is a twenty-four-metre tube shaped like a torpedo that can roam the oceans, carrying a warhead, that is—and prepare for this—it's a hundred megatonnes in terms of the power of the thermal weapon inside. 

Thomas Small Compare that to the – the nuclear bombs that America dropped on Japan, a hundred megatonnes, how much bigger are we talking about? 

Aimen Dean God. Goodness. Like, I mean, okay. Fine. The – the – the Hiroshima bomb was fifteen kilotonnes. The Nagasaki bomb was twenty kilotonnes. This is a hundred megatonnes. 

Thomas Small Well, I'm no mathematician, but that sounds like a lot bigger. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. You know, basically, it's – it's, you know, it's tens of thousands of times bigger, I mean, than Hiroshima or Nagasaki. 

Thomas Small So, there's this underwater nuclear torpedo that is just kind of moving around and it can detonate at any time. The detonation underwater. Obviously, if you detonated it under a naval group, all – say goodbye to three or four aircraft carriers. But what happens if you, like, detonate it by the land? I mean, that is a big explosion. 

Aimen Dean And a big tsunami after that. You can destroy entire coastal cities. And so, this is why the Russians call it the doomsday weapon. And the idea is that, "Okay. If, for whatever reason our nuclear arsenal was destroyed, we were subject of a first strike by the enemy, we still have these weapons roaming the ocean that will take revenge in such case." 

Now, of course, you don't endear yourself, you know, to the West and to America by inventing a weapon like this, that could destroy the, you know, New York and Boston and other key cities.

Thomas Small No. I mean, clearly weap- – weapons like that justify any – any American, kind of intervention. My goodness, that's terrifying. 

Aimen Dean It is terrifying. I mean, you know, so inventing a weapon like this, I mean, okay, what are you trying to achieve here? Is it security for your country? 

Well, I mean, you are achieving the opposite, you know. People now will try to undermine you, because you have now gone so far in threatening, you know, well, a global, natural catastrophe on biblical scale and you have, you know, deployed, you know, quite a few of these weapons, you know, to the oceans. So, this is not good, you know, as far as the image of Russia and the image of Putin, you know, is concerned. 

Thomas Small But I suppose Putin would say, "Look, you know, we're not going to use these things. But this is an insurance policy. We need an insurance policy. After all, America's military is much bigger than ours. It has more nuclear bombs than we have. It is not like America isn't developing weapons of its own." 

But Russia has an insurance policy. 

Aimen Dean Well, the problem with this insurance policy, it might come at a huge premium to the natural order of the world. I mean, what if anything goes wrong with these? Because, don't forget, they are unmanned. You know, they are roaming around. What if, one day, you lose contact with them? You know, one day, there is something goes – is going wrong with one of their nuclear reactors? 

Actually, there is a double, you know, risk here. You know, there is the risk of the warhead itself, you know, malfunctioning or the nuclear reactor on the damn thing, you know – you know, malfunctioning. One way or another, if you put, you know, four or five or six of these in the ocean, you know, the chances of something going wrong, you know, is, you know—. It's quite big. 

And especially with the fact that, sometimes, you know—. You know, over the past three years, there has been numerous accidents with almost nuclear-like explosions in Russian military bases well-documented by videos, you know. And this is the problem. So, if anything goes wrong with these weapons, and there could be a possibility, then we could say goodbye to the Seychelles, to the Maldives, to Bermuda, to what, you know, to whatever island chains or coastal cities that, you know, these weapons might find themselves in the vicinity of.

Thomas Small My goodness. Well, America and Russia facing off over nuclear bombs. There's a reason why we're focusing on the Cold War in this series of Conflicted, because it seems to be back. I think – I think the main thing to take away about the Cold War—. 

And I promise you, dear listener, from next episode onward, we're going to go deep into the Cold War in the Middle East—but we thought it would be good to establish the geographical, the geostrategic, and the ideological fault lines that resonate to the present day. 

The Cold War wasn't about imperial expansion in the old sense, where an expansionist state sought to impose itself by force on another territory and rule it. Ideally, directly. But indirectly, if required. 

In the Cold War, each of the two competence we're primarily trying to expand not its state so much as its ideological system where they're capitalist or communist. These two ideologies were different, incompatible views on the course modern life should and would take. 

"Ideology" is a word ferociously difficult to define. And I'm not going to attempt to definition here. But what is key about the two warring Cold War ideologies is their universalist character. Each side believed its system, its way of life, its entire worldview was universally applicable. Americans believed that everyone would be happier, better off, more blessed, really, to live in a liberal democratic capitalist system. Soviets believe the same about their centrally-planned Marxist, highly bureaucratic system. 

And one way of understanding US-Russian relations today is that, when the Cold War ended, Russia, throughout its universalist ideology, and, perhaps naively, it believed that the US would do the same. But the US did not. 

To this day, the West is still animated by an ideological conviction that liberal democracy is the only morally and politically legitimate form of government. And that may be true. But not everyone agrees. 

What's more, during the Cold War, both sides believed that its system was destined to triumph. There was an almost religious dimension to this belief in providential manifest destiny. In fact, because both liberalism and communism emerged from a Protestant Christian world under pressure from secularisation, the scientific revolution, the enlightenment, and the French revolution, liberalism and communism can be regarded, in my view, as something like Christian heresies. And, therefore, each bears a universalist eschatological stamp just like Christianity. 

That returns us to the opening quote by Don Manuel about the medieval Cold War between Muslims and Christians. If the Cold War, Aimen, was a battle between two heretical versions of Christianity trying to impose their debased religion on the world, have Islamists been right to oppose both in the name of a pan-Islamic solidarity?

Aimen Dean Well, Islamists, you know, are already divided over which version of eschatology they will fight for. The Shias and the Sunnis have their own cold war. 

Thomas Small Oh, we're never going to get to the actual bottom of any of this. It's far too complicated. 

Okay. To throw forward now to our next episode, it's important to know that, beginning in the twenties, Soviet strategists saw that what would eventually be called the Third World—and the Middle East fell into that category—was ripe for revolutionary communist expansion, especially as the old European empires collapsed, leaving new states in their wake. The question was always: Which system would the new states choose communist or capitalist? Essentially controlled command economy or a more or less market economy, finance driven and governed by the law of supply and demand?

That's the Cold War Middle East that we're exploring in this series of Conflicted. In our next episode, we're going to discuss the very first Cold War fault line in the Middle East with echoes down to the present day. 

That's right, Aimen. We're going back to one of your favourite countries: Iran. 

Well, dear listener, that was our best attempt, four weeks ago, at explaining the wider historical and geopolitical context for what's going on in Ukraine. I hope you found it at least somewhat insightful. Given everything that's happened since, what would I say now? I don't quite know. 

Listen, unlike Aimen, I'm not a professional. I'm like you, an ordinary guy trying to understand the world as best I can, relying on the expertise of others. And what's weird in this current conflict, the one between Russia and Ukraine, between Russia and the West over the future of Ukraine, I find myself with skin in the game. Twenty-two years ago, while living in a monastery in northern Greece, I converted to Orthodox Christianity. Like most Russians and Ukrainians, I am an Orthodox Christian. 

But I'm also from California, an American. And so, whatever ideas I might entertain up here in my head, in my bones, I am a liberal in the broadest sense, a citizen of the West.

When President Biden or President Macron denounced Russian aggression, Russian authoritarianism, the age-old Russian behemoth, and affirm the primacy of Western liberal values, my eyes well up a little and I feel a stirring inside. A patriotism, a pride. 

But when non-Western thinkers, Russian thinkers, including President Putin, denounced the West as a perfidious, sneaky globalising Leviathan seeking to turn the whole world into one vast marketplace rigged in favour of Western corporate interests, I can't lie, that narrative resonates, too. 

The conflict tearing Ukraine apart runs right through the middle of my own heart. The war itself is a monstrous, villainous, and, probably ultimately, a very foolish crime. And as I said before, Putin bears responsibility for it. 

But the history leading up to the war, stretching back months, years, decades, centuries, that history is impossible to reduce to easy black and white, good versus evil categories. 

So, what are we to think about at all? 

I don't know. I'm conflicted. 

As always, we'd like to remind you to follow us on whichever social media platform you find least disturbing, @MHConflicted. Over on Facebook, we have a fantastic community of fans having deep discussions on the topics we cover in these episodes. It's a great place to learn more and carry on the conversation. You can find that group by searching "Conflicted Discussion Group."

[THEME IN]

Lastly, another reminder that completely ad-free episodes and generous helpings of exclusive bonus content can be had for just 99p on Apple Podcasts and on Spotify by searching for "Conflicted Extra." 

We cannot wait for you to join us in two weeks' time for the next episode of Conflicted. 

Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Rowan Bishop. Sandra Ferrari is our executive producer. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley. 

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Conflicted S3 E3 - Spying for Saudi

CONFLICTED

S03E03

Thomas Small Hello, Aimen.

Aimen Dean Hello, Thomas.

Thomas Small We've got a huge episode today, so I just want to get right into it. Is that okay?

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. Definitely.

Thomas Small So, in this series of Conflicted, we're exploring the various ways in which the idea of clash of civilisations can be used to understand Middle Eastern history and the conflicts, which continue to rage across the region. As we said before, what we're trying to do isn't straightforward, because "civilisation" is a difficult word to define. But we're going to try.

Having told the story of the end of America's "empire" in the Middle East, we're going to tell the story of how that empire began and developed during the Cold War, starting in your homeland, Aimen, Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Arabia is, in a way, where the Cold War began. And to understand how, we'll explain how long-standing British power in the region gave way fitfully, and almost without anyone noticing, to American power. And we'll see how the Cold War world of spy craft, ideological conflict, and state paranoia continues into the present through Aimen's take on the notorious murder of Jamal Khashoggi.

[THEME IN]

What an episode, Aimen. My goodness.

Aimen Dean Goodness. It's going to ruffle lots of feathers.

[THEME OUT]

Thomas Small The story we're telling today about the origins of the Cold War in Saudi Arabia dovetails remarkably neatly with your own family's history. And that story starts with the British Empire. Now, Aimen, your paternal grandfather was born in Afghanistan and moved to British India, the Raj, and became an officer in the British Indian Army. He was sent to Iraq, in 1915, as part of the UK's Mesopotamian campaign, during which Britain grabbed Iraq from the Ottomans and incorporated it into the British Empire. Now, after the war in Iraq, he became a head of police. Is that right?

Aimen Dean Yeah. He was the head of police in a Baghdad district then, for the whole of Basra.

Thomas Small The whole of Basra in southern Iraq. Wow, that's quite a job. He must have got his hands dirty.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. He was one of those responsible for the suppression of the 1920 rebellion. I don't know if I feel sorry about that or proud.

Thomas Small Ah, the 1920 Iraqi revolt. Now, this was an uprising of Iraqi nationalists, which was put down by the British. But it also encouraged the British to adopt indirect rule in Iraq. They installed a Hashemite as king, King Faisal bin Hussein. The Hashemites, of course, were the traditional rulers of the Hejaz, along the west coast of the Arabian Peninsula, where Mecca and Medina are. And, in fact, that King Faisal was whom Alec Guinness played in Lawrence of Arabia. Very memorably, of course.

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

Thomas Small So, eventually, your grandfather was invited by the ruler of Bahrain, which was then a British protectorate, to join the security services there. So, Aimen, the question is: Does spy craft, as well as working for foreign powers, run in your blood?

Aimen Dean Oh, it runs in the family. Like, my father did it. So, as my grandfather. So, yeah.

Thomas Small So, it was in Bahrain that your father grew up. And in the early 1930s, after deciding to seek their fortune just across the water, in the eastern province of Saudi Arabia, he and his older brother, your uncle, caught the attention of a certain British spy.

Aimen Dean That British spy is known to the English world, to the English-speaking world, as St John Philby.

Thomas Small St John Philby. St John Philby.

Aimen Dean Yeah. St John Philby. Very posh name. But to the Arabs, and especially to the Saudi royal family and to King Abdulaziz himself, he was known as Sheikh Abdullah Philby.

Thomas Small Sheikh Abdullah Philby. Now, St John Philby / Abdullah Philby is a fascinating figure in the history of the – of the later British Empire and the transition of that world order into the American-led world order, of the Cold War. And his life, St John Philby's life, mirrors your family's life, Aimen. He was also sent to Iraq during the First World War. And after the war, he became minister of Internal Security in Iraq, meaning he would have been your grandfather's boss.

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

Thomas Small But just before that, during the Arab revolt, which broke out during the war—and whereas the famous Lawrence of Arabia was the British agent most active in the Hejaz on the west, advocating the claims of the Sharif of Mecca to be the king of the Arabs—Philby was sent to the Nejd, the central Arabian plateau, on a mission to the then-Emir of the Nejd, Abdulaziz known in the west as Ibn Saud, who was then a rising power in Arabia. Philby ended up becoming a staunch advocate of Abdulaziz, who had conquered the eastern province, where you grew up, Aimen, only a few years before.

Now, explain how Arabians like yourself, who weren't from the Nejd, from the central Arabian plateau where Riyadh is, where the House of Saud come from, how would Arabians like yourself have regarded Nejdis?

Aimen Dean Well, if you remember, the Nejdis were always regarded by the rest of the population of Arabia as the noble warriors. Somewhat nomadic, but also with some settlements that were regarded as the trading centres of Nejd. So, they were warriors and, also, they were merchants, but also there were religious missionaries all at the same. Merchants, warriors, and religious missionaries.

Thomas Small Religious missionaries is a nice way of putting it. I mean—.

Aimen Dean Zealot. No. No.

Thomas Small Yeah.

Aimen Dean They were [crosstalk].

Thomas Small Wahhabi zealots, let's say.

Aimen Dean So, I wouldn't call them Wahhabis, you know, because, basically I myself am a Salafist. So, basically, I'll call them as Salafists in a sense.

Thomas Small Oh, I beg your pardon. Yes. Wahhabi is often regarded by Muslims themselves, Salafi Muslims themselves, as a slur. I don't mean it as a slur, of course.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Yeah. But, nonetheless, you know, for many people they were regarded as staunch religious fundamentalists. You know, this is the best I can describe them. You know, also, they were warriors and, at the same time, with a mercantile bend to them. So, that is why they were regarded as fearsome in both the east and the west of the Arabian Peninsula. But, nonetheless, these fears, you know, started to lessen a bit as King Abdulaziz adopted a more conciliatory tone towards both the east and the west of the Arabian Peninsula.

Thomas Small So, yeah. The House of Saud, now, they have a very long history. But they really burst into history properly in the eighteenth century, when they entered into a famous alliance with the Muslim reformer, Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab (from whom the word "Wahhabi" comes) and – and they conquered at that time much of the Arabian Peninsula and formed the first Saudi state. That's how it's known to scholars. That state was destroyed by the Ottomans in 1818. But only a few years later, the House of Saud had recovered and established a smaller, but still impressive second Saudi state. 

Now, this second state suffered from internal divisions and was eventually conquered by a rival Arabian clan, allies of the Ottomans, the House of Rashid. Abdulaziz, the king whom St. John Philby / Abdullah Philby was an advisor to and who founded the third Saudi state, the current kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Abdulaziz was then only sixteen years old. And he went into exile to Kuwait with his family where he nursed a powerful ambition to restore his royal house's fortunes.

Now, this he did starting in 1902, reconquering first, Riyadh, and, from there, slowly extending his rule across the peninsula. And he just started his expansion when Philby met him in 1917.

And it's important to point out that Philby was basically an intelligence operative. He actually became head of the Secret Service in Palestine during the mandate, where he would come to grief with the British and was eventually forced to resign on account of sending confidential information to Abdulaziz. He really, really respected Abdulaziz. He'd grown to believe that he was a great leader. 

And after his resignation, Philby ended up settling in Jeddah, where he was living when Abdulaziz conquered the Hejaz, becoming its king in 1925. Philby grew then even closer to Abdulaziz, became one of his closest advisers, converted to Islam in 1930, and took the name Abdullah.

Now, Philby argued strongly that Abdulaziz should unite all of his domains under his sole rule, which he did in 1932, proclaiming the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. And that is the Saudi Arabia that we know today and in which you grew up. But your family knew St John Philby / Abdullah Philby. Is that right, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Of course. Because of the fact that both Philby and my grandfather were, you know, in Iraq serving the British in the military sense. But also, when my grandfather moved to Bahrain and, from there, my father and my uncle who were hyper-linguists, both of them—. I mean, you know, each—. I think my father spoke five languages and my uncles spoke six.

Thomas Small Another thing which must run in the blood, Aimen. Because, my goodness, you are also good at languages.

Aimen Dean Thank you. So – so, they moved across from Bahrain to Saudi Arabia just at the right time, in 1932, when Saudi Arabia became the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Abdullah Philby—as I would always call him, Abdullah Philby, because that's how my father and my uncle always called him, Sheikh Abdullah Philby—he was instrumental in really delivering a blow to the British Empire. 

It doesn't sound right that, you know, an agent of the British Empire delivered a blow to the British Empire. But he was the reason why King Abdulaziz, when he was considering granting oil concessions to the Anglo-Persian, you know, Oil Company, he decided based on St John Philby or Sheikh Abdullah's advice to instead grant the rights to the Americans, to the—.

Thomas Small Haha.

Aimen Dean Yeah. To your part of America, actually. To California. To Southern California.

Thomas Small Before we go into the – the discovery of oil in Saudi Arabia, I'd like to zoom out and talk about Arabia in general. It's a very ancient place. It's vast. It's the size of India. It's been inhabited from, really, the beginning of time. And those beginnings have come down to us as – as sacred history, really, recorded in the Bible and, indeed, in the Quran, as well as an oral tradition.

Now, in the Bible, the forefathers of the Arabian people, as well as the Jews, is Abraham. Ibrahim, as he's known in – in the Arabic world. Abraham had two sons, the younger son born to his wife, Sarah, was Isaac, the father of Jacob from whose twelve sons came the twelve tribes of Israel and down through the centuries to the Jews today. 

Now, Abraham's older son was Ishmael, born to his Egyptian concubine, Hagar. 

Now, Aimen, tell us what happened to Hagar and Ishmael in the story. Sarah was jealous of Hagar and Ishmael, and instructed her husband Abraham to send them away. And he did so. Where did he take them, according to the story?

Aimen Dean According to Islamic teachings, God commanded him to go south. You know, from the Levant. So, he kept going south on south and south. He thought he might, you know, drop them in the [unintelligible 0:12:08], but actually, like, you know, he continued. He thought then it would be Yemen, but then God stopped him. 

So, they ended up in a abandoned valley, in a very, you know, barren valley, you know. And that valley later became Mecca. So, there, he left them. And Hagar, of course, was left alone with a child, her son Ishmael. But with no water, with nothing. But then she just encouraged her husband. "If this is the God's command, then, you know, I will follow it. Just go."

Miraculously, beneath Ishmael's feet, water started to gush, you know, and to come from beneath the ground. And that would later become known as the Holy Well of Zamzam, which is, you know, still gushing water to this day. 

Now, you know, when the birds started circling that valley, an Arab tribe—. Remember, Ishmael is half-Aramaic, half-Egyptian.

Thomas Small Yes. Because Abraham was an Aramean. So, Ab—. So, Ishmael's father was an Aramean and his mother was an Egyptian.

Aimen Dean Yeah. So, when – when Yemenite tribe from, you know, Yemen, who are Arabic people—.

Thomas Small Southern Arabs, really. Yeah.

Aimen Dean Yeah. So, when they were traveling towards the north, towards the Levant, they realised that the birds were circling that valley, and they were wondering, you know, "There is no water." I mean, you know, they only circled water, these birds. And so, they went to inquire and they found an Egyptian woman with a child in the middle of that barren valley, which has no water whatsoever or any trees, even, and they found there were with lots of water. And she was trying to build a well around it. And so, they asked her, you know, "Why on Earth do you have water? How did this happen?" 

So, she explained, of course, in order to gain power over them that she is the concubine of a holy man and this is his son and that he was – they were left there on God's command. And a miracle happened. This water came out. 

So, of course, the tribe realised that this is a special woman and her son will be special. And so, they said, "Can we settle beside you? Because if there is a water and this is on a caravan way, you know, trade caravan way, so we can make money, can we settle next to you?" 

She said, "Yes. But me and my son are the masters of the water." 

They accepted. So, they said, "But only on one condition. That when he comes of age, he will marry from us."

So, the tribe is called Jurhum. And when Ishmael became a young man, he married from them. And his language, Aramaic, and his half, you know, Egyptian heritage, mixed with the Southern Arabs. And, you know, his twelve sons became the twelve new Arabian tribes of the north, and their language became the dominant, which replaced the old southern Arabic.

Thomas Small It's a fascinating story, because it really holds in – in the cultural memory of the Arabs something real about their origins. They are a mixture of an ancient southern Arabian people, of the Aramean people of the north. Their language reflects a mixture of these two sources. And that's the story of how the city of Mecca was founded. Obviously, an extremely important city today, both for Arabs and all Muslims.

Now, when Abraham left Hagar and Ishmael there, thinking, of course, that they might die (There was—. The Holy Well of Zamzam had not yet been revealed), he gave a famous prayer. The Quran records this prayer as "My Lord, make this land secure and provide its people with fruits." This is called the Prayer of Abraham. And – and, Aimen, you told me quite interestingly that this prayer features importantly in Saudi self-identity today.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. They call it "Dua of Ibrahim." dour too. You know, the Prayer of Abraham. Whenever they discover oil, "Oh, this is Abraham's prayer." 

When he said the fruits, the fruits in the Quran doesn't mean, like, you know, just only, like, you know, the fruits you buy from the grocery. But it means the bounties, you know. It means whatever treasures, you know, that you will find in Arabia. It is the blessings of Abraham, you know, upon this land. 

So, oil, that is the prayer of Abraham. Gold, phosphate, bauxite. You know, silver. You know, gas. This is a prayer of Abraham. This is what Abraham, you know—. You know, how he blessed this land. And, therefore, this is why the descendants of Abraham right now are reaping the rewards of that prayer four thousand years ago.

Thomas Small Which brings us back to oil where we left off. Now, by the time King Abdulaziz was rising in power, the geopolitics of oil were already active in the region. It had first been discovered in Iran in 1908 by what would become British Petroleum. Then, the First World War proved that petroleum was the future and that whoever controlled the oil had a major tactical advantage. Britain was the major player, but also France. And they signed an agreement in 1920, shutting American oil companies out of the Iraq oil fields.

Standard Oil of California was one of those big American companies. And, in fact, you know, what—. The thing that puts Southern California, where I'm from, on the map was oil. And I can remember, as a kid, driving around and seeing still these creaky old oil pumps going up and down, probably something similar to – to what you experienced, Aimen, when you were driving around Khobar in the eastern province of Saudi Arabia.

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

Thomas Small Now, the Great Depression had reduced the pilgrimage of the Hajj by sixty percent. And that was the – the major source of revenues for the Saudi government in the pre-oil period. King Abdulaziz needed to find another source of funding. So, this inspired his desire to get some oil prospecting going. And that's, as you said before, Aimen, where St John Philby, despite being British, advised the king to grant the concession to the Americans. He thought it would better safeguard the country's independence. 

And so, Standard Oil was given the concession in 1933 and started a subsidiary, which would in time be called the Arabian American Oil Company, Aramco. This is around the time that Philby met your uncle.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, I remember the story in the family is that when my uncle and my father, when they crossed, you know, from Bahrain into Saudi Arabia, their linguistic skills immediately caught the attention of St John Philby / Abdullah Philby, who was already talking to the American delegations and courting them in the eastern province and trying to convince them that there is oil.

If there is oil in Bahrain, you know, there will be oil here. It's just the same shelf. You know, the same continental shelf. It's the same, you know, place. I mean, if they find oil there, you will find oil here.

Of course, it took five years until they found the first, you know, oil well. And, you know, then later, you know, they found the largest oil field in the world.

Thomas Small Yes. Five years, it took them. But they finally struck gold—as you say, black gold—on the 3rd of March 1938. And this is the famous Dammam Oil Well No.7. Well, you can go visit it now. It's a kind of national monument.

Aimen Dean So, what happened here is that Abdullah Philby realised that, you know, my uncle, who spoke six languages and, you know, was very much wise, you know, in the ways of the world, you know, and he was well traveled, you know, from Iraq to Bahrain, to Cairo, and back again. So, he was very well educated. So, he decided that this young man could actually serve, you know, in the court of King Abdulaziz as a translator and interpreter, which was very much needed.

So, my uncle was then sent to the court of King Abdulaziz to become an interpreter. So, from being one of the first ten employees of Aramco—. And if you go to Aramco's museum, you will find his picture there as one of the first ten employees there. You know, all the way to the court of King Abdulaziz. And it shows that the influence of Abdullah Philby was positive in two areas as far as King Abdulaziz and his ruling, you know, strategy was concerned. 

First, Abdullah Philby advised them to ignore the British and to give the oil concession to the Americans, which proved, in later years, to be absolutely vital not only for the independence of Saudi Arabia, but to the decline of the British Empire in later years as, of course, they were denied these riches, because of that advice, which, you know, absolutely hacked off the British in later years regarding Abdullah Philby and his betrayal.

But the second advice, which is – was – which was equally important, is that Abdullah told the king that "you need to rely on the educated classes in the east and the west of Arabia, the Hijazi intelligentsia, and the eastern province merchants who were mixing always with the British in India, and the trading networks that were taking place there. If you rely on both, then—." 

You know, you – you have to understand also that he also told him to incorporate the southern tribes in the south of Arabia. [unintelligible 0:21:16], Al-Shahranis, [unintelligible 0:21:19]. All of these people.

Thomas Small Who – who really had – were Yemeni tribes, really, originally.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small But they'd been conquered by the House of Saud.

Aimen Dean Yeah. To incorporate them into the military. So, he told him that, you know, "a chair cannot stand on one leg. You have to have four legs. You know, you have to have the Nejdis, the easterners, the westerners, the Hijazis, and you know, the southern Arabian provinces all part of your court, part of your empire." You know, this new fledgling kingdom.

And this is exactly what he did. And this is how, you know, a Durrani Afghan, you know, individual like my uncle, who was, you know, who raised in Iraq and Bahrain and it started in Cairo, and then, you know, spotted by Philby, ended up being the translator of King Abdulaziz. At the same time when, you know, a Hijazi from another old Turkic family, a Turkish family, you know, Ottoman family, living in Medina for five hundred years, you know, became the personal physician of King Abdulaziz.

Thomas Small Ah, you're talking about Muhammad Khashoggi.

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small The – the grandfather of the famous Jamal Khashoggi. We'll get back to him in a second.

So, because of your father and his brother, your uncle, migrated to the east – eastern province, that's where you grew up. And, obviously, that whole part of Saudi Arabia was dominated by Aramco, an American company until beginning, in the late seventies, it introduced a phased transfer of – of ownership to the Saudi government.

Now, American culture must have, to some extent, been present there in – in your childhood, even before the troops arrived in 1991 to expel Saddam Hussein from Kuwait. Is there something like a hint of a clash of civilisations there? I mean, there were cordial relations between the Saudis and the Americans. But Americans largely lived behind walls. Paint a picture of – of how this strange modern society of the eastern province, the oil society, with American oil engineers and Arabs from all over the world working. What kind of culture was it?

Aimen Dean Well, actually, we used to see them more, you know, more often than, you know, people would think was possible. American families, British families, Dutch families. Because, don't forget the, you know – you know, BP (British Petroleum) and the Royal Dutch Shell, you know, Company, they all were present there also as sub-contractors or to provide services. Schlumberger, one of the companies that, you know, is famous in the world of oil, were there. So, there were so many Europeans and, you know, also like Americans, Canadians, Australians, Dutch, Germans, and British.

And, you know, there were certain supermarkets there that catered for their tastes. And so, places like Safeway, you know. And Aramco had their own TV station, which was broadcasting, you know, to the eastern province. And they had all the latest sitcoms from America. And so, we were watching sitcoms and we were watching comedy shows coming from America and dramas and all of that, because Aramco TV was broadcasting there to the American families and to the Western audience there.

So, no. There was actually not only a cultural, you know, interaction, but also educational. Why? Because the schools I went to, you know, first, you know, Ibn Jabr School and then Farabi School, these two schools, the primary and middle schools, were actually built by Aramco, and they were built to mirror exactly the same architecture and the same standard of high-end American schools. So, you know, with the lockers and everything and all of that. 

If you – if you walk into them, you will think, you know—. If an American walked into them—ignore the dress code—you know, you will think you are in an American—. You know, there are basketball courts. You know, there are locker rooms and all of these things. And they were built by Aramco. And the King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals also was completely Americanised. You know, the entire education there, from top to bottom basically, is American curriculum, and most of the professors and educators there were either Americans or were educated in America.

Thomas Small I wonder what the American residents of the eastern province thought about aspects of Arabian culture. Because, certainly, one thing which really divides Westerners from Muslims is Sharia law. Sharia law almost haunts Westerners. It's a sort of byword for harsh justice, bordering on injustice. You know, we're sort of scared of it. And we all have the image in our minds of beheadings and public executions.

I remember when I was first in Riyadh, in 2011, being told about its infamous "Chop-chop square" outside the city's main Friday mosque, where public beheadings were regularly carried out. 

Now, growing up, Aimen, the fact of public executions wouldn't have been particularly unusual for you, I think. I mean, you told me that you attended your first execution when you were nine years old.

Aimen Dean Yes. You know, against the explicit orders of my family, of course. But, nonetheless, I, you know, I still remember there was a case of a – a paedophile. I mean, someone basically who kidnapped a young boy and, you know, raped, and killed him. And so, you know—.

Thomas Small He sounds like a real jerk, this guy.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Yeah. Of course. And so, one of my, you know—. The execution—. The executions in Khobar used to take place in a public square in front of a mosque called [inaudible 0:26:52]. I mean, for those listeners who are from Khobar, they would be familiar with it. 

And I, you know—. So, one of my friends, his house was just overlooking the square. And so, you know, me and several friends, we, you know, went after Friday prayers to his house, to the rooftop, in order to observe. And even though the execution was taking place about two hundred metres away, the sight of the sword striking the man and the, of course, the head falling to the ground and the blood gushing, I mean, that, you know, basically sent me home back numb. I felt like, you know, my hands numb. You know, going—. Walking – walking home, I was still in shock, you know. And, you know, my mother was screaming her lungs off. Like, you know, "Why did you have to see it?"

Then, two years later, I saw the other execution. But this time, basically, I was ready for it. This time, I knew it was going to happen. And yeah. I mean—. But then, I saw in-between executions that were supposed to happen, but never happened.

Thomas Small Yeah. So, this is interesting. I'd never really encountered this aspect of Sharia law. I mean, you told me and it really fascinated me that – that the reason why public executions are encouraged in Sharia law isn't for the reasons that we might think. It's not because there's some prurient, sadistic desire to revel in someone's gruesome death. It's actually, in a way, the opposite,

Aimen Dean The reason why there are public ex- – executions and why, you know, the family of the victim or victims need to be present there to witness the justice, you know, being done is, and also for the other people to come and see, is also for them, for the people to encourage and to, you know, really, almost beg the family of the victims to forgive and to show forgiveness.

There are—. Especially if the murder happened, you know, due to rage or, you know, not a premeditated murder, but basically something happened during rage, and there are no other aspects like, you know, rape or kidnapping or anything like that. So, if – if it is just the question of a murder happened between two people, I mean, this is when the families are encouraged to forgive by the, you know, onlookers and bystanders who sometime, basically, will be willing to contribute to the blood money, you know, to the compensation that the family would receive if they forgive.

Thomas Small So, let's break this down. The—. In Sharia law, murder is a civil offense. It's not actually a criminal offense in the same way that we understand it. A murder case is settled between the victim and the – and the murderer. The state is there to establish guilt and to arbitrate between those two parties. And if the victim's family decide to forgive, then all is forgiven.

And this—. As a Westerner, this comes as a shock. I mean, I—. In – in a – in a – in a Western murder case, if the father or the son of a murder victim stands up in court and says, "Your honour, I forgive the murderer," the state will say, "Well, that's very nice of you, but this is up to us to punish the murderer, not you." This is different in Sharia law.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Because the Sharia focuses a lot on restitution. In cases like these, especially in murder, they focus on restitution for the victim's family. And, therefore, the victim's family are given control over the process. Why? Because if they want justice, they can get it. They can have a life for a life. You know – you know – you know – a life is taken, so the other life will be taken, too. An eye for an eye.

However, if the family of the victim are willing to forgive, it – still, it is in their control. It was their gift, you know. So, even if they forgive, still, justice is done, because you know, that person took a life. They spared a life. So, one way or another, that power gives, you know, immense, you know, restitution in both ways.

Thomas Small Yes. I mean, you sent me – you sent me some links, Aimen, to – to some YouTube videos, which I watched. I watched with some trepidation, because, you know, you could see there – there was the – the – the perpetrator. He was on his knees and he was circled by Arabs. And there was the sword. And I thought, "Oh, no. What am I going to see?" And to my surprise, what I saw was the crowd really encouraging the victim's family to forgive. Sometimes …

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … pushing money into – into the hands of the victim's family, saying, "Take this money. Forgive." It was very moving. It was clear that there was even a sheikh there that was – that was trying to negotiate forgiveness, if you can imagine such a thing.

Aimen Dean Because at the end of the day, you know, the Quran says, "[Arabic language]." That, you know, an eye for an eye, you know, basically. But what it says after that, "[Arabic language]." "Whoever, you know, forgive and, you know, seek the path of, you know, forgiveness, you know, God will reward him."

So, it is important to understand that, you know, it's—. You know, people are not there in a to witness executions out of morbid curiosity. They are there to encourage forgiveness.

One episode in particular of this forgiveness is that when the cleric who was responsible for my religious education as a young man, you know, from the age of nine until the age of sixteen. And under him, I learnt so much of Islamic theology, and I'm still grateful to him to this day. So, he was known for arbitrating between, you know, families of victims and families of murders in order to try to, you know, achieve forgiveness. 

So, he had a son, and his son was in his twenties. And, in 2014, his son was murdered, you know, by, you know, basically a business associate over a dispute. I mean, it was, you know, just young people, hot-headed moment, and, you know, there was a stabbing. And, you know, his son was, you know, die—. He died. He died. So, the man was arrested. He was same age as the victim. 

So, this cleric, he rushed to the prison to see that man. And when he went into the police station, of course, everyone in the police station know who he is. And they said to her—. You know, of course, after offering their condolences, they said, you know, "Please, sheikh, do not forgive." At the beginning. They—. You know, because they knew he was coming to forgive, you know, and rushing to forgive. And, you know, "let him just rot in prison for a while, so he can know what happened." 

And he said no. You know? "I have a duty, and I know what I'm supposed to do." So, he went. He met him. He said, "Just tell me what happened." You know? 

And he told him the story. And he was fully remorseful and cannot believe what happened and what rage overtook him. 

So, the cleric said, "I forgive you. And I don't want any blood money or compensation or restitution or anything. You can go. Go. Just go home."

And, of course, there was that shock. And, you know, he said, "I just killed your son."

He said, "I spent the past twenty-five years of my life convincing families of murdered people to forgive the murderers and to spare their lives. It will be extremely hypocritical of me now to be in this situation. And I even hesitate, because I cannot hesitate for the sake of other, you know, people who I will try to spare their lives later. So, I have to spare yours now and without hesitation."

So, you know, sometimes, like, you know, I mean, when I reflect on this, I think that if only people know that forgiveness, you know, might always seem Christian, but it has a lot of room within Islamic society.

Thomas Small Well, I certainly thought that myself when you told me the story the first time of this – of this sheikh, whose – whose own son had been murdered and yet he forgave the murderer immediately. I just thought, "Oh, my goodness. He's more Christian than the Christians."

Aimen Dean Totally.

Thomas Small So, back to the rise of the Cold War. You know, it said famously that Britain conquered the world in "a fit of absence of mind." And if that's true, it's – it's really even truer of the United States, especially in the Middle East. As we've said, America's foothold in Saudi Arabia began as a private concern. Aramco was a private company run on the commercial lines only. And when the Second World War was brewing, King Abdulaziz in Riyadh adopted a neutral position. He favoured the allies, especially because Britain was still the great power in the region. 

But he did flirt with the Axis powers. So, Japan, for example, did attempt to gain a countrywide oil concession in 1939. And King Abdulaziz listened to them. And this was particularly alarming to the Americans, because Japan, you know, obviously, was a growing imperial threat on the Pacific.

This is when the US military, the US government began to regard Saudi independence as a strategic asset. During the war, the US was also neutral at first. And for that reason, the British actually found it useful to allow the US to offer Abdulaziz various forms of aid to keep him more favouring the allies.

So, there was a huge drought in 1939, for example, and the US sent an agricultural mission to help relieve the suffering there. And, again, because the war had cut off global travel routes, the Hajj had collapsed, and Abdulaziz needed money. So, Aramco, through the encouragement of the US government, stepped up and lent the Saudi government money, amounting to the country's entire budget in 1939, in 1940, and in 1941.

Then, of course, America, after Pearl Harbor, joined the war, declared war on Germany and Japan, and its focus became increasingly on the Pacific Theatre, to combat Japan. And so, the US Navy needed Saudi Arabia as a waystation and to guarantee oil supplies, which were, of course, vital to the war effort. 

And then, towards the very end of the – of the war, since aviation had really developed and would mean, in future, that air bases would be what tied the world together and allowed America's imperial power projection to take off in the way that naval bases had done before, the Dhahran airfield was negotiated with King Abdulaziz, and an air base was opened in Dhahran for the US Air Force, which would become a linchpin in the Cold War.

Aimen Dean The fence of that air base is only eight hundred metres from the home I grew up in Khobar.

Thomas Small You grew up with that air base just in your backyard.

Aimen Dean I used to hear the fighter jets flying in and out all the time.

Thomas Small So, with that base in Dhahran and with the firm foothold in Saudi Arabia, thanks to Aramco, America begins its Cold War journey. So, now, the – the—. You know, the American-Saudi partnership in the Cold War, it developed slowly, and it grew more important ideologically when the White House realised—and this is in the sixties now—that pan-Islamism grounded in the Saudi King's control of the two holy mosques was an effective counterweight to the competing ideology of Arab nationalism focused on Egypt, which was broadly speaking supported by the Soviet Union as a – as a means of eventually spreading communism into the region.

Now, Saudi pan-Islamism and anti-Arab nationalism led to the kingdom accepting ideological Islamists, mainly Muslim Brotherhood members, as refugees from other Muslim countries where they were being persecuted. These Muslim Brotherhood members entered the civil service, the security services, and the education system, and helped to spread modern Islamist ideas throughout Saudi society.

This would, in time, combine with the country's own version of Salafist Islam to create the monster we know as global jihadism. You know, al-Qaeda and other such groups that we've talked about a lot on Conflicted. But in the eighties, as we all know, this form of Islamism was harnessed by the US in its Cold War struggle against the Soviets in Afghanistan.

And as I say, this has all been covered in Conflicted before. The Saudis maintained this Cold War relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood long after the Cold War ended. And we can say that, within the Saudi political establishment, there have always been reformist voices advocating for change. And these reformist voices were on a spectrum with liberals at one end, advocating secularism for your markets, individual rights, things like that; and moderate Islamists on the other end, affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood.

This approach where the Saudi government attempted to balance Islamist and liberal voices within the political spectrum came to an end with the Arab Spring, especially in 2013. Isn't that right, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. 2013, I think, was the moment in which the Saudis—. Oh, I would say, basically, the wing within the Saudis who wanted to divorce themselves from the Muslim Brotherhood won the argument against the other wing, which believed that a coexistence with the Muslim Brotherhood was possible.

Thomas Small At the time, you remember the Muslim Brotherhood had achieved power through democratic means in Egypt. This was the result of the Arab Spring in Egypt. There were elections, and Mohamed Morsi, the – became president. He was the leader of the Muslim Brotherhood or a Muslim Brotherhood leader there.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. But here we come to the thorny issue of the coup led by the current president of Egypt, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. And the question here, the choices that were presented to the Saudi leadership, at the time it was under the rule of King Abdullah. 

Late King Abdullah convened the meeting, and that meeting was an urgent national security meeting in which, you know, his son, the head of the National Guard, Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah; his other son, the minister of Foreign Affairs, who was serving under the foreign minister, Abdulaziz bin Abdullah; Saud Faisal, the former minister was there; his brother, Turki Faisal, who was, in the past, the head of the GIP, the intelligence; Prince Muhammad bin Nayef, who was the Minister of Interior; and he's now on the run, Saad Al Jabri, you know, was there. And the question was like this: In six hours, the Egyptian military is going to depose the democratically elected president of Egypt, Mohamed Morsi.

Thomas Small So, CC had called King Abdullah to – to say, "Look, ins—. We're – we're going to do this. Do we have your buy-in?"

Aimen Dean I mean, the Egyptian military institution as a whole called up the Saudis and the Emiratis and told them, "We are going to move against President Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood. We are going to depose them completely from power."

And in order for this coup to be successful diplomatically and accepted by—.

Thomas Small Legitimised, really.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Yeah. Legitimised. Yeah. You know, in the eyes of the world. "We need your backing. You are the de facto leader or semi-leader of the Sunni Muslim world. And, therefore, we need you on our side."

Now, the reality is that the—. King Abdullah asked, you know, "Will that come back against us? I mean, because if we do that, you know, then we are going to be divorced completely from the Muslim Brotherhood. Like, you know, we cut all ties with them and we burn all the bridges."

So, those who were arguing, you know, for "No, we shouldn't back this up and we shouldn't let, you know, this happen. This will antagonise the Muslim Brotherhood. This will encourage more terrorism—."

Thomas Small Which – which – which had been an important plank in Saudi foreign policy. For example, in Yemen.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small I mean, the Saudis had very close relationships with the Islah party in Yemen, which is a largely Muslim Brotherhood party. It was one way in which Saudi Arabia kept a handle on things in Yemen. So, being open to the Muslim Brotherhood for many decades was an important part of Saudi foreign policy. But this was all changing.

Aimen Dean Yeah. And the reason is because those who actually advocated for burning the bridges said that, in the year between middle of 2012 to the middle of 2013, in which Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood were in charge of Egyptian politics and Egyptian diplomacy, it proved to be disastrous. 

Why? Because the, you know, the fact is that the Muslim Brotherhood couldn't wait to enact certain policies that encouraged, you know, forms of extremism to grow. And I'm talking about the fact that they opened the prisons wide to jihadists and extremists, you know, to roam around, you know, without any restrictions. Hamas terrorists, like, you know, were roaming in the streets of Cairo and Alexandria without any checks on them.

So, for me, for example, I mean, as, you know, as someone with a fatwa on his head, like, you know, from al-Qaeda, I used to go to Egypt before and after the uprising, you know, in 2009 and 2010. And then, you know, and then after that, in 2011, even in Ramadan of 2011, I was in Egypt. I was praying in the mosques. I was going to Alexandria. I was going to Cairo. No problem whatsoever. 

It is after Morsi took over that, you know, Muhammad al-Zawahari, you know, the brother of Ayman al-Zawahari, was roaming the streets fine. Like, you know, those returnees from Afghanistan, all of the people who the Egyptian intelligence, with the Pakistani intelligence help, rounded up from Peshawar, you know, in Pakistan, and from the camps in Afghanistan, they were in prison in Egypt. You know, their prison cells were opened.

The—. In fact, the master bomb maker of al-Qaeda, Abu Khabab, you know, who is – who is Egyptian, his own son—.

Thomas Small Who taught you how to make bombs.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. His own son, another qualified bomb maker, was let loose and was actually given a passport in order to go and fight in Syria. You know, so—. You know, suddenly, you know, the Saudis in particular were worried, as well as the Emiratis. And even the Kuwaitis, they were worried. We thought the Muslim Brotherhood rule in Egypt will be moderate and they will not, you know, appease the extremist to this level. You know, it – it was really worrying.

I know many listeners will be thinking, "Oh, but they were democratically elected." And I accept that. But as someone who was keeping an eye on all of the issues regarding security and safety in the Muslim world and the Arab world and in the Middle East, the level of extremist infiltration and jihadist congregation in Egypt between mid-2012 to 2013 was alarming for everyone, including the Saudis and myself also.

Thomas Small So, as you say, King Abdullah convened this meeting with all the top decision makers in the kingdom and said, "Look, are we going to support this coup or not?" And he – he took a straw poll of the room.

Aimen Dean The majority supported King Abdullah's inclination to support the coup. And especially princes Saud al-Faisal and Turki al-Faisal. Of course, Turki al-Faisal was worried about the number of jihadists, you know, who are free at large in Egypt, you know – you know, whether one day they will turn their gaze on Saudi Arabia again and we will have the bloody years of al-Qaeda's campaign, you know, between 2003 and 2006 in Saudi Arabia repeated.

Thomas Small Now, with all this background info, we're in a place to better understand an event that could have been ripped straight from the Cold War. And I'm talking about the notorious murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, in October 2018.

I got to admit, Aimen, in the run-up to recording this episode today, I've been having sleepless nights. The Khashoggi affair is a landmine, and the things you've got to say about it don't entirely conform to the received narrative. Now, how can I be sure that you're not whitewashing what is unquestionably a gruesome murder and a heinous crime carried out by agents of the Saudi government?

Aimen Dean I would say that, here at Conflicted, we only deal with facts, you know. You know, and the facts are facts. And it doesn't care about, you know, our narratives and our prejudices and who we favour and who we don't favour. In real-world, basically, we're dealing with facts. And, you know, and based on the facts. 

Facts alone also, sometime, basically, are orphans. And the parents of the facts are precedent and analysis. And you have to put these three together—facts, precedent, and analysis. And once you put them together, you reach the truth.

Thomas Small My problem, of course, as an ordinary guy—. I'm not – I'm not like you, Aimen. I don't have access to privileged information. So, as an ordinary guy, trying to find out the facts, I sometimes struggle. And this is one of the problems with the twenty-first century and with the sort of media environment that we have today. It's not always easy to know what the facts are.

Now, when it comes to Jamal Khashoggi, most of our listeners will know who he is. He was born in Medina in 1958 to that prominent Hijazi family that you mentioned before, with close connections to the royal family. As we said, his grandfather was King Abdulaziz's personal physician. 

Now, in the late seventies, like many, many young men of his generation, Jamal Khashoggi was inspired by the Muslim Brotherhood. In fact, he claimed that he officially joined them for a time and he adopted their perspective on world affairs. Now, this was very usual at the time. 

In the early eighties, he became a journalist and established himself as one of the Arab world's most dynamic voices, reporting on the jihad in Afghanistan especially, during which he became acquainted with leading figures in that campaign, including Osama bin Laden.

By the nineties, his journalism overlapped with intelligence work on behalf of the Saudi government as they sought to reign in and increasingly threatening in Ladin. And Khashoggi became an outspoken advocate of reform at home. A key spokesperson, in fact, for – for that wing of the reformist class, which inclined more towards a Muslim Brotherhood-influenced perspective on politics.

Now, I've – I've tried to be balanced there. I believe those are the facts about Jamal Khashoggi. If you agree, Aimen, then you can tell us about when you met Jamal Khashoggi in 2012.

Aimen Dean I ment him in 2012 in Jeddah, and I must say I was impressed by his intellect, by his knowledge, by his ability to recall events and dates with clarity. Individuals. He's know—. You know, and his knowledge radiated. You can tell basically that the man had spoke with an air of authority and understanding and background knowledge, which made him sometime come across as arrogant. But, nonetheless, if I was Jamal, I would be arrogant a little bit, too.

Thomas Small I mean, some people might consider you to be a bit arrogant in your knowledge, Aimen.

Aimen Dean Maybe I should be more humble, actually.

Thomas Small We all should be more humble, Aimen.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. There was a red flag, though, which annoyed me when he expressed a indignation that I worked for the British. Because, at the time, of course, I kept this issue secret. It was still 2012. I didn't come out, you know, publicly as a, you know, a double agent until 2015. But, of course, because of the—. You know, I didn't want to alarm him that, "Oh, I knew about bin Laden because I was a member of al-Qaeda." So, I thought, "Okay. I will soothe his fears by saying but also I was a double agent, you know." So—. 

And he said, "Really? I mean, how – how could you? How could you, you know, do that even?"

And I was, "What? Joining al-Qaeda?"

He said, "No. Joining the British."

And I was like, "Jamal." You know? So, of course, like, you know, I didn't call Jamal. I said Ustaz Jamal. I have to, you know, show some respect. So, I said to him. I said, "Jamal, I mean, I was actually passing information to the British on al-Qaeda in Arabia, you know, including people like al-Ayeri and al-Mogrin and al-Hajj. Like, I mean, who were – who were terror masterminds in Saudi Arabia. They were actually in a terrorised terrorising this country."

Thomas Small Well, they launched enormous attacks, killing many, many people.

Aimen Dean Yes. Absolutely. Foreigners and Saudis alike. So, I said—. When I said this to him, that seemed to calm him down, you know.

And he was saying, "Yeah. But I don't like the British." I mean, basically. Like, you know, I mean, you know, he – he – he called Britain [Arabic language]. Like, you know, I mean, the mother of all evils.

Thomas Small Wow.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small He had lived in London for much of the nineties where he was editing a newspaper here. That's—.

Aimen Dean Exactly. I mean, so I was wondering, "Okay. Thank you for your insight."

Thomas Small No. He – he – he, of course, knew Osama bin Laden from – from early on in the eighties. There – there, you know—. He must have had some lingering disappointment, would you say?

Aimen Dean No. No. It's a romantic idea of Osama bin Laden. I mean, the man was on and on about the manner of his burial. It's like, you know, "Which idiot who advise the Americans, you know, to just dump his body to the sea? That's not how he should have been buried. He should have been buried with honour."

And I – and I kept telling him, you know, "Ustaz Jamal, I mean, remember, please, that, you know, the Osama bin Laden you knew in the 1980s and early 1990s is not the same man that I met in the mid-1990s. I mean, by then, the complete brainwash, you know, by the Egyptian jihadists and extremists around him, you know, was complete. They really totally, totally, like, you know, changed him into the monster that he, you know, was transformed into later. So, please, you know, do not confuse the two. He changed. People change, you know, to the worst."

And he still – he still had a lingering romantic vision of Osama bin Laden. And he said, you know, "If only we engaged with him." I remember this word exactly. "If only we engaged with him, we could have saved him, you know, from those Egyptians. Brought him back to Saudi Arabia for rehabilitation."

Thomas Small Of course, he actually was sent to the Sudan in the mid-nineties to engage with Osama bin Laden and bring him back to Saudi Arabia, and he failed. At that time, he was already an intelligence asset for the Saudi government. He became an advisor to Prince Turki al-Faisal, the head of Saudi intelligence, and remained in that capacity for Prince Turki until that fateful year of 2013, when Prince Turki decided to back King Abdullah's support of the coup against the Muslim Brotherhood government in Egypt.

This is where a kind of rift opened up between Jamal Khashoggi and the royal family.

Aimen Dean Oh, totally. That's exactly the time when Jamal realised that the government is now heading towards a direction of confrontation with the Muslim Brotherhood. So, this is why when, you know, when we talk about the fact that the rift between Jamal and the royal family didn't happen when you know, King Salman and his son, MBS, came to power. No. It happened, you know, two years earlier than that.

Thomas Small We don't want to get into the weeds here of Saudi politics. So, it is fascinating. King Salman becomes king in 2015. Shortly thereafter, he makes his nephew, Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, crown prince. Muhammad bin Nayef, it is understood, had opposed the move to support the coup in Egypt. He thought that Saudi Arabia should maintain its delicate balancing act with the Muslim Brotherhood. So, he was already a little bit out of step with the way things were going in Riyadh, which is why, in 2017, Mohammad bin Salman managed to replace Muhammad bin Nayef as crown prince. 

Mohammed bin Nayef was placed under house arrest. Mohammed bin Nayef's closest adviser, Saad al-Jabri fled the country. And in the same month that that happened, Jamal Khashoggi fled the country. He moved to the United States and began writing editorials for The Washington Post.

So, there he is, writing editorials for The Washington Post, some of them critical of the Saudi government. But, nonetheless, that's what he's doing. How then, Aimen, does he end chopped into small bits in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul?

Aimen Dean Well, the Saudi intelligence were worried that since Jamal was one of their assets for almost twenty years, that he might leak sensitive information and intelligence to Saudi government opponents in the region. You know, namely Qatar and Turkey. And according to one of the intelligence officers I talked to at the time, you know, they feel that he might have done that. And there were some—.

Thomas Small Why did they think that? What – what are – what are the—? What was the evidence?

Aimen Dean Because some information were leaked, you know, to Qatari, you know, backed press, which suggests that Jamal might have been the source. Most likely, he was the source. And as a result, you know, the Saudis were extremely annoyed with him.

Countries tend to be annoyed with former intelligence operatives blabbing out to the press, you know, in a negative way. That's why I never speak ill of the British government ever. You know, you never heard that from me.

So – so – so – so, basically, the situation here is that the Saudis started to become agitated and, you know, they were trying several tactics to lure him back into the country. You know, with offers of amnesty, with offers of comeback. "We will just debrief you, and you will be fine." But he was having none of that. He know basically that, you know, as soon as he go back, he will disappear into one of the cells, you know, for a few years. Won't be released and won't see his family maybe for four or five years, at least.

So, he did what he – the sensible thing of staying in the United States. That's perfect. However, it all went horribly wrong when he fell in love with a young Turkish woman, who was an intelligence analyst and a Turkish military intelligence or called the MIT, which, you know, her own father also was a, you know, a intelligence operative in the same agency. So, he fell in love with her. He was lured to Turkey by the Turkish intelligence and with Qatari-backed money in order to set up something called the DAWN, you know, Initiative, which is a think-tank to promote democratic reform in Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf countries.

And he decided to move to Istanbul. And when he moved there, of course, he, you know, married that woman. All the press call her his fiancée, but in reality, the marriage actually was based on religious ceremony.

Thomas Small So, they went through a – a religious marriage. But – but according to the government, they weren't married.

Aimen Dean So, she was religiously his wife, but legally wasn't. And there is a reason for that. Because Jamal was already married to two ladies in, you know, Saudi Arabia. He already had two wives, you know, and he was married to them. Because, in Saudi Arabia, polygamy is allowed. But in Turkey, it wasn't. So, he needed proof of divorce from both wives, which, you know, he obtained in the end. But the idea is that he needed to go to the Saudi consulate, in Istanbul, in order to obtain these papers.

And that is where, you know, of course, the tragedy happened. First, he went for the first meeting there in order to ask for the papers. And the Saudi consulate promised, "Yeah. You can come back, and they will provide you with all the papers necessary."

However, of course, the Saudi consulate alerted the Saudi Royal Court that, you know, "Jamal was, you know, at our consulate. I mean, he was asking for the papers, you know, to marry someone."

Thomas Small And not only that. We know precisely when he's going to come back.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, as far as the Saudis were concerned, they were aware already of his plans with the Qataris and the Turks established at DAWN centre in Istanbul. They were worried about his links to a – a group of fanatics in Turkey called [Hezboll ummah], you know, which is the Ummah party run by, you know, people who are close to the Muslim Brotherhood opposition. People, you know, against the UAE, against Kuwait, against Egypt, against, you know, and, you know, linked to the Libyan Muslim Brotherhood. So, they were worried that he is getting deeper and deeper and deeper into the enemy's laps.

Thomas Small So, now, the Saudi government knows that on this and at this time, Jamal Khashoggi is going to be in our consulate in Istanbul.

Aimen Dean But they have only a week. And this is, I think, where things started to go horribly wrong as far as the Saudi plan was concerned.

Thomas Small What was this plan? What did they want to do? Did they want to kill him?

Aimen Dean Okay. This is where I really beg the listener's indulgence, because the prevailing narrative out there is that the Saudis wanted to kill him in their consulates. And this has – couldn't have been further from the truth. You know, the reality here is that, based on facts, precedent, and analysis, they wanted to kidnap him. 

Because everything about the team that was sent, you know, to retrieve him from Istanbul, to kidnap him basically, is similar to previous, at least four occasions, you know, in 2016, 2013, and 2012 and 2011. I mean, there were many occasions in the past, especially four occasions, where the Saudis will send private jets with teams in order to kidnap either a rogue member of the Saudi royal family or a certain officer or a businessman who is running away.

Thomas Small I see. So, you go – you go abroad. You send a team abroad. They sedate the – their target and then they claim that the target is ill. And then, under the guise of medical evacuation, they're – they're airlifted out back to – back to Saudi. That's the kind of—. That's the precedent.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. That's the precedent. The analysis here is that if the Saudis wanted him dead—and I've been told this now by multitude of Saudi either officers or senior officials—"If we wanted him dead, why we sent our own to be caught on cameras, you know, to do the deed on our own soil there in Istanbul," which is, you know, the Saudi consulate, you know, "having our fingerprints all over it. You know, we don't do that. Like, you know, I mean, this is very stupid. If we wanted him dead, there are, in Istanbul, especially, you know, there are Chechen mafias, Russian mafias, Albanian mafias. We could have higher than you have them. For $200,000, they would have done the job perfectly and our hands will be clean. We didn't want to kill him, you know. And that's not our, you know, MO or modus, operandi." I mean—.

Thomas Small If that's the case, Aimen, then why did they send a forensic scientist with a bone saw? I mean, that's pretty—. That's – that's pretty damning evidence, isn't it?

Aimen Dean No. Absolutely not. And the reason is because, with every other kidnappings, they would have done the same. Why? Because at any given stage, either the victim would resist and die. So, you need to dispose. Or the victim, you know, the one who's, you know, you need to kidnap, could actually resist and kill someone. Kill a member of your team. So, you need also to, you know, basically dismember that member and bring him back.

Thomas Small It's not a very happy story. That's for sure. So – so, what happened in the consulate, according to your – your analysis and what you know?

Aimen Dean The week, you know, time scale in which they were supposed to put this team together and send them, you know, was one of the reasons why the whole operation failed, as well as who was put in charge of this operation. In the past, it used to be only the GIP, you know, the General Intelligence Presidency, which basically handled such cases.

Thomas Small Which is like the CIA of Saudi Arabia.

Aimen Dean Yeah. In this case, it was mostly done under the supervision of Saud al-Qahtani.

Thomas Small Saud al-Qahtani. At that time, the crown prince MBS's top advisor.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Now, he is an amateur, as well as a sadist. And incompetent, you know. To add, you know—. To put three things together. You know, deadly combination,

Thomas Small An incompetent sadistic amateur. Whoa. that doesn't sound like you—. You're not as biggest fan.

Aimen Dean Oh, God. Like, you know, I mean, you know – you know, he is one—. He was one of the obstacles to real reform in Saudi Arabia and, you know, maybe one of the, you know, one of the silver linings basically of what happened with Jamal, you know—may God bless his soul—was the fact that, you know, Saud al-Qahtani was taken out of the picture because of, you know, this incident.

But, nonetheless, what happened is that, in the embassy—and then we have to rely on, you know, at least two Western intelligence agents who I know, who listen to the, you know, carefully selected and edited seven and a half minutes audio tape from inside the consulate.

Thomas Small Now, the Turkish government had actually bugged the consulate, and then, after the fact, released seven and a half minutes of the audio to the intelligence community. So, Jamal Khashoggi arrives. They arrest him. They placed them in front of a Skype call to Saud al-Qahtani.

Aimen Dean Well, from what I gathered from these two European intelligence analysts who listened to the tape, he was rude, condescending.

Thomas Small You mean, Saud al-Qahtani?

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small Yeah.

Aimen Dean And disrespectful towards Jamal. I mean, there was no question, you know, that with all this disrespect and all this bile, you know, being thrown at him by, Saud al-Qahtani, I mean, he realised he's going to be kidnapped, because he's aware of all the kidnappings that happened before, and that he's going to be sedated. So, he started to resist.

So, when they inserted the sedative gun in his neck, the Saudi government narrative is that it malfunctioned. Whether it malfunctioned or not, the reality is that the pumping of the sedative might have been prolonged and, you know, more sedative went into his system, because either the struggle or malfunction of the sedative gun itself. Nonetheless, that caused a cardiac arrest and he died.

And this is where the team there, you know, could have salvaged the whole issue by basically just calling a ambulance. That is the right thing to do immediately. Call an ambulance and just say he just collapsed. You know, he was, you know, out of control. "We wanted to sedate him and just he collapsed." And they could have basically avoided the complete disaster that happened afterwards.

But—. And, you know—. And who knows? Maybe the Turkish medics could have revived them on the spot. But, unfortunately, they decided to go down the dark path of coverup. And this is where the, you know, the forensic medical expert was called in order to dismember and to get rid of Jamal's body. 

And so, the dismemberment happened. And to this day, no one knows where Jamal's body is. And this is when the lies started to be concocted around what really happened.

Thomas Small Lies from the perpetrators. Lies from the Saudi government. Confusion. Mis- – mismessaging. The narrative was constantly changing. It was a terrible, terrible, terrible cock-up. And – and, you know, basically surrounded by tremendous evil and darkness.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. And the problem is because the advisors, you know, especially Saud al-Qahtani, and the perpetrators, the team, were not communicating properly with the, you know, with the government back home what really happened, and they gave conflicting narratives to the point where they started blaming each other. And everyone is saying, "Well, the fault lies with this person or that person or that person." 

So, it became a, really – an issue of the truth lost, you know, between a group of incompetent, you know, operatives who basically, you know, bogged down the whole operation. What was supposed to be a straightforward medical evacuation/kidnapping, you know, turned into a grue- – gruesome murder and an international scandal on a big scale.

The Turkish, you know, government wanted to milk this as much as possible for their own advantage, you know, including, you know, trade deals or weapon deals with the Saudis. And they were negotiating these, you know, abs- – absolutely. The problem here is that the narrative was already out and decided that it is a murder.

Thomas Small It is an assassination. That's the—. That's the problem. We—. It was a murder. But the – but the—. I think the – the narrative is it was a premeditated assassination, which is what your claim—. But you're saying it was not.

Aimen Dean No. There was no premeditation for assassination. If they wanted to assassinate him, there are many other ways they could have done it without having to do it themselves.

Thomas Small Eventually, the perpetrators of the murder in the consulate were arrested by the Saudi government and an investigation was launched. And according to the Saudi government, justice was served there. They were found guilty of murder. The Saudi government eventually admitted that a murder had occurred. They denied that the crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, knew anything about it in advance. People contest that, of course.

But no one was executed, Aimen. Its—. Reports are that people like Saud al-Qahtani are under house arrest, not even in prison. How can we say justice was served if, following this murder, no one was executed, no one is – is serving really hard time?

Aimen Dean And this is where we have to go back, you know, again to the question of who is in control of this process now? It will be the family.

Thomas Small The family of the victim.

Aimen Dean Khashoggi's family. Yes. Absolutely. So, we're talking about Salah and Abdullah. You know, his sons. You know, the question of: What will happen to the people?

Now, there were sixteen people involved, you know. Five were found not guilty of the murder, because, you know, they were away, you know. And the five were sentenced to death, and six people were sentenced to prison, you know, terms. Now, even the five who were supposed to be executed, they are still serving prison sentences. 

Now, the question here is that it was put before the family that they were—. "We have these five who we believe that caused the struggle to go out of hand. They are the ones who agitated him more than anything else. They are the ones who are responsible for – responsible for not calling, you know, for help afterwards and then decided to let him just die on the floor and then be dismembered. And these five will face the death penalty."

So, a court sentenced them to death, and their fate then was presented to the sons of Jamal Khashoggi, Salah and Abdullah. They were presented with the facts that these people are sentenced to death. "What is your inner desire? Do you want to forgive or do you want to, you know, see justice, you know, served and these people executed?"

Now, you know, to show something, is that the family, you know, decided not to forgive for five months. For five months, they held their ground, all the way until May of 2020. And then, they said that the reason why they wanted to, you know, for, you know, to wait for five months is because May 2020 coincided with the month of Ramadan, in the holy month of Ramadan, and that they wanted to announce the forgiveness during the month of Ramadan in order for this act of forgiveness to be amplified in the eyes of God.

But also, at the same time, to my knowledge and in good authority, that the considerable compensation, you know, and restitution by the Saudi government was paid to the family, whether in a very large lump sum in terms millions of US dollars, as well as, you know, housing and income for life. So, it was one of the largest—still yet undisclosed, but largest—settlement in offered by the Saudi government.

Thomas Small In Western terms, we would not think that justice was served in the Jamal Khashoggi case. But you are saying that, in Saudi terms, justice was served?

Aimen Dean Well, and this is where the clash of civilisations, you know, is going to happen now. Because in the Western mindsets, you know, any Western listener listening to me right now, they will think, "This is a farce." You know? "These people should be sent to jail for the rest of their lives and, you know, MBS himself should answer for this."

And you know, you – you will have all of these things being said. Yes. That's fine. I respect that. I understand that.

From the Saudi perspective, it's no different than any other case. I mean, you know, it's—. You know, that—. If the family said, "Okay. We forgive. We forgive." The Saudi mindset is that, one, the state admitted guilt. Number one. Number two, the children were summoned to the royal court, and they got an apology from the king and his son, MBS. They apologised and they explained that "this was not our intention." 

All the facts, you know, basically that's presented to the Khashoggi family—and they were always given the transcripts of the interrogations—you know, point to the fact that this was not supposed to be a assassination. It was supposed to be a kidnapping. But, unfortunately, it went horribly wrong.

And then, the blood money. The blood money was paid. Once the blood money is paid and accepted by the family, then, by Saudi standard, not mine, from the Saudi point of view, justice has been served.

Thomas Small Well, there you have it, Aimen's take on one of the most shocking and notorious stories of our time. If anything, it shows us once again that they do things differently in the Middle East, but also how the geopolitical and ideological fault lines of the Cold War continue to resonate today, perhaps more than ever given what we're seeing as of this recording along the Russian-Ukrainian border.

With that in mind, next time on Conflicted, we're going to pivot away from the United States and towards its Cold War superpower competitor, the Soviet Union. What were the Soviets' designs on the Middle East? To what extent was the Cold War just a continuation of Britain's competition with Tsarist Russia in the great game? And how does all of that help us to understand what's going on today as Vladimir Putin and Joe Biden play an increasingly tense game of chicken over the geopolitical direction that Kyiv face? East or west?

A quick, friendly reminder that if you don't do so already, you can follow us on Twitter and Facebook @MHConflicted. And while we're on the subject of Facebook, a reminder that we have a great community of fans over there, all discussing and arguing over the topics covered here on Conflicted. And we'd love you to step into the fray. You can join us there by searching "Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group."

And, finally, if you're a fan of ad-free podcasts and bonus content, then you can subscribe on your preferred platform to hear episodes entirely free of adverts and get that sweet bonus content in which, dear listener, we will be answering your questions. All this for just 99p on Apple Podcasts.

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And over on Spotify, find Conflicted Extra to also listen ad-free and get access to future bonus episodes for just 99p a month.

There you have it. We can't wait for you to join us for another episode of Conflicted in two weeks' time.

Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Rowan Bishop. Sandra Ferrari is our executive producer. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

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Conflicted S3 E2 - Clash of Civilisations

CONFLICTED
S03E02

Thomas Small Hello, faithful listeners. And, indeed, to all you, new listeners, welcome to Conflicted. You're joining us for episode two of season three. And gathering momentum for the new series with me as always is the great and powerful Aimen Dean. 

Hi, Aimen. How are you? 

Aimen Dean What a wonderful introduction. Please do it every episode. Please. 

Thomas Small So, you see, listeners, Aimen is still alive. A lot of you in the Facebook page and on Twitter are always wondering. "Aimen, are you still alive? Are you still alive?" I'm glad to report he's still alive. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. Rumours of my demise has been greatly exaggerated. 

Thomas Small In fact, I'm glad to report that I'm still alive, because I am convalescing from COVID-19. It finally struck me down. I was, you know—. I thought I was going to get through this pandemic without being – without being hit. But I got it. I got the – I got the bug. 

Aimen Dean And who advised you to get some home therapy and home, you know, medicine?

Thomas Small It's true. I immediately called you, Aimen. And you were very kind. You gave me your wife's sort of—. Well, I'm not going to say peasant remedies, but, you know, natural remedies informed from long experience, no doubt.

[THEME IN]

Aimen Dean Exactly. 

Thomas Small Okay, Aimen. What do you say? Shall we dive right in? 

Aimen Dean Absolutely.

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Aimen Dean Last time, we told the story of how incompetence and corruption within the American administration led to its shambolic and ignominious withdrawal from Afghanistan after twenty years of occupation. A symbol, really, of what we argued in series two of this podcast, that America's post-Cold War experiment in creating a new world order has failed. After the downfall of the Soviet Union, it looked to many observers that America was the last man standing and that its model of global governance rooted in liberalism, capitalism, and "rules-based internationalism," backed up by American military and financial power, would dominate the world forever. 

As we stated, this idea was made most famous by Francis Fukuyama in his book The End of History and the Last Man. Fukuyama's book appeared in 1992. Four years later, a repost of sorts was published by Samuel Huntington. It was called The Clash of Civilisations and the Remaking of World Order, which we also discussed briefly in series two. Huntington said that the ideological conflicts that underpinned the two world wars and the Cold War may have gone, but their departure wasn't necessarily going to lead to the optimistic scenario imagined by Fukuyama. Rather, the period of Western super-domination was coming to a close as the rest of the world fitfully caught up with the West. The West won the world, Huntington wrote, not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion, but rather by its superiority in applying organised violence. Westerners often forget this fact. Non-Westerners never do. Now, as technological parody drew closer, geopolitics would return to how things had always been since time immemorial, a world of distinct civilisational zones between which would be encounter, competition, and conflict. The Cold War division of humanity is over, he wrote. The more fundamental divisions of humanity in terms of ethnicity, religions, and civilisations remain and spawn new conflicts. Human history is the history of civilisations. 

Now, to prepare for this episode, I reread The Clash of Civilisations, and I can't pretend I liked it all that much. Huntington's thesis is so broad that it can pretty much accommodate anything, reducing its analytical power. Plus, there's the thorny issue of what civilisation really means. It's such an elastic concept that it can be stretched to include pretty much whatever he wants. As he basically admits, civilisations, he writes, have no clear-cut boundaries and no precise beginnings and endings. People can and do redefine their identities. And as a result, the composition and shapes of civilisations change over time. Civilisations are nonetheless meaningful entities. And while the lines between them are seldom sharp, they are real. 

Right. That's it from Huntington. Series three is not going to be about his book. As I said, I don't really rate it. But we have named this series Clash of Civilisations. And we are going to use that idea as our launching point to explore—. Well, to explore a lot. On the surface, having just narrated the end of America's "empire" in the Middle East, if it is indeed the end. 

In this series, we're going to tell the story of that empire from the beginning, which basically means we're going to tell the story of the Cold War as it played out in the Middle East. America and the Soviet, both manoeuvring for dominance in the region, both trying to stamp their model of modernity upon it, both inheriting imperial structures from the previous period of European colonialism, both giving rise to resistance movements of various stripes. All of this is fertile ground for asking the question: Doesn't essential clash of civilisations underlie the Middle East's experience of modernisation? 

But in a way, that's just on the surface. Underneath, we'll be feeling our way to even deeper, more universal, and more ancient questions, questions of meaning and religion and the wider arc of history as it plays out on the stage, really, of the human imagination where matter and spirit, concept and reality, time and eternity meet, mingle, and clash. 

Big stuff. Right. That's my opening spiel. Aimen, how does that all sound to you? You up for it? 

Aimen Dean Well, between you and me, Thomas, I know I was listening to you and I was wondering some university there, you know, is missing its professor. 

Thomas Small Oh, that's very kind of you. Right. So, let's – let's start by discussing what civilisation means. You know, it's—. It is a very difficult concept. In the West, we tend to – we tend to contrast civilisation with, I don't know, barbarism. What do you call it? The uncivilised world. It's a very difficult concept to grasp, especially since, in the Western world, you know, we have been, in our own minds at least, "civilised" for a very long time. But what interests me, Aimen, is that you actually come from a world where the dichotomy between the civilised and, let us say, the uncivilised is still quite fresh. 

I mean, in Arabic, the word for civilisation, al-hadara, is contrasted with its opposite, al-badawa. Explain to us the difference between these two words. I mean, al-hadara really means "the settled," those people who don't move around. Al-badawa, from which the word "Bedouin" comes, are the nomads. But I think, as – as recently as fifty, sixty, seventy years ago, in Arabia, the distinction between those who lived a settled, civilised life and those who did not was really apparent. Is that right?

Aimen Dean Yeah. Because—. Let me put it this way. I mean, for the – for the Arabs, in particular, definition, you know, extend into two spheres here. You know, the physical sphere, you know, and the non-physical sphere, you know. You know? So, for the physical sphere, when you say to some – about someone, hadari, you know, as, you know, someone who is civilised, you know, actually, the word doesn't translate into "civilised" in English. You know, it – it actually translate into "urbanised." So, they say someone who's urbanised and someone who is nomad. Because why? The Arabs, you know, they always stressed that hadara or, you know – you know, in other words, you know, "civility," sometime can be main- – observed and maintained by nomads more than, sometimes, the urbanised. 

Thomas Small This is very interesting. Because, throughout – throughout human history, there has been a sort of conflict, if you like, or tension between these concepts of the civilised and the uncivilised. On the one hand, people from the safety of their stonewalls and cities looking out at the wilderness, seeing nomadic peoples. On the one hand, they feared them. They – they held them in contempt. They saw that their manners and morals were less refined. But on the other hand, they valorised them. They – they thought that they – they had a kind of unsullied nobility of soul. So, there was a strange – a strange tension there. 

Aimen Dean For me, if I'm looking for the perfect Arabic definition of what civilisation means, whether it is for the urbanised or the nomad, it is summarised by the Egyptian poet Ahmed Shawqi, who is nicknamed the Prince of all Arab poets. Amir al-shu'ara. He said, "[speaks in Arabic]." That nation's foundations are manners. So, civilisation equal manners. Therefore, it's your manners that determines how civilised you are regardless of your urbanised or nomadic status, I think. 

Thomas Small That's interesting. However, I distinctly the first time that I visited Riyadh. Your—. You know, the capital of Saudi Arabia. And I was driving around with my colleague, who was a Saudi middle-class gentlemen who'd grown up in Riyadh. And he – he—. We – we – we stopped at a police checkpoint, and he had to roll down his window. And the policemen—. And he had a – had – had a bit of banter about them. And we drove off. And as we drove off, he chuckled to himself and he said, " Bedu," as if – as if the person – the person that he had just – that he'd just had this exchange with was sort of cute, but – but clearly rough around the edges. So, that was – that was the idea. That his … 

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small … his manners, if you like, weren't very refined. But he was sweet. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. 

Thomas Small He treated him a bit like a child. I have to admit.

Aimen Dean Yes. Unfortunately, I am as guilty, you know. When – whenever I visit Saudi Arabia, you know, I always, you know, distinguish immediately between those who are urbanised and those who are, you know, coming from a Bedouin background. They are no longer nomad, you know. But it's – it's still, you know—. This, you know, lack of, you know, certain refinement is still there. And yet those who lack the certain refinement, I mean, they aren't going to tell you, "Oh, sir. How are you?" Whatever. All of that. Like, you know, he will say, "Papers, please." You know? "Show me your this. Show me that." Whatever. But, nonetheless, if he feels that you are in distress and if he feels that you are in need, he will be quicker, much quicker, than the urbanised person to offer you help, support and to see this [unintelligible]. His entire manner changed completely, you know. So, there is something that, you know—. Basically, like, you know, there is a pluses—. You know, there are cons and pros, like, you know, for each. 

Thomas Small Yeah. There – there you go. There's that tension that I mentioned. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. 

Thomas Small The tension between viewing the – the nomad, viewing the person beyond civilisation as noble of spirit and soul while, at the same time, viewing them as – as – as, you know, as lesser in some way. 

Aimen Dean Rough around the edges.

Thomas Small Rough around the edges in – in fact. Now, the reason I bring all of this up is that, as we begin to try to reach a wider understanding of Middle Eastern history and the way it informs the present, I think it's very important for people to realise that within the Middle East itself, there are different, if you like, civilisational strata or layers. And though we tend to look at maps today and we, you know—. In general, as human beings, now, we look down upon the world and we see a flat space. And that—. Those flat spaces are determined by borders, and we think of governments as controlling all of the land within the borders. 

In historical terms, that's not really what happened at all. And that within these spaces, there were cities and there were villages and there were, at the same time, these nomadic peoples. And they were all mingling together. And, often, that distinction between a – a city life and a village life, an agricultural life, and a nomadic, a pastoral life and a merchant life, that distinction was often not just divided civilisational-ly, but ethnically, religiously, linguistically. And all of these different peoples, all of these different modes of life were mingling and together to create a very rich but often conflictual tapestry. Does – does that make sense, Aimen? 

Aimen Dean Of course. Because even in Saudi Arabia, you know, that, you know—. And my Saudi listeners will, you know, I think, will chuckle when they listen to this. The distinction here is between not only two classes, you know, which is the – those who are of Bedouin, you know, in other word, nomadic, you know, roots, and those who are of, you know, urbanised roots, hadari. But, also, there is the third class, which is, you know, the qarawi, in, you know, in Fusha. You know, in classical Arabic. But also [speaks in Arabic], you know, in the slang. 

Thomas Small [speaks in Arabic].

Aimen Dean Yeah. [speaks in Arabic]. So, whenever, you know—. You know, actually, sometime, if, you know—. A Bedouin is no longer an insult Actually, [speaks in Arabic] is the insult, you know – you know, which means a villager, you know. So, if you really want to insult someone in Saudi Arabia, call him a villager. So, you know. 

Thomas Small The farmers get no love. The farmers get no love in any civilisation.

Aimen Dean No. Okay. Because, you know, the old kings of time, and to this day, you know, among the royal families of Arabia, what is their favourite sports, you know? Is it, you know, farming? No. Of course, not. It's hunting. 

Thomas Small Yeah. 

Aimen Dean You know, with falcons and with, you know, hounds and all of that. So, you know. Because hunting is the noble sport of kings, you know. But farming. Come on. This is for the peasants. And so, you know—. So, actually in the hierarchy, you know, of Arab, you know, mentality, first, there's the urbanised, educated, ruling class. And then, you have the Bedouins or, you know, no longer nomadic, but they are descendants of Bedouins. They form most of the security and military apparatus. You know, they are the warriors protecting the, you know, kingdoms. And then, below them, peasants, so. 

Thomas Small Well, this distinction between a kind of noble pastoral, nomad people and a slightly corrupt backwards agricultural people, this is as old as certainly the Bible. I mean, the story of Cain and Abel … 

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small … is one hundred percent about this idea. You know, Cain is the farmer. Cain is somehow corrupt and wicked. Cain murders unjustly the noble – his noble brother, Abel, the pastoralist, the shepherd. And out—. And – and from – from Cain's lineage, it says, came all forms of wickedness as well as technology and cities and civilisation. So, from the very beginning of the human sort of spirit trying to work out these things, as – as – as at least it's in the Bible, we see this tension and this conflict from the very beginning. 

Now, as Huntington wrote, defining civilisation is not easy. But it does mean something. And whatever reality that that word is gesturing towards, that reality plays a very real if very complex and subtle role in history and in current events. 

Returning now, as we have so many times to the years following the end of the Cold War, in 1991, we can see this already playing out. In fact, in his book, Huntington provides a long list of examples from 1993 of how his civilisational paradigm was already manifesting itself in the post-Cold War world. We've discussed several already on Conflicted the wars that followed the breakup of Yugoslavia, which you participated in, Aimen. 

Aimen Dean Yeah. In Bosnia.

Thomas Small The expansion of NATO into former Warsaw Pact countries, antagonising Russia, fighting in central Asia between a weakened Russia and Mujahideen troops. But one sticks out, both because it involves a conflict we haven't discussed and because it illustrates how ancient and how lasting the civilisational fault lines are. This conflict is the one between two small countries in the Caucasus region, Armenia and Azerbaijan. 

Now, dear listener, you may remember that, starting in late September 2020 and lasting for about six weeks, a war broke out between Armenia and Azerbaijan over a disputed territory called Nagorno-Karabakh. This flare up was the sequel to the conflict in 1993, which Huntington referred to a clear sign that some places at least are still experiencing the fallout of the Cold War. But before we get into the details of the conflict, Aimen, in general, why have Armenians and Azeris been in conflict? 

Aimen Dean Well, we need several hours, but in order to condense this—. 

Thomas Small Well, it's really about territory. The fight is really about the territory. 

Aimen Dean It's always about territory. But it's more than that. Don't forget. Like, you know, I mean, yes, the underlying, you know, reason is territory. But there is a lot. A reservoir of deep-seated, you know, feelings, grievances, insecurities. I mean, we could talk about it forever. Historical grievances that could last, you know, a thousand years. But the reality is, as someone who'd been to the Caucasus, and I participated in the conflicts of the Caucasus, you know, within Chechnya, Dagestan, and Azerbaijan. 

Thomas Small Yes. I mean, you went to Baku, which is the capital Azerbaijan in 1996. Is that right? 

Aimen Dean Yes. Indeed.

Thomas Small And – and the reason you were there was to – to help smuggle—. Was it peanut butter? To – to [unintelligible]. Mayonnaise to Mujahadeen in Chech- – in Chechnya.

Aimen Dean No. Not peanut butter. Mayonnaise. Yeah. Well, among other things, of course. 

So, we have to understand that with such deep, you know, deeply held grievances that the Armenians feel about the fact that the, you know, history was not kind to them for almost fifteen hundred years, and on top of the fact that their ancestral homeland seems to have been eaten, you know, piece by piece by continuous Turkic tribal migration starting in the, you know, tenth and eleventh century, you know, with Turkish tribes coming from the steps of central Asia, they were pushed and pushed and pushed, you know, to the Caucasus regions. And that's it. I mean, basically, it's just long list of, you know, grievances against Turkic people for almost a thousand years. 

Thomas Small It's important for the listener to understand that the Armenians are among the oldest peoples in the world. In the Bronze Age, there was a network, a patchwork of Indo-European kingdoms that stretched across Anatolia and into the Caucasus. Anatolia and the Caucasus really what is the modern state of Turkey. And those Indo-European peoples—. You may have heard of the Hittites, for example. They're in the Bible. So, they're – they're sometimes well-known. They're sort of a famous people. But they were just one of many Indo-European peoples, which, during what's called the Bronze Age collapse beginning in 1200 BC, sort of disappeared, certainly seemed to leave the historical record. They amalgamated. They were conquered. 

But out of that strange several centuries of – of – of conflict and – and civilisational dissipation, the Armenians emerged. And it seems that they were focused around, you know, eastern Anatolia and into where they now live, around Lake Van in the Eastern part of – of the Anatolian plateau. So, we're talking a very old, well-established people. They were the first kingdom to officially adopt Christianity before any other kingdom. Before any other nation became Christian, the Armenians did. So, they're very ancient and they're very proud of that antiquity. 

The Azeris are descendants of—well, from the perspective of – of – of Armenians—new Turkic arrivals, the Oghuz Turks who entered what the ancients called Albania, which is where Azerbaijan is today, beginning in the tenth century. Now, there's – there's echoes here of that civilised/uncivilised or – or hadara/badawi split. Of the Christian/Muslim split even. And – and these things still matter. So, the Armenians who are a "civilised," long-established Christian country saw nomadic, pastoral Turkic warrior peoples move into the valleys of their – of the zone that they had been living in, and it created tremendous conflict. 

The Turkish migrations resulted in the establishment of many new states long established, which, you know, echo to the present as well. And the Armenians felt like they were a people trapped between imperial zones. If you look at the map of ancient Armenia, they're like the Poles of the Middle East. They're sort of like Poland there, always shifting back and forth.

Aimen Dean Yeah. 

Thomas Small Victims of various imperial power struggles. They were stuck there between Safavid Iran and the Ottomans. The Russians to the north got involved. And, obviously, to the south, various Arab peoples as well. So, they're always in the middle. And that's when we reached the twentieth century and the sad story of the Armenian genocide. 

So, that brings us up to the – the twentieth century, really, from the Armenian point of view. Now, Aimen, I mean, you spent some time in Baku, in – in Azerbaijan. What is the Azeri point of view about their own history and – and – and how it relates to coexisting or not with Armenians? 

Aimen Dean I remember when I met several Azeris. And some of them actually were Shia, some of them were Sunni. As you know, the Azeris are almost seventy percent Shia Muslims, but they are not the same as the Iranians in terms of their belief in the supremacy of the supreme leader of Iran. So – so, basically, when you talk to them and they hear that I was in Bosnia, fighting, you know, against the Serbs and, you know, and the genocide that happened there in Bosnia, they say, "And what about the genocide that happened and the ethnic cleansing that happened against, you know, your Azeri brothers and sisters in the Nagorno-Karabakh region? You know, we were expelled from our homes there. I mean, our, you know, Azeri brothers and sisters were slaughtered, killed, and driven. You know, the Armenians are the Serbs of the Caucasus." 

The Azeris share with Armenians, you know, the ideals that their homeland actually is supposed to be much bigger, you know, because of the spread of their ethnic group across other countries, including Iran, where they have, you know, a massive amount of Azeris living there. But they believe themselves to be also the descendants of great empires and great traditions of the Mongols, of the Tartars. In fact, the one of the biggest mosques in Baku is called the Tartars' mosque in order to stress that link between them and the ancient civilisations of the steps. 

Thomas Small The first Oghuz Turks who came into that part of the world, they established a great empire known as the Seljuk Empire, the first really great Turkic Islamic empire. And they feel that they are the heirs of that empire and many empires that followed. 

Aimen Dean Absolutely. Not only that. They say that they have contributed considerably to Islamic civilisation. They were the barrier between, you know, the Russian southward conquest of the Caucasus that – that, you know, that they—. That without them, you know, that the Cauca- – the – the entire, you know, Turco-Persian Muslim world would have been subjugated by the Russians. So, for them, they feel that they were the guardians, you know, of the, you know, northern gates of Islam. And – and they say it with zeal. 

In fact, the city that lies between Azerbaijan and the Soviet – Soviet region of Dagestan—and now it's the Russian region of Dagestan—is called Derbent, you know, which, in Persian, means "the gate of gates." You know, this is where, you know, we protected, you know, the – the Turkish-Persian Muslim world from subjugation by the Russians. 

Thomas Small So, there you have it. Two peoples, in their own minds both very ancient, both heirs of great civilisations, clashing. Now, let's return to the beginning of the twentieth century when the story takes a very tragic turn. So, at that time, two peoples who have – who were subject to the Ottomans revolted, encouraged by Western powers: the Arabs—and, of course, we'll cover that in another episode—and the Armenians. At the same time, the Bolshevik Revolution actually conquered much of what was Armenia. And the Armenians had to fight and resist them. 

So, during this period, the Armenians are developing a very strong sense of nationhood and a very strong sense of their independence. This resulted in Turkish reprisals against Armenia, and at least hundreds of thousands of people were killed. Millions were displaced. For that reason, you – you find Armenians everywhere today, even in Los Angeles. I'm looking at you, Kim Kardashian. And this genocide is a very important component of Armenian self-identity today and informs their perspective towards their neighbours, their Turkic neighbours, really, on either side of the border. Both Turks and Azeris. Would you say that's true, Aimen? 

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. Because, for them, as far as the Armenians are concerned, and when you speak to Armenians, for them, the Azeris are the more aggressive and trespassing version of Turkish people. 

Thomas Small Is that because they just live much closer to them?

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. I mean, at the end of the day, like, you know, in order to justify taking back lands or, you know, basically conquering territories or fighting against them, you have to, you know, really—. I won't say dehumanise, but you have to demonise, you know, your enemy and to say, "Whoa, the Turks did genocide against us. But these Azeris are, you know, the worse versions of the Turks." 

They don't distinguish actually between the Azeris and the Turks. They consider the Azeris an extension, and a more aggressive extension, of the Turks. And between you and me, you know, the Azeris, you know, and the Turks share almost the same language. When they speak to each other, it's almost—. You know, a slight difference in dial- – in – in dialect. But that's it. Like, you know, I mean, the Armenians view them as more aggressive Turks. Trespassing—. They were trespassing. I've heard that many times coming out of Armenian, you know, people when they talk to me. 

Thomas Small In the end, both Armenia and Azerbaijan became Soviet republics. Nagorno-Karabakh, this disputed region that has caused the war, lies between Armenia and Azerbaijan, really. Although it's a very mountainous area with highlands and midlands and higher lands and low lands, 'cause it's so mountainous, and that's that more sort of, let's say, vertical stratification informs the ethnic diversity of the area. 

But that region, Nagorno-Karabakh, which was within Azerbaijan, was largely self-governing, because it had a majority Armenian population. Now, this obviously is a recipe for conflict. And once the Soviet Union collapsed, war broke out in 1992. One conflict after another, during which, largely—I think you would agree with this, Aimen—the Armenians beat the shit out of the Azeris and they were able to occupy Nagorno-Karabakh, and though no country recognised that occupation as legal, effectively made it a part of Armenia. 

Aimen Dean Yes. The conflict of 1993, 1994. So, the Armenian army – military really, really dominating the battlefield. And not only they were able to beat the Azerbaijani military, which was really pathetic at the time, they, you know, however, did not just be satisfied with the annexation and the occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh, which was three-quarters Armenian population. 

The problem is not here. The problem is that Nagorno-Karabakh itself is an enclave, you know, inside Azerbaijan. And, actually, the area surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh that straddled the border between Armenia proper and Nagorno-Karabakh was almost eighty-five percent ethnic Azeris. So, the idea is you have to expel—. From the point of view of the Armenians, you have to expel almost seven hundred thousand Azeris from these – from their homes in order to make way for the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave to have a continuous, contiguous land connection with Armenia proper. 

Thomas Small And were they successful in – in clearing out all the Azerbaijanis?

Aimen Dean Seven hundred thousand plus, you know, ended up as internal refugees in Azerbaijan. Now, I can't confirm that myself, because when I used to work for al-Haramain charity—It was a Saudi charity set up in Azerbaijan to help with internally displaced Azerbaijanis, as well as Chechen refugees coming from the Chechen war pouring into Azerbaijan—the numbers stack up. You know, they do actually. You know, the numbers stack up. The numbers are credible. 

So, seven hundred thousand people were kicked out of their homes. And that's why the Azeris used to tell me, you know, "Well, you know, what about our, you know – you know, genocide and ethnic cleansing that took place here? You know? Why—? You know, you went to make jihad in Bosnia. Why don't you come and make it jihad here in Azerbaijan?" And, you know—. And I was like, "Yeah. I mean, really, do you view it as a Muslim against Christian?" And they said, "Yes." You know? So, there—. You know, they – they mixed everything. They, you know—. Just like the Serbs, you know, cloaked their ultra-nationalism in Bosnia with the symbology – symbology of Christianity, you know, the same thing. The Azeris felt that this is, you know, yet another manifestation, you know, of, you know, a Christian crusade against them, you know, in the Caucasus. 

Thomas Small So, back then, in the nineties, you said that Armenian well-equipped and well-trained, and, therefore, one. Though there were more Azeris than Armenians, but the Armenians were better equipped. The Azeris, their military wasn't much. But what about the Turks? So, why – why didn't the Turks back then come to the Azeris' aid? I mean, here you have Armenia invading Azerbaijan. You have Armenia ethnically cleansing huge areas of – of Azerbaijan. Seven hundred thousand Azeris had to flee. Why didn't the Turks intervene?

Aimen Dean Turkey, at the time, did not intervene for two compelling reasons. First of all, the Turkish economy wasn't as great as it is right now. I mean, the Turkish GDP at the time, in, you know, in the early 1990s did not exceed a hundred billion dollars, you know, compared to about, you know, nearly nine hundred billion dollars right now. That's the first thing that we need to understand. 

The second reason is that, you know, Turkish politics was so complicated at the time. Because of the proportional representation in the elections, you end up with governments comprising of six parties in a coalition. So, six small parties come together and make a coalition. And it doesn't last more than seven, eight months at a time. And they keep changing prime ministers more than they changed their socks. 

Thomas Small This prevented the Turkish government from really executing its will. It was very divided. Internally divided and weak.

Aimen Dean Exactly. The third reason, which is very important, they were fighting a war against the PKK. So, a Kurdish Marxist, you know, guerrilla, you know, group, you know, an insurgent group, basically that were fighting a bloody war, you know, in Anatolia against the Turkish military.

Thomas Small It's funny that you bring up the Kurds, because the Kurds are yet another very ancient group who lived in this part of the world, who are contesting their – their – their statehood and their nationality against competitors. So, my goodness, it's a messy – a messy part of the world. 

So, the Turks were—. They were poor, they were politically weak, and they were fighting a war with the Kurds. So, they couldn't intervene. Now, at the time, the president of Azerbaijan was a man called Heider Aliyev. Now, his son, Ilham, later became president. And that's when the game began to change. What did Ilham do, Aimen?

Aimen Dean Well, Ilham Aliyev is a man living in the future rather than living in the past. You know, this is the best I could describe him. I mean, he basically realised that there is no point crying over lost territories. The question is: How do I take them back? 

So, he started, you know, a plan based on three simple, you know, steps. First, grow the wealth of the nation through oil and gas exports. That's the first thing. You know, make Azerbaijan wealthy. 

The second, make Azerbaijan a diplomatically strong country by alliances with Russia, with Turkey, with Israel, and with Pakistan. So, you know, this is how it all started. And then, the third thing, make Azerbaijan militarily advanced, you know, with technology and smart planning. 

Three steps. That's it. While, you know, the Armenians were savouring their victory of the mid-1990s and they were very complacent, you know, next door, Ilhan Aliyev put these three, you know, plans into action and executed each one flawlessly.

Thomas Small The – the – the Arab Spring informed Aliyev's geopolitical perspective as well, didn't it? I mean, he – he looked around at 2010, 2011, 2012, and all the instability. This encouraged him to strengthen his diplomatic ties both to Turkey and, surprisingly, to Israel. 

Aimen Dean Well, he looks at the fact that he is sandwiched there between the Caspian Sea, Russia, mighty Russia, Turkey, and Iran. He doesn't trust Iran. He—. Even though, you know, basically, that he comes from a Shia family, but he doesn't feel that the Iranians are trustworthy allies. So, he looks across the border into Turkey. He realised that Turkey is a – the closest ally from a cultural and linguistic point of view. He looks at Russia and thinks, "A good partner, a good—.Someone who I can keep happy. But how do I keep the Russians happy? How do I keep the Iranians nervous? How do I keep the Americans, you know, from lecturing me about human rights, you know, and democracy, you know, and all of that?" Which basically, like, you know, I mean, Azerbaijan [unintelligible], like, you know, doesn't have a very good record neither, you know. 

So, how do I keep them happy? Well, Israel. Israel is a great lobbying power in DC, but also Israel has something that I need, because Israel also know that I have something that they desperately need. 

Thomas Small I can imagine what Israel gets from Azerbaijan: access to the Caspian Sea, and the ability to practice espionage against Iran. Now, what is it, though, that – that Israel can offer Azerbaijan? 

Aimen Dean Israel is one of those countries that proven that, you know, with minimum manpower and maximum technological advancement, you can win a war against any conventional army, you know, as long as the numbers are manageable. 

Thomas Small So, it's Israel's military technology, its military experience that was useful to the Azeris. 

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. I mean, no question about it. It was—. It's—. It's billions and billions of dollars', you know, worth of weapons and technology that were, you know, basically sold by the Israelis, you know, to the Azeris. So, that is one. But the other aspect that the Israelis can offer the – the – President Ilhan Aliyev is the lobbying power they have in DC in order to just keep the Americans away from criticising or over-criticising the regime of Ilhan Aliyev's, you know, records on human rights and democracy.

Thomas Small Which was useful to Aliyev, because Armenia has a – a pretty sophisticated lobbying effort in Washington, as well. There are so many Armenians living in the United States. American citizens now, but of Armenian background. They're often very rich. Armenians abroad have succeeded in becoming a very wealthy, merchant people. 

Now, the – the funny thing is, though, that Armenia itself, the Armenian country, the country of Armenia, isn't very rich. Why isn't it? It should be rich. If – if Azerbaijan can become rich, why can't Armenia become rich? 

Aimen Dean Unlike Azerbaijan, Armenia doesn't have any oil or gas or natural resources, and it's landlocked. I mean, it doesn't have access to the sea. So, two, you know, recipes for economic disaster. You know, and at the same time, the brain drain. Because the migration, it really, you know, drained the, you know, Armenian economy of important resource, which is the manpower, you know, and the brain power that they need in order to develop. But also surrounded by hostility. You know, you can be landlocked, you know, and prosperous. I mean, look at Switzerland. 

Thomas Small Exactly. Well, Switzerland is famous for its banking sector, which I would have thought, given Armenians abroad, especially in – in Lebanon, for example, where, you know, Armenians are famous for their banking acumen, I would have thought that Armenia might be a financial centre for – for that part of the world.

Aimen Dean Again, we come back to the fact that Armenia is not lucky with its neighbours. You know, there is Iran. What do you do with Iran? They're already under sanctions. There is Turkey, which is hostile to you and can, you know, blockade you. There is Azerbaijan, which is at war with you. And then, there is Georgia to the north. And Georgia is actually the country that became the banker, you know, of the Caucasus. You know, they are the ones who actually decided to become the centre for banking operations in the Caucasus. And also because the Armenians minions themselves, like, you know, chose to become a little bit of an isolationist nation, you know, in – in their own way, you know, of thinking, of conducting diplomacy. You know, they seem to be an insular, you know. They adopted that insular.

Thomas Small Fortress Armenia.

Aimen Dean Yes. Exactly. Plus, the – the bureaucracy and the regulations and the laws, you know, which are complicated. The ease of business index of Armenia is not exactly there on the top, you know. Not even in the middle. So, all of this meant that Armenia was destined to be poor. 

Thomas Small Now, in 1995, Armenia, as we said, conquers Nagorno-Karabakh, begins its ethnic cleansing campaign of the surrounding areas. And from that point onwards, there's been an on-again, off-again attempt to internationally broker a settlement between the two sides. Now, this resulted in 2007 in what are called the Madrid Principles, point-by-point principles outlining how maybe peace could be brought to bear on the situation. 

It's funny when you read the Madrid Principles now point-by-point, it's really almost like a blueprint of America's New World Order. This idea that, through goodwill, through economic incentives, through international peacekeeping operations, that somehow conflicts could just be neutralised. But it doesn't really work out that way. It certainly didn't work out that way in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. 

At the same time, there's on-again, off-again breaches of the ceasefire. Fighting breaks out again and again and again. Eventually, Nagorno-Karabakh declares itself independent and establishes the Republic of Artsakh. But in effect, Armenia had annexed it and the surrounding areas. 

So, finally, war broke out. And in September and October of 2020, Azerbaijan the Armenians. Why were they able to do this, Aimen? 

Aimen Dean There is a joke in diplomatic circles in DC always about the Palestinians. You know, they say that the Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. This applies even more to the Armenians. 

Because the Madrid Six Principles, in 2007, 2009, 2011, you know, and the Russian attempts in 2012 and '13, I mean, all of these, you know, opportunities would have given them exactly what they wanted. The whole of Nagorno-Karabakh with a land corridor to Armenia proper, with, you know, the fact that, you know, except the – the surrounding areas, which they occupy, it should return back, you know, to the Azeris. The Azeris can go back to their homes, you know. But, nonetheless, Nagorno-Karabakh and a land corridor will be theirs. 

So, you know—. And—. And also, the deal will also extend a oil and gas pipeline from Baku all the way through Armenia to Turkey for export, and that would have – would have given Armenia some semblance of energy security. 

I would say it's a sweet deal. Why abandon it? We come back to the irrationality of nationalism, historical grievances, inability to live in the future and not – no longer live in the past, you know. This is a – the same plague, you know, basically that is plaguing the Palestinian mindset when it comes to negotiating with the Israelis. It's the same thing here. 

Thomas Small At same time, the president of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev was—. He was ruthless, but he was very calculating. He was very smart. He never attacked Armenia proper. 

Aimen Dean No.

Thomas Small He only attacked those areas that were still officially internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan. So, no one could actually officially criticise his actions. He was simply defending his country's own borders. 

Aimen Dean The problem was that the fact that the Armenian prime minister at the time, who came to power in 2018, you know, was someone who lacked, you know, the ability to, you know, to lead in a smart way. First, he alienated the Russians, his traditional allies. He was, you know, also someone who alienated the Turks by talking a lot about the fact that, you know, when he went to France and, you know, along with Macron, was saying that, you know, "We have to pressure Turkey to return certain territories to Armenia." 

So, as soon as you start claiming territories from Turkey, while you, you know—. I mean, that actually woken, you know, the Turkish, you know, fears and, you know, and also the belligerence of the Turks. I mean, do not step on the tail of the Turks. You know, there is a famous, you know, Turkish cat called the Angora, you know – you know. It has the bushiest tail you could ever see on any cat breed. But to step on its tail, and it will scratch you, you know, and then it will bite. It's the same thing here. 

The Armenian prime minister stepped on the Turkish Angora's cat, you know. And, as a result, the Turks took, you know, you know, notice of this. So, they reached out to, you know, the Azerbaijani, government to discuss further military cooperation, transfer of military technology.

And, suddenly, instead of having one ally, you know, which is the Israelis, he has the Turks now. So, Ilham Aliyev decided now is the time. Because, you know, three things happened. One, the Armenians are alienated from their traditional allies, the Russians. Two, the Armenians are threatening Turkish territorial integrity. And, therefore, he has an ally with the Turks. And three, now, the Azerbaijani military now has reached the level of readiness, thanks to Israeli and Turkish military support, you know, to take on the Armenians who have been sleeping on the wheel of technological advancement for a very long time. 

Thomas Small And that's really the – the main point. Since the nineties, the Armenian military hadn't developed to the same extent. So, they were fighting a more conventional sort of war. They thought the Armenian fighting spirit would see them through. Whereas all along, the Azeris had built up an extremely sophisticated, hyper-modern military. Describe that military a little bit. Just a little bit. I mean, it – it involved the use of drones. What other sort of modern technologies did Azeris bring to the field? 

Aimen Dean First of all, the most important element of any modern military is the ability to see your enemy while your enemy can't see you. So, the ability to have air superiority, where your enemy cannot see you but you can see them all the time move – moving using drone surveillance technologies, means that you know where they are and they don't where you are. So, that's – that's the first advanced, you know, advantage that you have. You know, your enemy is blind to your movement. You can see the enemy clearly everywhere. 

Thomas Small And the Azeris had that advantage. They could just—. They were sort of using their drones, hovering over the battlefield. They could see their Armenian enemies on the ground, and they would just take them out. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. At the same time, they are shooting down Armenian aircrafts and they are shutting down Armenian drones. In other words, basically, total air superiority. That's the first, you know, win that the Azeris scored. 

Second is drone technology that is armed with small-sized but very smart bombs that can actually rain down on tanks and on artillery. So, the Armenians have their rocket launches. They have their T-72, advanced, you know—. Well, semi-advanced Russian tanks. They have their artillery pieces. They can feel them. But as soon as they put them in position, the Azeris basically, like, you know, I mean, with several drones—each drone carry about eight of these bombs—they can choose their targets and pick them one by one. And the Armenians can't do anything. They – they describe it. It's the equivalent of eagles hunting bunnies, you know. That—. Really, it's a war between eagles and bunnies. 

Also, there is this technology, you know, coming out of Israel—and now even the Emiratis are actually, you know, manufacturing it—called loitering munitions. Basically, it's a drone, small-sized, that actually travels around, looking for military targets, something that looks like a rocket launcher or a tank, you know, for the enemy. And then, you don't need to do anything. It will—. It – it will have, you know, its own system, its own guidance systems to recognise the enemy's vehicles, positions, and it will just, you know, attack it immediately. It's a suicide drone ladened with explosive, and it will just attack. So, they can launch hundreds of these. 

Thomas Small You mean, this – this sort of technology operates without even a man on the ground directing it?

Aimen Dean No. 

Thomas Small But this is something out of science fiction. This is, like, out of the Terminator movies or something. 

Aimen Dean Exactly. Exactly. It can recognise, you know, the enemy's vehicles, the enemy's tanks, because it's already fed, you know, it's – it – into its algorithms that, you know, "Okay. This is an – a 70 – 72 tank. This is a BM-40, you know, rocket launcher. This is a 152mm Howitzer. Go and attack it." And it will go and attack it on its own. And you can launch dozens of these, you know. And there is nothing, like, really, there is nothing, you know, the, you know, the Armenians can do about it, because they're too small to detect until it's too late. 

Thomas Small So, the Azeri military prowess really won the day. Now, because of mistrust between Azerbaijan and Iran, Iran has, in recent years, been an ally of Armenia. And when the war broke out, Iran did smuggle munitions to Armenia. But when this became known, the big protests broke out in Iran amongst the Azeris there. And so, Iran had to kind of withdraw that support, further isolating Armenia. 

Turkey, as you said, straightforwardly supported Azerbaijan. Russia, in general, a protector of Armenia, traditionally, refused to get involved, as you said, because the prime minister of Armenia had such a pro-Western position. It got Putin's back up. But, nonetheless, in the end, it was Russia who oversaw a ceasefire agreement between the two sides. Armenia withdrew from most of the territories surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh that it had occupied. Nagorno-Karabakh itself remains an autonomous Republic of Artsakh. And Russia is patrolling a corridor between it and Armenia to make sure that Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia are connected. 

So, the war was over. According to official estimates that resulted in about three thousand Azari deaths and four thousand Armenian deaths, but tens of thousand wounded in Armenia. 

So, what's the point of all this? The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is a good snapshot of the post-Cold War world. And the US's absence from the diplomatic table is a sign of its fading power. 

More importantly, the conflict reveals the depth of historical memory, how ancient history informs the present and how the conflicts we see raging across the region are, in important ways, manifestations of the continuity of old civilisational fault lines. 

Just in this episode, we've had to go back to the Bronze Age to understand what's going on. We've touched on a number of historical turning points that will come up again and again the season. The Bronze Age, as I've said. The religious dimension as paganism, Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and many shaded areas in between work their magic on history.

The ethnic dimension as ancient dividing lines, Semite, Indo-Aryan, Greek, Turk are still in the. The imperial dimension. As the three great imperial zones that comprised Islamic civilisation, from the Mongol invasions onward, the Ottoman, the Iranian, and the moguls in India, weakened and collapsed in the face of European and then American power. All these dimensions are there, haunting the present. And in this series of Conflicted, we'll continue to shed light on them all as best we can as we explore the complex legacies of the Cold War in the Middle East and how that conflict often echoed earlier conflicts, both from the age of European imperialism and from the Islamic empires that proceeded and overlapped with it. 

In a way, the Cold War began in the Middle East, when an Arabian king made a fateful decision. Instead of granting oil drilling rights to Britain, the region's foremost imperial power, he chose an upstart instead: the United States of America. That alliance between the White House and the House of Saud would become the linchpin of Cold War geopolitics, the echoes of which continue well into the present day. Aimen and I will tell that story. 

And what I'm most excited about is hearing Aimen's insider view on an event both mysterious and macabre, one with roots in the Cold War, which dominated headlines for months, threatening to overturn decades of careful Saudi diplomacy.

Stay tuned for Conflicted's take on the infamous assassination of Jamal Khashoggi. 

Aimen Dean Oh, I'm so looking forward to it. 

Thomas Small As always, I'd like to extend the invitation to all listeners to join the Conflicted discussion group on Facebook, where you can connect with other fans of the show to discuss the themes and topics we cover in each episode and be the first to hear all the latest news about future episodes. You can find the Facebook group by searching for "Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group." 

You can follow us on Twitter and Facebook @MHConflicted. We're also pleased to announce that you can now subscribe to ad-free listening and upcoming bonus content for just 99p on Apple Podcasts. And over on Spotify, you can also listen ad-free. 

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Okay. I think that's everything for today. We'll be back in two weeks. 

Conflicted is a Message Heard production. This episode was produced and edited by Rowan Bishop. Sandra Ferrari is our executive producer. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

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Conflicted S3 E1 - Afghanistan Continued

CONFLICTED
S03E01

Thomas Small Dear, listener. It's finally happening. Welcome to season three of Conflicted. My name is Thomas Small, and I am very happy to say that the wonderful and mysterious Aimen Dean is here with me as always.

Hello, Aimen.

Aimen Dean Hello, Thomas. I'm so happy that we finally do it.

Thomas Small It's been a long time, my friend. I mean, we did have that wonderful bonus episode on Afghanistan a few months ago, which – which you guys really liked, listeners. You loved it. But we haven't had a full season for nearly two years.

Aimen Dean Indeed. It's overdue.

Thomas Small Yes, it is. And – and what a couple of years they have been, as well. My goodness. The whole world has changed. I mean, we – we reached the end of season two of Conflicted, which was all about the collapse of the new world order just in time for the new world order to well and truly collapsed all around us.

And you'll never guess, I'm actually, Aimen, in your home country of Saudi Arabia. Here I am in my hotel room in Riyadh, coming to direct dear listener from the heart of the Middle East.

[THEME IN]

So, are you ready to start season three?

Aimen Dean Oh, my God. You have no idea.

[THEME OUT]

Thomas Small Just before we get going, we first wanted to say a huge thank you for your patience in season two. We are so happy that you stuck with us. And, at last, we are back with a brand-new run of episodes. More than ever before, in this season of conflicted, we're coming at you with at least sixteen episodes. So, get ready to hear our voices a lot in 2022.

Season three is also more ambitious. We're focusing on the Middle East, but this time, even more deeply, going further back in time and exploring history and religion in more complex ways than before. Our hope is to genuinely alter the way you think about the world. And, today, in our first episode, we're picking up where we left off: in Afghanistan.

In our bonus episode, we focused on the story of the Taliban's rise to power in the nineties and took you, the listener, behind the scenes with Aimen's dramatic story of facing an oncoming caravan of Taliban warriors and being unable to fire upon them. We thought it was important to go on a historical deep dive, because, at the time, the news reports were all focused on the present. But that's what Conflicted does best. On the picture of the present, we paint in the background to help you understand the present better.

So, to take up where we left off, and also, once again, back to where we began, all those episodes ago in season one, we start with 9-11. Aimen, by that point, you've been working for MI5 and MI6 as a double agent inside Al-Qaeda for, what, like, thirty-three months?

Aimen Dean Almost. Yes.

Thomas Small Obviously, your brief must have included Afghanistan.

Aimen Dean Well, actually, most of my time was spent in Afghanistan over the thirty-three months prior to 9-11.

Thomas Small So, the Twin Towers come crumbling down. The world is in shock. And on September 12th, what did you think was in store for Afghanistan?

Aimen Dean There was no question that there would be massive retaliation. America was wounded deeply. And that sense of the two oceans and the nuclear deterrent that protected America for a very long time was shattered.

Thomas Small So, what were you doing then, on that September 12th, and – and on the days following? What was your job inside the intelligence services?

Aimen Dean Well, I ended up, basically, looking at maps of Afghanistan and pinpointing locations of cams, supply routes, weapon storage facilities. So, my role was to familiarise the intelligence services and, you know, of course, the UK's MOD, the Ministry of Defence, with the military apparatus of Al-Qaeda.

Thomas Small And what did you consider the American-led invasions prospects to be at that time? And were you – were you bullish? Were you bearish? What did you think? Did you think that it would be a cakewalk or did you think America would get bogged down as it did?

Aimen Dean I thought that the Taliban will be able to withstand the American onslaught for roughly six months, because it's not a Vietnam. I knew that the advanced technology and the experience of the Americans in Iraq in the Gulf War against Saddam Hussein to liberate Kuwait made sure that the Americans basically will not, you know, be bogged down in the sense that they would be able to smash the Taliban's fighting ability as a coherent force.

Thomas Small You thought the Taliban would hold out for six months. But in the end, they – they barely survived six weeks. Why is that?

Aimen Dean You know, many Taliban units who were tribal in their nature, they decided to basically, "Just pack and leave. I'm not going to withstand the B52s dropping, you know, know hundreds of tons of explosive over my head. I can't fight that. So, I'm going to go back to my family." Because, don't forget, the Talibans were not wearing, you know, distinct informs. They all wore civilian clothing. So, they melted into the background, which collapsed the Taliban's ability to run a military campaign to—. It was just the Americans.

Thomas Small And what kind of a firepower did America bring to the table?

Aimen Dean At the beginning, they had the difficulty, because, you know, Pakistan, did not really open all the military air bases. And so, they were using the American aircraft carriers, F18s and even they converted F14s, to carry smart-guided bombs. But then, of course, it is the long-range firepower of both the B52 and the B2. These are long range bombers. They can fly all the way from Arizona to Afghanistan over eighteen hours, drop their bombs, and then come back again.

So, you know, that continuous barrage of massive ordinance falling over Taliban positions, which actually had more psychological effect, you know, than just actual the damage.

Thomas Small So, at that time, I mean, here we have this lightning strike invasion of the Taliban fold quite quickly and the coalition has – has clamped the country fast.

But did you feel then that – that America was pursuing some kind of overall strategic goal? Or was it just revenge? Was it just in response to 9-11? "You hit us. We hit you." Or – or was – was there already a glimmer of a kind of – of a long-term goal here?

Aimen Dean From the beginning, you know, the thinking in DC and in 10 Downing Street was the Taliban must go. And, therefore, who will replace them? So, from the beginning, the question of nation building was on the table.

Thomas Small And how did this idea of nation building strike you?

Aimen Dean For me, at that time, because it was maybe swept in the moment, I believe that maybe it could work. Because, at the time, I still was believing that Tony Blair was a forceful good.

Thomas Small Okay. So, at the beginning, you thought, "Well, maybe Tony Blair can save the situation." But when did – when did you realise that that was unlikely to happen?

Aimen Dean I think three weeks into the war. When you start to see over-reliance of, you know, on warlords who were involved, you know, in gang activities and drugs. So, the over-reliance on these—. Yes, they were opposing forces to the Taliban, but they were criminal classes. I mean, they were, you know, people who the Taliban put away for a good reason. They were terrorising the civilian population before. And so, this Machiavellian execution of the war started to, you know, give me doubts that—. I don't think basically they are serious about nation building.

Thomas Small Well, were there other actors on the ground in Afghanistan that the US could have – could have allied with? I mean, maybe – maybe they were stuck with these warlords. Who else might they have allied with?

Aimen Dean They could have more or less picked up their allies in a better way and allied themselves more with the tribal leadership and relied on a more tribal consensus building, you know, effort rather than trying to, you know, rely on warlords and people who were involved in the drug trade, you know, prior to the rise of Taliban. However, you know, more or less the biggest doubt that came to my mind that there is going to be a difficulty in this nation building was the rejection of the return of the monarchy to Afghanistan.

Thomas Small Yes. That in December of 2001, at the – during the negotiations and bond between the Afghan power players, not including the Taliban, the Afghan party wanted to bring back the king, but the Americans vetoed that. And you – you think that that was a sign that the American nation building project was – was sort of more ideologically slanted than it should have been?

Aimen Dean Yes. And there is actually another, you know, a mistake, which I highlighted at the time. You know that the Taliban are Deobandis and they listen, you know, a lot to the Deobandi scholars in Pakistan and India.

Thomas Small So, long-term listeners will remember that the Deobandi movement, which comes from Northern India during the – during the Raj, during the British rule there, is one of the – one of the biggest ref- – reformist, revivalist political Islamic movements in the world. Because it – because it grew up in the context of throwing out the British. It has a particularly strong anti-Western anti-imperialist edge to it. And the Taliban are – are – are a part of that stream of modern Islamist thought.

Aimen Dean Exactly. I suggested, at that time, that there are many moderate pacifist Deobandi scholars, Afghan and Pakistani and Indian who could have been actually courted initially, even if it was just outside of the bomb process in order to, you know, facilitate the—. Not only the—. Well, we don't call it the surrender, but the rehabilitation of the Taliban back into the political fold. So, they can be, you know, placated and, at the same time, not be pushed towards mounting a resistance movement in the future.

And the third issue, which we already talked about it before in the last episode, which is the rejection of the, you know, aspects of sharia to be incorporated into the new Afghan constitution. All of this, give me doubt that, nah, it's not going to work.

Thomas Small So, as you say too many warlords had been invited into the process, warlords whom the Afghans had effectively rejected earlier. And this is because the Americans, you know, they'd assumed, if you were against the Taliban, you were good, forgetting that the Taliban had, of course, arisen by – by fighting arseholes.

Let's be honest. But that's what America went in there thinking, "The enemy of my enemy must be a good guy," which is a pretty naive view. So, what opportunities in those early months were lost? I mean, you once told me that you had an idea—this sounds crazy—but you had an idea that America should have actually consciously put together a massive Islamic, a Muslim invading force to conquer the country.

Aimen Dean Well, or at least the peacekeeping force.

Thomas Small Which countries might have – might have contributed to this force?

Aimen Dean I would say Saudi Arabia. I would say the UAE. The UAE already, like, contributed, you know, before. Indonesia, Malaysia.

Thomas Small I mean, countries with – with – with men – with manpower. Arm—. you know, big armies.

Aimen Dean Turkey, Iran, Egypt. I mean, there is no shortage of big armies in the Muslim world. I mean, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, as well as Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, all of these countries, basically, among them, they have millions of men, you know, men in terms of manpower. They could have spared the a hundred thousand troops easy in order to facilitate that kind of, you know, revivalist, Afghan political tradition of the loya jirga. Like, you know, I mean, of this kind of rule by consensus. It could have happened. But no one reached out to them, because, somehow, the Taliban basically were viewed as the absolute villains. Everyone forget that Afghan, you know, society and Afghan history is full of villains. It's just basically some of them are better than others.

Thomas Small The plan that you're suggesting isn't so different from the plan that informed the invasion of Kuwait in 1991 to expel Saddam Hussein. And in that case, America working closely with King Fahad of Saudi Arabia, brought together an enormous coalition of Islamic countries to help legitimise that – that invasion. So, they could have done the same thing. Although, you know, that took months to – to cobble together. That took six, seven months for – for that invasion force to be – to be formed. I suppose America just didn't – didn't feel they – they had the time for that kind of diplomacy.

Aimen Dean I think it's just the inability to see further than a four-year election cycle. It's a question of "Okay. We want to show the American public that we took revenge." And, you know, you – you could have taken the revenge right away, like—. And I mean, just bomb the hell out of them. But the question here is what will replace the Taliban afterwards to make sure that the Taliban do not return. Because, guess what, twenty years later, the Taliban returned.

Thomas Small Okay. So, to—. Before we get to the now, we can do a quick summary of what happened after the invasion. So, between 2001 and 2008, the peace process did – did sort of move ahead, the bond agreement was signed, elections were held, Hamid Karzai became president. And you know, it was fairly calm at first. Then, as you told us in the last episode, the US got distracted by Iraq and the Al Qaeda terrorists leader there, Zarqawi, rose, began sending money to the Taliban where they were held out in the – in the Af-Pak border. And then, they started launching terrorist attacks inside Afghanistan, again creating the instability that became endemic there.

George W. Bush goes. Barack Obama arrives. Now, he promises to sort out Afghanistan. When he arrived, did you feel more encouraged, Aimen?

Aimen Dean No. On multiple levels. I just did not trust him. I did not feel that he was going to make any significant changes. I say this why? Because he had a much bigger fish to fry, which is the financial crisis. I mean, America and the American economic system was in dire situation. So, for him, the focus was actually how to get America out of the mess they are in financially before he can actually get America out of the military mess in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

Thomas Small That is certainly true, Aimen. That's certainly true. But he did increase troop numbers in Afghanistan. He did try to solve the problem there. So, let's – let's speak about – about those – those efforts, I mean, in a concrete way. What were the US tactical errors at that time?

Aimen Dean It's like this, you know—. It's – it's like a gambler going into a casino and saying, "Okay. Well, how do I recover my losses? Put more money in, so I might, like, recover the old losses." It is that habitual gambler, you know, situation, which is hopeless.

Thomas Small Well, that makes sense to me, Aimen. More troops, more – more, you know, more fists punching the Taliban in the face.

Aimen Dean Yeah. But, again, we come back to comparing oranges and apples here. We come back to comparing Iraq and Afghanistan. You can't compare a rock, which is an open desert, to Afghanistan, which is a mountain society. You know, Iraq, which has a decades of central government with Afghanistan, which has decades of rural, you know, population. You can't compare the two at all. And, therefore, you know, the idea that the troops there will actually serve as a catalyst for the Taliban to, you know, capitulate, it was the opposite. They increased their ranks. They increased their number. More recruits joined them, because, you know, it's like introducing more virus into a body that will, you know, create more antibodies. Obama would have actually done better if he spent the money on the infrastructure of the country than actually sending more troops.

Thomas Small Another problem, I suppose, that when you send more troops to Afghanistan, more American troops, all you're doing possibly—and I'd love to hear what you think about this—is bloating a corpse, really, that was already riddled with – with corruption. I mean, the US corruption in Afghanistan was – is pretty infamous.

Aimen Dean Oh, my God. Don't get me started.

Thomas Small No. No. I want to get you started. Come on. Let us – let us – let us have it, Aimen. Talk to us about the corruption in the US forces in Afghanistan and how it contributed to the long-term failure there.

Aimen Dean You know, in the last episode, we talked about the rotten corpse of the Afghan nation state and how it – the army and the military and the ministry of interior, they were all corrupt. They were actually more or less a reflection of how corrupt the US military was. The US military there in Afghanistan relied a lot on contractors. You know, some contractors who were based in the US, some contractors who are ex-Marines and ex, you know, Green Berets and ex whatever. You know, special forces.

Thomas Small So, by contractors, you don't mean people who are building bridges. You mean contractors, people who come with – with weapons of their own. These are contract killers, mercenaries, warriors.

Aimen Dean Mercenaries. You know, people who can, basically, you know, raise private militias from the locals. But they're Americans. You know, they are American contractors who have contracts with the Department of Defence, with the DOD, with the Pentagon, or with the state department or with the CIA. And these contractors then who are based either in places like Hong Kong or Singapore, or, you know, in the Middle East, in Dubai or other places, but what they do is that they end up being the logistical arm of the Pentagon. They are the not just only logistical, but also they do some of the operations in which will go under the radar. I'm not saying Black Ops, but we are talking here about raising private militias, establishing private security firms to, you know, employ Afghans, former warlords who are rejected by the Afghan National Army from joining their ranks. So, they become the private thugs of the US military. And you end up in a situation where these contracts are worth so much in terms of protecting convoys, protecting the transport of weapons, the transport of fuels, the transport of food. After all, American troops used to enjoy McDonald's and Subway and other fast-food chains in their bases.

Thomas Small Delicacies. I think we call them delicacies in America, Aimen.

Aimen Dean Exactly. But these delicacies need to be transported somehow. And, you know, America is not going to spend the life of American Marines and GIs protecting, you know, the shipments of Big Macs.

Thomas Small I was just going to ask you why in God's name would – would the Pentagon be relying on American, you know, contract killers and mercenaries when they have a huge army of their own. And you're saying it's because – it's because of the political optics of the situation. They would rather mercenaries be killed than – than their own boys, if you like.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Because these mercenaries are not just only Americans. You know, these mercenaries are South Africans, Colombians, Venezuelan army, you know, ex-soldiers. You know, people from Nepal in, from the Gurkhas. I mean – I mean, we're talking about multinational forces. As well as from local Afghans and local Pakistanis, I mean, basically, who joined these private security firms set up by these American contractors. And they are given the job and the task of protecting logistical supplies. The Pentagon did not want to spend American blood protecting these shipments. So, who will do it? These people.

Thomas Small But where does the corruption come in, Aimen? Where does the actual corruption come in? I can understand, you know, the Pentagon is making – is paying people to do some jobs. But how is that corruption?

Aimen Dean The corruption comes in the form of obscene amounts, you know, of overpayments for this project. You will have the contractor coming, American contractor, with South African, Venezuela, and Columbian mercenaries, saying, "Well, I have a two-thousand manpower. I'm happy basically to, you know, supply you with whatever you need in terms of manpower and to protect these shipments and to protect the logistical support lines." But the problem is that he's only employing twelve hundred, and he is pocketing the salaries of the eight hundred, you know, he is quoting, you know, the DOD for.

Thomas Small This is precisely the sort of corruption you outlined for us in the previous episode about how the Afghan military was working.

Aimen Dean Exactly. But the difference here is that the American generals—and I'm not naming anyone.

Thomas Small No. No. Come on, Aimen. Give us the names. Who are these guys? Who are those? Come on.

Aimen Dean No.

Thomas Small We want to throw the book at them.

Aimen Dean It's – it's our policy, we don't.

Thomas Small You see, the trouble with corruption, Aimen, people who know about it, they don't speak openly about it.

Aimen Dean I have kids. So—.

Thomas Small Oh, that's true.

Aimen Dean But, you know, you – you will see, like – like, you know, there will be a certain contractor who I know and a certain general who I know. The general will turn a blind eye to how much the contractor is overcharging, you know, for the services and the obscene amounts of money asked for these, you know, services and for these contracts. And then, you know, four or five, six years later, when that general's time is over in the middle, you will find him serving on the board, you know, of directors as an executive director in that company. And he is paid, you know, six, seven figures sums of money, you know, in terms of, you know, remunera- – remuneration and bonuses and salaries and stock options. Yes, that's how the entire gravy train.

Thomas Small That – that – that is the classic example of corruption. But you know, Obama, President Obama, must have known about this. Many people must have known about this. Why didn't he do anything about it?

Aimen Dean Well, you know, when you are, you know, fighting a war, you don't rock the boat. I mean, you're already fighting a war and you know, basically, that, you know, this money is going here on there, and it is important that this money keeps flowing because it is feeding, you know, the Black Ops, it is feeding the irregular rendition sites, it is feeding, you know, the, operations that you need to be done in order to win the war against the Taliban in a dirty way, which your military is restrained from doing. That is exactly, you know, the issue. Bribing certain officials. Bribing tribal leaders. Paying ransom money, you know, to certain local commanders in order – you know, from the Afghan, you know, society in order to facilitate the American intelligence gathering, and, you know, so on. So—. And so, you know, that's why in any war, you will find that dirty money is part of it. But in Afghanistan, the dirty money almost – almost matched to the legitimate money.

Thomas Small So, in 2014, 2015, 2016, a new player arrives on the field of – of the Middle East: ISIS. And before long, they're also in Afghanistan. Why were they in Afghanistan? What did they seek to achieve there?

Aimen Dean Well, Afghanistan had three important elements for them. First, it's a ungovernable space. Second, it's full of American forces. And third, it has, you know, Shia minorities. So, for ISIS, their two favourite targets, Americans and Shia, you know, they were available there in Afghanistan. And also, it is a failed state ready to be infected with the virus of ISIS.

Thomas Small And when we talk about ISIS in Afghanistan, are we talking about the whole country? Are they everywhere? And I mean, I would've thought, you know, ISIS and the Taliban would get along, you know. I mean, why – why – why are ISIS there, fighting the Taliban, and ISIS—. I mean, it seems crazy. Aren't ISIS and Taliban equally bad guys, you know? Aren't they both terrorists?

Aimen Dean No. I mean, I wouldn't equate the two. And, actually, the two wouldn't get along whatsoever. ISIS is a extreme, like, absolute extreme version of Salafist jihadism.

Thomas Small The Kharijite were a very, very early Islamic movement that were so zealous in pursuit of what they considered to be Islamic purity that they took it upon themselves to excommunicate fellow Muslims and to tell – to – basically, to say that "you are an apostate. Therefore, you can be killed. Your property can be looted. alluded. Your women can be raped." And – and this was very early on, within the first century of Islam. This tendency within Islam manifested itself, and the broader community rejected it. ISIS is an – is another manifestation of this possibility within the bosom of Islam.

And – and – and by Salafist, we mentioned earlier how the Taliban are attached to the Deobandi movement. Salafism is a different movement. It comes from the Arab part of the Middle East. It is associated with the Muslim Brotherhood, with characters like Sayyid Qutb. It comes with – with a fusion with Saudi-inflicted Wahhabism.

It's the sort of Islam that underpins Al-Qaeda and other such movements.

Aimen Dean Exactly. You know, while Al-Qaeda was tolerant towards Deobandism, and Deobandis were tolerant towards Al-Qaeda, because Al-Qaeda did not represent a rejectionist Jihadi Salafism towards other Suni trends, ISIS, however, completely, re—. you know, they rejected Al-Qaeda themselves, actually, and they agreed that Al-Qaeda were kafir. You know, they were, you know, infidels. They were apostates.

Thomas Small You're – you're an extreme Muslim when you think that Al-Qaeda isn't extreme enough.

Aimen Dean Exactly. But they were not all over Afghanistan. I mean, they found their, you know, natural habitat in the province of Kunar.

Thomas Small So, Kunar. This is in the east of Afghanistan where the majority of the population there are Salafist, not Deobandis. Is that why ISIS are there?

Aimen Dean Yeah. And they call themselves Ahl-i Hadith, you know. It's another name for Salafist there. It's just, you know—. We don't need to be bothered with the terminology. But, nonetheless, they found in the Salafist tradition, there is some sort of a incubator. So, a minority, of course of, you know, the Kanari Ahl-i Hadith Salafist joined ISIS, but they were just big enough, between five hundred to a thousand, they were big enough to actually cause significant headache for the American forces, for the Afghan government.

Thomas Small And did ISIS have any sort of – of big game plan in Afghanistan? I mean, you know, they're – obviously, they're crazy killers. But in Syria and Iraq, they had this basic goal of establishing a state, which they accomplished. But in Afghanistan, is that what they were trying to do or – or were they really just troublemakers there,

trying to make things difficult for – for their enemies?

Aimen Dean I believe they were just a disruptive force. I mean, their ultimate aim is just the disruption and to present themselves, hopefully, as the alternative to the Taliban, to those Taliban units who believed that the Taliban were not, you know, vigorous enough in their pursuit of an American withdrawal from Afghanistan. And they succeeded in attracting a few hundred disaffected Taliban fighters. But that's it.

I think the project of ISIS in Afghanistan failed on the same way that the project of ISIS failed in Yemen. Because there was already a traditional jihadist, you know, groups there, existing on the ground. And trying to out-compete them and trying to, you know, to supplant them, it takes considerable amount of persuasion, resources. And that's something that ISIS in Afghanistan did not have. So, instead of being the alternative, they became the disruptor.

Thomas Small I see. So, the Obama years are coming to a close now. We have this situation where ISIS is – is – is on the rampage in Afghanistan. The Taliban are well and truly back, causing problems. Corruption, heretofore, unimagined, is endemic both within the Afghan and the American security apparatus. And then, we come to Donald Trump. So, Donald Trump had risen to power by attaching himself to, really, the isolationist wing of the Republican party, the old right of the Republican party who were not interested in policing the world. They rejected the neo-conservative movement. He had no interest in nation building and was determined to get out of Afghanistan. So, as Donald Trump enters the scene, Aimen, were you encouraged?

Aimen Dean Well, there is always a tendency to believe that, you know, when a right-wing leader comes in, that troubles comes with him. It's not always the case. And in the case of Donald Trump, I [was encouraged when I saw that he was happy to talk to Kim Jong-un. You know, the president of North Korea or the leader. And it became clear that he is willing to talk, but on his own terms. And he and, in later years, his secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, sounded both like two New York, you know, mafia dons, I mean, basically trying to make a deal. And we'll get—. "I – I – I would make an offer you can't refuse." Kind of.

Thomas Small Well, you told me once, and I – I found it quite telling that, you know, Donald Trump is an expert at recognising lost causes, because, you know, he – he's failed so many times in his life. He's lost so much money. He's been bankrupt so many times. So many of his businesses have failed. So, coming to power him, he – he – he looked at Afghanistan and thought, "Well, this is a lost cause. We got to get out of here."

Aimen Dean Say whatever you want to say about Donald Trump—and there are, you know—. You know, we could be spending hours talking about his faults. But he recognised, in Afghanistan, not only a lost cause, but he recognised what Afghanistan really was: a money-making scheme for corrupt, you know, Afghan officials and American officials and American military, generals. And, therefore—. []x contractors. Therefore, he decided, "You know what? Let's talk to the Taliban. Let's continue the – those tentative inner first steps that Obama took in order to talk to the Taliban in Doha, in Qatar, and let – let the Qataris be the mediators." And this is, I think, where it started.

Thomas Small To move away from the American perspective and – and start walking in the Afghan shoes at the moment, I mean, it's obvious now that Afghans themselves agreed with you at the time and they knew that their hold on power was shaky and that they needed to negotiate with the Taliban. I mean, Hamid Karzai, then the president, he wanted negotiations to start in 2007, but the Bush administration refused. So, Karzai knew, as early as 2007, when the Taliban were then well and truly coming back. "We must negotiate with these players." But Bush said no. There were negotiations with other resistance militias, including your old friend Hekmatyar's group, Hezb-e-Islami.

Aimen Dean Yeah.

Thomas Small And they did sign a peace treaty with the Afghan government in 2016. So, on the ground in Afghanistan, the Afghan government, to the extent that it was sovereign, was trying to cobble together some sort of peaceful arrangement with these other actors. Now, in February 2018, Donald Trump is president and Karzai's successor as president of Afghanistan, Ashraf Ghani, publicly called for peace talks with the Taliban. Now, presumably, he would have discussed this move with the Americans, and Trump said, "Okay. Go for it." And then, a new – a resurgent peace movement began again in Afghanistan. And the people, they were worn out. They wanted an end to all the fighting. And then, there was a big conference in Tashkent, in Uzbekistan, where twenty countries, including the US, lent their support to President Ghani's call for peace talks. So, how is it that a few months later, in July 2018, the Taliban ended up talking peace with the Americans in Doha, in Qatar? Trump had asked the generals, "Look, how do we end this shit show there in Doha?" Why Doha?

Aimen Dean First of all, the Taliban, from the beginning, did not trust the government of Ashraf Ghani. So, the end of the day, you know, I want to talk with the paymasters. I mean, the Taliban knew exactly that. Abdul Rashid Dostum, Mohammad Fahim, Ismail Khan, all of the leaders, Abdullah Abdullah, all of the leaders of the Afghan government and their factions, you know, ethnic or otherwise, depend on American patronage. So, why am I going to waste my time talking to them? Because they will be going back to their paymasters, the American. They will be asking their opinion. They will come back again. And I don't trust if they are going to tell the Americans what we want to tell the Americans. And I can't trust that they will tell us what the Americans really wanted to tell us.

So, the Taliban insisted that it should be direct talks between the Taliban and the Americans, and that they want it to be in Doha, because it will be a safe, secure location. And the Qataris were more than happy to provide that safety, security and guarantees for the Taliban that no one will be arrested, no one will be harassed from your side. And, of course, the Americans were happy to see basically that, since they will be transported from Pakistan by military planes, Qatari military planes, to that military base in Doha, and then, from there, they can have the talks. The Taliban insisted direct talks, because "we don't trust the government of Ashraf Ghani." I think the Taliban and Trump, I would say, realised that the mediator here shouldn't be the Ashraf Ghani government and the other factions, because they have a lot to lose financially if there is peace.

Thomas Small And why not the Pakistanis, though? I mean, weren't they in a good position to – to be this mediator?

Aimen Dean The American intelligence, in particular the CIA, did not trust the Pakistanis. Also, the same time, Pakistan was still teaming with terror organisations, you know, from Al-Qaeda, Lashkar-e-Taiba, you know, that American officials wouldn't feel safe landing in Pakistan just to conduct talks with the Taliban. Therefore, Doha was the most secure location for the American mediators and for other Taliban felt that the Qataris will keep their words that no one will be harassed.

Thomas Small So, there we are in Doha. the Taliban are on one side of the negotiation table. The Americans are on the other side. What were these negotiations over? I mean, the Taliban presumably really wanted one thing: for the Americans to leave. So, why didn't Trump then just leave?

Aimen Dean Well, first of all, the manner of leaving needs to be done in a way in which, basically, it doesn't embarrass his government and to say, basically, that, you know, he left Afghanistan to be devoured by the Taliban. During that time, he basically wanted to empower as much as possible the Afghan National Army. He started the process of arming them with attack helicopters and attack propeller planes, which are light attack aircraft that will enable the Afghan National Army to have, you know, air superiority over the Taliban. The idea—.

Thomas Small So, before leaving Afghanistan, Trump wanted to make sure the Afghan army was strong enough to resist the Taliban for at least some time, so it wouldn't look like America had cut and run, left their allies high and dry, and the Taliban just took over the country in a lightning strike, which is, of course, what happened.

Aimen Dean Some people will always say that would the Taliban have taken over Afghanistan so quickly like this if it was Trump was in power rather than Biden.

And there is an interesting answer here. You see, during the negotiations between the Taliban and Trump administration in and Doha, ISIS in Kunar were presenting significant challenge in terms of security for the American forces. So, what Trump did, he authorised the use of the largest non-nuclear conventional bomb in the American military's arsenal, which is called the MOAB. The MOAB stands for the mother of all bombs. So—.

Thomas Small The mother of all bombs. He dropped the mother of all bombs on ISIS in Afghanistan.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Twenty thousand pounds. Ten tons of high-yield explosives, lie, were dropped on a cave network in the mountains of Kunar. It killed more than a hundred. And six ISIS members, including their leaders. You know, but many people did not understand that the significance of that bombing is that it was a message to the Taliban. "While we are negotiating with you, you know what, like, you know, we could actually use a fire power that could obliterate your hideouts. You know? So, deal with us now in a proper manner or we will do that." And so, Trump did not shy away from using massive bombs and massive orders in order to persuade the Taliban by attacking ISIS, that "we could do this to you."

Thomas Small And did the message land? Did the Taliban learn the message?

Aimen Dean Since that bomb fell on ISIS, the Taliban did not kill one single American soldier after that.

Thomas Small So, Trump had insisted any attack would be met with the swiftest retaliation, and he had proved that he was willing to do that by dropping this mother of all bombs. But it is also true that, following the US Taliban peace agreement, which was signed in February 2020—so, that's about a year before Trump left office, and which interestingly did not involve the Afghan government at all—the Taliban did begin a wave of attacks against Afghan government forces. So, they weren't attacking the Americans, but they were attacking the Afghans. From one point of view, it looks like the US had sold its allies in Kabul down the river.

Aimen Dean But some would say that it was the Kabul government actually that betrayed the Americans. Because for years, they misrepresented how many actual troops they have on the ground. They said, "We have recruited three hundred thousand strong Afghan army and security forces," when in fact they only have eighty thousand. Two hundred and twenty thousand were fictitious numbers in order to collect their salaries from the Americans. [crosstalk].

Thomas Small This is that corruption on the Afghan side.

Aimen Dean Exactly. They lied and lied and lied to the Americans about, you know, intelligence gathering. They lied to the Americans about their capability, their ability. They were unreliable allies. And so, as far as the Americans were concerned, how can—. Why should we be honourable to dishonourable allies? You know, so [as far as Trump was concerned, "I want to get out. This is the American taxpayer money. And it has enriched the pockets, you know, of so many corrupt Afghan officials, as well as American officials." You know? And he knows that. So, he decided, "You know what? As the Taliban demanded, let them slag it off with the Afghan National Army." And, actually, for Trump and Trump's administration, those months after the February 2020, they were a good, you know, testing ground of the capability of the Afghan National Army. They saw for themselves.

Because the Afghan National Army was absolutely unreliable in the sense they were telling the Americans every time, basically, they got beaten, "Oh, we have killed four hundred Taliban this day." And then, the next day, "We have killed two hundred and fifty-eight Taliban today." Actually, you know, some people were actually, you know, keeping tabs that the Afghan National Army, in a year, killed, you know, forty-five thousand Taliban, you know. But yet, at the same time, they were saying, "Oh, we estimate the number of Taliban thought about around the country to be about fifteen to twenty-five thousand. That's it." How could you – how could you kill forty-five thousand out of twenty-five? I mean, I don't know what creative math you come with, you know. With such creative math, they could become bankers.

Thomas Small So, the US and – and the Taliban, they agree peace in February 2020. Over the intervening year, negotiations were supposed to take place between the Taliban and the Afghan government. And they sort of did and then, they sort of didn't. There were prisoners swaps at times. A lot of fighting. It really was a mess. Which brings us to Joe Biden. Now, like Donald Trump, actually, Joe Biden, isn't a fan of state building. He never believed in the Afghan state building process. And as a Democrat, at the beginning of the war on terror, he had opposed Bush's war. And he – he largely stayed that way throughout. He was always opposed to the neo-conservative project. So, Trump and Biden are quite similar in that way. How are they different when it comes to Afghans?

Aimen Dean Well, actually, they were exactly similar. I mean, both of them did not believe in nation building. Both of them did not believe that the American taxpayer money should line up the pocket of corrupt people. And I think both of them believe in some sort of military might should be used as last resort. The only difference is that Trump was a bully and he could easily prove, you know, his willingness to use overwhelming power. He's willing to pull the trigger. Joe Biden is just little grandpa, man. Like, and I mean, he's such a nice guy. Like, and I mean, you know, harmless. And that is why the Taliban were thinking, "He will never drop, you know, a bullet on us, let alone, you know, drop a – the mother of all bombs. He is no Trump. You know what? Let's roll the government back like a carpet." You know? And they took over Afghanistan in nine days, in a lightning speed campaign, because they knew that Biden will not use any overwhelming force to stop them.

Trump, in my analysis, in order to appear strong in front of the American people, he would have dropped several of these mother of all bombs on the Taliban advancing forces to tell them, "Stop where you are until I evacuate everyone I want. You are going nowhere near the capitol." And they would have respected that. The Taliban would have respected that show. Biden was just, you know—. We have a saying in Arabic that he's the kind of a guy that he would not only let the cat has his dinner, but he will offer more.

Thomas Small In addition to being less of a bully than Donald Trump, Biden also made quite a serious tactical error. So, as soon as he came to power, his national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, immediately said that they were going to review the peace deal that Trump had signed with the Taliban and they were going to give their opinion on that deal by May 2021, which is actually precisely the month that Trump said the troops were going to be withdrawn from Afghanistan. And in the end, Biden announced that he was going to withdraw the troops on the 11th of September 2021, twenty years after 9-11. Sort of symbolic day to withdraw the troops for sure. But you believe, Aimen, that this was a major mistake. Why?

Aimen Dean It was a big mistake. Because Trump's secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, he knew what he was doing when he decided that we should withdraw around May. Why? Because for those people who do understand the dynamics of the Taliban jihad in Afghanistan, the Mujahideen or the Taliban are seasonal. So, they joined during the summer and then they go home during the winter. So, they went around their homes in massive numbers. And then, during the summer, they came back to swell the ranks of the Taliban.

So, the Taliban are always at only twenty-five percent military readiness during the winter. So, you know, the – the – the snow in the mount – in the mountain passes, you know, start to melt around, you know, March, April. So, only around May that the mobilisation starts. So, they are not exactly fully. By May, they will be around forty to fifty percent of their, you know, the military readiness. So, if you withdraw in May, you know, the Taliban won't have enough numbers to overwhelm the Afghan National Army at least for another month or two. So, when the Biden administration said, "Oh, we're going to delay until September," it was music to the ears of the Taliban. "Oh, thank you."

Thomas Small I think we can probably defend the Biden administration at least a little bit, given how unstructured, the transition was from Trump to Biden.

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah.

Thomas Small I mean, Trump – Trump was a very irresponsible president at the end, and a lot of his apparatchiks in the administration were tremendously irresponsible. And in addition, I imagine, within the Pentagon, there must have been a lot of higher ups who were unhappy with the idea of this very lucrative war coming to an end. Presumably, they were doing what they could to postpone things, hoping that maybe Biden would change tack and keep the war going.

Aimen Dean Not only that, but also the contracts for the evacuation of sensitive materials, equipment, military gear. Because not everything can be left behind. Some of it need to be to leave. Otherwise, it's so advanced. It will fall into the hands of the Chinese, you know. So, basically, the contracts for evacuating all of these were just the final cherry on top of the corruption game.

Thomas Small Oh, my goodness gracious.

Aimen Dean So, they wanted to prolong it as much as possible, because there was so much final, final money to be made.

Thomas Small Now, we all remember the scenes of the – of the American Withrow itself, the chaotic scenes. We also remember hearing about the Taliban getting their hands on a tremendous amount of American weaponry. Why did the Americans leave so much weaponry behind if, as you say, they had paid these men to get rid of it in advance?

I mean, what was going on there? Why didn't they sabotage at least these assets, so that they couldn't be used? Why didn't they destroy them?

Aimen Dean Well, first of all the majority of the weapons that you've seen captured, you know, were actually the weapons of the Afghan National Army.

Thomas Small Which the Americans had supplied them.

Aimen Dean Exactly. Yeah. So, the reality here is what you saw there was actually battalions and brigades, you know, worth of weapons. So, the commander of the unit will walk to the Taliban and he will say to them, "You know what? We have tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of weapons inside our base. We don't want to sabotage it. You know, pay us fifty thousand, a hundred thousand US dollars, and it's all yours." And so, the Taliban will pay them, and they will give them amnesty, and the Taliban will walk in and just pick up everything. That is what happened. And the reality here is that the Afghan National Army had far more weapons than they needed, because they lied to the Americans about their true numbers. They said, "We have three hundred thousand, you know, troops part of the Afghan National Army and the Afghan security forces," when, in fact, the maximum number was eighty thousand.

Thomas Small Were these weapons in the Afghan army—? I mean, were they very advanced weapons? Is America scared now that China is going to get their hands on them?

Aimen Dean Most of that phone swiping reads that the Americans didn't want the Chinese to have already evacuated. So, basically, what's happening is that the contracts evacuated the most sensitive technologies. Were done, were carried out. So, no sensitive technology fell into the hands of the Taliban. But what you have is already, you know, weapons that are quite advanced for, you know, even for Iran. I mean, you know, recently, there were clashes between the Taliban and the Iranian forces on the border, you know, in which the Taliban, you know, basically, like, you know, overran the Iranian forces because they had better weaponry.

Thomas Small Oh, my goodness.

Aimen Dean So, you know, and of course, basically the Iranians, you know, quickly throw in the towel and said, "Hey. Hey." Like, you know, "Just, you know, calm down, you know, guys." You know, easy tiger. Like, you know, "Let's talk." So, the reality is that, you know, there were tens of billions of dollars' worth of weaponry that the American supplied to the Afghan army that failed.

Thomas Small So, you say the Taliban have got their hands on some advanced American weaponry. But how – how might the Chinese get their hands on it then? Are they going to sell it to the Chinese?

Aimen Dean Oh, yeah. I mean, there is a tradition, you know. The—. Many times during the war, when – when an Apache helicopter, you know, during combat, you know, the Taliban, you know, came, dismantled it, and started selling the parts of the Chinese. You know, when any American drone, you know, would fall into Taliban territory, you know, during the Afghan war, they would basically sell the parts to the Chinese. And that's how the Chinese started their Wing Loong, you know, drone program, you know, reverse engineering, the American technology. So, you know, the—. I mean, one of the ironies of the Afghan conflict is that America was there to save its national security, but, at the same time, you know, their weaponry was finding its way through the Taliban to the Chinese markets in order to reverse engineer it and for the Chinese to become a bigger threat to the American national security, so.

Thomas Small Oh, my goodness. How many times during Conflicted have we pointed out how American policy has inadvertently benefited the Chinese? It's quite remarkable. Poor Afghanistan.

But what about the future, Aimen? You've described the situation in Afghanistan at present as a game of poker. Afghanistan is the chips lying there waiting to be taken. And the dealer is, weirdly, the Taliban. But who are the players around the table? I mean, obviously, we've—. There's China.

Aimen Dean Well, since the last episode, you know, things are becoming more clearer. I mean, there are now several players who want to get involved in Afghanistan. You know, the first, you know, two major players here are China and Pakistan in unison, because they want to become the, you know, the infrastructure builders. You know, the root, you know, for the rebuilding, for the commercial route for Afghanistan, the port for Afghanistan, the access to the sea. And then, you have the Emiratis and the Turks. They are fighting with each other over who will run the airports in Afghanistan. You know, the Emiratis are offering to run the airports in Kabul, [unintelligible] Kandahar for passenger and freight services. And, of course, the Emiratis, you know, want to have these contracts. The Turks want to have exactly these contracts, too.

Thomas Small And none of these players—not China, not Pakistan, not the Emirates, and not the Turks—none of them are – are against dealing with the Taliban. They don't care. They're there. They're – they're happy to deal with. They're behaving in a way that you think America should have been behaving all along, treating the Taliban like partners we can negotiate with, not imposing upon them. Some sort of bogeyman status.

Aimen Dean Absolutely. I mean, at the end of the day, the rehabilitation of the Taliban, if anything is possible like this, like, and I mean, it could take years and years. And that can only be basically happened with a tremendous amount of patience and diplomacy and trade and commerce. To isolate Afghanistan because of the Taliban is going to actually cause Al-Qaida and other unsavoury groups to re-emerge there again. Do we really need to go back and repeat the cyclical history again? No. Only—. The only way to strengthen the wing within the Taliban that wants to engage with the rest of the world is through talks and commerce in particular. Let commerce flow into Afghanistan.

Thomas Small So, those are the countries that you feel look upon a Taliban-run Afghanistan as an opportunity. But what about the countries in the – in the neighbourhood that are worried about it? I mean, Iran must be at the top of that list.

Aimen Dean Yeah. Iran – Iran is conflicted—and no pun intended—concerning Afghanistan. In one hand, they see them as an opportunity. But on the other hand, they see them as a threat, you know. And already, border clashes between the two shows that the Taliban bond I'm not going to take any dictates, you know, from Iran, whatsoever, and that the Taliban is demanding that Iran treat them as equals and not, like, you know, as, in the past, a group that just were supported by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.

So, the Iranians are afraid of the Suni power next door and often emboldened Pakistan because of it. But at the same time, this could be a potential customer for greater trade, you know, in the future. You know, it all depends, you know, on Iran's ability to, you know, bribe the Taliban enough. But also, they're afraid that if the Emiratis and the Saudis and the Turks are going to get there with better terms, then these countries will have, you know, a significant amount of leverage over the Taliban, that the Afghanistan will become a territory through which espionage and possibly even sabotage against Iran could originate from.

Thomas Small What about Russia? What do they feel about what's going – what – what's been going on there?

Aimen Dean All what Russia wants is for the Taliban to control the IMU, you know, which is the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, the Tajik jihadists, and others from not launching cross-border attacks into these countries or trying to destabilise these countries. These countries are considered to be satellite countries as far as Moscow is concerned.

Thomas Small They were members of the Soviet Union, these countries. They were parts of the Soviet Union. So, there's a reason for that.

Aimen Dean Exactly. They are considered to be the security buffer, you know, know as far as Russia is concerned. And so, the – the Russians are offering a infrastructure projects, you know, maintaining the dams in Sarawbi and in Daruntah, and some hydroelectric power projects, you know, in the country in return for a goodwill from the Taliban. And the Taliban basically are, you know, feeling that, well, you know, why not? Like, and I mean, if the, you know—. And this is why the Taliban are actually, you know, playing some game here. They are making, you know, all these groups a little bit visible on the border, you know. They're making the IMU visible. They are making the jihadi Tajiks visible in Badakshan. Also, in Badakshan—.

Thomas Small Threatening the Russians, reminding the Russians of the possible threat, so that the Russians will give them concessions.

Aimen Dean Exactly. And they're making the Uyghurs, you know, the members of the Islamic Turkistan, the Is – the Turkistan Islamic Movement, ITM and TIP, which is the Turkistan Islamic Party. There are Chinese jihadist groups from Xinjiang province, which is bordering Afghanistan from the Wakhan Corridor, they actually are parading them a little bit, you know, around that border area.

Thomas Small Reminding the Chinese of what – what might happen if they don't play along.

Aimen Dean Exactly. So, the Taliban are, you know, savvy, you know, political operators. They are not your average tower heads. Like, you know, they are more smarter than you would give them credit for. And they are using this leverage on both China and Russia to gain as much concessions as possible.

Thomas Small But would you say that, all things considered, China's going to end up being the winner? I mean, when you think of the rare earth minerals that Afghanistan is loaded with, lithium especially, all – all of which China needs to be a leading chip battery in lithium processing power, they're going to win aren't they, the Chinese? They – they're certainly not going to be hobbled as the Americans have been hobbled by ideological and moral scruples. They're going to do what needs to be done to get their hands on those resources.

Aimen Dean Not only that. But how many other, you know, multinational companies, you know, are going to be crazy enough to go out and operate in Afghanistan? Most of the mining companies are either from Australia, Canada, and America and Europe. And none of these have the risk appetite to go and actually operate in a very dangerous environment like Afghanistan. So, you really only have the Chinese and, to some extent, the South Koreans and the Japanese and the Malaysians, you know, who – and the Turks who are more than willing and happy to come and operate. So, these are the countries that are already courting the Taliban over the question of the minerals and the minerals rights.

Thomas Small Well, it's been a long twenty years, Aimen, since America decided to venture into Afghanistan, only to withdraw in—. Well, let's – let's put it bluntly. In defeat.

Aimen Dean Exactly.

Thomas Small What's the takeaway? Where did America go wrong? A lot of money was spent. Not much – not much return on that investment. Where did they go wrong?

Aimen Dean I think the Americans went wrong when they actually decided that, instead of waging a campaign to rebuild Afghanistan in terms of infrastructure, they decided to actually just fund projects that were designed to say to the Taliban "in your face." They waged the cultural war on Taliban values, forgetting that some of these values are also entrenched Afghan values. So, trying to teach modern arts to Afghan people and trying to talk to them about, you know, modern liberal, you know, ideals as – and spend money on these programs that were supposed to be allocated to infrastructure and for things, basically, that will actually bring them benefit, that alienated more Afghan and actually emboldened the Taliban.

Thomas Small Well, Aimen, it sounds to me like you're discussing something that some people call hyper-liberalism or radical liberalism.

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small The people who hate it the most, they call it woke-ry and all that sort of thing.

Aimen Dean Yes.

Thomas Small This hyper liberalism, Aimen, this institutional woke-ry, if you like, is really the guiding ideology behind America's global hegemony. And over the past thirty years, since the end of the Cold War, that weird nexus of radical liberalism, global capitalism, and idealistic militarism has evolved, but it remains the US government's guidance. The question is for how long.

We've just told the story of America's retreat from Afghanistan, but some might say we've told the story of its retreat from the Middle East entirely as it pivots towards Asia and, quite frankly, focuses more and more on itself. America is fraying. The result of huge social and economic stresses, which the COVID pandemic has only exacerbate. So, America's "empire" in the Middle East, is it drawing to a close?

What we want to do in this third season of Conflicted is to tell the story of the rise of that "empire" in the Middle East, which will force us to go back to the end of the Second World War and the beginning of the Cold War. What we want to do—and stick with us, dear listener, because what we're proposing is a historical and cultural trip that will stretch your imaginations—is to deep dive into the subterranean conflicts that some thinkers have said are ultimately to blame for the riven, blood-soaked Middle East that we see today. Deep cultural conflicts that have been called the clash of civilisations.

Well, there you go. We've finally gotten up to the present day when it comes to Afghanistan. And on the next episode of Conflicted, we are properly going to explore this idea of the clash of civilisations, setting out the course for the rest of season three.

But before we head off, there are a couple of exciting things we want to tell you about. First of all, as always, I want to encourage you to join our discussion group on Facebook. We have almost two thousand members now, and we love seeing all your love for the show. In the group, you can continue the conversation with your fellow Conflicted fans after each new episode and get all the news about what's coming up before anyone else. First being news of brand-new, bonus content that we will be launching for Conflicted biggest fans very soon. And we need the Facebook group's help to come up with what that bonus stuff might be.

[THEME IN]

So, find the Facebook group by searching for Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group and find out how to get access before anyone else.

And as always, make sure to follow us on Facebook and also Twitter by searching @MHConflicted. And please spread the word about Conflicted to all your friends. Word of mouth is still the best way to grow our community.

All right. That's everything for today. We'll be back in two weeks.

Conflicted is a message heard production. This episode was produced by the [late lamented] Jake Otajovic and Sondra Ferrari, and edited by Sandra Ferrari. Sandra Ferrari is also our executive producer. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

[THEME OUT]

Conflicted S2 E6 - Climate Crisis

As the financial crisis moved off the front pages, activists and politicians began to organise around another global emergency: climate change. In the final episode of this season of Conflicted, Aimen and Thomas sweat their way through the swamp of science and politics that surrounds the world’s most flammable issue.

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THOMAS: Hi everyone. Thomas Small here. I'm coming to you from deep undercover, literally. I'm sitting on my bed with the covers pulled over my head, trying my best to recreate the conditions of a recording studio. You see, the episode you're about to hear was recorded before lockdown, but before we kick it off, Aimen and I have a favor to ask. As we come to the end of season two, we're doing a survey to find out what you, dear listeners, enjoy about the show. What you want more of and where we can improve. The survey will only take about five to ten minutes to complete, and let's face it, you're at home twiddling your thumbs waiting for this global pandemic to end. So why not just click on the link in the show notes below or go to bit.ly/conflictedq. That's all lowercase bit.ly/conflictedq. And as a Thank You, anyone who completes the survey will be in with a chance of winning a copy of Aimen’s book, ‘Nine Lives: My time as MI6’s top spy inside Al-Qaeda’. Now on with the show.

THOMAS: Welcome to the last episode of this season of Conflicted. I am Thomas Small and of course Aimen Dean is here with me. Hi Aimen.

AIMEN: Hi Thomas.

THOMAS: How are you doing today? Don't say you're still alive. People are getting sick of that joke. [Aimen laughs] I noticed that there's more gray hair in your beard. Is that the toll of being a jihadist or the toll of being a father of two young children?

AIMEN: Um, I can tell you I've been through many wars and I can tell you nothing prepares you to raising children. [Thomas laughs] Raising children is worse than actually going to war. [Aimen Laughs]

THOMAS: All right, so, so far, we have been on a long journey of tracking the rise and demise, potentially the demise, of America's New World Order. In the last episode, we turned our attention to how the collapse of the American economy, or near collapse of the American economy in 2008, rippled around the globe. And today, to conclude the season, how is the history of the environmental movement connected to the history and politics of the New World Order? And what does the global climate crisis mean to the billions of people who don't live in what we call the Western World?

[Theme music plays]

THOMAS: So, we've been talking about the end of the New World Order, the end of liberal democracy, the end of capitalism. But with the climate crisis, are we actually witnessing the end of the world itself? This is potentially, Aimen, not disconnected to the question of the success of global capitalism, which along with its arguable benefits has also, or so the scientists tell us, had a pretty huge negative impact on the environment. Now, before we get into this, I want to say that this is a topic that many people today feel really passionately about. And I'm going to be honest, I don't always know what to think about it, because there's so much conflicting information out there. Not so much about the problem itself, about which the science is pretty settled. But about the best solution. Which is where, of course, science takes a back seat to politics. People are truly conflicted. So, Aimen, we've discussed this issue a hundred times, and some of your views might make people think you're a climate change denier, are you?

AIMEN: No, definitely not. I'm not a climate change denier. I am more or less skeptic about the solutions that some quarters are putting forward. So I am someone basically who believe, while I'm not a scientist, I believe that the total disruption of human economic activity all across the globe is not the answer.

THOMAS: Right. Okay, good. So you're not a climate change denier, and we will discuss later your views about the more radical suggestions that some voices have about how to deal with the crisis. But before we get there, I just think it's good to offer a brief history of the environmental movement. And the first thing to point out is that movement is actually very old. Its roots lie in the 19th century, the romantic movement really, which coincided with the industrial revolution. Poets and philosophers began to grow uneasy about the rising pollution that resulted from industrialization, not to mention the social and spiritual dislocations that followed. Legislation in Britain and elsewhere from the Victorian period onward, primarily over air pollution was passed, plus conservation societies were founded all across the world. In 1962 Rachel Carson's hugely influential book ‘Silent Spring’ kicked off the modern environmental movement, and the first earth day was celebrated in 1970. So the movement has really deep roots. But it was really the establishment of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 1988, followed by the first UN Earth Summit held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 where global action on climate change began. The Rio Summit was actually expressly a post-cold war effort to bring countries together so they can discuss how to cooperate on development issues, which involved what was then called sustainability, sustainable development. The countries wanted to make sure that prosperity rose, but they were concerned that with rising prosperity would be an increasing environmental degradation. This all eventually resulted in the Kyoto protocol of 1997, which has struggled to be ratified by the countries of the world, to put it lightly. Especially the United States has been an outlier. They have not signed the Kyoto protocol. This has all led in recent years to lots of activists being fed up with what they consider to be global inaction on a pressing problem and the growing popularity of green political parties and what's called the Green New Deal and other such policy proposals. So that's the history. And we can see that really the era of the New World Order, which has seen this explosion of capitalism and economic growth everywhere, has been shadowed all along by a growing concern. That it is not sustainable in the long run and that the Earth is suffering as a result of all our prosperity. Now, before we focus on the politics of climate change in the West, I'd like to talk about the Middle East. Ultimately, listeners come to you, Aimen [Aimen laughs] to hear about the Middle East. So how has the climate crisis and the facts around the climate crisis been a factor in everything that Conflicted has been discussing over the last two seasons?

AIMEN: Well, don't forget. We in the Middle East are the source, or the largest source of this pollution. [Aimen laughs]

THOMAS: Because of the oil that you're pumping out.

AIMEN: Oil and gas. So basically, we've been pumping oil now for almost a hundred years to the rest of the world. You know, basically the two thirds of the world energy exports, they are coming from the Middle East, of course. So if you look at Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE, Iraq, Iran, Libya, the production levels basically are just tremendous. So of course we are the producers, but we are not necessarily the polluters.

THOMAS: Well, you do consume a lot of petroleum yourselves, but of course it is the West and more recently, China.

AIMEN: And India

THOMAS: And India, Yes. So the source is the Middle East, but then from that source of the pollution is created everywhere. AIMEN: Yeah. So when I talk to people, whether it is in Saudi Arabia or Iraq or Iran, or Yemen, wherever, basically they say, look, you know, the World is angry about OPEC being one of the biggest polluters in the world because OPEC, you know, the organization for petroleum producing chemicals--

THOMAS: [Overlapping]The global petroleum cartel really.

AIMEN: Exactly to the point where there were even environmentalist who were shouting that OPEC is a terrorist organization because—

[Aimen and Thomas laugh]

THOMAS: Yet another terrorist organization from the Middle East.

AIMEN: Exactly. [laughs]

THOMAS: Gosh, you guys can't help yourself.

AIMEN: No, we can't. Because you know, it should have been disbanded and assets seized and all of that because unfortunately with the environment, the environmental message from the West that is actually seeping through to the people in the Middle East is extremely negative. And they feel that basically, that the environmentalist are hostile towards the Middle East because of so many, what I call intersectionalities of causes, that are dumping more and more of the world's problems on the Middle East.

THOMAS: Well, if rising carbon dioxide is seen as the major problem, then petroleum is the source of that problem.

AOMEN: Ah ha, but someone from the Middle East would say, well, excuse me. We were living in nomadic lives, or semi urban lives. We were agricultural, or pastoral or having livestock going around. Until you guys came discover the juice [Thomas laughs] beneath our feet and you decided to extract it and give us the money.

THOMAS: Well, let's not talk about the pollution itself. I want to talk about the effects of this pollution, i.e. climate change. And how climate change has influenced the things we've been talking about on Conflicted. I mean, it's absolutely true that in the first decade of the 21st century there was widespread drought in countries like Syria and Yemen. These are countries that became hotspots for the Arab Spring, and of course civil war. Has climate change played a role in that?

AIMEN: Of course. There is no question. That as the climate changes drastically, you start to have areas and pockets where drought follows, and crops fail. Of course not entirely the environment's fault, but also the management of the countries. Basically like Yemen and Syria are poorly managed as countries

THOMAS: Because of the drought, Syria specifically, a huge influx of rural residents moved into the cities. So there was a burgeoning population explosion in the cities. There weren't enough jobs for these people, which created the unrest that to some extent led to the Arab Spring and the civil war there.

AIMEN: Exactly. And actually, by pushing more and more rural people into the urban centers, they--these became the foot soldiers for the rebellion that followed in Syria and also for the civil war that followed in Yemen.

THOMAS: The urban population of Syria increased by 50% in a decade proceeded up to the civil war.

AIMEN: Exactly because of the fact that the crops were failing because of rising temperature as well as, less water and rainfall. The same thing happened in Yemen and Lebanon, for example. Lebanon was affected also. Lebanon now is becoming more and more a narco economy.

THOMAS: Drugs.

AIMEN: Drugs, yes. Do you know why?

THOMAS: No.

AIMEN: Because with water becoming more and more scarce, so what would you rather plant? Because if you spend so much on water, you might as well plant something that's actually have more intrinsic value. You know, like…

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Marijuana.

AIMEN: Marijuana and coke and opium, [Thomas laughs] than tomatoes, potatoes and peaches.

THOMAS: You can maximize your profit.

AIMEN: And the same thing in Yemen, they also turn to drugs instead of coffee.

THOMAS: Especially Khat.

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Yes.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] This very famous Yemeni drug where you see Yemenis with a big sort of bulb, bulge in their cheek. [Aimen laughs] They're constantly stoned.

AIMEN: Exactly. So what happened is it affected the populations. They became more and more lazy drug addicts. They becoming more and more reliant on the fact that this is a new source of income, but it is either criminal or semi-criminal and it's not sustainable. So actually the shortage of water and the rising temperature caused both Yemen and Syria partially to become failed States and caused Lebanon to become a narco economy, to some extent.

THOMAS: The ISIS phenomenon also involved water. It's not often talked about, but one of the things that ISIS managed to get a hold of during their conquest of much of Syria and Iraq were several dams up the Tigris and Euphrates River. Which you know, have seen in the last couple of decades, a precipitous drop in water level. So water was involved in the struggle with ISIS as well.

AIMEN: Indeed. In fact, if you go back to the Yemen episode in the first season, we talk about the fact that the entire Yemen war from the Saudi perspective, was based mostly on the fact that it is about water security for Saudi Arabia. And that's why, for example, if you look at countries like Oman. Oman is going to run out of oil in just 20 years or less.

THOMAS: And what will they do?

AIMEN: And already, basically they are enlisting the help of Saudi and Kuwaiti companies that specializing in building, and this is the new innovation, in building solar power plants on the sea that also does water desalination.

THOMAS: Water desalination is so important throughout the peninsula. I mean, I think something like 50% of Saudi drinking water comes from desalination.

AIMEN: [Overlapping] 95%.

THOMAS: 95%!

AIMEN: Saudi Arabia alone produce one third of the entire world output of desalinated water and the UAE produced one fifth. So the reality is that the entire peninsula produced almost 60% of the entire global consumption of desalinated water because there is that entire big peninsula, the size of India, not a single river or lake. So the water sources are very scarce. And therefore any drastic change in the environment could have negative effects, as well as some other positive effects that we'll talk about later. But the negative effect is the scarcity of water and rainfall. So here's a problem for Oman which will be the first oil rich Arab country to run out of oil in the near future, 20 years is nothing. We will see it in our own lifetimes, that in less than 20 years, the last oil tanker leaving Oman to export oil, we will see it.

THOMAS: And they’ll be waving it away with tears on their face wondering what does the future hold.

AIMEN: Exactly. So from now, they started using solar power to desalinate water.

THOMAS: Solar power to run desalination plants? But those plants require huge amounts of energy. Can solar power power them? AIMEN: Yes. If you have enough concentration. If you produce roughly between 500 and 600 megawatts of power per day. Then that's it. You have it.

THOMAS: I'm glad you brought up the subject of solar energy because green energy in general, as it increases in its sophistication and as the West especially begins to rely more and more upon it has an economic effect on the Middle East, because as demand for oil and gas decreases in the West, that will affect the economies of a country say like Saudi Arabia. Are they aware of this? What are they doing to prepare for this?

AIMEN: Why do you think Saudi Arabia is frantically trying to diversify their economy as soon as possible by relying on the religious tourism and expanding it from $16 billion per year to $63 billion per year in 2030? Why do you think they are trying to rely more on extraction of other minerals like gold, silver, uranium, phosphate, bauxite and other things? Why do you think they want to build these tourism cities like Amaala on the Red Sea and other places, and using their cultural sites and opening the visa system so anyone can visit Saudi Arabia? Why do you think they're doing it? Because basically they know that there will be a time when ships will sail away with the last bit of oil and that’s it.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Or oil will become not valuable enough.

AIMEN: Actually, many people are telling me oil will not become valuable enough. And I will say basically that is still far away in the future. Why? Because still there are two modes of transportation that cannot be powered by electricity yet. Maybe by natural gas, but not by electricity. Not yet.

THOMAS: Which are those?

AIMEN: Airplanes, commercial airplanes and commercial ships. So, commercial shipping there is no engine unless if you placed nuclear powered engines on the big ships which is most likely impossible to do that for thousands of tankers and massive container ships. THOMAS: I can imagine your old friends in Al-Qaeda would love to get their hands on a huge tanker with a nuclear bomb on board.

AIMEN: Exactly. It's a security hazard. So you will still have to rely on diesel engines and also kerosene engines for the aircrafts for a generation to come. Because no amount of electrical batteries can actually power a seven, triple seven plane to fly from London, let's say to New York, it’s impossible.

THOMAS: So, oil will remain in demand for the time being.

AIMEN: Yes. But the question is what other parts of the economy that we can, you know, remove the fossil fuel from? So we're talking about power generating so we can use solar, we can use wind.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Well, and Saudi Arabia has been investing tremendously in green energy itself, actually, especially solar power. I believe they're building right now the largest solar farm in the world.

AIMEN: Yes. Because why? We have an area in Saudi Arabia called the Empty Quarter. The Empty Quarter basically is nothing but the emptiest most desolate and inhospitable desert in the world. THOMAS: But you invoke the empty quarter and it gives me all sorts of romantic ideas of...

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Of Thesiger?

THOMAS: Wilfred Thesiger walking across the Empty Quarter to the mountains of Oman. Oh gosh, those were the days.

AIMEN: Exactly. [Laughs]

THOMAS: For the listener, Wilfred Thesiger, the last of the great British explorers, in whose fantastic book ‘Arabian Sands’, I really recommend this book ‘Arabians Sands’. He describes his journey across the Empty Quarter to Oman, and it's just a magnificent book.

AIMEN: I totally agree. Funnily enough you'd mentioned this, just now as we speak Saudi Arabia and Oman finishing the last touches on the road that actually track the Thesiger journey from the Empty Quarter, basically to Oman. So you can take it and you can basically bask in the beauty of the Empty Quarter.

THOMAS: Oh Aimen, I hope you and I can maybe take that journey together.

AIMEN: We will do, I have a car in Dubai in a park there. So we can go and take it and do it.

THOMAS: I'm going to hold you to that.

[Thomas and Aimen laugh]

AIMEN: So basically, the reality here is that the Empty Quarter have a huge amount of sunshine throughout the year, the rainfall there basically is extremely negligible and cloud cover is almost nonexistent. So, and what they do basically is the new technology with the solar farms, some of them make them 400% more efficient in terms of production. So Saudi Arabia basically could do two things: wind farms for the night because at night the wind pick up in the desert, and in the day the sun is shining. So basically you have two sources that are almost complimenting each other, throughout. And once you add the fact that the battery technology, thanks to the efforts of people like Elon Musk and his teams, the battery technology, if it become more and more efficient, then whatever's produced during the day that has an excess can be stored so it can be utilized during the night from the solar power. Also, Saudi Arabia, controversially, is investing in between 17 to 18 what they call mini nuclear reactors.

THOMAS: Mini nuclear reactors.

AIMEN: Why? Again, it's the water security issue here. Because you said that solar can produce, solar power in intense production can desalinate water. The problem with water desalination is that it requires intense source of power. So while 500 megawatts, or even one gigawatt can produce enough desalinated water for two hundred thousand, three hundred thousand people, so it's good for Oman. It can power a province with it and give enough drinking water for a province. The problem here is in Saudi Arabia, the population in 2030 we'll hit 40 or 45 million. So what you need is intense source of energy that is continuous in order to generate that. Also, the Saudis, and this is not in the public domain, but this idea is being floated by ministers and deputy ministers, and I've heard one from a deputy minister there. They are toying with the idea that the nuclear energy output could actually desalinate so much water that you can basically pump an entire river into the interior of Saudi Arabia to change the climate.

THOMAS: Well, this sounds like fantasy. This sounds like something out of Dune or something like that.

AIMEN: But funny enough, if you look at the numbers and if you look at basically the energy output from a nuclear reactor on the Red Sea and how it could basically pump water in huge quantities into the interior of Saudi Arabia, building oases in the desert, that can actually fundamentally change the environment and fight desertification. Then you see basically that we can fight climate change but in the Arab way, very entrepreneurial and very radical. [Aimen laughs]

THOMAS: Well, maybe the Arabian Peninsula will become heavily forested before I die. Wouldn't that be amazing?

AIMEN: That's what the prophet Mohammed himself said.

THOASM: The prophet Mohammed said that?

AIMEN: He said that the end of days won't come until the land of Arabia become once again lands of meadows and green hills and rivers.

THOMAS: Another prophecy, always prophecies with you Aimen.

AIMEN: What can I say? Look, I grew up in Saudi Arabia and then I joined Al-Qaeda, it's just nothing but prophesies there. But in order to convince the Arab World, which is very climate skeptic, by the way, to convince the Arab World that actually it is in their interest to look for greener sources of energy, even including nuclear, and I know it's controversial, but remember, in the Western World there is abundance of water, in that Arabian Peninsula, which is the size of India—

THOMAS: [Overlapping] There’s none...

AIMEN: There is no water. So nuclear is the safest and the greenest guaranteed source of power they could have in order to make sure they have enough water. Otherwise, if water isn't available in quantities enough for the population to drink, wars and ugly situations will emerge.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Mass destabilization.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: So the Saudis and other Middle Eastern states are pursuing policies in response to climate change. What about more widely? So what to say, the high-level people outside of the middle East, but not in the West, so China, India, et cetera, what sort of things are they telling you about the climate crisis? What is their attitude in general towards climate change?

AIMEN: The problem with India is that they, India and China, they are gripped by this idea of a conspiracy theory that the environmental movement is nothing but a ploy by the West in order to derail their economic progress. That's what I hear in China.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] They’re convinced of this.

AIMEN: And I hear also from other Indian entrepreneurs in Dubai whenever I meet them that, well, the environmental issue, they try and basically to strangle our economies by saying, well, it’s all the environment! You have to reduce your carbon footprint. But the problem here is, and when you talk, especially Indians, they say basically that on a government level, on a central government level, on New Delhi level, the initiatives are just really bureaucratic talk. The real initiatives are taken by small towns, villages and individuals who are installing solar panel on their rooftops. Even sometime in shantytowns they install, you know, not because it is environmentally friendly but it is pocket friendly. [Aimen and Thomas laugh] So it turns out basically that, you know, some of the charities that donate solar panels to these villages and towns are actually doing the right thing. But you know, here's the problem, is that it's really a drop in the ocean. You need to have a massive production of solar panels in India, as well as in China, and other places in order to convince them that, okay, this is economically viable, and the government can do it.

THOMAS: I want to return to what you were saying, how Indians and others, they have this conspiracy theory about the climate crisis and the politics of the climate crisis being exploited by the West to undercut Eastern prosperity and development. Because it's, I'm not saying that it's right, but geopolitically, the politics of climate change have been taking an interesting turn of late. For example, it is Western leaders and Western people in general who care most passionately about climate change. And it might be possible to spy within that concern something like cynical power politics going on. For example, the president of France, Macron, and other leaders of you know what, let's face it, these are relatively speaking, shrinking powers at the moment, France and Britain, and even the United States, relatively speaking, shrinking powers. The president of France threatened to spike a major EU trade deal with Brazil, unless Brazil put an end to rainforest clearance. And some analysts are beginning to wonder, so just as the threat of the Soviet Union used to be invoked to unite the West around ideas of human rights as a means of projecting and shoring up their global power in the 20th century, the question is, is the climate crisis now being invoked by primarily Western powers to do something like the same thing? If the West can rally around climate crisis, can they force the Eastern world to adopt policies that might protect Western power? AIMEN: That's what I hear in places like Beijing, in places like Delhi and Bombay, or Mumbai as they call it now, and in places like Riyadh and Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

THOMAS: And in in your analysis is there's some reason to worry about this?

AIMEN: [Overlapping] That they say that the way they are doing it, which is do it now impose taxes like this. We will impose taxes on carbon, we will impose taxes on plastic, we will do this, this and that, I mean, they believe that this is all designed in order to assert Western hegemony. That is the problem here is that for many of them, and especially when you talk to policymakers in the East, whether from China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, or in the Middle East itself, they will tell you basically that the problem here is that the message that is coming from the West is rather confused and aggressive at the same time. It's like, we're going to die. But we look around and we don't see that the changes are so drastic that we're going to die. That the world will end, but we don't see this around us. We are not seeing anything in the horizon approaching slowly with the word doom written in cloud formation. [Thomas and Aimen Laugh] So we don't see it. So, but nonetheless, they are, you know, doing it in a way to try to push us around to adopt certain economic and regulatory standards. And of course, we'd have to push back because what they say, we already are taking measures to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. Not because of the climate change, but because fossil fuels will run out eventually. So we need to start from now. So it's an economic imperative, that's the first thing. The second thing is a health imperative. In China in particular they are in a hurry actually to replace as many of their coal power stations, which they are building still, but they are trying to replace them, especially around the big cities, with either natural gas, solar, wind and nuclear.

THOMAS: But this is to protect people's health.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Cause air pollution is a huge problem in that part of the world.

AIMEN: I mean, every time I go to Beijing, and I go to Beijing a lot every year. Not for the past months, just for disclaimer because of the coronavirus. But, every time my poor wife have to deal with the fact that every time I come back from Beijing, I suffer for two or three days from nosebleed.

THOMAS: From the pollution.

AIMEN: From the pollution.

THOMAS: Ugh.

AIMEN: And so, you know, the pollution is stabbing inside my nose. So of course that's why they want to do it. They want to make sure that their skies are clear. This is also what they're trying to do in New Delhi also. So the pollution is a health issue and that's how I think swe should be selling this to the rest of the world. It's an economic issue, as well as it is a health issue.

THOMAS: Well, instead of selling it in that way in the West, at the moment, people who you know, are increasingly concerned about climate change. They have adopted a different rhetoric, a rhetoric which I think--

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Doom and gloom.

THOMAS: A doom and gloom rhetoric, let's call it. And, I think that this rhetoric is at the moment, particularly associated with this movement Extinction Rebellion. You know, the global environmentalist movement. Which, you know, depending on your point of view, is either notorious or inspiring, which started actually here in London. And I actually can remember first encountering Extinction Rebellion when in April 2019 they took over Oxford Circus, a big sort of roundabout in the center of London near where I work, and I would come up from the Oxford Circus tube station and I saw them there. They’d sort of camped out in the middle of this huge intersection. They’d erected tents and they created this sort of platform and there was sort of clownish hijinks going on. It was a very strange, rather phantasmagoric scene of, on the one hand, political activists on the other hand, what-- sort of hipster entertainers. It was weird. And their rhetoric was certainly very, very, I would say extreme, trying to encourage us all to panic. They were saying, the end of the world is nigh. We haven't done anything really to address it. We must start doing so now. Now I'd like to talk about the way Extinction Rebellion is organized. It's very interesting. There was a quote from The Economist that says, ‘Whereas the occupy movement’, which as it happens we discussed in the previous episode, ‘a similar outfit became bogged down in cumbersome people's assemblies, Extinction Rebellion has adopted an approach called Holacracy. Holacracy claims to spread power across employees by ditching traditional management hierarchies in favor of semi-autonomous circles. In Extinction Rebellion's case, this amounts to what are in effect franchises of the main brand which plan and carry out their own protests following a loose set of rules set out by the main group’. Now, when I read that, I thought I must ask Aimen because that sounds a little bit like the way Al-Qaeda is managed. Are Extinction Rebellion, just terrorists Aimen?

AIMEN: I mean, look at the similarities between the two. You know, from a rhetoric point of view, I'm not talking about action. I'm talking about rhetoric. Both are saying that the world's going to end. [Aimen and Thomas laugh] Both have prophecies of doom and gloom. Both believe that their cause is righteous and anyone basically who deny their cause is a monster. So you know, the problem here is, and both of them have a defined enemy. My problem is that they believe somehow that the enemy is the human race. And you know, the use of rhetoric that the world is gonna end, that we will have an environmental catastrophe of biblical proportions in 12 years time and that we will all die, and if we don't do anything right now. I don't believe that even, if the entire world decarbonized tonight, and we all went to the stone age again tonight, that it will slow basically the climate change in 12 years. If there is a catastrophe, that the catastrophe wouldn't happen. So it's kind of irrational.

THOMAS: Yes. Al-Qaida and Extinction Rebellion both think the world is going to end. One difference to be fair to Extinction Rebellion is that they're basing their prophecy, if you like, however perhaps exaggerated it might be, on scientific facts. Unlike Al-Qaeda who are being inspired more by religious texts and the religious prophecies. The thing about Extinction Rebellion and other such groups is that though they are responding to a scientific consensus about climate change, they are themselves actually a political group, a political activist group. Which is why their organization is actually interesting. So if we're going out on a limb here and saying that Extinction Rebellion, at least in its organizational structure, is similar to a group like Al-Qaeda, I want to ask you, what did jihadists think about climate change?

AIMEN: I'm sure the listener will be baffled by the fact that Osama Bin Laden wrote a letter to Barack Obama asking him to take the environmental crisis seriously.

[Aimen and Thomas laugh]

THOMAS: In fact, it's true, Aimen. And in that letter, Osama bin Laden actually calls on the American people to launch a revolution in the name of the environmental crisis.

AIMEN: So no one should actually berate us for comparing Extinction Rebellion with Al-Qaeda. Look, when it comes to Extinction Rebellion, I admire what they do. I understand why they are doing it. And it's a great cause. It's an honest cause, it’s a noble cause. I don't doubt their intentions. But unfortunately, I doubt their methods. And there is a lot of naivety also there.

THOMAS: You know, Extinction Rebellion was founded initially by an organization called Compassionate Revolution, whose webpage states that it was birthed in the occupy movement, and there are, as you say, ideological similarities. Both movements reject capitalism, they both believe that capitalism is incompatible with democracy as they understand it. And the Occupy Movement was also explicitly environmentalist at times. And Extinction Rebellion’s slogan is ‘System change, not climate change. Only revolution will save us now’. So if we're talking about ideologies, as we often do here on Conflicted, this is as a political ideology revolutionary.

AIMEN: And that's why their message has been the most harmful to the environmental cause. No group that ever advocated for combating climate change has done more harm to the cause of combating climate change, like the Extinction Rebellion.

THOMAS: Because of the panic they're trying to foment?

AIMEN: Because of the panic and because of the message and the intersectionality of the message. The problem is the intersectionality here. Where you have vegans, basically uniting with animal rights movements, I think, basically with anti-capitalist movements, with the pro-environmental movement, and then basically have them all together threatening the system that sustains the global economy as it is. And the problem is when you try to sell this to people in India or Africa or the Middle East or China or Southeast Asia or Pakistan, I'm talking about the most, and Bangladesh, the most populous nations of the world, two-thirds of the humanity, when you try to sell these ideas to them, it's not just only coming as, you know, the single issue of the environment it’s a whole package. You need to stop eating fish, you need to stop eating meat, you need to stop eating honey even, you shouldn't wear leather, you shouldn't eat dairy, milk, ice cream, whatever. And so basically someone from Saudi Arabia or someone from the deserts of Africa will look at you and say, okay, it's not green where I am, unless if you actually make a rain 24/7 so I can grow tomatoes and cucumbers, you know, then I'm going to eat the desert animals, like the camels and the goats or whatever, that it feed on scarce desert vegetation which is not suitable for human consumption.

THOMAS: So Extinction Rebellion's rhetoric isn't really landing in the developing world, but in the Western world--

AIMEN: [Overlapping] It’s rejected—it’s not landing, it’s actually viewed as a joke. [Aimen and Thomas laugh]

THOMAS: But in the West it is not viewed as a joke. I mean, anecdotally, I can just say, based on friends of mine who are really passionate about this and Extinction Rebellion's message is really landing with them. They are scared. They are panicked and they are changing their lifestyles in response to this. They really are, the amount of vegans, the amount of people who they no longer buy things from Amazon. They no longer buy new things at all. They go to charity shops more and more. They just, you know, it really is a movement. It's almost like a spiritual movement.

AIMEN: And that's a problem, it’s becoming like a cult. To some extent.

THOMAS: That's a negative way of putting it out, but I actually am, I'm often very impressed by, especially my younger friends, who are able to summon the will from within them to live in a more sustainable way, which after all, is not a bad thing. I find myself not as able to do so.

AIMEN: Yeah. But the problem here is you can't come from an environment like Europe and North America, which is lush, green, abundance of water, abundance of vegetation.

THOMAS: And already post-industrial.

AIMEN: Exactly. And demand that two thirds of humanity who have access to none of these, not abundance of water and not abundance of vegetation, not abundance of, we're talking here about 3 billion people depend on the ocean for their livelihoods in terms of food and protein intake. Because you can't go to the coast of Somalia, Mozambique, Madagascar, the Maldives, Indonesia, Malaysia, all of these places and tell them, stop eating fish.

THOMAS: To be fair to them, they are mainly lobbying their own governments and their own politicians to implement new and more radical policies. But ultimately what they would like is for those politicians to create a global strategy for combating the climate crisis along the lines they wish. And that would entail the Western World ganging up to some extent on, the rest of the world.

AIMEN: Look I have lived a life where I've spent years in four different war zones, and then I spent two years in the banking sector. I spent years in multiple countries from the West to the East. And I've been in different jobs from the spiritual to the economic, to the semi scientific when I was actually building, you know, chemical weapons for Al-Qaeda. In a sense, over 40 years lifetime, you accumulate some, I won’t call it wisdom, but I will call it basically...

THOMAS: Perspective.

AIMEN: Perspective and the perspective here is this: climate change is a crisis, that I accept. What I don't accept is panic. So how do I propose to deal with it?

THOMAS: Exactly. How do you propose?

AIMEN: Two principals that you always apply in business. And you apply in your own personal life and you can apply to every situation, including governance. The first one is crisis management, and the second principle is business continuity.

THOMAS: How can these two principles taken from business help us address the climate crisis?

AIMEN: Okay. Let's say basically that we have a factory that, let's say makes ice cream. And suddenly there was a hurricane that affected the dairy farm that was actually supplying the factory. It affected some of the employees…

THOMAS: [Overlapping] The supply chain has been disrupted.

AIMEN: Yeah, the supply chain has been disrupted. So what do you do? Already there is a plan. There is a contingency that should the supply chain be disrupted. Okay. Do we have enough in reserves for a day or two or three to keep the factory running? If there are shortage of employees, do we have any people basically who can come and fill the capacity? What about the road network, can we take alternative roads? Because you need to stay in business even if you know, okay. If we have to reduce capacity because we are really affected by the catastrophic climate disaster, how do we do it? So basically, we reduce the capacity by 10%, 20%, 30%, even 50% but let us actually keep working at 50% capacity in order to recover later. So this is called crisis management and business continuity.

THOMAS: So basically, the world needs to come together and say climate change is real, but in order to establish as much continuity in prosperity that we can, we need to manage this crisis. Not freak out about it and adopt radical revolutionary solutions. AIMEN: Yeah, because imagine two scenarios here. Okay. Let's say we are in a concert. And some terrorists basically pulled out a knife and start stabbing others there in the corner of that concert.

THOMAS: I can imagine that happening.

AIMEN: It's happened, unfortunately. So, what happens is if the ushers and the security manager of the venue is clever, he will announce quickly on the megaphone that ‘ladies and gentlemen, please proceed to the gates, there is an emergency. It's only an accident. There is nothing to worry about, but just proceed to all the emergency exits in an orderly fashion.’ It's a calming, calm, measured thing and you don't basically disclose the entire information because people will panic. You don't shout attack, attack, flee for your lives. What's going to happen to stampede will kill 10 times more people than the stabbing incident itself would have killed. See, these are the two differences here. Panic kills. THOMAS: But people who are advocating, well, let's say the people who are panicking say, look, there is no solution. We just need to stop with all of our consumptions. Stop with all of our industry. Stop with all of our resource extraction. We need to stop.

AIMEN: Okay.

THOMAS: If not, what do you suggest? What do you put your faith in to save us from what you acknowledge is a climate crisis?

AIMEN: Technology, we should put our faith in technology, in innovation going forward. Because just as I was talking to you minutes ago when I said that in Saudi Arabia they are actually experimenting with new solar power technology that is 400% more efficient, and if we are seeing that roads can be built from plastic waste, and even install solar panels on these roads so actually a static infrastructure become more useful, if we are looking at carbon capture technology, which one plant, one plant alone would replace the need for 40 million trees to suck the carbon out of thin air and sequester it or use it as when you mix it as hydrogen become a carbon neutral fuel. These are technologies now and in the last episode I told you basically that the technology in the past 10 years is greater than the technology of the previous hundred years.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] And the previous hundred years greater than the previous 10,000.

AIMEN: Exactly, so what's going to happen in the next 10 years? In the next 10 years, as you know, when humans feel the need, and they say that the need is the mother of all invention, when humans feel the need to come up with solutions, they will come up with solutions. Bill Gates is one of the great investors in this new technology of carbon capture. And carbon capture technology is proving to be more and more efficient than just only planting trees. I actually, I'm all for planting trees. But one plant over three or four acres of land could actually suck more carbon than 600,000 acres of forested area.

THOMAS: That's a lot of carbon sucking.

AIMEN: Exactly. Which we can sequester it in the ground safely, especially in empty oil fields. In empty previous extracted oil fields. Or we can basically mix it with hydrogen and basically it become a carbon neutral to some extent, carbon neutral fuel.

THOMAS: So you put your faith in technology, but Aimen, you're a Muslim. You're supposed to put your faith in God, and here you are sounding like some Silicon Valley techno futurist bro.

AIMEN: Oh, well, you know, in my own personal belief, I believe it's God who guided us towards this technology. God is merciful. Yes, he saw that how we are destroying his beautiful creation, but at the same time, he is whispering into our minds the solutions for it. So, I'm not saying Silicon Valley is receiving direct a star link from God. But I'm saying here is that there is a solution and the solution is technology and human innovation. Those who say stop everything right now. Unfortunately, they are actually dooming us even further, not actually providing any solution. You can shout in the streets all you want. You can shout until your lungs explode, but shouting will not get us anywhere. Panicking will not get us anywhere. Blockading airports and roads and bridges and subway trains and underground trains will not get us anywhere.

THOMAS: Well, I agree with you. I think that panic isn't the solution. But as for your faith in technology, mm, you might be an optimistic Muslim, but I think I'm more of a pessimistic Christian and I'm not sure that I put my faith in Silicon Valley and men like Elon Musk. I just can't bring myself to do it. I sort of think we probably are going to be soon facing a much more catastrophic change in political economies, change in our levels of consumption. I mean if you ask me, I tend to sympathize with those voices from the 19th century romantic movement that sees as a consequence of this industry and the consequence of our rising prosperity, see something like an essential spiritual problem at work there. That is now manifesting itself outside of ourselves. And, and for me, a spiritual problem really has a spiritual solution. I don't know what that solution is and it probably just muddies the water even further to bring it up. But the part of the Extinction Rebellion movement that, beyond the panic, is encouraging people really to spiritually transform, they might not think of it in that way, but consume less, buy less, save, live in greater harmony with the environment. That strikes me as at least part of the solution.

AIMEN: I agree. But still, I have to say that this message does not transcend the borders of the Western World. It's still a Western mindset, a Western white man savior mentality. I'm sorry to say.

THOMAS: Oh no!

AIMEN: It's still, I'm just saying from the point of view of people I talk to in the Middle East and China, in India and Africa. People just basically are not buying it.

THOMAS: The climate crisis is the new white man's burden. And we're going to bring the light of revolutionary environmentalist change to you, brown and black people who don't know any better.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: Oh god, that's so depressing.

AIMEN: I know but that's the reality. Like when you talk to an Arab, they are very optimistic. They will say, oh look, we are using, yes, we are getting the carbon, hydrocarbons out of the ground. We are extracting, we're making money, but what we are doing with it, we are saving. We are investing. We are basically buying more technology to replace our petrol power the electricity generators with solar, wind and nuclear. So we may survive, and we have water. So basically whenever you told them, yeah, but the West is saying though, they will immediately wave their hands specifically and say, let the West shut up. They have all the water, we have none. So they should shut up. Because we have far more pressing problems than theirs and we know how to deal with ours. Let them deal with theirs. That’s the message I'm hearing.

THOMAS: So Aimen, Extinction Rebellion's rhetoric isn't appealing to the non-Western world, as you say. So how could Western environmentalists change their message to appeal to the East? You mentioned earlier they could perhaps position their message along the lines of health, of human health.

AIMEN: What they need to do is to focus on the environment and the environment only, first of all. There is no need for the intersectionality of causes, like veganism and socialism and all of these things, just drop it. It's not going to sell in the rest of the world. That's the first thing. Second thing is to tell the people it is for their own health. And the second thing is for their own survival. So for example, if I'm going to convince the government of Bangladesh for example, that it is in their own interest of the government of Bangladesh to implement environmentally friendly policies because they are one of the first countries that will suffer if the sea levels rises because they are a very low country, the possibility of flooding that could displace tens of millions. THOMAS: This is the strategy that has largely been pursued by the UN and other global bodies.

AIMEN: Exactly. Because it's a calm measured way of approaching this. THOMAS: So on balance then you're actually rather, you're not antipathetic to the environmentalist movement more generally. You know, the moderate bureaucratic, almost way that it has been pursued over the last few decades. It's these more radical voices that have sprung up in recent years that you don't really think are on the right track

AIMEN: Because you can’t go to people in developing countries and tell them that sorry, you will never reach the prosperity that we ever achieved because you know what? The world is about to end. Sorry you missed your spot; sorry you missed your time. But that’s it, we're going to switch off the tap of prosperity. You know, and you have to live in the stone age. This is a message that has coming in into the rest of the world, and the rest of the world is giving the middle finger back.

THOMAS: So, Aimen, what do we do?

AIMEN: Just don't panic. My fear, Thomas here, is that I've been in an organization that is classified as terrorists, which is Al-Qaeda. And what I'm afraid is that as movements like Extinction Rebellion and others are framing the human race as the enemy and with the rhetoric going about how humans are going to doom the world and end the world, there would be some young minds who are genius and clever, but nonetheless isolated and you know, full of conspiracy theories in their heads. They might just decide together to develop a virus and just release it into the population in order to reduce the human population or even end it. And they see this as a favor. Already there is a university professor here in London, she came up with a book just recently where she argues that we should stop all having babies and let the human race die so the planet may survive. Ideas like this are becoming normative.

THOMAS: It's true. I mean, I think you do encounter such ideas more and more regularly. And I can imagine that certain impressionable people, maybe the same sword who might initially get involved in a mosque study circle to increase their own piety. And then they hear more and more of this sort of conspiratorial apocalyptic rhetoric from the Islamist right, or Islamist left or whatever you want to call it. And it might, you know, they might find themselves on a road that leads to evermore extremism that sometimes does result in, in violence.

AIMEN: In fact, whenever I talk to my clients either in the private or public sector when it come to counter terrorism issues, they actually express the fact that they are seeing the embryonic stages of environmental terrorism because that rhetoric is so vicious. Right now from minority of environmental activist.

THOMAS: A huge minority of them-- But just like Muslims--

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Exactly.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] A huge minority of Muslims get involved in Islamist violence, but it causes a big problem.

AIMEN: A small minority, not a huge minority.

THOMAS: That's an interesting question semantically. A very small minority of Muslims are seduced by Islamist violence, but it causes a big problem.

AIMEN: Exactly the same thing with the environmentalist movement. We will have a small minority who would actually most likely end up resorting to violence and terrorism in the future, possibly the near future. Because if we have this deadline of 12 years unfortunately being propagated by politicians who should know better, you end up pushing agitated people towards violence and we need to, this is why I'm saying we shouldn't panic. People just please calm down your rhetoric. We're not gonna die. We will survive and don't worry. We will survive.

THOMAS: So if it is true that it is the climate change political rhetoric that might unite a diminishing West and allow them to claw back some of the power they've been losing of late, it might be that weirdly enough, environmentalism becomes the ideological underpinning of the New World Order. We are certainly living in a world very different Aimen from the one that we grew up in. George H. W Bush’s New World Order didn't turn out as he planned, but nobody can doubt, compared to the cold war when the globe was split between the two superpowers of America and the Soviet Union, or even to the 90’s when for a brief moment, America was totally dominant, today following everything we've touched on over the course of two seasons now, 9/11, the War on Terror, the rise of China, the return of Russia, the clash between Iran and Saudi Arabia in the oil rich Gulf and the twin crises of global capitalism and climate change, we're in a much more multipolar world than we were. A world that remains conflicted.

[Outro Music Plays]

THOMAS: Dear listener, thank you so much for sticking with us throughout this season of Conflicted. We hope you've enjoyed it and will keep listening when we come back for our third season. And don't worry, you won't have to wait very long this time. To hear the details as soon as we announce them, subscribe to the show in your podcast app and follow us on social media. You can find us on Facebook and Twitter at MHconflicted. And of course, once again, you can win a book connected to this episode. It's called ‘Wilding’ by Isabella Tree. And it is a beautifully written description of a pioneering rewilding project, a reminder of the power of nature to heal itself if human beings step back and let it happen. To have a chance to win it, join our discussion group on Facebook before the 29th of April. You can find it by searching ‘Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group’. Conflicted is a Message Heard production. It's produced by Sandra Ferrari and Jake Otajovic. Edited by Sandra Ferrari. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley. Thank you again. My name is Thomas Small and Aimen and I will be back soon. Stay tuned.

AIMEN: Goodbye.

Conflicted S2 E5 - Wall Street

From a bomb maker to double agent to… banker?

In this episode, Aimen draws on his experience as a helping banks combat financial terrosism as our hosts explore the 2008 Financial Crisis and its impact on the world order.

---

THOMAS: Hello and welcome back. You are listening to Conflicted. My name is Thomas Small and with me, of course, is my co-host, Aimen Dean. How are you doing today, Aimen?

AIMEN: I'm still alive.

THOMAS: Still alive. Thank God. But where would we be without you, Aimen?

AIMEN: The land of the living perhaps? [laughs]

THOMAS: Oh, I think I'm there, but I'm not, I can't ever be quite sure. So, in season two of conflicted so far, we have been focusing on how America has been faring over the last few decades in its attempt to establish their New World Order. We've examined all three of their main objectives to achieve this. Essentially, those were: first sorting out the Middle East, bringing neo-liberalism to Russia, and establishing a new relationship with them after the Cold War, and as we learned in the last episode, bringing China in from the cold and integrating it into the global economic system. We learned about China's New Silk Road, which is their initiative to basically take control of continental Eurasian trade, which if successful could create a Chinese new world order to rival America's. In this episode, America is more clearly in our sights. We'll go back to 2008, the last time everyone thought the world was about to end, the financial world at least. Yes, I mean the credit crisis of 2008 and the impact it had on the West's hopes of a global neo-liberal order.

[Theme Plays]

THOMAS: So Aimen, we're talking about banking today. What makes you an expert on banking? I understand that after you left your job as a double agent for the security services working inside Al-Qaeda, you became a banker. [Aimen laughs] How did that happen?

AIMEN: Well, it's basically exchanging one form of terrorism to another.

THOMAS: That old chestnut. You love that joke.

AIMEN: I love that joke, because it's almost true. Actually, most funny jokes are the true jokes. But in reality, when I went into the banking sector, after I left the service of MI6 and MI5, I actually was there fulfilling three functions. So the first function is the global strategic security function. The bank that I went to work for, which was one of the biggest global banks, was attacked before in terms of terrorism and they lost many staff and they lost their entire headquarters, in one of their middle Eastern countries.

THOMAS: I mean, they were, they were actually the victim of a terrorist bombing.

AIMEN: Indeed. So that's the first function I fulfilled. The second function is terrorism finance. So, no I wasn’t--

THOMAS: [Overlapping] You financed terrorism? Wow!

AIMEN: No, no, no. Okay, okay, okay, I rephrase here. I rephrase. It's CTF or counter terrorism finance.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Oh that’s less interesting. Oh that’s too bad.

AIMEN: Making sure, basically that high-net worth individuals or charities that are operating within the Middle East and beyond are not exactly dabbling in financing terrorists.

THOMAS: And the third thing you were doing?

AIMEN: And the third thing basically is investigating companies, high net worth individuals, and sometime even banks that are operating within the Middle East for signs of either corruption, money laundering, and understanding basically how they are operating to make sure basically that there is no corruption or money laundering going on.

THOMAS: Corruption amongst high net worth individuals in the Middle East. That must've kept you busy. Now, [Aimen laughs] now when you joined the banking system, what were your first impressions of it? How was it different from the worlds you had been inhabiting in Al-Qaeda and in MI6?

AIMEN: I felt basically there is no difference between them and Al-Qaida except they’re wearing suits.

[laughter]

AIMEN: But you know, I felt, of course it's full of nerds, geeks, it's full of also lawyers.

THOMAS: Well you must have felt right at home.

AIMEN: [laughs] Yes, and one of the things is that I felt that basically that my job was quite interesting because, you know, I was moving between these three functions seamlessly. Between the security function into the counter terrorism finance function into the investigative, financial investigative function. And of course, basically I had to learn a lot. You know, I had to be mentored by other people who will teach me about finance, how banking works. How financial services work, how insurance work in order to understand how financial fraud and insurance fraud work. So it was a learning curve—

THOMAS: A steep learning curve, but presumably during your times as a terrorist and as a double agent, you were aware of how terrorist financing happens from that side. I mean, were you ever involved?

AIMEN: I was involved in it, actually. [Laughs]

THOMAS: How did that involvement work?

AIMEN: Well, we used to infiltrate charities that were operating basically in places like Afghanistan or Azerbaijan and Georgia on behalf of the Chechens or in the Philippines or in Kenya on behalf of the Somali terrorists. So basically in order to divert charitable funds and resources and donations…

THOMAS: [Overlapping] These are donations given with goodwill from people. They didn't necessarily know that you were there pocketing the money and spending it on building bombs.

AIMEN: Ah, yeah, of course. It was all done, you know, without the full knowledge of the poor donors who were thinking basically it's going to buy, you know, tents and medicine for flood victims in Afghanistan or in Somalia.

THOMAS: So you knew about terrorist financing from the terrorism side, and it was a steep learning curve to come up to speed with how the banking system works. But tell us more. How did you use the resources of banks to help governments fight terrorist financing globally?

AIMEN: Well, because basically I came with the knowledge of how terrorists move money. And then I came into a bank where they told me basically about, you know, the basics of banking. And then, I combined the two together and I started to come up with ideas of how to spot what we call hotspots of terrorism activity in terms of finance. And so we can shut them down, we can track them down. And this is when you start to see an evolution. Where the banks started to become in some countries different from others, of course, but in some countries, the banks became the eyes and ears of governments to track down the movements of individuals, not only involved in terrorism, but sometime even involved in drugs and involved in child sex trafficking because there are certain hotspots around the world where these people congregate.

THOMAS: Yes, so tell, you say you came up with ideas. What was your big idea? What ultimately, what tool did you create that allowed you to combat terrorist financing from within the bank?

AIMEN: Okay, so banks utilise something called data mining software. They are expensive. I can tell you that they cost millions of pounds or dollars or whatever. So, but the problem is, data mining is like looking into 30 needles in a billion haystacks.

THOMAS: Wow, that sounds like a big job.

AIMEN: Yeah. Therefore you still need human intelligence to direct or zoom in on certain specific spots around the world in order for the data mining software to actually yield the tangible results.

THOMAS: You need to find the right haystack so you can focus on the right needles.

AIMEN: So let's take an example of ISIS. Since ISIS now is almost destroyed, almost, like physically destroyed. In hibernation, I would say.

THOMAS: [overlapping] Yeah for now…

AIMEN: So let's take an example. A certain bank here in the UK with a very expensive data mining software operation. They were thinking logically, rather than thinking as a terrorist. [Thomas laughs] So basically, they decided that, okay, let's look at the cities on the Turkish Syrian border. If any of our debit or credit cards are used there in ATMS or in shops or at hotels or whatever, then we flag it up.

THOMAS: And these aren't major cities actually along the border.

AIMEN: Yeah cities like Urfa, cities like Gaziantep, like Kilis ,like Reyhanli …

THOMAS: Provincial cities, Turkish provincial cities.

AIMEN: So, but they all close to the Turkish-Syrian border. So it started to give them results, but the vast majority were useless results because why? It turns out basically that these cards belong to British citizens or British residents who are of Kurdish origins. And they are going there to visit their families.

THOMAS: So not terrorists.

AIMEN: They're not terrorists at all.

THOMAS: Tourists, really.

AIMEN: Tourists, not tourists only, but actually visitors, expatriates in the UK who are visiting their families for the summer or whatever. So, you know, the results were so disappointing. So, and I walk in, and I say, basically, you are looking at the wrong place. You know, there is, you have to look at Istanbul. So I remember, you know, the banker who I was dealing with, he was saying, come on Aimen. Istanbul at any given day, including residents, tourists, and visitors and day workers there will be 30 million people there. So, you know, it's impossible. I said, no, no, no, no. So I took him up, and I'm not going to mention the name of the place so they don't avoid it anymore.

THOMAS: Fair enough, fair enough, the terrorists don’t avoid it.

AIMEN: So yeah. But I draw a 16-block radius to him on the map of Istanbul. And I said, this is where you will get results.

THOMAS: And you know this, I mean this reminds me of what you were saying in episode one of this season when you were talking about being a private spy today when you would go to cities and you would talk to taxi drivers and other such people to find out where the terrorists in that city are congregating. So this is how you can use this knowledge for practical purposes with the bank. You say they're here. Look here.

AIMEN: Exactly. So when I draw that square over 16 blocks radius. They said, okay, that's, that's manageable. It's not an entire mega city like Istanbul, which is, you know, if you include Istanbul in Europe, it would be the largest city in Europe. So basically, he said, you know, that's fine. So they looked at the 16-block radius. They asked me the question, of course, how do you know? So I said, because I've been there myself. I went there, I infiltrated the place. It is an elevated place; you don't end up there by mistake. Tourists don't go there. You only go there because you want to go there. And because you have business there. It's a place basically where jihadist congregate, where immigrants from Muslim countries and…

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Because there are radical mosques there? Because…

AIMEN: Radical mosques, you know…

THOMAS: Safe houses…

AIMEN: Safe houses, you know, associations that support them. So as soon as they implemented that they started to get tangible results that ended up basically with even sometime families, UK based families, being intercepted by the Turks before they reach ISIS and then deported back to the UK.

THOMAS: To face justice here.

AIMEN: Well, not necessarily because they haven't committed a crime yet. But the idea is to bring them back, confiscate their passports, make sure they don't travel to join ISIS. So in other words, basically it really saves lives. Because these families could have been killed by the coalition bombs there when ISIS were bombed.

THOMAS: Not to mention the people they might've killed themselves.

AIMEN: Yes, exactly. So there is…so when you talk about bank saving lives… [laughs]

THOMAS: People usually don't talk about that Aimen.

[laughter]

Aimen: Indeed, but this is basically part of their CSR, their Corporate Social Responsibility. That they make sure that none of their customers is dabbling in terrorism. And this applies also to areas of concentration where drug dealings takes place. So they take the profile of the individual, let's say, basically, they wouldn't necessarily take an individual who have a Turkish surname and say, Oh, he's there, let's investigate. But if there is someone basically with an English surname, a French surname, a Pakistani surname, an Algerian surname, but end up in that area in Turkey, then…

THOMAS: It's a red flag.

AIMEN: It’s a red flag. So profiling works. It saved lives.

THOMAS: So that's Istanbul. What other cities were you able to sort of target…?

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Well Karachi, Manila, you know, in Nairobi in Kenya. So basically there are many places around the world, even places that you would think it is kind of benign, but nonetheless, there is a concentration of certain individuals there or certain activities there. Even in Bangkok for example. I mean, there are places that are famous like you know for people who unfortunately go and have, you know, inappropriate sexual relationship with young girls. So, you know…

THOMAS: To put it lightly.

AIMEN: Yeah, to put it lightly. So this is where, you know, you can really you know…

THOMAS: Infiltrate and well, what's the word you can really…

AIMEN: Detect.

THOMAS: Yeah, detect.

AIMEN: This is how you can detect terrorism intention. So, and therefore, basically you can alert the authorities.

THOMAS: So there you are now working for a bank, in fact, it was quite soon after you started in the banking system. And in 2008, the famous credit crunch, the credit crisis, the global economic crisis begins to play out really starting in April 2008 and then really hitting the fan in September of 2008. What was the environment like inside the banks as the bankers realized, Holy smokes something really bad is happening?

AIMEN: Nervousness. Oh my God, I never seen many of my colleagues nervous. And you know where I was working, it was in Canary Wharf which is the financial hub of London where the banking industry have their skyscrapers there. And I remember there is a place called the Reuters Plaza where Thomson Reuters headquarters is there and in front of the underground station, which is the equivalent of the subway in America. So I saw many people from Lehman brothers, which is just on the Plaza itself from their building coming hundreds of them with their boxes. That's it, because it collapsed, and that's it. They ceased working and their faces told me everything that I need to know.

THOMAS: Yes, Lehman Brothers, which was allowed to go bankrupt in September 2008 and Lehman Brothers, which was an enormous global investment bank, was allowed by the federal reserve bank in the United States and the treasury department of the United States to collapse. They didn't bail it out. This is usually identified as the thing that…

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Catalyst.

THOMAS: Yeah, the catalyst, the thing that really started the whole house of cards collapsing. So, lots of bankers are losing their jobs. But you didn't lose your job. Why not?

AIMEN: Because my function became more important because many companies started to default on their loans to the banks, especially in places like the Middle East. Immediately after the crisis, two large families from my own hometown owed the global banks more than $22 billion after they collapsed due to the strain of the financial crisis. So it was my job, among others, to investigate whatever assets left of those two families in order to recover as much of the bank's losses as possible.

THOMAS: So for you, the credit crunch was a job opportunity?

AIMEN: Oh, yes. Actually, I got multiple pay rises after that. [Thomas laughs] You know, because of the fact that I started working, you know, seven days a week.

THOMAS: I swear Aimen. I wish I had signed up for jihad at the age of 15 [Aimen laughs] because clearly it means that from then on you're born under a lucky star. So just to sort of provide some historical context here, the credit crisis had many phases. On the 17th of March 2008 in New York, the federal reserve bank bails out a huge bank called Bear Stearns. It bailed out Bear Stearns, which was on the verge of collapse. And this, analysts pretty much agree, increased what was already a very morally hazardous situation because all the other investment banks, which were also facing huge pressures on their, on the system at the time thought, well, we'll be bailed out too and that seems to be proved. When on the 7th of September that year, in 2008, two huge government backed mortgage security broker institutions called Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were taken over by the government and bailed out. And then a week later on the 15th of September, the Lehman Brothers bank was not bailed out, it was allowed to fail. Even though the following day on the 16th of September, the government did bail out the huge insurance company, AIG. So there was one bail out after another one, one rescue after another, with the exception of Lehman. But the whole world realized, oh my God, something big is happening. We're all gonna go to hell in a handcart. I can't impress upon the younger listeners that at the time, everyone was glued to their TV sets. We thought, this is it. The world is coming to an end. I can remember President George W. Bush is coming out standing in front of the cameras to give this speech about how the government was going to rescue the financial system because unless the government rescue the financial system, the whole world would end. And he was white as a sheet. He just looked like, Oh my God. He actually looked more scared during that press conference then he had a seven years earlier after 9/11.

AIMEN: Indeed, because it looked like as if the entire house of cards was collapsing and there was no one to put this back together again.

THOMAS: So Aimen, why did the credit crunch happen? I mean, we've heard about these things, I remember, and people probably remember hearing about things like credit default swaps and all these acronyms and all this financial verbiage used to be flying around. What, underlies the credit crisis?

AIMEN: It all comes down, after 14 years of being a financial investigator and still to this day, I came to the conclusion that it was the result of abandoning that concept of risk. It's abandoning risk aversion when it comes to lending.

THOMAS: So you mean banks used to lend with the full knowledge that if they lent unwisely, they would lose, they wouldn't get paid back.

AIMEN: Exactly. Banks take risk when lending, because remember, banks don't just lend what they have, banks lend where they don't have. So if you think basically that a bank is, the money that they lend you when you take a mortgage or a credit card or a loan, that this is money that is already existing there in the bank and by other depositors, then you're mistaken. The banks basically lend you between nine to ten times more than what they already have in deposits. So if a bank have $1 million of deposits, they can lend up to $10 million to customers on the knowledge that not every depositor will come and take their money at the same time.

THOMAS: This system is known as fractional reserve banking.

AIMEN: Indeed.

THOMAS: So banks are empowered to lend more than the amount of money they have in the vault.

AIMEN: Yes.

THOMAS: That obviously is an extremely risky thing to do because if you lend 10 times the amount of money you have in the vault and you don't get paid back then all the money's gone. Nobody has any money.

AIMEN: Exactly, but why we have this system? Some listeners would be screaming, why, why? And we have two answers for this. The first is to make sure that more people have access to credit. Otherwise, economic prosperity will be nothing like we have seen today since the 1950s. And the second is to increase the money supply in order for more people basically to have access to actual money in the system. The reality is that 95% of the money that we have in circulation are actually digits in--

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Computers.

AIMEN: In computers in these banks. You know, really only 5% of it is really tangible cash that we can hold. And the reason for this, some people basically saying this sounds like a Ponzi scheme, sounds like, you know, as we all it a house of cards. But this is exactly why we have such a huge amount of prosperity. Because the reality is there is no physical, tangible, currency like gold or silver or platinum that can actually correspond to the amount of wealth that is in the world right now. Whether it's natural resources, land, space, data, technology. We don't have enough--

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Anything of value.

AIMEN: Anything of value to catch up with it. I think the entire global gold and silver and platinum supply doesn't exceed $10 trillion, but the wealth, every year we generate is 250 trillion. So you see there is a 24-fold shortage of anything tangible we can use as money. And so we created a system based on trust that we have money based on confidence that it has a value. We agreed that it has a value. So when people basically say that this is unsustainable, we say, no. It is sustainable because it actually has the global wealth as a cushion to stand on it. So confidence is not a bad idea but it's a little bit fragile.

THOMAS: Yeah, it certainly is fragile as was proved in 2008. So I return to the question, in this case what caused the credit crisis to happen? Why did the house of cards collapse then?

AIMEN: The house of cards collapsed because there were too many houses in the system being bought by people who cannot afford them.

THOMAS: So the banks in America and elsewhere, primarily America, were compelled to give mortgages to people who actually in the past they wouldn't have given mortgages to because they couldn't pay back the mortgage.

AIMEN: Three letters, that’s all it takes to understand what happened, three letters, CRA.

THOMAS: The community Reinvestment Act.

AIMEN: Yes.

THOMAS: Now, this was passed in 1977 it was an act that the American government passed in order to encourage banks, if you like, or force them, to give loans to people who previously had not been able to get loans in order to buy houses. And in America because of the, you know, systemic racial injustice of America there was a sort of racialist tinge to this act because traditionally African Americans and Latino Americans hadn't had access to mortgages to the extent that white Americans had.

AIMEN: Exactly, but you do this gradually. I've learned throughout my life that if you're given adrenaline shot to any economic problem, it’s going to cause another problem in another organ somewhere else. Here's the problem is that if you have done this gradually, over years so basically you start to reduce the risk criteria by let's say 5%, 5% incrementally over time, then this crisis wouldn't have happened. What happened is that basically the risk aversion criteria has been thrown out the window altogether. In order to rectify a clearly social injustice that was always there, which is the fact that African Americans and Latino Americans couldn't have access in large to mortgages in order to buy homes. But when you suddenly remove the barriers without making them gradual, just do it now in the early 2000s, what happened is that many of them now are able to buy homes. So we're talking about millions of families are rushing into the market where there aren't already millions of homes built already to cope up with the demand. So what happened is that it created a bubble where the price of these homes…

THOMAS: Skyrocketed.

AIMEN: Yeah Because--

THOMAS: More demand than there was supplies and the price went up which caused all sorts of malinvestments to occur in the economy. Huge amounts of money was pumped into house building in order to catch up with the demand, the supply expanded, the price is expanding, and then credit is being extended in greater and greater quantities to people who can't pay back the loans. And then of course, this becomes very complicated. These bad loans are then packaged by hedge funds and sold around the world where very unscrupulous hedge fund managers are convincing global banks that, no, no, no, everything's fine. These are great. We have created very sophisticated mathematical algorithms that's going to protect you, [Aimen laughs] even though these are bad loans. They're not really bad loans because look I'm waving my magic wand. They're not bad loans, but they were bad loans, and then [explosion sound] eventually, when the time came, no one could pay them back.

AIMEN: Exactly, because what's happened is, the government, you know, in its haste to rectify certain injustices and win votes and all of that, they actually created a bubble.

THOMAS: But that's interesting because you're, you see, you know, most of the time people say that the bankers caused credit crunch, but you seem to be laying the blame more at the feet of the politicians.

AIMEN: Yes.

THOMAS: For example, there's a very famous act which regulated the banks called the Glass-Steagall Act in America, which was founded during the great depression, which separated off commercial banking, ordinary everyday checking accounts…

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Retail banking

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Retail banking from securities banking.

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Investment banking, it’s called investment banking

THOMAS: Investment banking and Commercial banking were split off from each other until 1999 when the act was repealed, which allowed the previously two kinds of banking to be carried out by the same institution. A lot of people say the repeal of Glass-Steagall is what caused the credit crunch about nine years later.

AIMEN: Not necessarily. I mean, not necessarily. Many of the banks that are actually both retail, commercial and investment banks did not suffer the same fate. Lehman Brothers was actually more of an investment bank and did not have that much of a retail banking--

THOMAS: [Overlapping] That’s true and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were certainly not banks in any traditional sense at all.

AIMEN: Exactly

THOMAS: AIG was an insurance company.

AIMEN: Yeah, so basically this is a bit of a simplistic way of looking at it. And this is why I'm saying that the reason it happened is because the government, without, you know, unintentionally, and as you know the road to hell is paved with good intentions, created a bubble. Because, okay, you have, let's say a hundred people that you want to bring into the housing market in a village. And you wanted to lower the mortgage criteria, the mortgage lending criteria in terms of risk. So you don't remove the barrier to all hundred at the same time. Otherwise, the price will skyrocket. Speculators who are greedy will come and start speculating and driving the prices even more, you know? And as a result, you end up basically with a massive bubble. And bubbles is always synonymous with modern capitalism and even as far back as the Tulip bubble in the Netherlands in the 1600s. So what you do instead of removing the barrier for the hundred people in the village, you remove the barriers first for five. Once they settle into their homes, the next five, once they settle, the next five, and then you stop to see what is the housing stock is like. I mean, are there enough supply basically to cope up with an extra five or 10 demands? That's how you do it.

THOMAS: But this sort of gradual, long-term thinking isn't exactly what our democratically elected politicians are famous for.

AIMEN: Unfortunately.

[Laughter]

THOMAS: Well, we can talk on and on about the, the details of the credit crisis from a financial point of view. But frankly, we'd put everyone to sleep. I'd like to shift now to talk about the response to the credit crisis on the ground. Because very quickly we saw in America, and spreading from America outwards, tremendous populist movements opposed really to finance capitalism as it was being practiced. Most famously, the Occupy movement, it started on Wall Street, the Occupy Wall Street movement, and then it spread to other major cities. I certainly remember here in London when the Occupy movement came here, and they, they ended up camping out in front of St. Paul's Cathedral for weeks and weeks. And it was quite funny because, you know, I remember TV interviews with the Dean and the priest of St. Paul's cathedral, you know, who are very well intentioned, nice Anglican vicars and things, were really wringing their hands. What do they do? Do they forcibly remove these protesters who are, after all animated by an antipathy to greed, which I think Jesus Christ also felt in his heart. So they didn't know what to do. Eventually, the protesters were moved on and some of the priests resigned. You know, it was, it was really an extremely sort of heady time where you had, on the one hand, the big evil forces of the banks versus, you know, plucky protesters on the ground saying, we need a new system. The system is rotten to the core.

AIMEN: I remember one of my friends at the time asked me a question, he said, Aimen, you work in the banks in it. Don't you think these banks are evil? And my answer was, this. They are too incompetent to be evil.

[Thomas laughs]

THOMAS: Well, I mean, I don't know people have told me that Al-Qaeda is incompetent, yet they are pretty evil.

[Aimen laughs]

AIMEN: Well, the problem is with the banks and I met many of their chief executives and the chief operating officers and the chief risk officers and all of these people basically to think that they are evil. It's just basically they are normal human beings like you or me who were lucky enough basically to be in the positions where they are. But you know, do they have greed? Every human have greed. And the idea that somehow the bankers are a class of their own in terms of greed is rather… You know, I've seen more royal oligarchs, and land-owning gentry who are the personification of greed. But bankers on the other hand, well, they see themselves as the conduit for human prosperity and the servants of free market forces. That's how they see themselves.

THOMAS: Hmm. I'm not sure the Occupy protesters saw them that way.

AIMEN: Yeah

THOMAS: I mean, Aimen, let's be serious, now. You've described the system, you're, you know, in general, a very objective observer of this system. But isn't injustice to some extent, at least built into this system? Doesn't it favour some people over other people and caused this growing inequality that we see today?

AIMEN: Of course.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Are we just supposed to accept that?

AIMEN: Yes. The entire economic system of the world as it is right now will always have inherent injustices built into it. Why? Because life is unjust. Life is unfair. You cannot escape the unfairness of this world in any sector of it, no matter what. And this is the problem. And when people basically say that we want to build a completely fair, equitable, society, and I say, while it is noble, unfortunately, when you try to go against nature, nature, fight back. You know, and this is, you know, the problem basically with the financial world. Okay, I’ll give you an example now. Let’s say that, we are in the UK here, so let's basically take the entire UK population, 65 million people, let's say that we take all the wealth that everyone owns, and let's give everyone £10,000 to start with a new life, leveling everyone at the same level. And let's start. I guarantee you Thomas, that everyone have £10,000 today, within a week, within one week, we will have millionaires emerging. Within a month, we will have multi-millionaires emerging, and within a year we will have billionaires emerging/

THOMAS: Because it's just the natural order of things…?

AIMEN: The natural order that's it.

THOMAS: This is very depressing.

AIMEN: No, it's not depressing. It's the problem that not every human is as responsible with money as others.

THOMAS: Yes and not every human is as immoral as others. I mean, some people will steal that money. Some people will trick other people out of their money.

AIMEN: Exactly, but some people basically will come up entrepreneurial ideas, you know with products, that other people want to buy and they will start accumulating this money because they are making products.

THOMAS: I suppose your point is that before long, the world would just return to more or less what we have today. [Laughs]

AIMEN: Exactly I mean, so what I'm saying to people is that, do not be financially illiterate. You need to understand what wealth is and what money is.

THOMAS: Let's get back to that in a second. I know this is one of your great bug bears. We'll get to that in a second. I want to move away now from the Western world because we've talked about how in the higher echelons of Wall Street panic broke out and the banks were bailed out and government got involved. And down on the ground level in Wall Street, the Occupy movement rose to fight against the evil bankers. Now, as all of this is playing out in the West over the next 18 months, In the Middle East, something occurs which we discussed in season one of Conflicted. The Arab Spring breaks out first in Tunis, it spreads. It spreads to Cairo, it spreads to Damascus, it spreads to Yemen. It spreads everywhere, Bahrain. The Arabs are rising up against their rulers and they're saying, we want justice, we want democracy, we want freedom, or whatever they're saying. Is there a link between these two things? On the one hand, a kind of ground swell of anti-capitalist movement in the West and the Arab Spring in the East?

AIMEN: What people don't understand is that the world is a village. And you know, in one corner you have finance, in the other corner you have industry, in the other corner you have commerce, in the other corner you have agriculture, and in the center you have water. So the water, I mean by that, basically the energy of the world in oil and gas and natural resources, like in the Arab world and the Muslim world, you know. And the finance is America. The industry is Europe and China, and the agricultural is India and Russia and other places basically. And so you see, basically the world is interdependent. So if America sneeze, the rest of the world catch a cold.

THOMAS: Well America sneezed in 2008 and by January of 2011 the Arabs were on the street.

AIMEN: Exactly, why? Because everything because of, two words, really. The supply chain. The supply chain, we come back to the supply chain. Now when there is a credit crunch here, in North America, in Europe, people stop buying products. Now these products, let's say clothing, you will see lots of clothes basically, made in Morocco, made in, from Egyptian cotton, you know, made in Bangladesh or China or whatever. I mean, basically these are made from materials obtained from different other countries. You might wear a sweater, but this sweater basically, could have been handled in four countries by the time it comes to you.

THOMAS: So a access to credit in the West contracts, demand in the West goes down, and therefore the people who've been supplying that demand, they no longer have any orders. They're not being asked to make shirts anymore.

AIMEN: Exactly. Not just only shirts, but parts or even extraction.

THOMAS: So how does that lead to the Arab spring?

AIMEN: Because what's happened here is you end up with a situation where you have more unemployed. You'll have more unemployed. The whole Arab world caught fire because one single individual who was a university graduate and unemployed, Bouazizi

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Set himself on fire.

AIMEN: Set himself on fire and the rest of the world with him on fire, actually.

THOMAS: In protest against kind of

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Unemployment.

THOMAS: Well he had a little stall. He had a little market stall--

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Because of the unemployment.

THOMAS: I see, He was forced to resort to simply selling vegetables on the street.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: And then some unscrupulous bureaucrat was oppressing him, and he decided the whole system was rotten. So he set himself on fire. And from there it spread.

AIMEN: Exactly. So that is why, you know, the idea that somehow what affects one part of the world doesn't affect the rest, and these ideas of protectionism and we need to be putting tariffs and putting walls and putting — no. We are in the 21st century and whatever happens in one corner of the world affects the rest of it.

THOMAS: That's one way of putting it but another way of, since we're talking about the New World Order, is that, you know, if America has erected this globalized order, globalization after all. Where, as you said, agriculture is in one part of the world, manufacturing is another part of the world and it's all being financed from the huge banks in London and in New York. Doesn't it mean that the New World Order is inherently fragile? Do we want a world order where if a bank sneezes in New York, unemployment throughout the Middle East grows to such an extent that civil wars breakout?

AIMEN: Let's put it this way. When I said to you, the world is now a global village, then what we see here is that, yes, it's a fragile village, but it's a prosperous one. Because look at the levels of abject poverty in the world in 2020 and look at the abject poverty in the world in the 1900s, just a 120 years ago. In the year 1900 I think the abject poverty basically reached heights of 80 and 90%. Now abject poverty around the world basically is around 9%. So to tell me basically that globalization did not shrink poverty is rather disingenuous in anyone's argument. So that's why I'm saying that yes, it’s fragile, but because it relies on peace and order as a conduit for this prosperity. But if peace and order start to crumble and nations started fighting each other, then the entire system collapse.

THOMAS: Well, it's true. I mean, it certainly is true that that abject poverty has decreased. It's hard to tell that to, say a poor Egyptian who has no job, has no money, bread subsidies are being lifted up because neoliberal ideology is taking hold there. He can't even feed his family. So he goes into Tahrir square and just starts demanding... Well, this is the interesting thing. What is he demanding? You know, during the Arab spring, the demands were more political than economic, it was all about democracy. We want democracy. But would you say that in fact, the Arab Spring protesters were barking up the wrong tree? It wasn't really about politics, it was more about the economic systems of the Arab world that needed reform? That just changing the politicians wouldn't do that, wouldn't do the trick or extending the vote isn't really going to achieve anything? Is that what you're saying? Or is it all sort of mixed up together?

AIMEN: Look, they understand—

THOMAS: They, you mean the Arab Spring protesters.

AIMEN: The Arab Spring protesters understood from the beginning that it's the oligarchy that is ruling them, which basically monopolize the money. If you look at every country, which you know, the system entirely collapsed. If you look at Ben Ali…

THOMAS: This is in Tunisia.

AIMEN: Yeah. He, his daughter, his son in law, controlled lots of businesses basically in Tunisia. And look what happened.

THOMAS: Egypt?

AIMEN: Egypt, the president, his two sons, Gamal and Alaa Mubarak

THOMAS: [Overlapping] The whole army.

AIMEN: The whole army as well as the party apparatus, Hosni Mubarak’s party, the national democratic party apparatus. All of these people who controlled, monopolized many aspects of the economy.

THOMAS: Libya?

AIMEN: Libya, of course. Basically you have…

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Colonel Gaddafi

AIMEN: Colonel Gaddafi and his sons.

THOMAS: Saif al-Islam!

AIMEN: Saif al-Islam, Hannibal, Moatassem

THOMAS: [laughs] Hannibal! Can you imagine naming your son Hannibal, really? [Aimen laughs]

AIMEN: Well, you know, he believes that… He hated the Italians so much because basically of Italy’s history in Libya and you think basically, okay, our neighbors the Tunisians have Carthage, and we were a part of the Phoenician-Carthaginian heritage. So I should name my son, Hannibal, the scourge of Rome.

[Laughter]

THOMAS: The man who conquered Rome, well almost conquered Rome…

AIMEN: Almost conquered Rome, to spite the Italians so…

THOMAS: Anyway, So Gaddafi controls a lot of the economy. The Tunisian leadership controls the Tunisian economy, the Egyptian leadership—

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Same with Syria, Syria for example, you know Bashar al-Assad’s mother, Anisa Makhlouf, her brothers and her nephews, Rami Makhlouf and others, they control 60% of the Syrian economy. Just let this sink in 60%.

THOMAS: Yemen?

AIMEN: In Yemen, it was far more different, but it was a failure of this nation state to provide any sort of services whatsoever.

THOMAS: So you think that the Arab Spring protestors really did know that when they're protesting against their government in the name of democracy, what they're actually wanting is the dismantlement of this oligarchic, corrupt oligarchic economic system and increase there of economic opportunities for everyone, basically liberalism. Basically the thing that the American New World Order is supposed to be giving them.

AIMEN: The ruler of Dubai, Mohammed bin Rashid in 2011, he gave a speech, it was a rare speech where he was so candid. He was so candid. He was saying to the audience in a conference in Arabic, he was saying that, I always have told my colleagues and my friends remember, he is also the prime minister of the UAE as well as being the ruler of Dubai. He said, I've been saying to my colleagues in the Arab world, feed your people, give them jobs, give them opportunities. Do not allow certain people to monopolize everything. Because what's going to happen is that these people will end up rising against you, because hungry people have nothing to lose. Hungry people got nothing to lose. So, and this is why in the UAE, as well as other resource rich countries in the Arab world, you know, the royals are very rich, filthy rich. But at the same time, they do not really squeeze the people out of their savings and out of their pockets. They still allow people to have loans to build houses. They give them free parcels of land. Land is free. Give them parcels of land, give them long term loans from the government…

THOMAS: [overlapping] Encourage entrepreneurship.

AIMEN: Yeah. You know, encourage entrepreneurship, give them loans to start businesses, send them to America and to Europe to gain degrees. I remember during the election campaign here in the UK, whenever you hear, you know, people who are leaning towards, you know, socialism like Jeremy Corbyn, the former leader of the labor party, whenever basically he talks about economic models, I always look at him and say the country that you most hate in the world, which is Saudi Arabia, he’s written so much against it, it's the economic model that you want to implement, you idiot. You know it's the one you wanted because basically, he wants free education. Well, Saudi have got a free education, and actually they send their students basically to Western countries to pay their tuition fees, their tickets…

THOMAS: Hundreds and thousands of students.

AIMEN: Hundreds of thousands, I think by far now is 400,000 students who have benefited from this. They've got salaries and accommodation and their tuition fee paid and tickets back and forth to their education destinations. So, you know, free healthcare, or insurance covered by the government or by the employer.

THOMAS: A very generous housing program for citizens.

AIMEN: Exactly. So the question is, you know, what is it that you hate about them then? Apart from being pro-American. Is there anything else? Their economy is a mix of state enterprise, profitable state enterprise, and private sector enterprise.

THOMAS: Well, sure, but Saudi Arabia also has that little magic bullet of huge amounts of oil to sell.

AIMEN: I tell you something, every time someone brought up this issue and says, Oh, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, and Oman, whatever, they have oil man. They have oil so of course they would be economic successful, and I will say yes, this is partly true, but if it is purely just natural resources, then Venezuela, and the DRC, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, will be far richer than Saudi Arabia. Because the DRC sits on $25 trillion worth of—

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Natural resources.

AIMEN: Natural resources and Venezuela have more oil than Saudi Arabia. And yet, look at both of them right now. It's not about, purely just natural resources. It’s about—

THOMAS: [Overlapping] How you empower the economy to take advantage of them.

AIMEN: Exactly. Exactly. That's why when people tell me the Arab world, they rose against oligarchy. And I say yes, but they say, well, Royal families are oligarchs too. And I will say yes, but the difference here between one set of oligarchs and the other is that if one oligarch or a government. Let's put it this way, if a government runs its country as a business and take stock of the potential of this country to generate profit, then you have prosperity comes in. So if you look at the model that is followed in China, in Turkey, you know, to some extent, especially between 2003 and 2014 in Turkey, and in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, in UAE, in Singapore, in Hong Kong, in the city-states. If you see that they are running their countries as businesses, any country will look at its capabilities. It will look at geographical position, whether advantages or not, population size, big or small, natural resources, you know, many or none.

THOMAS: Geographical location.

AIMEN: Cultural sites for tourism, natural beauty, there are many ways in which our country can look at all the negatives and positives, advantages, disadvantages, and basically makes it work. And then start with the idea. First of all, everything you've learned about economics in terms of Marxism, Capitalism, whatever…

THOMAS: All the great 19th century ideological buzzwords.

AIMEN: Exactly, throw it in the rubbish right now dear listener, please throw it in the rubbish.

[Thomas laughs]

THOMAS: Aimenomics, everyone. Here we go. Aimenomics.

AIMEN: Why? Because we live in the 21st century where the last 10 years technological advances were more than the past hundred years put together and the past hundred years were more than the past 10,000 years put together. Which means we need new kinds of economics. And with the world becoming a global village where we are so interdependent because of technology, because of the communication revolution, and the information revolution, we need to have new kind of economics.

THOMAS: Not some one size fits all, global paradigm of neoliberal American domination but...

AIMEN: Or socialism.

THOMAS: Or socialism.

AIMEN: No, we don't need Marxism. We don't need capitalism.

THOMAS: So when you said that countries should be run like companies, you're not just parroting some super right-wing capitalist perspective.

AIMEN: No, I tell you something. The right-wing people basically say the state should just regulate and should not run any business whatsoever. I disagree. And the left-wing will say that the government should own the means of production and run them for no profit motive, for the benefit of the people. That also I disagree with. What I agree with is a country where there is a state enterprise run efficiently for profit and also private sector that actually supports the public sector to achieve profit and to maximize the prosperity for the people.

THOMAS: And this is the model being pursued in these countries like Turkey and China and elsewhere that you mentioned.

AIMEN: Exactly. So when someone says to me, Aimen, have you seen any, for God's sake, any state-run company that generate profit? Because this is the skeptics always. And I tell them, yes, the largest company in the whole world.

THOMAS: Saudi Aramco.

AIMEN: Saudi Aramco. Because my father worked there, my uncles, all of them without exception work there, half of my cousins and their kids work there. So I know all about Aramco and I can't tell you basically that the largest state-run enterprise in the world is the most profitable company in the world. In 2018 they made $111 billion more than the other five largest oil companies that come behind them combined.

THOMAS: Well, of course. I want to counter by saying, well, you can sell oil, so pump oil out of the ground, you sell it. I mean, is that so difficult?

AIMEN: Look at the national oil company of Venezuela, they are making losses all the time. And basically the other five private companies just behind Aramco globally combined together, actually, they have larger production value together than Aramco. Yet their profits were less than Aramco, even though they are privately run, and Aramco is a state run--

THOMAS: It's also very important to point out that Saudi Aramco doesn't just sell oil. It actually is the linchpin of an incredibly sophisticated petrochemical industry that the Saudi state has allowed to grow in Saudi Arabia where they don't just sell the oil, they refine the oil. They oversee manufacturer of oil products. So it's a whole industry, which leads to economic prosperity there.

AIMEN: Exactly. So, you know, and Saudi Arabia and other companies basically like this. Maaden which is their minerals company.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Mineral company.

AIMEN: They do that. So they do that. So actually, Norway does that. You know, it's not just only—

THOMAS: Yeah, the Norwegian oil company is state owned and profitable.

AIMEN: Equinor. Equinor is profitable, and this is state owned. The idea that somehow, we are afraid that the state will be inefficient, well look, if you have the will, you can create state owned companies that generate profits and compete like capitalist companies, like free market companies in that market, like each other.

THOMAS: This sounds remarkably moderate and balanced for you, Aimen. You're basically arguing for an intelligently designed and run mixed economy. Some state ownership, some private ownership, as long as everyone is animated by the profit motive in order to spread prosperity more generally.

AIMEN: Exactly. So first of all, leftist should drop this notion that profit is immoral.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Evil.

AIMEN: And the right-wing, you know, ultra-capitalists should drop the notion that there will be no efficient and profitable state-run enterprises.

THOMAS: But Aimen, what about, dare I ask it… democracy? Human rights? Liberal societies? I mean, you've mentioned China, Turkey, Saudi Arabia. They don't really score very highly when it comes to that side of political economy.

AIMEN: Of course they don't score highly on that side.

THOMAS: Is that not something we should care about?

AIMEN: Of course we should care about the human rights of every single human being on this planet. Their right of free speech, the right to assemble, the right basically to express themselves. The freedom of conscience, freedom of religion, freedom of not having a religion to begin with.

THOMAS: How does that square with what you're advocating?

AIMEN: Okay. Because politics and economics are two separate things. And anyone who tried basically to argue otherwise. Look at China. Look at Hong Kong. Look at Singapore. Look at Saudi Arabia. Look at Norway. All of them have very different politics from each other. Yet they all achieved some sort of, you know, successful mixed economy of efficient, profitable state enterprise and a thriving private sector.

THOMAS: And perhaps the idea is: with prosperity down the line will come an increase in the protection of human rights and democracy, or not necessarily? This is of course, what animated George H. W. Bush’s New World Order. The idea that with prosperity would come, democracy, would come liberal democracy. It doesn't seem to be happening that way.

AIMEN: It doesn't seem to be happening because the more prosperous I see people become… For example, I have friends of mine in Saudi Arabia who were extremely critical of the government, the vision 2030. And the fact basically that there will be liberalization of the economy—

THOMAS: [Overlapping] This is an enormous program of reform, particularly economic, but also social and cultural reform that has been going on in Saudi Arabia since the coming to power of King Salman and the rise to power of now Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman in Saudi Arabia. It's called Saudi Arabia Vision 2030.

AIMEN: But with this liberalization and economic reforms comes greater repression, greater control over people's thought. I mean, basically there is less freedom of thought in Saudi Arabia in 2020 than that was in 2014.

THOMAS: Isn’t that bad?

AIMENL: Oh, of course it's bad. No question about it. But the friends who I had who were critical suddenly changed their minds when they started having good jobs. Oh I love it. Now I have a job, they were telling me about the new joint ventures between big international companies and Saudi companies. They got jobs finally after they graduated long time ago from universities in the U.S. and what about the oppression? You were talking to me about, Oh, it's such a stifling situation in Saudi Arabia. We can't speak our minds. Oh yeah. I was just basically angry about being unemployed, but now I'm employed. [Thomas laughs] You know, I have a parcel of land now from the government and they are going to give me a loan to build a house on it and finally, I can get married. Suddenly all the talk about, you know, freedom, democracy and human rights evaporated as soon as you know, Mohammed bin Salman stuffed in a, a wad of cash in their mouth.

Thomas: Aimen I know last time I said that you were depressing me. I don't want to say this time that you have depressed me, although you do have this remarkable capacity of spinning an optimistic narrative that leaves me thinking, things aren't really that good. [Aimen laughs] But as ever your perspective is informed and thought provoking. It does make me wonder if the New World Order that America set out to create in the 90s, which we discovered last time when talking about China has countered a serious rival in the Chinese’s own version of that order, that the New World Order, the idea that through globalization, prosperity will increase, that through globalization the globe will become a village and we'll all be interconnected and that ultimately in some way fitfully we will all benefit from this, maybe it's not that it is failing, but that it is succeeding--

AIMEN: Economically.

THOMAS: Just not in the way that America expected and perhaps not ultimately to America's own benefit.

AIMEN: I tell you something. Do you know who really won the globalization game so far? Really? Google, Apple, Twitter, Facebook…

THOMAS: Silicon Valley

AIMEN: Silicon Valley. They were the ultimate beneficiaries of globalization.

THOMAS: Well, we are going to talk about Silicon Valley, among other things next time on our final episode of this season of Conflicted. As we've been discussing today, after the credit crunch, the Occupy movement rose to try to fight back against what they considered to be the injustices of global capitalism. The Occupy movement in the end fizzled out or did it? In the next episode, we'll describe the way the anti-capitalism movement following the credit crunch morphed into Extinction Rebellion and other environmental activist movements. And how with the end or at least mutation of the New World Order the new game changer for global politics may be the end of the world. That's right. We'll be talking about the climate crisis in the last episode of this series. I'm sure it will be a doozy.

[Outro music plays]

THOMAS: If you would still like to find out more about the effects of the 2008 credit crunch, enter our competition to win a copy of a wonderful book called ‘Crashed: How a Decade of Financial Crises Changed’ the World by Adam Tooze. This is presently the definitive narrative history of the 2008 financial crisis. Tooze is an excellent writer and though his left-leaning views would probably irritate Aimen, the book is well worth reading. To be in the running to win, just make sure to become a member of our Facebook group before the 15th of April. Find it by searching ‘Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group’ on Facebook. In the group, you will find articles and further reading and it's also a place for you to enter into discussions with all the other Conflicted listeners. You can also find Conflicted on Twitter. We are at MHConflicted. And if you enjoy listening to the show, please do us a favor and rate us, review us, or maybe even tell other real human beings in your life about Conflicted. Join Aimen and me in two weeks’ time for the next episode of Conflicted. In which we conclude our journey across the unraveling of America's New World Order.

Conflicted S2 E4 - China 3.0

From the protests in Hong Kong, to the persecution of the Uighurs and the building of the New Silk Road, this episode explores the role China played in the New World Order.

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THOMAS: Hello there. Welcome back to Conflicted. I'm Thomas Small and my friend and cohost Aimen Dean is here with me as well. Hello Aimen.

AIMEN: Hello Thomas.

THOMAS: How are you? Have you contracted Coronavirus yet?

AIMEN: Not yet.

THOMAS: I believe we're all going to die of it soon. [Laughs]

AIMEN: [Laughs] No.

THOMAS: Well, inshallah, as you say. So far in season two, we have been dissecting America's ambition following the end of the Cold War to establish a New World Order of global capitalism, liberal democracy, all protected by America's military might. Last time we talked about Russia and about America's ambition to establish a new profitable partnership with their old enemy, and about how thanks to Vladimir Putin that didn't quite work out. So, we've done the Middle East and we've done Russia, and today we're focusing on the third object of America's attention as it strove to build a New World Order. And of course, I'm talking about China. For the New World Order to succeed, China would have to be fully integrated into the global economy, which would result, or so America believed, in China's leadership enthusiastically embracing, liberal democracy. Let's discuss how successful that plan was.

[THEME MUSIC]

THOMAS: So Aimen, in your life now as a contractor let's say, around the world [Aimen laughs] working with all sorts of governments, you have grown into something of an authority on really the entire, what used to be called the Developing World, but let's face it, they're pretty developed now. So, you have authority to speak on China, would you say?

AIMEN: From a political and security point of view, yes, to an extent. Because in my first trip into China, and it was the first of hundreds of other trips like it afterwards, was in 2010 when I was invited by one of the largest oil and natural gas companies, state owned, to lecture on issues regarding security. After the lecture, I ended up basically being signed on as their security advisor in the Middle East, and I started basically frequenting China sometimes six, seven times a year or more than that.

THOMAS: What was your first impression of China when you arrived?

AIMEN: Um…

THOMAS: And we're talking Beijing here?

AIMEN: Yeah, but, Beijing, I went to Hong Kong, of course. Basically, and other places across China. From the Northeast, all the way to the Northwest and beyond. So, I really was fascinated by this society, by this place. I remember my first trip was in the middle of winter, so it was so cold, [laughs] but in time my relationships started to extend beyond just, you know, oil and telecommunication companies, started even to grow, even with the government departments there. You know, in order to basically talk with them, think tanks. Actually, you know, advise the leadership of the Communist Party. So, I started basically to have, a greater integration with them in terms of understanding, first of all, their fears and also their aspirations. Their fears of dealing with the Muslim world, but at the same time, their aspirations into really economically conquering the Muslim world as they have done in the 1420s, 1430s and 1440s during the voyage of the Muslim admiral from China, Zheng He. So, they wanted to have this extended trade network with the Muslim world, because that's where the energy is, and that's where the potential for China's economic expansionism is.

THOMAS: We're going to get there in the end. So, let's focus our attention on Hong Kong and see what the tensions between it and China can tell us about the wider question of an American-led New World Order. Aimen, as you know, Napoleon famously said, “China is a sleeping lion, let her sleep for when she wakes she will shake the world.”

AIMEN: I would have corrected him by saying, China is a sleeping dragon.

THOMAS: Ooh. When she wakes, she will burn the world!

AIMEN: Well in this case, I'm not saying burning the world, but I would say basically more or less embracing the world. [Laughs] But how tightly this embrace and how suffocating, well, that's what we are going to discuss today.

THOMAS: So, the theory has been for the last 40 years or so, that if China is integrated into the global order of world trade and the American-led Atlanticist order that that they built up following the second world war and ramped up following the end of the Cold War, if China could be integrated into that, then, not only would economic growth occur there, but liberal democracy would flourish there. Why do you suppose Western leaders first assumed this to be the case that that with economic growth comes liberal democracy?

AIMEN: I think because they always equated capitalism or free market system with liberal values and democracy which is not the case. If you look at many prosperous nations around the world, not all of them basically follow the same liberal democracy and human rights as others. I mean, you know, there are many prosperous nations that are really autocracies.

THOMAS: So from the Western, I mean, when we're talking about the West, this is just an ideological fixation. Liberal democracy and capitalism go together. They just think that, but there's no reason to think that.

AIMEN: There is no reason. I mean, just look at, for example, a country like the United Arab Emirates, or Kuwait, or Saudi Arabia. And if you look at a country like, even Singapore because it is very strict. You can't chew gum there. You can't throw anything on the street. You know, it's very, very regimented.

THOMAS: Not known for its liberal regime.

AIMEN: Exactly. So, if you look at a country like the United Arab Emirates, I mean, people there do not have the aspirations to become a liberal democracy because for them they believe that well, look, we're already a free market, free enterprise society. We are doing really well. Why do we have to rock the boat?

THOMAS: I want to stop you so that we don't get off track because we’re talking about China. And so, we've said now that the West was looking at China and thought, we've got to make them liberal democrats. We'll make them liberal democrats by incorporating them into our global economic system and with prosperity will come liberal democracy. Fine. Let's move away from America's point of view and try to imagine ourselves into China's point of view, particularly the point of view of the Chinese leadership. And as this series is talking about the New World Order, the post-Cold War world, it's good if we start back in 1989. The Berlin Wall is falling and precisely around that time in China, the Communists are crushing protesters in Tiananmen Square. This is a very famous event, the protests by students in Tiananmen square in Beijing. I remember, 10 years old, I guess, maybe 11, I remember watching it on TV and that famous image of the lone student standing in front of the Chinese tank. Daring the tank to crush him, daring the Chinese regime to crush his aspirations for a more liberal, more democratic China. Do you remember that episode from where you were at the time in Eastern Saudi Arabia?

AIMEN: Vividly. I was a child in Saudi Arabia, but it was a picture that was posted in most of the Arab newspapers at the time.

THOMAS: So, the Chinese are, the Chinese leadership I should say, in Beijing are watching the Soviet Union slowly collapse while struggling but succeeding in crushing any liberal dissent internally. But as they're watching the Soviet Union collapse, they're pretty concerned that the same thing might happen to them. They were born out of the same sort of ideology as the Soviet Union. You know, Maoism, Communist China, they had been allies of the Soviet Union before famously they broke away for geopolitical reasons that we don't want to go into. But they shared so much in common with the Soviet Union ideologically that they are… obviously the collapse of that empire would have threatened them, would have frightened them. So, they're determined not to have the same thing happen to them. Do you think it was ever likely around that time that the same thing could happen to them?

AIMEN: Well, what was going on through their mind and, remember basically that the Chinese leadership have greater collective wisdom at least than the collective wisdom of the Soviet Union leadership at that time, so for them they realize that Tiananmen was a wake-up call. And some within the party, within the Communist Party, decided that the direction is to go into more oppression and more state control. Dong Shao Ping, he basically envisioned that, no, we can survive. We can basically survive as a quasi-communist government. If we liberalize the markets. He basically saw that there is a way forward for China.

THOMAS: I think the, the important point here is about is to really ignore ideas about Communism. It gets in the way. The Chinese leadership were primarily interested less in maintaining Communism as an ideology.

AIMEN: [Overlapping] It is to maintain power

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Instead maintaining their one-party totalitarian rule.

AIMEN: Yup

THOMAS: They want one party rule in China focused entirely on Beijing, and their totalitarian system had already over the proceeding 40 years been through a lot. I mean, during the period of Chairman Mao, there were two great waves of extraordinary, really extraordinary, violence and social disruption let us call it. First, the so-called great leap forward, which caused a famine that killed about 30 million people. And then only 10 years or so later, the so-called Cultural Revolution. The Cultural Revolution, which killed at least 20 million. So, China has been through the ringer. Now in the 70s, things began to change. Nixon famously went to China in 1972 and brought China in from the cold, and from that point onward, the American leadership worked closely with China. At the time, of course, thinking well, since China and the Soviet Union have fallen out, we can maybe take advantage of that by making the enemy of our enemy our friends. And then following Mao's death when this Dong Shao Ping becomes the premier, he starts this shift away from Maoism and towards allowing aspects of a free market, or at least a private property dominated economy in the country. So, China has already, by the time of Tiananmen Square started to make these moves. But you're saying that Tiananmen Square was a wake-up call, but it wasn't a wake-up call like maybe the West wished it to be. They didn't think we need to have liberalism. They just said, what.

AIMEN: What they said is we should embrace pragmatism. In other words, that if the people have enough, if the people have financial aspirations, then their political aspirations can be kept in check.

THOMAS: So this is in fact the opposite of the Western point of view. So, the Chinese are saying with prosperity will come political quiescence. Now that's, that's interesting because in the last months we have seen in Hong Kong, the opposite of political quiescence. The Hong Kong people are rising up. Hong Kong, which is a very important bastion of the Western economic system, right there beside China. Sort of quasi a part of China since 1997 which beginning in April, 2019 has seen lots of protests which became increasingly violent, increasingly inflammatory over all sorts of questions. Questions that really get to the heart of the Western economic system, what's called neoliberalism, because in Hong Kong they're facing growing property prices, the young generation feel disenfranchised, economic growth is stagnating. The system actually, though it seems to have a veneer of democracy, is being revealed more and more to just be a kind of economic capitalist, crony capitalist oligarchy. So, first of all, before we start analyzing it, what can you tell me about these Hong Kong protests? Why did they start? When did they start? What do the people who are protesting in Hong Kong want?

AIMEN: Okay. In Hong Kong, the protesters are protesting mostly because of the extradition treaty between China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. Which talks about basically the extradition of criminals or people basically who have been deemed a criminal in the Chinese justice system, and Hong Kong Justice System and in Taiwan Justice system. So basically, the idea is that it's an extradition treaty. So someone would say, is that really? And I will answer no, basically –

THOMAS: Well it’s true…

AIMEN: It's a culmination of so many things and the feeling that this is just an excuse by China to extend this hegemony into Hong Kong.

THOMAS: Now Aimen, it must be said that the Chinese crackdown against these protesters has been, at least from our lights, severe. President Xi Jinping, China's strong man at the moment. He threatened the protesters openly. He said that ‘any attempt to endanger China's national sovereignty and security, or to challenge the power of the central government crossed a red line and would be dealt with harshly’. He did say that. Which is in general, a very clear articulation of the Chinese political perspective, which is: you will not stop us. China is going to win.

AIMEN: But you know, basically there hasn't been any direct Chinese crackdown in Hong Kong.

THOMAS: But he said they would.

AIMEN: They would, but they didn't.

THOMAS: I know, but they will.

[AIMEN LAUGHS]

THOMAS: I mean but they will. The Hong Kong police have cracked down very harshly and everyone knows, you know, to whom the Hong Kong police actually answer. [Laughs]

AIMEN: Yeah, but whose fault is that? You know, Britain did not defend its position in Hong Kong.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] It is not Britain's fault that Hong Kong police are cracking down on-- Britain doesn't have the power to--

AIMEN: [Overlapping] What I mean, basically is that they left in 1997. So, 22 years later, who do you think basically the Hong Kong police would answer to? If it's not to China, then to who? Because—

THOMAS: Maybe to the people of Hong Kong. That'd be nice.

AIMEN: Yeah, but in 20 years it will go back to China. [Laughs]

THOMAS: It's true. Well, in 20 years they can deal with that. It must be pointed out that for almost 200 years, Hong Kong was part of the British Empire. It was sort of leased to the British in the early 19th century on a long lease, and that lease came up in 1997 at which point Hong Kong was handed back to the Chinese. Now, a very complicated set of negotiations led up to that handover. And one of the many things that, one of the many concessions that the Chinese agreed to, was for example, not to extradite criminals from one justice system to the other because the Hong Kong residents were, for justifiable reasons, afraid that the legal system of Hong Kong based on British common law and respect for human rights and things might clash with the system in China. So, the extradition treaty may seem like a small thing, but it symbolizes something. Which is that the agreement that the Chinese had made might be coming apart and that the Hong Kong will be integrated more completely into the Chinese system, which Hong Kong people fear. Is that fair?

AIMEN: Well, one of my bosses when I was working in that particular global bank I used to work for after I left the UK intelligence services, he said to me that up to 1997 the people of Hong Kong were feeling so nervous that between 1992 and 1997 many, many people basically migrated to Canada, the U.S., U.K. and other places, you know, because they were afraid that the handover will make them proper Chinese. And remember, 1997 China wasn't as advanced as now.

THOMAS: And the shadow of Tiananmen Square hangs over this whole conversation.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: Throughout the 90s China was still kind of a baddie. It hadn't been, you know, it hadn't been brought in entirely from the cold.

AIMEN: Exactly, but you know, when I started going to Hong Kong, I started to see basically that people there were relaxed about it because why? Because up until then, up until, even up until the celebrations of the 20th anniversary of the handover in 2017.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] In 2017 yeah

AIMEN: Because I was there in Hong Kong also, and I was seeing all these, you know, billboards and advertisement and celebration of ‘better together’ and all of that. So, you know, you ask people there and they say, well, so far China did not interfere too much, but also people are saying we are now almost halfway to become fully integrated into China. It is 2047, that's a date when the special status, most likely, the special status of Hong Kong as an SAR, a Special Administrative Region of China, will come to an end.

THOMASL This was also part of the negotiations with the British at the handover that the-

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Exactly

THOMAS: The settlement that they agreed on would last only 50 years, at which point China would do with Hong Kong what it wished, and everyone assumes that will be to incorporate it as a proper, a proper part of, of the country.

AIMEN: Exactly. But since then, if you see basically the Pearl River Delta

THOMAS: [Overlapping] The Pearl river Delta.

AIMEN: Yeah. And we're talking here about, you know, Macau, Hong Kong, but also Shenzhen and Guangzhou. So basically, all of these cities, you know, there are over 95 million people basically live in that Delta. And China now has basically built a sea bridge over that Delta in order to connect all the four cities together.

THOMAS: So they're coming, the infrastructure is being laid down already.

AIMEN: Exactly. So, for them, for the people of Hong Kong, they started to feel that, Oh my God, we're being incorporated. But at the same time, the living standards, you know, in the cities around Hong Kong, especially Shenzhen just to the North of it, started to improve considerably. And this is the mainland China, and this is something that started to affect the people of Hong Kong where they started to have this kind of double loyalty. They fear China, but at the same time, they admire the fact that China builds while Hong Kong doesn't. There is a monopoly of land in Hong Kong, and that basically has caused many young people to feel despair over the fact that they will never be able to own a property because it is the most expensive real estate in the whole world

THOMAS: This is extremely interesting to hear because in a way, Hong Kong is like a little Western satellite just beyond China. And the West as well is kind of going through waves of a similar realizations. That its relative prosperity is less than it used to be vis-a-vis the rest of the world, especially China, as a result of which it doesn't command the same sort of power. It looks across at China and is a little bit concerned or half concern, half admiring. Property values throughout the Western world are skyrocketing, especially in the cities. The young generation can't afford to buy houses, including, you know, even the generation like myself. And so, the Hong Kong people are kind of going through the same thing,

AIMEN: But 10 times worse. Ask any person from Hong Kong, can you afford to buy a house? Which is in reality, a shoe box in a high rise. That's what it is. And they will tell you, basically it's, you know, not until they are in their forties they can, you know, they would be able to afford. Um, and that is the problem here. Is the fact—

THOMAS: [overlapping] It’s true, Hong Kong is the world's most expensive real estate market, by far. The average house $1.2 million in, in Hong Kong. This is well above Singapore, which is the second most expensive in the world. So that's a big problem. Hong Kong's real estate prices are extremely high.

AIMEN: Not for shortage of land.

THOMA: Not for shortage of land? It's an Island!

AIMEN: Yeah, no, but still, they have a good, decent part of the mainland, basically that belongs to them. So basically, it's not a shortage of land. It is the monopolization of land by the land department of the government of Hong Kong. They rarely basically put out small parcels of land for development or for auction. And of course, it would be the highest bidder. And as a result, you know, the prices just keep going higher and higher and higher. They control it because basically of the fact that there is, when people say Hong Kong is you know, a democracy I really start to laugh. It's an oligarchy of real estate barons.

THOMAS: It's true. Hong Kong is headed up by someone called a “Chief Executive,” which is quite funny cause that's an expression we usually associate with the world of corporations. So the Hong Kong Chief Executive oversees a committee, which is dominated by property oligarchs really, but then who also have their fingers in all the pies of Hong Kong.

AIMEN: Exactly, so what happened here is that now the protests are about anti-China. That's what's happening. But the question is what triggers it? What triggered all of this? Yes. The fear that China is going to erupt them off their human rights of their freedom of expression, freedom of assembly, and that's right. If I tell you what the Chinese official told me over dinner, and he is someone I also met in Hong Kong, you know, several times as well as in mainland China. And he said that the problem is I feel that the Hong Kong young are protesting against China. But they are protesting at the wrong enemy here. The real enemy are the ones who are robbing them of their aspirations. Because if he compared a young entrepreneur from China, from Shenzhen, just north of the border, and the young entrepreneur, you know, from Hong Kong. And he will say basically that the young entrepreneur in Hong Kong won’t have enough savings or money to invest in his business or invention because he's already spending so much of his income on rent, because he can't buy and if he tried to get an office around, incorporate basically, it is even more expensive. But a young man from Shenzhen can save more, even though the income is less, can save more of his income because the rents are less. And you know, if he wants to incorporate and start a business, the cost of business is less. So, you know, the reality is that Shenzhen is now becoming more successful than Hong Kong as a tech capital of China, while Hong Kong, remaining reliant on the financial sector as well as the trade sector. But, if only the real estate prices start to go down, only then we start to see basically that the people of Hong Kong, will start to feel more secure about their future…

THOMAS: It’s difficult though because the entire Hong Kong political economy is propped up by high house prices.

AIMEN: Unsustainable.

THOMAS: It may be unsustainable. But it's true. I mean, because Hong Kong has famously low taxes.

AIMEN: Yeah.

THOMAS: Which is, it is claimed, which lies behind its rise to economic domination over the 20th century. Fine. But the state which still needs to provide public services is funded largely by its ownership and its selling and renting of these, of property. So they have to keep the price very high in order to sustain the system as it is.

AIMEN: But then the system will lock out the next generation. The next generation will remain locked out of the property market because it's just too high. It's just unrealistically high.

THOMAS: So what does the China, what does the Chinese official say is the solution? What would the Chinese Communist Party do to solve this problem?

AIMEN: Well, for them, they are saying, well, we are going to wait until 2047. We are biding our time. 2047 is around the corner from a historical point of view. And only then basically when the whole, the two regions, both Macau and Hong Kong, become fully integrated into China then the real estate market basically, you know, in Hong Kong will collapse automatically because then there will be no border between Shenzhen, you know, Guangzhou, and the mainland China and Hong Kong people can commute. It will be linked up by trains. There will be no visas or passports or border anymore. There will be commuter belt created for Hong Kong by then. People can just live in Shenzhen or its suburbs and can basically commute to Hong Kong on a daily basis.

THOMAS: So, the Chinese are not threatened by these protests. I mean, we hear all the time in the news here that the protests in Hong Kong are a harbinger of big problems for China, that it might be the first domino in a set of dominoes that come that brings the whole system toppling down. The Chinese, they're pretty sanguine. They, they're not afraid?

AIMEN: This is the problem. I mean, the West always get excited about protests and freedom and all of that, but you need to understand that it's far more complex than that. The Chinese media machine is very formidable. They really know how to steer the public opinion of their people without the people knowing that they are being steered into that direction. The argument I made now, that the protesters in Hong Kong have been... Yes, they have been triggered by the treaty, but in reality, basically they are also protecting the-

THOMAS: [overlapping] The extradition treaty.

AIMEN: Yes, the extradition treaty. They've been riled up about it but also they are riled up because they feel that they don't have a future in Hong Kong because of the fact that they will always remain renters, you know, rather than property owning individuals and professionals. And so that is, so the Chinese media really made it into, Oh, these poor people, they are misled. They are protesting against the wrong enemy here. Their enemy is the oligarchs, those capitalist oligarchs who have monopolized the land, look at them. You know, unlike us, we are building entire cities in months, in order to accommodate you, our people. So you have cheap, you know, affordable, high quality homes.

THOMAS: So this is the Chinese counter narrative. Is it, is it landing? Is there any indication that you, that you know of that the Hong Kong people are listening and thinking, Oh, that's interesting.

AIMEN: Well, now it's not directed at the Hong Kong people, it is directed at the Chinese people. Because when the Chinese people see the protest, the Chinese government want to make sure—

THOMAS: [overlapping] That the protests don’t spread…

AIMEN: Exactly. So what they're saying, Look, look at Hong Kong model. People can't afford the shoebox. You guys however, basically we are building like there is no tomorrow. [Laughs] So you know, so in a sense they have actually cleverly turned the narrative upside down and that the protesters are just misled people who thinks their enemy is China, while in fact basically they are angry about their living conditions.

THOMAS: So the Hong Kong protests aren't going to derail the Chinese juggernaut anytime soon. Let's switch now. Let's move to the other side of China and return in fact to a topic that we discussed in Season One of Conflicted. And this is the other thing that you often hear about these days that's going on in China, on the West side of the country amongst the population of Uighurs, the Uighurs of the Xinjiang province in the West. Um, briefly now, because we did cover this in season one, who are the Uighurs? They're not actually Chinese.

AIMEN: Well, remember that China have 56 ethnic minorities. So, they are one of the ethnic minorities of China.

THOMAS: They're not Han Chinese.

AIMEN: Oh, no, the Han actually make up the vast majority of Chinese people. But then remember there are, you know, Mongolians, Kazaks, there are Tibetans.

THOMAS: [ Overlapping] Tibetans

AIMEN: There are the Cantonese, the Hui Muslims who are actually Han Chinese by ethnicity, but Muslims. Um, and don't forget the religious minorities who are always prosecuted, like many people basically talk about Muslims being prosecuted, not necessarily. Hui Muslims don't have the same trouble that the Uighur Muslims have. And that's because of the separatism that the Uighurs have.

THOMAS: Now Aimen I want to push you on this. You say that Hui Muslims haven't faced persecution by the Chinese state. I think that's not strictly speaking accurate. Now, it's true, they're certainly not experiencing what some of the Uighurs are experiencing, but in April 2018 the Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Work department took control of the State Bureau of Religious Affairs, and so they are now directly overseeing religious affairs, no longer the government itself. And this United Front has emerged as a very aggressive proponent of making sure that religious groups throughout China are not expressing anything that they consider to be anti-Chinese. It's part of a larger process of signification of religion in China. So for example, amongst the Hui Muslims, they've been knocking down domes and minarets, anything that smacks actually of Arab aesthetic. Arab Islamic aesthetic. Now I think it's important to point out that this actually, in fact, this actually backs up your larger argument, I would say. Which is that the Chinese state is involved in state building and creating a viable nation state, which can then project its power outwards. And Muslims within China are considered to be potentially antagonistic to that effort. Ironically, as they are often considered to be elsewhere in the world, even in the West. You know, it is Muslims that often create this sense that they're not really one of us. They're not really signed up to our national identity.

AIMEN: Well, historically speaking, the Hui Muslims filled up many, many posts in the government that are related to commerce, diplomacy, and even the Navy. So in a sense, yes, the emergence of that committee from the Communist Party to take over the religious, affairs of China was worrying and worrying for so many people, including the Hui. But for the Hui, when they were saying yes, only very few mosques of ours basically have minarets and domes because the vast majority of Hui mosques, and I've been to some of them, look exactly like Chinese temples.

THOMAS: They must be beautiful.

AIMEN: And they've been like this for centuries. The Hui Muslims from the beginning, from a thousand years ago, they built their mosques not distinguished at all from the rest of the Chinese architecture. So, when you see, you can't tell a mosque from outside, and this is not because of the communist party or anything, it's been happening from a thousand years ago.

THOMAS: It's true. But more recently, in fact, the Hui Muslims have received some money from the Gulf, especially Saudi Arabia. And Salafi missionary movements have been appealing to some Huis and the Chinese state is trying to stop this.

AIMEN: Exactly. I mean, and ironically, some members of the diplomatic mission of China in Saudi Arabia are Hui Muslims themselves, and they were talking to religious scholars in Saudi Arabia telling them, please, you know, just leave us alone when it comes to our religious identity. We are Muslims, Muslims enough. Thank you so much. Just stay out of it.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Okay. You’re racing ahead now, who are the Uighurs?

AIMEN: So the Uighurs are a Turkic ethnic group. So, they are more similar to people in Kazakhstan, Kurdistan, and Uzbekistan. So they are Turkic in their, in fact, it's the birthplace of Turkic based languages, especially in places like Kashi, which called in Arabic Kashgar and in the local language, Kushgar. So, which is basically sitting in the Southern Part of the Xinjiang province in Northwest China.

THOMAS: So, let me just tell you what I know about the Uighur situation in China. The Chinese are evil and they're erecting enormous concentration camps, shoving millions of Uighurs in them and brainwashing them into not being Muslims because they hate God.

AIMEN: No, it's not like that. [Laughs]

THOMAS: Really? I mean, that's what I've been told.

AIMEN: Okay.

THOMAS: First, before you just destroy the perceived wisdom of it. To what extent is that narrative true?

AIMEN: Okay. So, you know, a disclaimer to the listener here as I have, you know, a lot of commercial interests in China, myself. So basically, I'm not defending China because of that. And I'm not actually defending it, I'm explaining the situation as it is.

Thomas: Great.

AIMEN: But also, I have to basically state that I relied a lot on the official Chinese narrative here. In fact, when I was invited to come to Xinjiang myself, I've been there and I visited, even one of the camps that’s been talked about, so I was still being minded. I was still basically like, in a way, you know…

THOMAS: [Overlapping] The Chinese government minder…

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: But you have visited one of these camps that are holding Uighurs?

AIMEN: Indeed. So, for them they believe that the separatism, you know that the Uighurs basically harbor…

THOMAS: Like Tibetans say. So the Uighurs think, we're a people. We shouldn't be dominated by Beijing. We want to be separate.

AIMEN: Yeah. So, the separatism which is cloaked in Islamic ideology also with it…

THOMAS: Because Uighurs are Muslim.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: Sunni Muslim, like Saudis, like Egyptians, like Algerians…

AIMEN: Yeah, Sunni Muslims. But you know, there is a division there between those who are Sufis and those who are more influenced by other schools of thought. Not just only Deobandi--

THOMAS: Which is kind of hardline Salafi kind of…

AIMEN: [Overlapping] No no--

THOMAS: [Overlapping] From South India, South Asia…

AIMEN: Yeah, it’s not Salafi, it's a hard line, Hanafi—

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Sorry.

AIMEN: Yeah, it’s a hard-line Hanafi

THOMAS: These different labels [laughs] get all confused.

AIMEN I know, I know, trust me. I struggle always basically to explain this to others. But, you know, there are so many schools of thought that have influenced the Uighurs basically in terms of religious affiliation. Remember, Xinjiang province as a whole have about 26 million people. Um, and despite being so big as a province and roughly about 12 million to 13 million are Uighurs. So basically…

THOMAS: So roughly half.

AIMEN: Roughly half, below half. So, but they are concentrated mostly in the Southern half of the province and the Northern half have less Uighurs and more Han and Hui and Kazaks and other ethnicities.

THOMAS: So, the Uighur population, which lives more in the South part of the province. They're broadly speaking Sunni Muslim. So what are the Chinese government trying to do to them?

AIMEN: Okay. The Chinese didn't have that much problems with them in the 1970s and 80s, because mostly it was Sufi Islam that was dominant. I remember I was talking to an Iman there in Kashi and he said to me something interesting. He said, look, you know, you've noticed that on the way here there were villages that are looking like a post apocalypse, like basically no one is there. You know, a mosque is destroyed, bulldozed completely, and the streets are empty. No one is there. And then you pass into another village or another town where the mosques are open with lights and celebrations and the streets are bustling. He said, this is when you see a Sufi village that is, or a town, that is cooperating with the authorities. And you will see another place where there is more spirit of separatism. That's a place that is deserted and this is a place that is rewarded. So—

THOMAS: So the Chinese aren't really, it's not really about Islam. It's about a form of Islam that some Uighurs have embraced over the last few decades that is more political in its orientation, let's call it Islamism, more Islamist in its orientation and which feels that being within or being under the Chinese State is against Islam or something. They're political separatists.

AIMEN: Yeah. So, so what's happened here is that the problem is there were a group of people from Xinjiang who when they were studying in Pakistan in the Islamic university of Islamabad in the 1980s. Their teachers included, people like Kamal Helbawy, who was one of the most senior leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood in the world. And Abdullah Hassan…

THOMAS: Oh wow.

AIMEN: Oh yes who was the—

THOMAS: [overlapping] The great ideologue who basically started the jihad in Afghanistan against the Soviets.

AIMEN” Oh, yes. So, they influenced a new generation of—

THOMAS: Uighur students in Pakistan.

AIMEN: Indeed. And they started to return and preach the gospel of jihadism.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Ah.

AIMEN: I know it's a contradiction of terms, but anyway—

[Aimen and Thomas Laugh]

AIMEN: So, they started to preach jihadism, Muslim Brotherhood ideals, and even some of them returned from places like Uzbekistan and other places with the new ideas that coming from the Middle East which is the ideals of Hizb ut-Tahrir.

THOMAS: Which is a radical Sunni Islamist group.

AIMEN: Exactly. Which calls for the return of the Caliphate.

THOMAS: Like all the other bozos who we’ve been talking about. [Laughs]

AIMEN: Exactly. To the point where it's estimated that the number of Hizb ut-Tahrir members, underground members basically in Xinjiang, according to Hizb ut-Tahrir sources themselves exceed six or 7,000 members.

THOMAS: That doesn't sound like so many people. And I mean the country has 1.3 billion.

AIMEN: Ah, yeah. I'm talking about the Uighur population is 12 million. So basically having six or 7,000 members Hizb ut-Tahrir, and that’s only Hizb ut-Tahrirm, we're not talking about the Muslim brotherhood. And not to mention the jihadists.

THOMAS: Cause there have been Uighurs in Syria as we discussed in season one.

AIMEN: And Afghanistan, you know, fighting alongside the Taliban.

THOMAS: So the Chinese are afraid of the separatism that is being incubated amongst this kind of Islamist ideology amongst the Uighurs. But what are they doing to the Uighurs?

AIMEN: So if you are looking at them, they are, you know, they basically believe that, look, as we have pacified Tibet, they believe they have pacified Tibet. So the person, the individual who actually was responsible for the pacification of Tibet is now in Xinjiang. And he's been there for a few years. He is now basically leading the effort to pacify Xinjiang.

THOMAS: Aimen, I'm afraid you're not selling this to me. Because my whole life I've only heard that the Tibetans have been utterly crushed by the Chinese behemoth. And, you know, Richard Gere has told me many times at the Oscars that the Tibetans are suffering.

AIMEN: Well, okay, suffering politically maybe. But economically speaking, things are starting to change a lot.

THOMAS: We’re back again to that Chinese way. We will make you rich.

AIMEN: Yes.

THOMAS: And you just give us your freedom in exchange.

AIMEN: Well, yeah. You know, this is the money. Obey. That is the Chinese methodology and this is why when I talk to people about it, they keep saying, but they are not supposed to do that. I remind them that this is China. This is not Europe, this is not North America, this is not Australia, this is China. The Chinese have their own way of dealing with things and therefore we have to understand their mentality, their mindset. I must stress Thomas that I made my position very clear in my lectures on counter terrorism to Chinese officials that repression doesn't work. Repression will breed only further acts of terrorism and further acts of violence. And what's happening is beyond what could be endured by the population who are very proud people.

THOMAS: The Uighurs.

AIMEN: Yeah. And, you know, and I made my position very clear.

THOMAS: I'm glad you're saying this because I, you know, I want the listener to understand that Aimen is not justifying the Chinese state repression. He's simply explaining it.

AIMEN: I'm explaining it. I tell you that there is a possibility of a negotiated settlement for this entire sorry crisis. There are many people in China who are good-hearted people, decent people, whether in academia or in the think tanks that advise the Chinese government. If the demands for separatism is dropped, then the negotiation over religious freedoms can kickstart really. And this is why I'm saying, as long as there is a possibility of talks, of secretive talks basically taking place… take this chance. It's about the survival of the Uighur Muslim religious and ethnic identity.

THOMAS: Aimen, this is all very interesting. I mean I must say it freaks me out what you're describing about the Chinese and their apparatus of repression in Xinjiang against the Uighurs.

AIMEN: We have to understand, you know, basically we don't excuse by the way we just say understand, why they want to maintain the integrity of their borders and the integrity of China as a unified country.

THOMAS: And their way of doing things includes setting up camps, putting recalcitrant Uighurs into them and brainwashing them into being obedient to the Chinese state. Is that basically what's going on?

AIMEN: Yes.

THOMAS: And are they being murdered in droves if they refuse?

AIMEN: Uh, well, I mean, basically the question here is that, and I ask the question all the time, are there any people basically who has been executed? And the answer is there are people who have been executed since 2009 until now on charges of terrorism. And the fact that many of them were returnees from Afghanistan, or you know, in later years, basically have returnees from Syria who were trying to carry out acts of terrorism. There have been dozens of acts of terrorism by the Uighurs who are jihadists in China, you know. The Kunming Massacre is one of them--

THOMAS: I’ve never heard of the Kunming massacre.

AIMEN: Well, it is in the province of Hunan, I think, it was in 2014 where in a train station--

THOMAS: Oh it was a knife attack—

AIMEN: It was a knife attack

THOMAS: Someone went berserk and killed all sorts of people.

AIMEN: Exactly. Like dozens of people were killed. Hundreds were wounded. I mean, and there were many other acts of terrorism, you know, car bombs against police stations in Xinjiang and basically the Chinese, you know, released a video, basically containing five minutes, containing all of these acts of terrorism happening, caught on CCTV and all of that. So now—

THOMAS: [Overlapping] So jihadists have been executed in China,

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Yeah yeah.

THOMAS: But what about just garden variety Uighurs who would frankly rather be Muslims and not Chinese?

AIMEN: Okay, so this is basically when you ask and they say, no, we don't execute people because they think differently. We will put them in prison until they recant. But we do not execute people in this way. That's what they say. And I haven't seen any evidence of people being executed for thought crimes.

THOMAS: Frankly, even if that's the case, it doesn't make me really want to move to Xinjiang. The real question is why does China care that much? I mean, it’s Xinjiang, who cares about Xinjiang? Why can't these people just, why don't we just allow a new central Asian Republic, call it Xinjiang, to be established and it breaks away from Beijing.

AIMEN: Ah ok.

THOMAS: I mean Western China. It's nothing. It's just desert and crap.

AIMEN: Yeah, I know. I, you know, I've been there, but actually, you know, if you tour the place, it's really beautiful. I mean, really, I'm not kidding. It's really beautiful.

THOMAS: Sure. There are lots of beautiful places. The Chinese don't need to own them.

AIMEN: Yeah. But, [laughs] but historically speaking, first of all, the Chinese border always fluctuated. Against the Russian empire, against the Turkic empires in a back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, that's always the case. And since the Qing Dynasty and beyond, and before even that, the Uighurs lived, you know, for periods of time under a Chinese influence, under Russian influence, under Turkic influence. So there were always these movements. There wasn't a single country, you know, basically called Turkistan or East Turkistan, as they call it, you know or Xinjiang, except for brief periods of time in the last millennia.

THOMAS: [Overlapping]This part of the world has always been frontier zone between empires and always has been.

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Exactly. It always has been. So now for when I will not say this as my opinion. I will just tell you what that Iman from Kashi who was telling me about why the Chinese are putting hundreds of thousands of people in the camps and talking about them and saying, while it is regrettable, he believed it was necessary. Because you know, the ideologies that are coming out of other Muslim countries has infected them with the rebellious nature which doesn't bode well for the future of the Uighurs in the region. He said that, look, we are 12 million people in this province. This province was always the backdoor of China, you know. You know, there was no reason for the Chinese to hold onto it because basically it is not exactly rich in natural resources. It is not basically very strategic. But something changed in the recent years. Now, instead of being the back door of China, now Xinjiang is the front door of China, the new front door of China. And it's important for a strategic survival.

THOMAS: And why is that? What's changed?

AIMEN: Okay. What changed is the Belt and Road Initiative.

THOMAS: The Belt and Road Initiative. And I think just because it's easier to say and to remember, let's call this the new Silk Road. It has a very orientalist flavor about it.

AIMEN: [laughs] Exactly.

THOMAS: So the Belt and Road Initiative, the new Silk Road, is essentially a continental high-speed rail network which connects China to Europe via Central Asia and the Middle East and Russia, meaning that goods can get to Europe faster than by ship. And this is amazing because it undercuts American Naval shipping routes. It basically is shifting back to the continental system from the Atlanticist naval dominated system. And it includes all sorts of things, ports, new maritime routes... The Chinese are basically throwing down the gauntlet to the way the world has been run for the last 500 years and saying, We are back. We are going to dominate global trade.

AIMEN: Look, the Belt and Road Initiative is a gigantic, gigantic project. It will cost a trillion dollars and that's only phase one. What would happen is that there will be in Xinjiang, whether it is Ürümqi, the capital or Kashi the second city basically in the South of Xinjiang, they will become the junctions of this new Silk Road. Freight trains will leave Beijing with the containers and they will arrive in Berlin in 16 days. Now, these days, it will take by ship between 42 to 48 days to do it.

THOMAS: That's astonishing. That is really undercutting the time.

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Yes and not just only that, to cut the time… But also it would reduce insurance premiums because it’s rail, it’s safe; while the shipping routes basically are, of course, you know, threatened by hurricanes and weather—

THOMAS: Pirates.

AIMEN: Pirates in the Malacca Strait which is a chokehold. And also the Somali Pirates, there are many chokeholds. The Strait of Malacca, the Suez Canal and you have to pay money there and all of that. So what happened is, if the railroad will go from Beijing to Ürümqi, from Ürümqi then it goes to Almaty in Kazakhstan, from there and to Moscow and St. Petersburg, and from there into Poland and Germany and France and UK and Spain. And also, there will be another one from Kashi going all the way to Gwadar which is a port in Pakistan--

THOMAS: [Overlapping] On the Indian Ocean

AIMEN: No, on the Arabian Sea, just at north of the Gulf—

THOMAS: Well the Arabian Sea is part of the Indian Ocean--

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Yeah the Arabian Sea is part of the Indian Ocean [Laughs] but you know to be very geographically accurate. Sorry, I'm a nerd. And so, so basically 3000 kilometer of railroad and a truck road basically going from Kashi all the way to Gwadar. And that port basically will be selling goods to Saudi Arabia, to the UAE, to the Gulf countries, and even to Iran and to Pakistan itself, and maybe even to India. So the idea is that Xinjiang no longer basically a backwood province. It is now going to be the center of China's new Silk Road. It’s the junction, and this is what the Iman told me in Kashi. He said, if China didn't let us go basically when our province mattered little, they will never ever let us go. They will not let 12 million Uighurs stand in the way of progress of 1.4 billion Chinese. So, what he said for the survival of our religion, for the survival of our race, we need to cooperate with China. He said basically just like, and he mentioned this name, he said, just like Ramzan Kadyrov in Chechnya, realized—

THOMAS: Oh from the last episode, Kadyrov who is Putin’s little lapdog.

AIMEN: Yeah. So as Ramzan Kadyrov in Chechnya realized in the middle of the war against Russia that we're not going to win, the Russian bear will crush us completely. So for the survival of the Chechen race, and for the survival of us, our Chechen religious identity—

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Just like Kadyrov, the Uighurs need to, need to bend the knee really and just get with the program—

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: The program’s not changing and the West is not going to change it.

AIMEN: So no one is coming to our rescue. No one is coming to our rescue, not the Muslim world, you know, not the Western world. We are the only ones who can save ourselves by accepting like our ancestors accepted before, Qing dynasty hegemony over the Uighurs, we can basically accept the current hegemony. But we have to negotiate in order to regain our religious freedoms.

THOMAS: So Aimen, preventing Islamism from spreading amongst the Uighurs of Xinjiang, preventing separatism, political separatism amongst the Uighurs of Xinjiang. Is this really just an excuse that Beijing is giving in order to… do whatever they want in Xinjiang, including say, ethnic cleansing, just killing all the Uighurs? Often that is what you hear in the media that in the end, the Uighurs are done for, they're just going to be wiped out.

AIMEN: No, of course not. I mean, otherwise we would be hearing about, you know, hundreds of thousands of people dying, but that's not the reality. And know why spend billions of dollars basically trying to reeducate the whole population only to kill them later.

THOMAS: Right. So I can understand that perspective, but that's like, zoom out a bit from the Uighurs and talk about the new Silk Road and of a Chinese dominated economic transport system that completely changes the way everything is working. Now, officials in the Western world have actually known for quite a long time that this was coming. As I quoted at the beginning of the episode: China is lion. When it wakes, it will roar.

AIMEN: Dragon. [Laughs]

THOMAS: So, I was personally first introduced to this new reality of a growing China by a friend of mine. His name was Alexandros Petersen. A brilliant young American man who lived in central Asia, lived in China and was studying… He was actually one of the world's experts on the new Silk Road and what it meant for the world. Sadly, the Taliban assassinated, or he was a victim of a Taliban bombing in Kabul where he was teaching at a university and he died.

AIMEN: What a waste.

THOMAS: It's a terrible waste. He, but he wrote a book called ‘The World Island’ in which he reintroduced to people an older geopolitical theory. It's the World Island theory. It was first formulated in 1904 by a Victorian geographer called Halford Mackinder. The World Island theory is basically this: that if you take the whole globe, the African Eurasian part of the world is the vast majority of the world's land. It's the world island, and that in the middle of this world island is what's called the Heartland, which is basically central Asia. The Eurasian plateau that stretches from the West of Russia into China, The Heartland. The theory is if you control the Heartland, you control the world island, and if you control the world island, you control the world. Now, in fact, if you think about it, the whole history of the 20th century is the history of attempts to control the world island on the part of big land empires and the Western world, especially the British-American world, trying to prevent that from happening. Most famously during the Cold War with the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union controlled the Heartland and the American Imperium, if you like, was absolutely animated about preventing it from maximizing the power that the Heartland gave it. And it succeeded. The Cold War ended with the Soviet Union failing to take power that it got from controlling the Heartland and dominating the world. Now we have China. China is dominating the Heartland today and is laying down the foundations for a new wave of economic domination that by taking the power of the Heartland, by linking the entire World Island via land-based trade routes like in the old days, like the Silk Road before the Portuguese and the Dutch and the British created the new maritime shipping system that has dominated the world for centuries. Now China's doing it and they're going to succeed. So Aimen, given the fact that the Chinese new Silk Road and its own new world order really threatens America's, is America trying to stop this or undermine it? Is this what lies behind the frankly bellicose language of President Trump in the last few years and the trade war between China and America? Is America trying to stop the new Silk Road?

AIMEN: Well. Yes, but halfheartedly because there is a problem here. Okay. And the problem is this: Trump has been engaging in a trade war not only with China, but also with Europe. And also basically insisting on America’s energy independence which means they don't buy oil anymore from the Middle East or beyond. So, who's buying the Middle East oil right now? It's China. So at the end of the day, it's like, okay, America. You don't want us to trade with China. You don't want 5G to come. You know, you're not buying our oil. But at the same time, basically, you are saying that we shouldn't even do it with China. So, either you provide the alternative or shut up.

THOMAS: So by isolating itself, America's forcing the rest of the world into China's arms.

AIMEN: Precisely. So if you are going to pick up fights with Russia over the Ukraine and Crimea, impose sanctions, who will Russia trade with? It will be China. You know, if China is going to buy Russia’s oil and gas, if China is going to buy the Middle East oil and gas, if China's going to export machinery to both Russia and the Middle East and America basically is saying uh well, we are going to defend human rights and we are going to stand for freedom and all of that okay, you want to stand for freedom, then become a viable economic partner or just do not try to sabotage another economic partnership that is emerging.

THOMAS: If the United States was being led by someone more internationalist in outlook than president Trump, is it possible that he might be able to create a genuine global alliance or coalition against the rising China? Do you think that would be possible?

AIMEN: No. Because you know, Obama also failed and he's an internationalist. America doesn't need a protectionist or internationalist. What it needs is a pragmatist.

THOMAS: America just needs to face up to the fact the Chinese train has left the station. You'd better get onboard.

AIMEN: Yes.

THOMAS: And so really, dear listener, everything is going to change. The Western world is sort of over as we understand it. And the new century is China's. Now this whole season is about the New World Order that George H.W. Bush wanted to create. America, it's not necessarily that America has failed. It's that China has succeeded. The Chinese New World Order is being born today. What do you think? Am I right about this or am I exaggerating?

AIMEN: You are right but there are some caveats here. You know, we have to always remember something. China is not a nation of innovation. China is a nation of imitation. And it will remain so for a little while. When will I see China rise to heights of greatness that was never seen before, is when they are transformed from a nation of imitation to a nation of innovation.

THOMAS: Because?

AIMEN: Because then if they become innovative, nothing can stop them. Because at the moment, why the American economy is so dominant--

THOMAS: With the tech boom and the internet. I mean, we dominate all of them. We, I mean, I'm an American, you know, I personally don’t dominate the world economy. America dominates, you know, all of the innovative technological advances that are creating economic growth at the time, especially from Silicon Valley.

AIMEN: Why? Because basically America is the innovation economy. Yeah, China manufacturer the iPhone. But really who designed it and made it and created it? America.

THOMAS: Ok, but what about Huawei, and all of these big Chinese firms and East Asian firms more generally, which fall within the Chinese orbit?

AIMEN: Exactly, that's what I'm saying, that at the moment they are imitating. But when they start innovating and they are beginning to, we can see the transformation now from the imitation nation to the innovation nation, this is basically when we start to see a greater Chinese dominance. Why? Because then they will be a true alternative. And the most important example of this now is the 5G row all over the world. The question is—

THOMAS: Huawei’s 5G network right here in the United Kingdom, you know… Absolutely. It's tearing political parties apart. Do we allow a Chinese firm, you know, basically linked to the Chinese security service, to install for us our telecommunications network?

AIMEN: But here's the problem is that the Americans could not yet come with a viable alternative.

THOMAS: So I didn't exaggerate. So the New World Order is Chinese.

AIMEN: Exactly. This is why I said… And I remember I was at a dinner at the largest oil company in China. I was their guest of honor at the time, and that was in 2010. So it was a really long time ago, almost 10 years ago. So I remember I said these exact words because they were asking me, when do you think China will become the top economy of the world? And I was asking, you’re Chinese you know, why do you ask me? And he said, because we love to listen to the opinions of others. So, I said, okay, once you stop imitating and you start innovating, then the world is yours.

THOMAS: Well, it's happened.

AIMEN: Yes, it's beginning. It's beginning to happen.

THOMAS: It's beginning to happen. And it seems to me that the Western world is beginning to wake up to this fact and this is directly connected to this New World Order, America's New World Order that it wants to create, because actually China hasn't played along. China all along has had its own plan to create its own new world order and it is succeeding. And so we see it with Trump and the trade war against China. We see it with even European leaders usually so deferent to China are beginning to speak out against the Chinese, against the power, the growing power that they have. Even George Soros, famous for supporting all sorts of internationalists liberal causes, in February of 2020 in a speech said that China is a rising threat and the Western world really needs to begin countering it. This represents a big change, and it could result in perhaps even a military clash between these two new world orders, these two visions for the 21st century.

AIMEN: Well, we hope it doesn't happen.

THOMAS: Of Course.

AIMEN: China is nuclear armed and it has an important ace which we didn't talk about. China has basically what I call the secret weapon.

THOMAS: Oh God.

AIMEN: Putin.

THOMAS: Oh, I didn't expect you to say that.

AIMEN: Yeah, and I tell you why. Vladimir Putin is looking at China as an important, not just only an important ally, but an important backer of the Russian economy. I mean, after all, basically, China buys a lot of oil and gas from Russia. Um, it's an important client but also at the same time, the new Silk Road is going to pass through Russia and through Russia and Satellite States, like, if we can call Kazakhstan a satellite state, but it's allied to the Russians. So basically the Silk Road will pass through Russia to Moscow and St. Petersburg, and then from there into Europe. This will empower Russia even more. Because basically, so many goods and services coming from China and so many European imports, don't forget, it's a two-way street. European exports from the UK and Spain and Italy and Germany—

THOMAS: [Overlapping] And Germany particularly.

AIMEN: The cars and the machinery will also travel from Europe to China through that. So, Russia will become the middleman between China and Europe and the rest of the world. And so for Putin, he's looking at this and rubbing his hands, [laughs] licking his lips, and thinking brilliant.

THOMAS: Well, there you have it. America's New World Order is being rather successfully countered by the Chinese alternative, a real competitor with the new Silk Road initiative from China. And you know, you never know what the future is going to hold but the Chinese economy is still chugging along pretty well. Economic growth in the West is not so hot in comparison. Neoliberalism, this is the economic faith of the West in the New World Order era. It was meant to spread. It was meant to promise endless economic growth for Western countries. It's not really happening. And it certainly became spectacularly unstuck during the credit crisis of 2008. And in the next episode of Conflicted, we will be talking about just that. What exactly happened in 2008? And what did it mean for America's grand vision?

AIMEN: I have to come wearing my banking hat next episode. [Laughs]

[Extro music]

THOMAS: This season we've set up a Facebook discussion group where we post recommended reading. And if you want to go into even more depth about the topics we cover on the show, as with every episode we are giving away a recommended book this week. This week's book is ‘Belt and Road: A Chinese World Order’ by Bruno Maçães. a book which successfully captures the exuberance as well as the apprehension that this huge project generates. Once again, all you have to do to have a shot at winning this book is join the Facebook group. Thanks to everyone who has. Your messages, comments and feedback mean so much to us really, and are actually very helpful in shaping the future of Conflicted. Find the group on Facebook by searching Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group. You can also find the show on Twitter at MHconflicted. And if you like the show, please rate and review us in your podcast app. It would also mean the world to us if you spread the word about Conflicted to your friends or even to your enemies, whether on social media or in person. Thanks again for listening. Aimen and I will be back in two weeks.

Conflicted S2 E3 - Enter Russia

In 1990, George Bush proclaimed the dawning of a New World Order. The Cold War was over, the nation-state and capitalism had won, and the US was ready to deliver their strategy for global governance of the world. Aimen and Thomas discuss how this played out in the Middle East and where the grand vision fell short.

---

THOMAS: Hello Aimen.

AIMEN: Hello, Thomas.

THOMAS: Today we're going to talk about Russia.

AIMEN: Can I just mention like, you know, my first, you know landing in Azerbaijan?

THOMAS: Well you will, but when it gets there, sure, absolutely.

AIMEN: Because it was so funny story about how, you know…

THOMAS: Not yet.

AIMEN: Yeah, okay.

[Laughter]

[THEME MUSIC]

THOMAS: We have a very complicated episode of Conflicted to record today.

AIMEN: Every episode is complicated, Thomas.

THOMAS: This one is going to prove perhaps the most complicated. We're going to talk, as we have been talking about, the New World Order – America's attempt to create an American-led global, if you like, regime of free market capitalism and perhaps even liberal democracy everywhere following the end of the Cold War. In the last episode, I suggested that America faced three primary challenges in order to achieve that ambition. We discussed how one of the challenges, sorting out the middle East, has failed. Another challenge, incorporating China into the world, we're going to discuss in the next episode. In this episode, we're talking about Russia and America's need to get Russia onside to create a new partnership with Russia if its New World Order ambitions were to be satisfied. So, let’s start with a rough historical sketch of the Soviet Union, its breakup, and Russia’s fortunes after the end of the Cold War. For the 45 years following the second world war, the Soviet Union, as it then was, was the big baddie of the world as far as the West was concerned. America and the Soviet Union were fighting. By 1991, the Soviet Union has collapsed. Its Eastern European satellite states are independent. Poland, Czechoslovakia as it then was, Romania, et cetera. The Warsaw pact, which was the communist equivalent of NATO, has broken down. Russia narrowly avoids civil war when Boris Yeltsin in, in what was considered at the time an act of heroism, saves the day, becomes the president of newly independent Russia, or the Commonwealth of Independent States, as it was called. Now at this point, what happens? A kind of… confused logic at the heart of America's New World Order played out as NATO expanded into these countries, extended its umbrella across them. That was very provocative to Russia. The EU and its ever-desperate attempt to expand its own pool of cheap labor moves into Eastern Europe as well. Uh, eventually even flirting with moving into the Ukraine, which was one of the reasons why the Ukrainian civil war would, would would break out in 2014. So, we did almost immediately see how incorporating Russia into the New World Order forming a new partnership with it, wasn't necessarily going to work. And it was disastrous for the economy as a whole. In the 90s the Russian economy was chaotic at best.

AIMEN: Remember 1998? The collapse? I mean, it was awful.

THOMAS: Overnight the Ruble collapsed and you know, any, any lingering dream that following the fall of the Soviet Union the Russian economy might boom and Russia might match, you know, match the, the prosperity of the West… was destroyed. But first of all, to start us off, what does Aimen Dean, former jihadist, have to tell us about Russia?

AIMEN: It seems for some reason, basically, that I always used to pop up in places where Russia, you know, had a beef or two with. I was in Bosnia, I was in Afghanistan and I was in the Caucuses. Um, you know, supporting the Chechen jihadists.

THOMAS: Chechnya, for the listener, is a tiny Muslim country—officially called the Chechen Republic and is a part of Russia. It’s located in the North Caucuses, that sliver of mountainous land between the Caspian Sea and the Black Sea. Now, Russia’s relationship with Chechnya over the past thirty years is a great illustration of the way Russia responded and adapted to America’s New World Order. And Aimen, you were involved in the Chechen Jihad, were you? When did it all begin?

AIMEN: The first Chechen-Russian war really started in 1994, it was almost two years conflict. When Dzhokar Dudayev, uh, the president, the first declared, self-declared president of the Chechen Republic, declared independence from Russia.

THOMAS: Part of the wider trend following this collapse of the Soviet union for Russian satellite states, certainly in Eastern Europe but also within places like the Caucuses, to declare independence. To wrest independence away from the, the evil Russians who had dominated them for, in some cases, centuries.

AIMEN: Of course. I mean, basically the Chechen-Russian Wars, or I would say basically the Northern Caucuses-Russian Wars, you know, lasted since the days of Catherine the Great.

THOMAS: Yeah, they’re proverbial. And you know, the Caucasian peoples of the North Caucuses are famously warlike.

AIMEN: Very much so. Few in number in comparison to the numerous Russians. But nonetheless, I mean, they were really formidable foes, you know, to the Russians. And I was there, you know, witnessing the first conflict, um, evolving.

THOMAS: So how did you get there? After you left Bosnia, uh, in ‘95 would it have been?

AIMEN: Yes. I mean, by late ‘95 in, uh, the Bosnian war came to an end. And so, uh, before I went to Afghanistan, there was a detour where I went to Azerbaijan and then later Georgia in order to become what we, what I always used to term as an office jihadist.

THOMAS: But at that time you weren't actually a member of Al-Qaeda. You were a kind of freelance jihadist. Who arranged for you to go to Azerbaijan and then to Georgia in order to join the Chechen fight against, uh, against Russia?

AIMEN: Ah. Now in order for this story to make sense, we need to understand the life, or at least the name, of one single individual. He is known in the jihadist circles as Ibn Khattab.

THOMAS: Ibn Khattab.

AIMEN: Yes. Now, Ibn Khattab, you know he was assassinated by the Russians in the year 2002. You know, using a poisoned letter.

THOMAS: In Chechnya?

AIMEN: In Chechnya.

THOMAS: Is this man a Chechen?

AIMEN: No. He is from nowhere else except my hometown. Hubbard in Saudi Arabia.

THOMAS: Oh, what a marvelous city Hubbard is.

AIMEN: [Laughter] Hey, we gave the world Aramco! And we gave the world the list of famous terrorists

[Laughter]

THOMAS: None more famous than Aimen Dean.

AIMEN: Oh dear.

THOMAS: So, Ibn Khattab… Why did the Russians assassinate him in 2002 and what does he have to do with you?

AIMEN: Well. First of all, even Khattab was my hometown boy. In fact, he went to the same school I went to except he went… he went many years earlier. And then he went to the Afghan jihad in 1989. Then he made the detour into Chechnya in 1994 when they declared independence because he wanted to lead the first Arab jihadist or international jihadist contingent to fight the Russians there… in Chechnya. The war really was mainly anti-Russian as in the Russian, you know, state itself. So, it was about being pro-independence for Chechnya. Not only Chechnya, but also the other Muslim republics like the Dagestan…

THOMAS: All these places in the Caucuses.

AIMEN: Exactly. So, the whole idea was about an Islamic awakening in the Caucuses. It wasn't meant to be anti-Russian. If it was any other nationality there, it would have been anti that nationality, anti that ethnic, anti that state in order to start something, because… why? Chechnya is a mountainous country with warlike, devout Muslim people. But of course, Ibn Khattab, uh, being an international jihadist who spent years in Afghanistan, decided the Chechnya is the next Afghanistan. Because it's going to spread from there into the rest of the Caucuses. And it's a mountainous region. It's sandwiched between the Caspian Sea and the Black Sea. It's perfect.

THOMAS: And Ibn Khattab just called you up, you're in Bosnia, you get a call from Ibn Khattab, he said: “Come on over to Chechnya! Fight some Russians!”.

AIMEN: Well, I, I'm, I'm flattered you say that he called me, but no, he didn't. It was his financier from Saudi Arabia who said: “Well, we need you there, but you know, I have bad news for you. You are not going to the front straight away. You know, we need you basically to run some logistics in the office in Azerbaijan. And then later in Georgia.” So actually, I went there to become someone who basically add up sums, make sure basically that enough supply of mayonnaise and other materials basically made it into Chechnya.

THOMAS: An accountant and a grocery supply, uh, agent.

AIMEN: Exactly. Which actually, you know… was boring. But nonetheless, that was an eye opening. Because I started learning Russian, uh, because it's easier basically if you are going to cross many different, uh, Caucus states, whether it's Georgia, Osettia or Azerbaijan or Dagestan… I mean, they speak so many different local languages and learning one local language is a waste of time. Just learn Russian. Everyone speaks Russian there. So basically, that was the time when I started learning Russian.

THOMAS: So you never fought the Russians in Chechnya?

AIMEN: Well, I didn't fight them with bullets just with jars of mayonnaise.

THOMAS: Mayonnaise? What are you talking about?

AIMEN: Well you know, one of the requests, the frequent requests, I used to get from Ibn Khattab and his group of Jihadists in Chechnya was to keep sending them, you know, hundreds of jars of mayonnaise. Because in the mountains, mayonnaise was the source of protein that maintain, maintained them basically, maintain their levels of energy.

THOMAS: That is so weird. Are we talking about like Kraft mayonnaise? Jars of American made mayonnaise?

AIMEN: Yes.

THOMAS: But mayonnaise goes off so easily. It doesn't last long.

AIMEN: Not in the cold mountains of Chechnya.

THOMAS: So when that first Chechen war against Russia ended in ’96, why did it start again three years later?

AIMEN: That's when I can tell you the entire story as to why it all happened. It all come down to that man I mentioned, Ibn Khattab. And many of his deputies, who many of them come from my city again, Hubbard. I'm sorry about that. I, on behalf of all the good, decent people of Hubbard, I apologize to the world.

[Laughter]

AIMEN: Um, so what happened is that because these, you know, the Chechens follow a particular brand of Islam which is Sufism. You know, it's mythic, it's ritualistic. But Ibn Khattab and the mainly Saudi and Jordanian, uh, jihadists who arrived in Chechnya…

THOMAS: All of them Salafists really.

AIMEN: Salafist, Wahhabis as they are called, basically…

THOMAS: …and therefore anti-Sufi. In theory, they don't like Sufism at all.

AIMEN: Exactly. So Ibn Khattab realized that the Sufis are compromisers who compromised, um, on the goals, you know, basically off the Chechan uprising in 1996 when they negotiated with, uh, the Russian government in Moscow to achieve some sort of autonomy within elections and a referendum later, on full independence.

THOMAS: So in Ibn Khattab’s mind, the Chechen leadership sort of betrayed the jihad by signing a peace agreement with Boris Yeltsin and the Russian government.

AIMEN: Exactly. I mean, it was Alexander Lebed, you know, a famous Russian general and then later politician, uh, who brokered this deal, uh, with the then Chechen president Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev.

THOMAS: So how did, uh… what did Ibn Khattab do next?

AIMEN: As any good Jihadi Salafists, you know, on the same lines of Al Qaeda would do: establish a religious academy to graduate, uh, local Chechens and Dagestanis and other Caucuses minorities to become Salafi preachers.

THOMAS: He, he sort of educated them.

AIMEN: Oh he brought, you know, quite a few preachers from Saudi Arabia. Uh, of course, with the disapproval of the Saudi government. Many of them became, you know, wanted by the Saudi government because the Saudi government and Russia had a good relationship at the time. So, they were brought in order to teach a new generation of Chechens and Dagestanis other Caucuses minority people the principles of Salafism so they spread it and therefore dilute the Sufi character of the Caucus’s Muslims.

THOMAS: They must have worked very fast. If by 1999, only three years later, another war breaks out between Chechnya and Russia.

AIMEN: Indeed, and actually I go into quite, you know, in detail analysis of this in my book..

THOMAS: Ah! Aimen, so shameless plugging your book in the middle of our conversation.

AIMEN: I know I'm not being, you know, not trying to advertise anything here. But I talk about, you know, the reason why the second Russian-Chechan war started, which is the fact that they did not want to just remain confined within the borders of Chechnya. Because they had almost full independence by then! Although not recognized by the UN or anything, but they were on their way to have a full independence by 2002, 2003. But for Ibn Khattab and the Salafists and as you know, basically the Salafi jihadism do not believe in borders. For them borders, you know, they are just lines… you know, dotted on a map that has no meaning whatsoever. They wanted Dagestan The bigger… well, the biggest Republic within the…

THOMAS: Muslim Caucuses.

AIMEN: Yes, Muslim Caucauses to become independent and so they made more and more incursions, killed so many Russian soldiers, you know, Dagestani police who are cooperating with the Russians. And as a result, the Russians were threatening again and again that they will do something. But Yeltsin wanted to maintain the peace. However, something that the jihadists, did not, uh, take into account. Which is: while they were planning to launch massive attacks inside Russia, in Moscow itself, against the Russian army residential compounds, you know, which will kill at least 300 Russian soldiers and their families, uh, and wound another 600 in September and August of 1999, they did not count that Yeltsin who was changing prime ministers more than he was changing his socks, would appoint the head of the FSB, you know the…

THOMAS: The successor to the KGB.

AIMEN: Absolutely. I mean, the head of the Russian intelligence, Vladimir Putin, as his prime minister.

THOMAS: Ah! Vladimir Putin. I wondered when he’d come up.... Because Vladimir Putin is obviously an enormously important figure from recent history about which much has been written… much is said. He's played the role, something of the classic Russian bogeyman for the West and the world for the last 20 years now it's been a long time.

AIMEN: But who created him? Who made him into what he is right now?

THOMAS: And you're saying that the Chechnyan war has everything to do with his emergence as, as the new Russian strong man.

AIMEN: I can assure you that it almost the catalysts which propelled him into the leadership. And I tell you why. I met in 2013 with a senior Russian diplomat, slash spy most likely, and he's basically had a personal friendship with Putin. And he said that when he was appointed as prime minister he saw this as some sort of a destiny, fate calling him. And he basically, you know, as a devout Orthodox Christian, he saw that being a prime minister is a calling. But he needed a sign from God. That this is his destiny to fulfill.

THOMAS: Before you tell me what that sign was, I just want to press you on this. Putin a devout Orthodox Christian. I am, as it happens, an Orthodox Christian, because I, you know, I even lived in an Orthodox monastery for a while. I would question your description of Vladimir Putin as a devout Orthodox Christian. I admit to you that he definitely pretends to be an Orthodox Christian and invokes Orthodox Christian symbolism, uh, in, in the new Russia that he's building. Which, uh, which, you know, he's trying to kind of, he's trying, trying to bring back the glory days of the old Orthodox czarist empire. But a devout Orthodox Christian? Really?

AIMEN: Well, I have to take the word of the person who told me. Who basically is a senior diplomat and someone basically who knew Putin quite well.

THOMAS: Okay. So what was the sign from heaven that devout Orthodox Christian Vladimir Putin was looking for?

AIMEN: The bombings of the army barracks in Moscow.

THOMAS: Tell us that story. Tell us the story of the Chechen jihadists and your hometown boy Ibn al-Khattab’s attack on the barracks in Moscow.

AIMEN: Well, the jihadists for 19 months, and I go into great details of that, of that operation in my book, but the jihadist planned for 19 months to avenge massacres, took place in Dagestan and Chechnya by the OMON and the Alpha, uh, units of the Russian Special Forces. They located where these special forces live alongside their families in military compounds and they attacked them in the summer of, uh, 1999. Just weeks after Putin was sworn in as the prime minister of Russia.

THOMAS: What did Putin do?

AIMEN: Putin saw this is as ‘This is the Lord's calling’. That's what he basically, you know, interpreted these attacks. Russia is challenged and therefore we should not shy away from more. Until then, basically the Russians suffered major losses in the first Chechen war, and they were not organized and they didn't have a good leadership. Yeltsin was a drunk, you know, incompetent idiot. But Putin decided that he will take charge of this Russian war you know, using his exceptional skills as a spy in order to execute the, uh, war against these people. So, this is why I always say that it is ironic that as Russian bombs are falling on jihadists in Syria, I always used to say ‘You want to blame someone? Blame yourselves. You made this man when you bombed Moscow in 1999.’

THOMAS: How was that greeted in the West? Because I imagine at the time the West must have itself been shocked, uh, at such a heinous crime by jihadists in Moscow.

AIMEN: Well, actually the West believed that it was Putin who orchestrated the whole thing.

THOMAS: Why did they think that?

AIMEN: Well, first of all, basically, okay. There is this man, he is the head of the FSB, the Soviet intelligence. So now he is the head of the Russian Intelligence. Then he became a prime minister. And then suddenly there are these, there are these bombings which basically you know making him so angry that he basically invade Chechnya again. And surprisingly, drive away the jihadists way into the mountains and take back Grozny and other Chechen cities. Uh, so everyone was saying… ‘Oh, how convenient, the timing. You become prime minister, six weeks later, you know, the pretext for the war that will make you a war hero and Russia’s strong man to the point where Boris Yeltsin appoint you as his successor. I mean, how convenient!’

THOMAS: But you're saying that's not true?

AIMEN: Not true. Because why? In Christmas of 1999 I just returned back from [Afghanistan. I was, you know, loaded with letters from Al Qaeda to say certain operatives here in London…

THOMAS: You're already a double agent at this time.

AIMEN: Exactly. I was already spying for MI6 and these letters actually were already opened, expertly scanned, and then put back again as if they were never opened. And then I have to deliver them myself without knowing the content. So… So basically I was supposed to deliver some of the letters to Abu Qatada, you know, famous, you know, Al Qaeda linked cleric who was based in London.

THOMAS: Abu Qatada… gosh, up takes me back.

AIMEN: Exactly. So I called him and he said “Come tonight.” It was Ramadan I remember. He said “Come tonight after the evening prayers. You will be hearing from an old friend of yours. So I said “Okay, fine. I'm coming.” So when I went to his house, we were sitting around, you know, like corporate managers, five of us. We were sitting around a speaker phone and from Tbilisi in Georgia, we were listening to Abu Sa‘id al-Khudri who I knew from Afghanistan years earlier. He was the head of the logistics for the Chechan jihadists.

THOMAS: Ah.

AIMEN: Including Ibn Khattab because he planned the whole thing. He told us when we asked him you know, “Was it disadvantageous to you?” Because even us thought that Putin did it.

THOMAS: You asked him about the, about the attack in Moscow.

AIMEN: Exactly. So you know, it's good basically that the whole thing was recorded. So, um, so basically I asked uou know “Was it disadvantageous that the war, you know, the, the timing of the war was determined by the Russians?” And so he asked “What do you mean, determined by the Russians?” “Uh, well, because Putin carried out, you know, these attacks in Moscow as a pretext”

THOMAS: A false flag. A false flag mission.

AIMEN: Exactly. False flag. I mean, it has all the hallmark of a false flag. And he said “No, we did it.” And he went on to explain the whole process, the reasoning, the pretext, and why they did it. It was damning evidence because he talked about details only the bombers would have known.

THOMAS: So, you have just been told from the horse's mouth as it were…

AIMEN: Yes.

THOMAS: …that what the whole West believed that Putin had launched a false flag operation killing his own soldiers in Moscow was not true. The jihadists had actually done it.

AIMEN: Yes.

THOMAS: And it was just amazingly convenient for him. A sign from God even.

AIMEN: A sign from God like in the later years, like you know, almost 15 years later I had a Russian diplomat who knew him told me that he viewed this as a sign from God. I, however, immediately called my MI6 handlers and told them, that “There is something that you need to know. And immediately.” So we met, I told them the information. It was a bombshell and it landed on Tony Blair's desk within days, basically. And as a result, he shared it with other world leaders and suddenly Putin was no longer treated as a pariah. Putin was treated as a victim of terrorism. And Tony Blair invited him to a pub a few weeks later where they shared the pint. They were wearing jeans and casual and everything, and suddenly everything seemed in a going Putin’s way.

THOMAS: But his reputation did not remain very high in the estimation of the West. What happened? Why? Why did the… People forget now because Putin is a big bad guy, but in the noughties, he wasn't a big bad guy. He sort of was playing along.

AIMEN: He was playing along, but then he was playing along, but then several things happened along the way. 9/ 11 happened. And not many people know but again, jihadists. Putin’s path was forged by jihadists. You know, if you want to blame, you know the rise of Putin on anyone, it's the bloody jihadists.

THOMAS: So why didn’t 9/11 have an impact on, on Putin?

AIMEN: Okay. So, he thought that 9 11 is a good thing in a sense that basically the Americans will realize finally that there is a serious war against terrorism.

THOMAS: He'd been fighting jihadists in Chechnya. And now he says, look, we're all fighting jihadists.

AIMEN: Absolutely. And he offered his help, you know, against the Taliban. Which he did actually. You know, the Russian military and intelligence provided, you know significant help to the US and the UK war efforts in Afghanistan.

THOMAS: And of course, they were experts on Afghanistan. They'd fought in Afghanistan for 11 years.

AIMEN: Exactly! And they have their own assets there, they have their own allies…

THOMAS: So Putin was an ally of the West in the war on terror.

AIMEN: Absolutely.

THOMAS: What happened to change that?

AIMEN: Iraq war….Because Putin was absolutely against it.

THOMAS: Because?

AIMEN: First, he believed that Saddam Hussein, just like Bashar al-Assad and others, they are the pillars of stability. They are, you know, the pillars of Arab nationalism because Arab nationalism protected Arab Christians. Because you know, look at who was Saddam's foreign minister? Tariq Aziz.

THOMAS: Yes, Tariq Aziz, the Iraqi deputy prime minister and foreign minister under Saddam Hussein.

AIMEN: He was a Christian. And there were many Christian officers in Saddam's army and in Saddam's government and in Saddam's Ba'ath Party.

THOMAS: Certainly in Syria, the Christian community are very close to the Assad regime.

AIMEN: Exactly. I mean, he viewed both Saddam and al-Assad as the pillars of Arab nationalism and Arab nationalism was an important buffer against Islamic extremism.

THOMAS: So Putin begins to realize that America's war on terror is not being prosecuted wisely.

AIMEN: No, he started to see that the war on terror had a more sinister ulterior motive. He started to doubt whether the neo-cons of Washington really wanted to fight terrorism or wanted to basically, you know, have an American hegemony in a project in the middle East. Which would then basically make America far more powerful because they will have access to the world natural resources. They can then flood the market with cheap, Iraqi oil, which would then undermine the Russian economy. Russia was a massive net exporter. So if you bring down the price of energy, both oil and gas, then the Russian economy would suffer significantly. So he saw that you know, with America being there, America will have its you know basically its foot on the hose like they can basically just press and cut, you know, the dollars to theRussian economy by manipulating oil prices.

THOMAS: This is very interesting because this is putting us into Putin's head. And often, you know, people aren't encouraged to see the world from Putin's point of view. Now….

AIMEN: By the way, I'm not the Putin apologist. I'm just basically stating facts. I don't like the man. I don't like what the Russians did in Syria whatsoever. I condemn it with the most, you know, you know, strongest way possible. I condemn it the strongest way possible. But we have to talk about facts. Here at Conflicted we are dissecting conflicts in order to come up with the right diagnostics.

THOMAS: So, from Putin's point of view, he's looking out at a certain foreign policy decisions that America is making and realizing ‘I'm not sure I really want to be a part of this new world order or I'm not sure if this new world order actually has my best interests in mind.’ Of course, there are other foreign policy decisions that America makes in this time. It expands NATO into former Warsaw pact countries.

AIMEN: Yep.

THOMAS: This is happening in conjunction with the EU which is trying to expand its influence into former Warsaw pact countries in Eastern Europe, which, which Russia considers to be something of a threat to its sphere of influence and this definitely includes the Ukraine as I mentioned before.

AIMEN: Thomas, remember… Kiev?

THOMAS: Well the Orange Revolution in Kiev... I mean, Ukraine would definitely come up in this conversation because we all know that, uh, that a civil war has been raging in Ukraine for six years now. Russia has covertly, sometimes overtly, intervened on the side of the Eastern Ukrainian pro-Russian separatists.

AIMEN: Yeah. And guess whose forces, whose irregular forces are fighting in Ukraine now alongside the Russians or alongside the pro-Russian separatists in order to keep K… you know, the Ukrainian forces at Bay.

THOMAS: Don't tell me the president of Chechnya is…

AIMEN: Yes. Ramzan Kadyrov…

THOMAS: Alrght, for the listener… Ramzan Kadyrov became president of Chechnya in 2007. His father was also president, though he was assassinated in 2004. Now Ramzan Kadyrov… the thing is he has this cherubic face. He looks like a little baby with his sort of soft, downy beard. But he’s a really fucking hard guy. He’s a real tough warlord.

AIMEN: He has a private army of many Caucuses Muslims, Sufis who are, you know, brave warriors. And…

THOMAS: A private army?

AIMEN: A private army…

THOMAS: You mean it's not the army of Chechnya?

AIMEN:

No, it is basically a private army you know, of Ramzan Kadyrov and they are deployed according to whatever they are needed. So in Syria they are deployed. They are between 4 and 5,000 of them. They are deployed as the Russian military police in order to, uh, police, newly liberated areas where I know… basically so-called liberated areas from the opposition. But because they are Sufi Sunni Muslims, they make it easy for the Syrian population to accept them.

THOMAS:

Uh, I mean, this is blowing my mind. A private army separate from the Chechnyan military. This, this is very much like…

AIMEN:

They are the Chechnyan military, but they are not a regular Russian military.

THOMAS:

This is, this is similar to the privatization of espionage you were talking about in the first episode. Are we seeing the privatization of the military completely?

AIMEN:

Not only that, Ramzan Kadyrov has his own mercenaries fighting alongside, you know, UAE and Saudi Arabia forces in Yemen. They are fighting alongside Haftar, General Haftar in Libya. You know, it's all for money. And he has actually a military Academy, uh, in Grozny where he is training…

THOMAS:

In Chechnya.

AIMEN:

In Chechnya. Where he is training, you know, soldiers from Saudi Arabia, from the UAE, from Nepal. You know, even Nepalis Gurkas in order to be deployed to war zones according to the whims of certain leaders in the middle East.

THOMAS:

War zones, including the war zone in Eastern Ukraine.

AIMEN:

In Eastern Ukraine and wherever Putin wants them to.

THOMAS:

This is amazing. So, Putin rises to power in 1999 on the back of Chechnyan separatism, he crushes Chechnyan separatism, installs in Chechnya a president that is basically his lapdog and now Chechnyan soldiers are everywhere fighting… jihadists, fighting anti-Russian forces, fighting whoever. They're the great mercenaries of the world?

AIMEN:

Yeah. And they are devout Muslims who believed, who believe that, you know, Russia is actually pushing back America's evil influence and therefore they are fighting Putin's jihad. I know it's, it's mind boggling.

THOMAS:

I'm actually speechless cause there's just such a conflation of everything we've talked about now for, you know, for almost a year… You know, Russia, it's not actually that Russia is simply geopolitically America's enemy. But Russia has actually allied itself with Islamists who think that America is the antichrist. And in a similar vein, before you brought up Russia’s presence in Syria today because it's an amazing thing. It's in fact one of the most amazing things about America's failure in the Middle East, that for so many decades, America did whatever it could to prevent Russia from, uh, having a untrammeled control of a swathe of the middle East. And yet now we have Russia, which can do more or less what it wants throughout Syria.

AIMEN:

Exactly.

THOMAS:

Now. They're there for many reasons. Why is Russia in Syria?

AIMEN:

Again, that diplomat who I spoke to… and… he said that there are multitude of reasons why the Russians felt confident enough that they can intervene in Syria. Because one, Obama is weak and wobbling and wasn't willing to intervene. And that even though Assad cross the red line, the chemical weapons red line, twice, Obama did not do anything.

THOMAS:

Obama's… Obama's lack of response emboldened Putin, fine. But that's not why he's there.

AIMEN:

The second reason we have an intervention in Russia, according to the diplomat is that again, it comes back to Putin's, you know, if it's not belief in the Christian Orthodox church at least it is, you know, acquiescing to the pleas by the Russian Orthodox church that the Czarist a treaty with the Ottomans, which basically granted the Syriac Orthodox Christians of Syria the protection of the czars of Russia. So, the idea is that since France was always viewed as the natural protector of the Catholics of the middle East…

THOMAS:

Like the Maronites in Lebanon…

AIMEN:

Exactly. It’s the same thing there. That the Russians are tasked since hundreds of years with the protection of the Orthodox Christians in Syria.

THOMAS:

Now for the listener, from well before the Russian Revolution made the Soviet Union an atheist state, Russia was the biggest Orthodox country. And as such it considered itself the protector of the Orthodox Christians of the Middle East. In the 18th century in fact, the Czarina, the Empress of Russia, Catherine the Great, who was in fact a German not a Russian, but she took to it like a duck takes to water, she was the first one to explicitly say that she was going to protect the Orthodox Christians of the Middle East. She had this idea and it, and a lot of Russians did at the time, that eventually the czar of Moscow, heir to the ancient Roman and Byzantines emperors would conquer Istanbul, Constantinople, and become the great leaders of the entire Middle East. Of the entire formerly Christian world. In fact, Catherine the great named her grandson, Constantine, the founder of Constantinople with this ambition in mind. Now, in January 2020 Vladimir Putin visited Syria. We all know the Russians are in Syria. The Russians are allied very closely with Bashar Al-Assad. But when he visited Damascus in January, he went along with the Orthodox Archbishop of the city, the Patriarch of Antioch, to the cathedral of the city, the Orthodox cathedral, to worship there alongside Bashar Al-Assad.

AIMEN:

Well… As you know, the czars of Russia has always been tasked with the protection of the Orthodox Christians of the Middle East. That's the first thing. The second thing is that Qasem Soleimani has just been killed. He is the major competitor to Russia's ambitions in Syria because he represents Iran's interests in Syria. He's dead - perfect. Putin is there to consolidate.

THOMAS:

Well, it's interesting. I was in Syria… I lived in Damascus in 2007, 2008.

AIMEN:

Lucky you. [Laughs]

THOMAS:

And I used to worship at that cathedral. I remember specifically, I'll never forget a Psalm Sunday, you know the Sunday before Easter…

AIMEN:

Yeah.

THOMAS:

…at the cathedral. You know, Arab Christians are a wonderful people… Quite bourgeois, very middle-class, but also slightly chaotic. So, I remember just at the end of the mass, outside of the cathedral an enormous ruckus began. A sort of din of brass band music. Because all of the young Christians of the old city of Damascus had organized themselves into a brass band. And then they spent the next several hours just wandering around the city playing this sort of brass marching music. It was very strange, but it was a tremendous sign of the depth of Orthodox Christian penetration in an old Middle Eastern city like Syria which, which we often forget about.

AIMEN:

Exactly that they predate Islam. We forget basically that they've been there since before the Muslims actually arrived in Damascus.

THOMAS:

And Vladimir Putin considers himself their protector. Clearly he has cultivated very close relations with Orthodox Christian communities in Syria and elsewhere.

AIMEN:

Absolutely.

THOMAS:

But how does that support his wider strategic vision?

AIMEN:

Because then we come to the third issue. You remember we talked about the Chechen war before and how that lasted years and years? Now you remember I talked about the friction between the Sufis and the Salafists in the Chechen war?

THOMAS:

Yeah. You can take it for granted that I remember what you say.

AIMEN:

Yeah. Putin decided that he will split the jihadists from each other. The Sufi jihadists he will court. And he will court them in order to cultivate their enmity against the Salafists to use it to beat the Salafists.

THOMAS:

To divide and conquer?

AIMEN:

Absolutely. So he showered Ramzan Kadyrov and his father before him, Akhmad Kadyrov.

THOMAS:

Who is, who are these Kadyrovs?

AIMEN:

Basically, they are members of a prominent Sufi clan in Chechnya. Uh, they were promised the presidency of Chechnya afterwards within the Russian Federation. And that they will be having the backing of the Kremlin, the backing of the Russian armed forces if they just basically turned their back on the Salafists, the Wahhabis basically, who are trying to ignite a never ending war in the Caucuses against Russia and against other ethnicities in the region.

THOMAS:

So Putin gave the Kadyrov family the control of Chechnya in exchange for turning against the Salafists?

AIMEN:

Exactly. So a war raged between the Kadyrovs and the Salafists, including Shamil Basayev and other people who were the leaders of that Salafist movement along with the successors of Ibn Khattab there. But you know, as the war raged and it claimed actually Kadyrov’s father, Ramzan Kadyrov, his father Akhmad Kadyrov was killed actually by a IED place under his podium by the jihadists. So what happened is: the Arab spring happened. Syria happened. And suddenly Syria became the magnet of jihadism. And what Kadyrov did? He opened the Southern border towards Georgia and allowed all of these people to exit.

THOMAS:

Bye, bye.

AIMEN:

Bye, bye. Go to Syria, wage your jihad there, go establish your califate there. So they went there and then what happened is – when they were all there, between five and 6,000 of them, then this is basically when the Russians thought ‘That's it. We have emptied the Caucuses from them, let us now pound them there.’

THOMAS:

So Russia has been fighting its own enemies in Syria.

AIMEN:

Exactly.

THOMAS:

Why doesn't anyone know about this? That's fascinating.

AIMEN:

Well, you need to be quite intimate with the events as I did when I was in Azerbaijan and Georgia in these days.

THOMAS:

We should all be more intimate with jihadists.

AIMEN:

[Laughs]

THOMAS:

You should create a dating app for jihadists. ‘Get intimate with jihadists’.

AIMEN:

Yeah, except basically I mean, it will entail some sort of slavery contract. [Laughs]

THOMAS:

But let’s get back to this. Russia. And Russia’s role in the formation, or perhaps subversion, of George H. Bush’s New World Order. The economic collapse in Russia that happened at the end of the 90s followed several years where Russia really did dance to the beat of America's drum. Americans insisted on radical economic surgery. The IMF, which along with the World Bank, tries to manage the global economy as it fitfully lurches towards free markets and liberal democracy, and America more or less insist on radical economic and financial surgery to what was a completely sclerotic post-communist economy. And very quickly it caused all sorts of economic problems. The ruble collapsed in value in 1998 I think quite famously, state assets were sold to the highest quote unquote bidder but actually that meant…

AIMEN:

The oligarchs…

THOMAS:

Insiders within who had influence within the government there, and most of them actually seem to live just down the street here in London but…

AIMEN:

Indeed.

[Laughter]

THOMAS:

That’s another story. Um. So initially, Russia did dance to the beat of America's drum. ‘98 the ruble collapses and from then on Russia really stops playing along. That decision, to go its own way again, is largely the result of Vladimir Putin who came to power at that time.

THOMAS:

There's obviously a lot more we could have talked about in this extremely complex episode of Conflicted. I mean, 20 years of Russian history is not easy to summarize. We could've gone into greater detail about the annexation of Crimea in 2014. Or we could've talked about the war in Georgia, Russia’s war in Georgia, in 2008. And, of course, the ongoing Ukrainian civil war which we did touch on. But as we’ve seen through the story of Russia’s relationship with Chechnya, America’s strategy toward Russia at the dawn of the New World Order was a bit of a roller-coaster. And it was, once again, jihadists, this time in Chechnya, who played such a huge role in undermining that strategy by creating the conditions for the rise of Vladimir Putin. A man who, you know love him or hate him, began to look around and realize that America’s global ambitions weren’t necessarily in the interests of Russia. In the end in a sort of twist, Putin partnered with the Sufi Muslims of Chechnya and gave them independence of a sort in exchange for becoming his vassals. Which is why we now see Chechen mercenaries in every Middle Eastern hot zone fighting for Russia and ironically enabling Russia to regain its age-old role of protector of Orthodox Christians everywhere. An unexpected dimension of Russia’s power struggle with America in the Middle East. So we see that despite efforts on both America’s and Russia’s parts to forge a new partnership following the collapse of the Soviet Union, that relationship soured over the course of the noughties leading us to where we are now. Russia with a strong foothold in the Middle East. Russia becoming an opposing force to America, definitely not their partners. Russia allied with Muslim warriors of the Caucuses who are in almost every war zone in the region and beyond supporting and projecting Russian power. It was certainly not what George H W Bush had in mind when he first invoked his New World Order.

[THEME MUSIC]

THOMAS:

Conflicted is a Message Head production. It’s produced by Sandra Ferrari and Jake Otajovic. Edited by Sandra Ferrari. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

This week we’ve got another book to giveaway to one of our lucky listeners. Our recommended reading for this episode is: ‘A Dirty War. A Russian Reporter In Chechnya’ by Anna… let’s see if I can get this right… Politkovskaya. Anna Politkovskaya is a hero among journalists and an early victim of Putin’s crackdown on independent journalism. Assassinated in 2006 for exposing the dark side of the new Russia. In this brutally honest book, Politkovskaya courageously documents the Chechnyan War from the ground. To be in with a chance of winning a copy, join our Facebook group before Wednesday 18th March when we announce the winner. The link to the group is in the show notes or search ‘Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group’ on Facebook. You can also find the show on social media – Twitter and Facebook at MHConflicted. And if you’re a fan of the show, please subscribe to Conflicted in your podcast app and leave us a rating and a review. It will really help us to spread the word.

You’ve been listening to Conflicted with me, Thomas Small, and my good friend Aimen Dean. See you again in two weeks!

Conflicted S2 E2 - New World Order

In 1990, George Bush proclaimed the dawning of a New World Order. The Cold War was over, the nation-state and capitalism had won, and the US was ready to deliver their strategy for global governance of the world. Aimen and Thomas discuss how this played out in the Middle East and where the grand vision fell short.

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THOMAS: Hello Aimen

AIMEN: Hello Thomas.

THOMAS: Nice to see you again.

AIMEN: Nice to see you too.

THOMAS: And hello to you, dear listener. Thanks for tuning in to the second episode of the second series of Conflicted. A podcast where we try to take you through the history of the last 30 years. The history of America's attempt from out of the ashes of the Cold War to build a new, and the glorious world, where freedom, liberal democracy and capitalism would thrive everywhere.

AIMEN: And unicorns flying everywhere [Laughs]

THOMAS: [Laughs] [Overlapping] And unicorns as well.

[THEME MUSIC]

THOMAS: In the last season, we started our story on 9/11. The infamous day when Al-Qaeda attacked New York City and Washington D.C. In this season, we're also going to start on September 11th, but not in 2001, in 1990. When George H. W. Bush, that is to say, George Bush Senior, the first President Bush, delivered a speech to Congress in which he said this:

[ARCHIVAL CLIP STARTS]

GEORGE BUSH: We stand today at a unique and extraordinary moment. Out of these troubled times, a new world order can emerge. A new era, freer from the threat of terror, stronger in the pursuit of justice and more secure in the quest for peace. An era in which the nations of the world, East and West, North and South can prosper and live in harmony. A hundred generations have searched for this elusive path to peace, while a thousand wars raged across the span of human endeavor, and today that new world is struggling to be born. A world quite different from the one we've known. A world where the rule of law supplants the rule of the jungle. A world in which nations recognize the shared responsibility for freedom and justice.

[ARCHIVAL CLIP ENDS]

THOMAS: So there you've just heard President Bush Senior invoke the New World Order, which he hoped to establish following the Cold War. What was the New World Order? Well, I think we can define it like this. America, now unopposed, a global hegemon with no Soviet Union to oppose it, uses its military to police the world, prevent one nation state from invading another… with the exception of America itself of course but that's another issue. [Laughs]

AIMEN: [Laughs]

THOMAS: And in general support the establishment and the strengthening of nation states everywhere in order to allow international organisations like what became the World Trade organization, to spread neoliberal capitalism everywhere, which they believed would spur global trade and lead to economic growth.

When President Bush Senior delivered that speech to Congress, Saddam Hussein had recently invaded Kuwait. You Aimen were living not so far away at the time down in Khobar on the Eastern coast of Saudi Arabia. Uh, and in the first season you told us about your memories of that time of having American troops come to Saudi to help rescue Kuwait and prevent Iraq from invading Saudi Arabia.

We don't want to go over that story again, but what I'd like to know from you is: do you remember the first time you heard this expression, New World Order and heard about America's ambitions following the cold war to create a new and prosperous world for everyone?

AIMEN: You know what, Thomas, you will be surprised to know that I did hear that expression in the run up to the first Gulf War between, you know, Saddam invading Kuwait and the launch of the war to expel him from it. Why? Because the listeners might not think of it like this right now, but actually at the time, we were afraid, and we were genuinely afraid, that the Gulf could become the battlefield of the Third World War. Because there was that general belief that Baghdad was part of the Soviet access. That… Baghdad was part of Moscow's Alliance.

THOMAS: If Saddam Hussein had been allied with the Soviet Union during the Cold War, at least on and off let’s say…

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Indeed.

THOMAS: He was a bit of a wily character.

AIMEN: Absolutely. So many people thought that Moscow wouldn't allow the Americans to launch an all-out war against Iraq to expel them from Kuwait, and that Moscow would, uh, push for a status quo. And I think even Saddam might have thought this way.

THOMAS: And that's how it always had been during the Cold War. In general, America had not been able to project its power militarily very directly with some exceptions of course, because Moscow would counter their power, so the world was held in a kind of stalemate.

So you're saying that Saddam Hussein thought he could take advantage of that Cold War scenario to… to press his advantage in, in Kuwait.

AIMEN: Indeed. But what happened is suddenly, we started to see that, you know, there is, there is a new shift. First of all, Moscow wasn't exactly very supportive of Saddam's move. That's the first thing. And Moscow was already weak, beyond weak. I think we didn't know how weak it was until Saddam invaded Kuwait.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Well the Berlin wall had fallen...

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Yup.

THOMAS: …the previous November and you know, communism was unravelling.

AIMEN: Exactly, so Moscow was in a weak position, but what actually made this seem like a new world order is that another of Moscow's allies, Damascus – Syria – sent 27,000 troops to protect Saudi border against possible Iraqi invasion.

THOMAS: So even you, a young, well young, 13 year old, 12 year old boy in Saudi Arabia could tell that things had changed. Did you see President Bush give this speech? Were you watching it on TV? Were Saudis watching it?

AIMEN: Of course, because we were living with the idea that, you know, my house was only 800 meters away from the fence of the largest air base, you know, in the entire Middle East, King Abdulaziz Air Base. And you know, not far away to… two kilometres away is the gate to Aramco, which is the largest oil company in the world. Where, you know, two of my brothers were working, my two uncles were working there, and so of course we knew that we will be the next target, you know, Iraqi tanks could be in our town within four hours.

THOMAS: So you're watching television with your family and Bush introduces this idea, the New World Order that he wants to create. What was your family's response to this?

AIMEN: We deduced really three things. One, Moscow is not coming to the aid of Saddam, so brilliant. It means there is no new world war, there will be no World War Three. That's the first thing. Second thing is that the Americans are building the coalition, which means basically that they are going to overwhelm Saddam, and by extension Moscow, with so many countries coming side-by-side together. It means that there will be no two sides fighting this war. Saddam will be alone, which means that Moscow is going to abandon one of her allies in the region. And the third thing is that, well perfect. It means there is no invasion, it’s going to be a simple war later basically to expel Saddam out of Kuwait. The question is, are we going to witness chemical war or whatever? That's what we were worried about.

THOMAS: What did you think the new world that America was now going to lead would be like?

AIMEN: We didn't think that America is going to lead yet because they haven't been yet tested in the battlefield. Yet, all of us in, you know, my family, the extended friends circle, we were worried about America's previous performance in Vietnam. I'm not kidding. Seriously. We were really worried that yes, the Americans are coming, but can they really expel Saddam out of Kuwait and is it going to be short or long, protracted war? We were worried about that.

THOMAS: It was certainly a short war, very quick. I think within a hundred days, Iraq was destroyed.

AIMEN: Yeah.

THOMAS: And then on the 6th of March 1991 again, George H.W. Bush gave a speech in which he again, invoked the New World Order.

AIMEN: That is the speech in which we believed that there is a new world.

THOMAS: And what, how did you imagine it? What did you think it meant?

AIMEN: I liked what my brother said. You know, my brother spent years in America studying for his degree and his masters degree, and he said something interesting, you know, he said: “What this means is that McDonald's is coming to Saudi Arabia.”

THOMAS: McDonald's.

AIMEN: That's what he said.

THOMAS: You didn't have McDonald's yet?

AIMEN: We didn't have McDonald's yet, but he, he said what this new world order means is that we would become similar culturally, economically, to the Americans.

THOMAS: And was he saying that in a spirit of expectation, of anticipation, of excitement?

AIMEN: Uh, no, more disappointment actually. [Laughs]

THOMAS: Oh, so people weren't looking forward to this New World Order where they could have McDonald's at every waking hour of the day and night.

AIMEN: Some were, some weren’t, so it all depends on who you speak to. Do you speak basically to liberal Saudis, or do you speak to conservative Saudis? Conservative Saudis especially… Don't forget, many conservative and liberal Saudis studied where? In the US. Aramco used to send so many people to study in America and then they come back and, you know, some have the opposite, you know, view of the U.S as you know, being a hegemonic, uh, culturally encroaching…

THOMAS: Great Satan.

AIMEN: Great Satan, but others basically have more positive view of the U.S and its influence in the world. But I think his words stuck with me when he saw that speech after the defeat of Iraq.

THOMAS: Well, that's very interesting. It shows your brother's prescience because about eight years later a book came out, a very famous book at the time, by Thomas Friedman, still a highly regarded New York Times columnist called The Lexus and the Olive Tree, which sort of became for the liberal intelligentsia, for the metropolitan elite if you like, the kind of Bible of globalisation. I mean, globalization is a word that sort of grew in precedence, but it’s expressing the same thing. This New World Order, where the globe is knitted together, united under American military, economic and cultural supremacy around the ideals and principles first of capitalism, let's be honest. And second, of liberal democracy.

AIMEN: When possible.

THOMAS: When possible. Um, and Thomas Friedman's book, the Lexus and the Olive Tree actually introduced a principle, which became quite famous, in which he said that two countries, each of which have a McDonald's in them, would never go to war with each other. In the end, this proved to be untrue. In fact, the very year the book came out in Kosovo, there were McDonald's there. [Laughs]

AIMEN: [Laughs]

THOMAS: And Siberia had McDonald's, but it expresses a sort of idea that thanks to American led global capitalism, peace and prosperity would rain and your brother thought that would happen immediately. He thought McDonald's is coming.

AIMEN: Exactly. That's how he saw it. And funny enough, when the Soviet Union collapsed months later-

THOMAS: The Soviet Union collapsed about nine months later.

AIMEN: Exactly. Yeah. So, months later, we saw the first McDonald's open in Moscow and we saw lines and lines stretching a kilometre. And he told me, basically: “Do you remember when I told you it would be McDonald’s?” You know, that McDonald’s represented both the cultural and the economic hegemonic arm of the United States.

THOMAS: It's funny that you say that in Saudi Arabia, people, uh, greeted the New World Order differently depending on whether they were liberals or conservatives. Because certainly I, in America at the time, growing up in a kind of quite right wing, fundamentalist evangelical environment, I was given to believe that the New World Order was absolutely terrifyingly, apocalyptically, horrible that it was the reign of antichrist about to arrive on earth. And in fact, the same year that Bush gave his first speech on the New World Order, a famous American Evangelical Preacher and Broadcaster called Pat Robertson, he published a book called The New World Order, in which he said: “It may well be that men of Goodwill, like George Bush, who sincerely want a larger community of nations living at peace in our world, are in reality unknowingly and unwittingly carrying out the mission and mouthing the phrases of a tightly knit cabal whose goal is nothing less than a new order for the human race under the domination of Lucifer and his followers.

AIMEN: Wow.

[Laughter]

THOMAS: So, amongst the right wingers of America, there was a lot of consternation about this New World Order and what it could mean. Of course, they thought it was going to undermine American national sovereignty as America's political class pursues something like an international global order, which would dilute national sovereignty in pursuit of international goals. Inside Saudi Arabia amongst, say, the conservative preachers and conservative teachers that you were socializing with on your way to becoming a Jihadist Terrorist a few years later, was there a similar, almost paranoia about this, this New World Order?

AIMEN: Let me tell you something, Thomas.

THOMAS: Please do, Aimen.

AIMEN: You will be surprised to know that the three months that followed the American victory in the Gulf War against Saddam, these three months were incredibly weird and surreal. And of course, when Bush spoke about a new world and a New World Order, it was almost visible above our heads. Why? Because before Saddam left Kuwait, he blew up all the oil wells, and so the smoke, the heavy dark smoke from the oil wells, covered all of our region. You know, the tri-city area of Dammam, Dhahran, and Khobar, my city, were covered in dark clouds for three months.

THOMAS: So you must have thought the apocalypse had arrived.

AIMEN: [Laughs] Indeed. And what happened is, you know, basically we wear white robes, they’re called thawb.

THOMAS: Yes, the white thawbs of the Saudis.

AIMEN: Yeah, so I go to the Mosque, or the school, whatever, basically like, I mean, and they closed the schools actually at the time, because of the health hazard. So whenever I go to the Mosque or to the shop or whatever, I, come back. And when it rains, it becomes black you know, basically it becomes so grey, you know, because of the rain that comes with oil in it. So, it was and smells, really smells awful. So, in this environment we were forming our opinion of what the world will be after the defeat of Saddam, the inevitable collapse of the Soviet Union and the Soviet access, Communism is defeated in Afghanistan. Remember, it was collapsing in Afghanistan also. It was collapsing in East Europe and Arab nationalism was defeated by Bush when he expelled Saddam out of Kuwait. So, we were thinking, yes, you know, the world is changing around us. And is it for the better? Well, you know, the dark clouds, literally, were hovering above us.

THOMAS: Take us into the minds of the conservative religious Saudis at the time, like my religious contemporaries in America. Were you afraid that the reign of Antichrist had arrived?

AIMEN: Well, I tell you something. You know, you remember there is a preacher. Not many listeners would have heard about, but of course, many, many, many within the Arab world and Muslim world heard about, his name is Safar Al-Hawali. Safar Al-Hawali, you know, you know, he has a PhD in Islamic studies--

THOMAS: He’s a part of a movement in Saudi Arabia called the Sahwah movement or the Awakening movement.

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Absolutely. Thomas, you always impress me.

THOMAS: Which was a movement of primarily Saudi clerics who it is alleged were to some extent allied to, or at least sympathetic with, Muslim Brotherhood ideas. And they petitioned the Saudi government over a series of years to increase the government's Islamic credentials, if you like, or-

AIMEN: Basically, to have a stricter introduction of Sharia into everyday life. To fight off the westernizing influence of globalization, culturally, economically, and all of that. And they wanted to ban interest-based lending. You know, in the kingdom. They wanted to ban conventional banking. Uh, you know, they wanted to go as far as Saudis condemning the new peace process started in 1992 in Madrid between the Palestinians and Israelis.

THOMAS: We'll get to that shortly.

AIMEN: So basically, there were so many things they wanted-

THOMAS: They were… They were, to some extent, successful in shifting attitudes within the government and certainly outside the government towards a more hard-line Islamic direction.

AIMEN: To an extent. But Safar Al-Hawali, he basically was looking at the American arrival to the Middle East, especially in the Arabian Peninsula as they used to call it, to push away Saddam and to safeguard the energy supplies in the world. He saw it as another episode of the crusades. He said that this is not because people wanted to save God, the sovereignty of one small little country like Kuwait. This is bigger than Kuwait. This is bigger than Saudi Arabia. This is bigger than anything else. This is about American Christian crusading hegemony that is in the service of the Zionist project in Israel.

THOMAS: Of course, we know that another person who was around at that time, Osama bin Laden, interpreted, uh, America's arrival in the Middle East in the same way.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: Which led to Al-Qaeda. Which led to 9/11 and everything we talked about in season one. But I think it's interesting that within Saudi Arabia there was almost immediately, in response to the New World Order, in response to America's new unopposed role in the world, that within Saudi Arabia people responded to this. Some people at least, with a call for a more Islamic order. Because the year after Bush’s speech, an extremely famous and influential book was then released by someone called Samuel Huntington. It's a book called The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. It started in ‘92 as a lecture, in ‘93 an article, and then finally in ‘96 a book. And in this book, Samuel Huntington quite infamously says that America's dream of a New World Order is not going to happen because actually, though, perhaps capitalism has defeated communism, in a new world it's not a clash of political ideologies anymore. It's a clash of culture. And he specified two cultures in particular that were not gonna play game. One was China, and we'll get to that in another episode, and the other was Islam. And as we saw to some extent, Samuel Huntington was proved correct. That to some extent, and in some ways, the Islamic world was not easily or successfully integrated into this New World Order.

AIMEN: Some more than others. You know, the problem is it's not so much basically that Islam in itself did not play a part because Islam is absent to be honest. Because of the fact that it's the Muslims who did not successfully integrate into this New World Order or into this you know, global economic model that the Americans wanted to install. And I tell you why. Because while Egypt, Algeria, you know, Iran, Pakistan – these countries failed to embrace, you know, these principles.

THOMAS: The principles of capitalism, liberalism, et cetera.

AIMEN: Well, capitalism, not so much liberalism. But I would say basically in a free market, economic liberalism. Those were embraced by countries like Malaysia, the UAE, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia. These countries embraced it, and as a result, basically the living standards in these countries basically are far better. Of course, oil helped. But in the case of, for example, Malaysia, you know – hardly any oil. And in the case of Turkey, you know, in 2003 onwards, basically when they embraced, um, free market capitalism, thanks to Ahmet Davutoğlu. Also, there was unprecedented levels of prosperity there. So, there are some countries that successfully embraced you know, free market liberalism. And other countries who did not embrace… They did not embrace, or they failed, because of the excessive dictatorship and autocracy that was implemented there.

THOMAS: Well, eventually, George W. Bush and his advisers would, would, uh, come to the same conclusion and thought that they would have to remove a dictatorship from the Middle East in order to see the New World Order through – with fabulously catastrophic results, as we saw in again, in season one.

Now, initially you're America. It's 1991, you've decided we won the Cold War. We have this unbelievable opportunity to erect a New World Order. You're basically going to have three objectives in mind. First, you need to establish a new partnership with Russia going forward. You've been their enemy for the last 50 years, but you've won and now you have to establish a new partnership with them. You need to incorporate China, this incredibly enormous and rising economic and, indeed, military power. You need to incorporate China into the world economy thinking that by doing so you will encourage the spread of liberal democracy there, and you will finally have to sort out the Middle East, a strange collection of monarchs and dictators and Islamists and post-Ottoman failed states. You finally have to sort out the problem. I would like us now to talk about that third objective, the Middle East, because immediately things started to happen. You mentioned before the Israel Palestinian peace plan that was relaunched in Madrid in 1992 by George Bush Senior, and then it was taken forward by President Bill Clinton. At the time, Yasser Arafat was the leader of the Palestinian Liberation Organization. The Palestinian authority hadn't yet been set up. It would be set up as part of this peace plan. And on the Israeli side, most famously, Yitzhak Rabin, who was eventually assassinated by a hard-line Jewish Israeli who felt that he had conceded too much to the Muslims. That peace plan didn't succeed. Why?

AIMEN: Well, it didn't succeed because, you know a multitude of reasons.

THOMAS: Well, first of all, let's talk about the plan. What was that plan? The Madrid peace plan which was supposed to sort out the Israel Palestine problem, finally. What was the plan?

AIMEN: I love the fact that the plan was a slogan. The slogan for the, [laughs] for the conference was also the plan. Land for peace.

THOMAS: Land for peace.

AIMEN: Yeah.

THOMAS: Meaning?

AIMEN: Meaning, give the Palestinians lands. And they give the Israeli's peace.

THOMAS: So they'll stop attacking Israel if Israel gives back lands, basically.

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Yes.

THOMAS: That's the idea.

AIMEN: That's the idea. The 1967, you know, lands in return for peace...

THOMAS: In 1967 there was a war between Israel and Egypt.

AIMEN: [Overlapping] And Serbia and Jordan

THOMAS: And Serbia and Jordan, [Laughs] and in the course of that war, Israel conquered huge amounts of land in the West Bank and in Gaza.

AIMEN: Yep.

THOMAS: And so, it became a sticking point of the Palestinians that in order to have a peace plan put in place, they needed to get those lands back.

AIMEN: Exactly, because there was a precedent for that which is in that war also, Israel conquered the entire Sinai Peninsula but they returned that to Egypt when Sadat, who was way ahead of his time in reading events, went to Jerusalem, reached peace with the Israelis unilaterally, and got most of the Sinai back. And piece by piece, basically it was returned. Until finally, in 1986, the last small drop called Taba you know, was given back to Hosni Mubarak.

THOMAS: So Egypt got the Sinai back and now the Palestinians say: “Well, we want all of the Westbank back, please.”

AIMEN: Indeed. And Gaza. Um, however, here, there is a problem. You know, this is where we have to tread carefully because we don't want to be, you know, siding with one side, Thomas, here.

THOMAS: No, I hate siding with one side. [Laughs]

AIMEN: Exactly. So, so on one side, the Israelis are saying that, you know, this is the land of Judea and Samaria, and this is our ancestral homeland. You know, basically, we came all the way from all over the world, basically not because of Tel Aviv or Haifa or Acre. We came actually for this particular piece of land, Judea and Samaria. So now that we have them by right of conquest… But you know, still don't, don't forget. Many people basically think that the Israelis are Europeans or enlightened or whatever. No, they are Middle Easterners. [Laughter] Like everyone else, they behave like such. I've been to Israel before basically, and you know, it was so refreshing to see the way they talk, they behave and everything. It's exactly like we talk and behave.

THOMAS: And so, they say we've conquered the land. We're not giving it back. And the Palestinians?

AIMEN: And the Palestinians say basically: “Excuse me, we are living here.”

THOMAS: Okay, so to explore America's perspective in the early nineties as they're creating the New World Order, why was it important for the Americans to solve this problem and what was the Madrid Peace Plan? How was it going to solve it, and how did it come unstuck?

AIMEN: Well, the Americans thought, and rightly so, that the Palestinian issue is the cause of you know, radicalization. Is the cause to which Arab Dictators use as a stick to beat, you know, their people into submission. Look at Syria, for example. Look at Aleppo. So, Saddam used it to say: “I'm pro-Palestinian and that's why the West is hating me and that's why we have sanctions”. And Hafez Al-Assad, you know, Bashar’s father in Syria, always use the Palestinian issue as a way to say: “If you are not with me, you are with the Israelis.” You know, to be honest I mean…

THOMAS: [Overlapping] They still invoked the Palestinians when it served them.

AIMEN: When it served them. [Overlapping]

THOMAS: As all Arab leaders and Muslim leaders did. [Overlapping]

AIMEN: All of them yes, indeed. So here is the issue, you know, is that one of the things that was really stark for me is that I visited a Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus.

THOMAS: I've been there too.

AIMEN: Yeah. I visited the Ain al-Hilweh in Southern Lebanon. It's a refugee camp. It's a thousand meter by a thousand meter, but inside it there are a 140,000 Palestinians living. So you can imagine basically the awful living standards there. I visited The Baqa’a camp in Amman, in Jordan, and then I visited the West Bank, you know, in 2018 and what a contrast.

THOMAS: A positive contrast?

AIMEN: A positive contrast. The living standards of the Palestinians in the West Bank, far, far better than the living standards in Lebanon, in Syria, and Jordan. I was thinking, what is going on here?

THOMAS: Well, that that is actually a sad and tragic fact that most visitors to Lebanon and Syria and Jordan learn, you know, that ultimately the Palestinians who are not granted citizenship of those countries, even though they've been living there for decades, up to 50 years, 60 years in some cases, and they're not provided with the level of public service that the normal citizens are provided…

AIMEN: Yeah in Lebanon [Overlapping]

THOMAS: …In order to maintain this idea that the Palestinians are victims and need our help.

AIMEN: Exactly. I mean, the hypocrisy over in Lebanon – they are barred from 84 jobs. 84 jobs they can't even do. They are barred from education. They are barred from so many things. They can't go to university in Lebanon. So, you know… And when I visited the West Bank, you know, you notice basically that they had the places that were destroyed in the 2004 Intifada. Intifada, which means uprising in Arabic. You know, when you look at Jenin, for example, they have a brand new university now there and you drive around and you find BMWs and Mercedes and you know, the levels of prosperity is far better. I'm not saying basically they are living the life...

THOMAS: No, I mean Palestinians suffer a lot injustice in the West bank.

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Exactly.

THOMAS: There's no question. And in Gaza strip, no question. But what is often not pointed out is that they suffer sometimes similar or even worse forms of injustice in their fellow Arab countries. [Laughs]

AIMEN: It’s worse in the Arab countries than in Israel. It's worse. Much worse. The hypocrisy of it, you know, is astounding. And I think that's one of the reasons why the Americans wanted to solve this issue, is to make sure that it cannot be ever used again to beat the Arab people into submission.

THOMAS: So, the Americans want to neutralize their opponents within the Arab world's ability to do that.

AIMEN: Exactly. And the Islamist… And don't forget the Iranians. The Iranians already created the IRGC, Al Quds Force. We talked about Al Quds force in the last episode. What does the word Quds force mean?

THOMAS: It means Jerusalem.

AIMEN: Exactly. So, you know, when you have an entire, you know, army in Iran called Jerusalem Army [laughs] Al Quds force. You know, so basically for the Americans, they looked at all of this in 1992 and said “Only when there is a viable peace between the Palestinians and the Israelis that we can tell the Syrians, the Iraqis, the Iranians, and the Islamists of the region – that's it. Put up or shut up. The Palestinians have signed up to this peace. You can't be more Palestinians than the Palestinians themselves.”

THOMAS: But they didn't sign up to the peace. Why?

AIMEN: Aha. Again, you know, peace require compromise. And both sides, in a way, were not willing to compromise enough for each other, basically, to accept. For the Israelis, who remember, basically, they are people who, you know, just a generation earlier, you remember this is 1990, a generation or two generations earlier, suffered one of the largest, you know, ethnic cleansing and genocide that ever happened in the world.

THOMAS: The Holocaust.

AIMEN: The Holocaust. And they'd been attacked again and again by multiple countries. 1948, 1967, and 1973, so they always basically, have above anything else, a worry called Security.

THOMAS: Absolutely.

AIMEN: And the country is so tiny. You know, basically, if you drive from Tel Aviv to the Hills of Sumaria and Judea, basically it's only like in a 12 kilometers or 12 miles, I think. I can't remember. But you know, we're talking about a small stretch of land, which means any opposing force can cut Israel in half and basically just divide the country very quickly and swallow it. So, they always have this, you know, unbelievable, irrational almost, obsession with security.

THOMAS: So they don't want to compromise their security and the Palestinians, they want their land back and Israel said we’re not giving it to you.

AIMEN: Well, you know, this is where things get really complicated. The headline is the Palestinians basically would like to have yes for an answer, or no for an answer. They take either yes or no. For the Israelis, they don't like answers. They like questions. They like hundreds of questions to be raised. You know, okay, well, the sovereignty over the airspace, the sovereignty, where is the airspace defined? Is it like in 200 meters above the sea level? 300 meters above sea level? Okay. What about the water underneath? Does it belong to Israel or the Palestinians? What about the settlements that already been built there? What do we do with them? Do we annex them, but, okay...? What about the roads between them? Basically, are they still a part of Israel or not? Can you believe these issues took years and years and years to just basically, you know, being hashed out and then in the end they were never agreed.

THOMAS: But why not?

AIMEN: Because, while these talks were continuing, the Israelis continued to build more settlements.

THOMAS: I see. So, they were antagonizing the Palestinians more.

AIMEN: And this is where we are stuck now.

THOMAS: So, America's goal of solving the Middle Eastern problem failed at the first hurdle. But, very soon, there was a second hurdle in the Middle East, or let's say the Muslim world which was in Somalia. Briefly because Somalia is goddamned complicated, tell us Aimen – what happened in ‘92, ‘93 around Somalia?

AIMEN: What happened is that what was put together, post-colonialism by force, ended up basically separating by force. Remember that Somalia was a socialist, planned economy, kind of a country.

THOMAS: Allied with the Soviet Union?

AIMEN: To an extent, it was, you know, kind of didn’t know what it wants. And so basically with the weakening of the Soviet Bloc, add to this basically the fact that Siad Barre was a dictator who ruled the country with an iron fist. Somalia is a tribal country and its borders were a construct of post-colonialism. It was bound to break. The question is when. In 1990…

THOMAS: [Overlapping] In 1991

AIMEN: Finally, the breaking point was reached. Siad Barre after ruling the country for 20 years with an iron fist, faced an armed uprising against him by some of his generals. And that led to the tribal powder keg to finally explode and the country to this day, 30 years on, still divided. If you want my opinion, you want to solve the problem, partition the country into three or four countries.

THOMAS: That may be the final solution, but at the time, the United Nations, uh, decided to get involved. A number of security council resolutions were drawn up and ratified to keep the peace in the country. Peacekeepers were sent, led by the United States, of course. Um, and that attempt by the United States to police these United Nations security council resolutions failed. Perhaps the listener will have seen that excellent Ridley Scott film, Black Hawk Down, which tells the story of some American peacekeepers there. When their Black Hawk helicopter was taken down and they were subjected to a prolonged assault from Somalians, which became infamous and ultimately led or helped lead to the withdrawal of America from Somalia. And the country's continual collapse into a state of total misery. So, America failed with Israel, Palestine. They failed with Somalia, and then they were forced to turn their attention to another part of the world. Not exactly part of the Muslim world, but slightly part of the Muslim world. The Balkans, specifically Yugoslavia. Ah, the Balkans, Homeland of war and… [Laughs]

AIMEN: [Laughs]

THOMAS: …and ethnic strife. Um, so people may know Yugoslavia was a member of the Eastern Bloc, although quite a, uh, independent member. It's long, uh, living, Communist dictator Tito did not get along with Stalin and the Soviets so well. So he kind of forged his own path and Yugoslavia was a relatively prosperous and peaceful place.

Uh, he died in the 80s, and a man called Slo.. Slo.. Slo-

AIMEN: Slobodan.

THOMAS: Slobodan Milosevic came to power there, who as the Eastern Blocc and as communism began to fall apart everywhere, decided that the best way to move forward was to become a, perhaps even a Trump style, let's say, [laughs] a nationalist, a dictator. So he leaned heavily on the Serbian rhetoric on supporting Serbian ambitions. That Serbs are the greatest people in this part of the world, and they need their rights to be protected. Uh, which was seen to be very threatening by the other peoples of Yugoslavia, the Bosnians, the Croatians, although they're actually all the same people. What really divides them is religion.

AIMEN: Exactly. I mean, the Slovenians and the Croats are Catholics and the Bosnians are Muslims and the Serbs are-

THOMAS: [overlapping] Are Orthodox

AIMEN: [Overlapping] Orthodox Christians.

THOMAS: That's right. Uh, and this led to a lot of suffering. Especially in the Muslim area of Bosnia where, not just from the Serbs, but from the Croats as well the Muslims were subjected to extremely harsh treatment. And as the the two larger partners, if you like, wanted to prevent their own ambitions for national sovereignty and statehood, again, in a way, addressing this larger question of the Muslim world and sorting it out. Yugoslavia and the descent there into sectarian warfare, which targeted the Bosnians particularly badly. Of course, this is where your own journey through life really starts because you signed up as a young man to join the jihad in Bosnia. What, at the time amongst your jihadist comrades in Bosnia was the attitude towards America's, let's say, hegemonic leadership? By this time, you're, you're, you're, you're not a member of Al-Qaeda, so let's say you're not a jihadist maniac yet. You're just defending Bosnians who are being targeted mercilessly by Serbs and Croats. But nonetheless, what was the attitude towards America at the time?

AIMEN: You know, when I, when I decided to go to Bosnia I didn't wake up that morning and say to myself, I'm going to join a terrorist group. I'm going to become a terrorist. No, of course not. I mean, it wasn't viewed this way. It was viewed that you want to go and join the defence efforts of the Bosnian people against the Serbian genocide. You will be surprised to know that there wasn't so much anti-American feelings within the jihadist movement at that time. It was more of anti-European feeling mainly Britain, France, and Germany…

THOMAS: That were failing to intervene.

AIMEN: Exactly. You know, their failure to intervene. Although there was some interventions by the Americans and the French, you know, forbidding the Serbs from placing heavy artillery weapons around Sarajevo during the siege of the city. But all of these basically were viewed as too little, too late, a window dressing. You know, it's not going to solve the problem. The slaughter is still taking place. Again, it's the obsession with heavy weapon, but in fact, basically in those small mortars and sniper rifles killed more people than heavy weapons in Sarajevo.

THOMAS: And the slaughter definitely took place. I mean, you must have witnessed this with your own eyes.

AIMEN: The discovery of mass graves was something that was happening all the time. So for me, basically I've seen the effects of the war, the, you know, I've seen the suffering. I've seen the mass graves being discovered and dug up. So of course, you know, there is no question that genocide took place there in Bosnia. The problem was that the European powers were just so unwilling to intervene. And I think, because don't forget, basically, you know, the European powers, you know, just also two generations ago, experienced a world, very destructive world war in their continent. Um, you know, but the question is…Russia was so weak to intervene in the side of the Serbs if they even wanted to. Boris Yeltsin was still basically begging DC and the Europeans basically for cash. So they could have intervened militarily and put an end to it, but they did not. And I think basically this is the lesson that Blair and Clinton learned later. Uh, when Kosovo, you know, uh, genocide was about to start…

THOMAS: In 1999 that they did intervene early in Kosovo.

AIMEN: Exactly. However, in this case here…

THOMAS: [overlapping] In the Bosnian case, so this is where? ‘92, ‘93, ’94?

AIMEN: ‘95. ‘95 was the end of it with the Dayton Accord which again, the Americans are the ones who basically intervened um in this case.

THOMAS: So in this case, in the, in the case of Bosnia and the, in the collapse of Yugoslavia in general, America's leadership in initiating this New World Order succeeded would you say?

AIMEN: Succeeded in putting an end to a war. Uh, that's for sure. But, in the words of another person, another man who will have a very profound effect on America, you know, when he sat down next to me, knee to knee, uh, in a wedding in Bosnia in October of 1995.

THOMAS: You're talking about Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

AIMEN: Indeed.

THOMAS: He was the architect of the 9/11 attack.

AIMEN: Exactly. He viewed it differently. He said the Americans, you know, are not trying to put an end to the war, but what they are doing is that they are going to reward the Serbs, who are only 35% of the population, they’re going to give them half the republic. Half the Bosnian Republic is under a Serbian - Bosnian control. And the, and the rest which is, you know, the Bosnians, who are about half the country and the 15% of the Croats basically, they are going to share the other half. So, he was saying they intervened but he actually twisted it. He said on the side of the Serbs. They came here to ensure that there will be no Muslim Republic in Europe. And they ensured that by making the Muslims half diluted with the 15% Croat who are going to be there.

THOMAS: But that's not really true. That was his paranoid conspiracy theory.

AIMEN: Of course, but what do you expect from someone who hated the Americans so much that in six years’ time he's going to launch 9/11 on them? Another thing is that of course, the Americans also had to convince the Serbs. They, they needed to persuade the Serbs…

THOMAS: To come to the table by bombing them.

AIMEN: Yes, by bombing them. They, they used in a force to bomb certain sites in order to tell the Serbs we are willing to do it. So, I think Slobodan Milosevic and Franja Tudjman, you know, Slobodan Milosevic was the…

THOMAS: [Overlapping] President of Serbia.

AIMEN: [Overlapping] President of Serbia. Franja Tudjman who was the President of Croatia. You know, both of them in the end basically decided, you know, it's time for the war to end. And Alija Izetbegović who was the president of Bosnia, who wasn't exactly happy with the terms – the Muslims had to give up so many lands basically. But in the end, he thought that the alternative to this is an ongoing war for another five years. Can the Bosnian people take it? And, um credit goes to him basically. I mean, he, in the end agreed.

THOMAS: Imagine if Yasser Arafat representing the Palestinians had come to the same conclusion in the 90s when the peace between those two countries was being ironed out.

AIMEN: You know, in Alija Izetbegović you have a politician-philosopher. Um, in Yasser Arafat, you have a flamboyant revolutionary. So, these are the two differences between you know, Arafat and Alija Izetbegović. Izetbegović showed leadership.

THOMAS: As I said earlier, America faced three main challenges in its pursuit of the New World Order. The first was sorting out the Muslim world, which as we've seen today largely failed. The other two: incorporating China into the international community and establishing a new partnership with Russia following decades of antagonism during the Soviet period. These two challenges we will discuss in upcoming episodes as we focus, in general in this series, on unpacking the story of the New World Order. First up in the next episode, Russia.

AIMEN: You know, Russia was for everyone to see, was about to fail. Was about to disintegrate.

THOMAS: Aimen You're giving away- you’re giving away the game. In two weeks, everyone!

AIMEN: Yeah. [Laughs]

[OUTRO MUSIC]

THOMAS: Conflicted is a Message Heard production. It's produced by Sandra Ferrari, Jake Warren and Jake Otajovic, edited by Sandra Ferrari. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley.

Now, as we mentioned last episode, we are going to be running giveaways for our listeners this season. This week, a recommended reading is a book I didn't mention during the podcast, but which is equally fascinating and extremely groundbreaking, very important when it comes to explaining the New World Order.

Francis Fukuyama's classic ‘The End of History and the Last Man’. This hugely influential book appeared the year after the Cold War ended and set out to explain why now that the Soviet union was gone, mankind had reached its predestined endpoint in the American-led global order of Western liberal democracy.

A controversial book, indeed. For a chance of winning your very own copy, join our Facebook group before Wednesday the 4th of March when we announce our winner. A link to the group is in the show notes, or you can search Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group on Facebook. You can also find us, of course, on social media at MHconflicted on Twitter and Facebook.

And if you enjoy the show, please subscribe to Conflicted in your podcast app and leave us a rating and a review. It will help the show to grow.

You've been listening to conflicted with me, Thomas Small, and my good friend Aimen Dean. We will be back in two weeks’ time.

Conflicted S2 E1 - World War Iran

With the assassination of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani, the world found itself teetering on the edge of a conflict, the scale of which has only been threatened a few times since 1945.

Aimen and Thomas kick off Season 2 looking at who Soleimani was, his role in defeating ISIS, as well as the place of privatised espionage and drone technology in modern warfare.

---

THOMAS: Well, hello! Dear listener, we're back. I'm Thomas Small, your co-host, with me as ever is… Aimen Dean. If you’re new to the show go ahead and binge listen to every episode of Season One right now. It'll give you a lot more about Aimen’s amazing backstory and my… my less amazing one. [Laughs]

AIMEN: Excuse me! [Laughs]

THOMAS: [Laughs] And you'll also hear us tell the whole story of the War on Terror, from behind the scenes. And discuss the issues involved in that war in a different way, really, from how you usually hear them discussed. Or… You could just start right here.

[THEME MUSIC]

THOMAS: Hi Aimen, how are ya?

AIMEN: Hi Thomas. I'm still alive.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Still alive!

AIMEN: [Overlapping] I’m still alive.

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Oh! I’m so glad to hear it. Not only alive, but in fact celebrating a new birth. I believe you have a son now.

AIMEN: Indeed. Now I have one of each…

THOMAS: Aw!

AIMEN: [Overlapping] …and they are delightful. But also, they come with the usual tax of sleepless nights.

THOMAS: [Laughs] Well, I imagine that your life as a spy also led to several sleepless nights.

AIMEN: [Laughs] Indeed.

THOMAS: In fact, frankly given the threat that you constantly live under of assassination and other such things, have you really ever had a good night's sleep?

AIMEN: Before the kids? Yes. I always had good night's sleep.

THOMAS: That’s not true. You’re lying. You once told me that you couldn’t sleep until you had endless audiobooks playing in your…

AIMEN: Exactly! That’s the source of my, you know, wonderful sleep. [Laughs]

THOMAS: [Laughs] So Aimen you know, here we are, series two, season two of Conflicted… Season one, it seems, was rather appreciated. In fact, we have been nominated for Best Independent Podcast at the ARIA awards – the Audio and Radio Industry Awards. Can you believe it?

AIMEN: I was… I was surprised, to be honest.

THOMAS: I'm sure that we owe any, any adulation we are receiving… we owe to you, dear listener, for sticking with us through these extremely complicated stories which we will now continue with a whole new series of Conflicted.

[PAUSE]

THOMAS: If you are starting here, then I’ll do a quick recap. In season 1, we told you the story of The War on Terror from 9/11 onwards. And we did it through the prism of Aimen’s life story. Aimen joined Jihad as a young man. He fought in Bosnia. He fought in the Philippines. He ended up in Afghanistan where he swore allegiance to Osama Bin Laden, becoming an Al-Qaeda terrorist. Couple of years later, he decided terrorism wasn’t really his thing. So ,he left and was given an option: you go to prison or you join MI6. He joined MI6, they trained him up and sent him right back to Afghanistan as a double agent inside Al-Qaeda. Which he was for eight years until Dick Cheney outed him [Laughs] and he had to flee the embrace of MI6 and go into the banking sector. One form of terrorism for another.

AIMEN: [Laughs]

THOMAS: Was that fair?

AIMEN: Oh yeah. [Laughs]

THOMAS: [Laughs] This season we'll be looking at another swathe of history. But before we go back in time, we want to start with a bang in the present.

[NEWS CLIP STARTS]

BBC NEWS PRESENTER: Iran says it will take revenge for the US killing of its most powerful military commander. General Qasem Soleimani died when his convoy was hit with a US drone at Baghdad airport.

[NEWS CLIP ENDS]

THOMAS: So Aimen… who was Qasem Soleimani?

AIMEN: Well, sometime if you ask this question in Iran, people will tell you, well, you should say, or you should ask, who Qasem Soleimani wasn't, because he was so many things. He was the leader of the Quds force.

THOMAS: So, the Quds force is part of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. And I think it's important – it's, it's usually known in the press as the IRGC. And people think that the ‘I’ stands for Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. That's not true. It is the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Which I think indicates what its purpose is. And the Quds force within that corps is an elite group of fighters who are devoted to spreading the Islamic Revolution beyond the borders of Iran.

AIMEN: Well, if you remember, we talked in the previous season about the civil war within Islam. And we talked about the fact that, you know, the entire Islamic world is divided between those who believe in the modern nation-state and those who don't. Whether they are on the Shia side or the Sunni side. So, on the Shia side, you have the Iranian nation-state. But people always forget that Iran is actually two Irans. One Iran is the nation-state and one Iran is the revolution.

THOMAS: So Qasem Soleimani was devoted to spreading the second Iran, the revolutionary Iran.

AIMEN: Exactly, because the Quds Force transcended borders and national identities. They didn't believe in the modern nation-state.

THOMAS: And so, what are some of the things that Quds force did to project Iranian power and the revolution?

AIMEN: Let's put it this way: The Al Quds force, you know, might be 20 or 30,000 Iranians, but there are 280,000 non-Iranians who actually are fighting under the banner of the Al Quds force.

THOMAS: Afghan mercenaries, other sort of other mercenaries. All Shia, some Sunni?

AIMEN: No, no, all Shia. And we are talking here about bigger than just Afghan mercenaries and Pakistani mercenaries. We're talking here about all of the Iraqi militias like Asa'ib Ahl Al Haq and Hezbollah Iraq. And then you have Hezbollah in Lebanon. You have the Houthis in Yemen.

THOMAS: All of these proxies around the region, they're sort of, in a way, they're members of the Quds force. And Qasem Soleimani was their commander.

AIMEN: To put this into perspective, 280,000 active troops fighting for Iran in the region. That's more than the standing armies of the UK, Sweden, and Netherlands combined.

THOMAS: So why was Qasem Soleimani assassinated by the Americans and why now?

AIMEN: Okay.

THOMAS: And he's been, he's been in the IRGC for decades, I guess, and the commander of the Quds Force since 1998. So why now?

AIMEN: Well. You know, ironically, I did encounter, not Qasem Soleimani personally, but I did encounter his influence when I was, you know, basically spying for the British intelligence services. So, when I was stationed within the Gulf after the 9/11 attacks and the movement of Al Qaeda from Afghanistan into Iran, especially many of his leaders relocated to Iran. So, I did encounter Al Quds Force influence when they hosted the commanders that were giving us instructions. The Al Qaeda commanders who are giving us instructions in Saudi and Bahrain and Kuwait and other places to attack American and Saudi interests.

THOMAS: You mean these commanders were in Iran at the time …

AIMEN: Yeah

THOMAS: … or they were with you in the Gulf?

AIMEN: No, no. They were in Iran. They were hosted in Iran. Abu Hamza Rabia who was the head of the external operations for Al Qaeda he's quite famous. He's the one who masterminded the assassination attempt against Hosni Mubarak, the president of Egypt at the time, in Addis Ababa in 1995. And he is the one who actually was responsible for planning the 7/7 attacks in London.

THOMAS: So, he was being held under house arrest in Iran with someone like Qasem Soleimani’s knowledge, and coordination even.

AIMEN: Total coordination. Because Qasem Soleimani saw these people as perfect, useful people. They want to attack Saudi Arabia, they want to attack America. How about basically we give them safe haven? They’re in Iran, and let them, let them do whatever they want to do. Let them wreak havoc in the region.

THOMAS: Just so… what I want to know, actually Aimen is: what, you know, what has the assassination of Qasem Soleimani achieved?

AIMEN: A former senior US intelligence official just told me that killing Soleimani is the equivalent of hacking into the military service of a belligerent nation and disabling them and, you know, wiping them out completely. Soleimani was always electro-phobic or electronic phobic. He believed the Israelis and the Americans were trailing him. So he never wrote any phone numbers. He never wrote any plans. He never basically, you know, put his plans together in written form, whether paper or online. And…

THOMAS: He was a walking hard drive, this guy.

AIMEN: Exactly. He was the ultimate hard drive, the ultimate brain, of Iran’s external operations.

THOMAS: So...

AIMEN: Iran’s revolution.

THOMAS: So, by wiping him out, basically, America has just formatted the hard drive of the Quds Force.

AIMEN: They have set them back 10 years.

THOMAS: Hmmm.

AIMEN: They have set them back 10 years. So, taking him out was a shock. You know, just look at the Iranians to this day, they are still in shock that the Americans were so bold to do it. And that's why when people say, you know… You remember the “World War Three” trending.

THOMAS: Yeah.

AIMEN: And I was thinking ‘guys, come on, world war three…’

THOMAS: This isn't going to lead to world war three?

AIMEN: No, it’s simple. Because the Iranians, they do not want to war, especially a direct war with the Americans, because they know it will only take 72 hours for all of their military hardware to be destroyed.

THOMAS: Yeah. I mean, everyone has to remember that even though it seems these days, with good reason, that American power is in decline, when push comes to shove, the American military can pretty much destroy any country, especially a second-tier country.

AIMEN: Exactly… And that's why wiping him out… This is important because he was the engine of Iranian aggressive expansionism in the region in Iraq, and Syria, and Yemen, and Lebanon, in Bahrain.

THOMAS: Not only that, a lot of analysts have suggested that he was actually being groomed to replace the Supreme leader Khamanei when the Supreme leader dies.

AIMEN: Not only that… he was actually groomed to become the newly elected president of Iran. You know, once Rouhani is, you know, the current one, basically finishes his term. [Overlapping]

THOMAS: So, this assassination has some serious consequences for Iran… politically, militarily, geopolitically. [Overlapping]

AIMEN: Exactly. It is their Chernobyl moment.

THOMAS: As we know, there have been these protests rocking Iran since early October with a sort of ferocity and an extent that has never been witnessed before. The regime has been cracking down, killing people in the street. We haven't heard much about it because they've done a good job of silencing the media and shutting off social media, but it is happening. Instead of World War Three are we perhaps seeing the second Iranian Revolution in as so many as 50 years?

AIMEN: I don't think if… This is my analysis: that if Iran descends into chaos, it's not going to be a revolution or an overthrow of the regime because they have the IRGC. It’s going to be another Syria… it’s going to be a civil war.

THOMAS: Oh God.

AIMEN: You know… As much as many people basically wish for a toppling of the regime, the regime will not topple because it’s an ideologically committed, driven regime. It’s going to be a civil war. Another point I want to make: many people objected, especially in the West, objected to what's happened based on two reasons. First, it was Trump, and they say: ‘Oh, Trump, the idiot. He's starting another war.’ They don't understand that the killing of Soleimani was engineered by none other than Mike Pompeo.

THOMAS: This is the American Secretary of State. But since when two secretaries of state organize the assassination of foreign generals? That's very odd.

AIMEN: Well, he is not organizing the assassination… He is actually putting it as a policy forward. And remember, he was the former head of the CIA.

THOMAS: [Laughs]

AIMEN: So, Mike Pompeo has a beef with the Iranians – that's well known in DC. And also, basically he believes that Iran's aggression in the region needs to be checked. For him, the killing of Soleimani is pushing back against aggression. [Overlapping]

THOMAS: I.e. It's not causing the third world war, it's preventing it.

AIMEN: It's preventing it because, you know, the two forces in the region, the Sunni and the Shia forces, basically are colliding. And therefore, to rebalance the conflict, you have to push back against Iran because they were being aggressive the six months prior with the oil tankers and the attacks and the ballistic missiles and you know, arming of the Houthis and the, you know, blockading the Strait of Hormuz, you know, or threatening to blockade the Strait of Hormuz. So therefore, it was important. So, when people were saying: ‘This is Trump, he's the idiot, how could he have a strategy? He doesn't know anything.’ It wasn't Trump. It was Mike Pompeo.

THOMAS: Former head of the CIA, who we assume knows one or two things about the way the world works.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: So, I return to my original question. Why now? If, if Soleimani has been involved in this kind of activity, anti-American activity, for 15 years, 16 years, 17 years, why on January, 2020 did the president say ‘okay, take this, this guy down’?

AIMEN: So many things happened during that time that really led to that moment. Because first, Qasem Soleimani had a low profile in 2003, 2004. But then it's the American invasion of Iraq that really propelled Al Quds force into prominence. So in 2006, was a pivotal year for Qasem Soleimani. First, there was a decision taken by the Iranian leadership that the Americans have overstayed their welcome in Iraq and they need to leave in order to make place for Iran’s hegemony in Iraq. The second thing is the Israeli war with Hezbollah in 2006, in Lebanon.

THOMAS: So, Hezbollah is an Iranian proxy allied with the Quds Force overseen by Qasem Soleimani. And in 2006, it initiated a fighting war with Israel which lasted about a month I think… in the summer. [Overlapping]

AIMEN: 33 days.

THOMAS: Yeah, 33 days in the summer.

AIMEN: So… So, for Qasem Soleimani his involvement in first of all instigating the beginning of the Shiad resistance to the American presence in Iraq in 2006 by supplying… First of all, by establishing Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq which is the foundation of the PMUs or the Popular Mobilization Units.

THOMAS: So, these are Shia militia groups armed by Iran, coordinated by Iran that are within Iraq, agents of Iranian foreign policy?

AIMEN: Absolutely, they are the IRGC of Iraq. They are the Hezbollah of Iraq.

THOMAS: I see.

AIMEN: Basically. So, when, you know, he established that and then gave them sophisticated IEDs that were targeting American armoured personnel carriers and American tanks, which basically led to the deaths of hundreds of American soldiers and the maiming of thousands of them.

THOMAS: I think most people remember, who were around then, remember these IEDs that were targeting American soldiers in Iraq, or British as well… you know, coalition soldiers in Iraq. But I'm not sure people then realised that they were being directly funded and coordinated by Iran.

AIMEN: Manufactured in Iran. Because they were so sophisticated, you know, they worked basically with infrared sensors and you know, a video imaging targeting. So, they were absolutely amazing in their own sophistication.

THOMAS: Okay. But you've taken us back to 2006. I'd like you to answer the question: why now? Why in 2020 has Qasem Soleimani been assassinated?

AIMEN: Because there are milestones. So, 2006 was a milestone here.

THOMAS: What was the next milestone?

AIMEN: The next milestone is 2011.

THOMAS: 2011 with the Arab spring and Syria?

AIMEN: Absolutely.

THOMAS: There is now evidence, hard and fast evidence, that Qasem Soleimani, as representing the Quds Force, was on the ground in Syria at the outbreak of the conflict there. Really moving it towards civil war from the very beginning.

AIMEN: Absolutely. I mean, the defence… The Syrian defence minister himself, Ali Ayyoub, was talking and giving an interview. He said: ‘I knew Qasem Soleimani. I met him and from the beginning in 2011 we planned to counter the uprising of the Syrian people.’ And the first battle was the battle of Baba Amur in Helms in 2011. Which basically was the first armed clash, you know, of the Syrian Civil War. So, you know, after six months it was peaceful. But then of course, basically the Assad regime you know, during the peaceful period killed more than 8,000 protestors. So of course, basically it was inevitable that it will turn into a civil war.

THOMAS: So, 2011 Qasem Soleimani plays a role in the destruction of Syria. So why 2020?

AIMEN: Again, another milestone is 2015. [Overlapping]

THOMAS: 2015.

AIMEN: Yeah, the outbreak of the Yemen War, which we talked about extensively as well as the Syrian conflict.

THOMAS: It does seem that Qasem Soleimani has been behind the scenes of Series One of Conflicted the whole time. [Laughs]

AIMEN: [Laughs] He was behind Al Qaeda’s relocation to Iran, he was behind, you know… [Overlapping]

THOMAS: In every great sequel at one point, you know, someone rips off the mask and says ‘I was there the whole time.’

AIMEN: Exactly. I mean, the man was really a pivotal, you know… He was a pillar of the terror in the region. Because, you remember when we said, basically there are three tectonic plates moving on in the region, moving in in the region, basically, colliding. So, you have the modern nation state, and you have the Shia political and militant Islam, and you have the Sunni political, and militant Islam – all of these plates basically joining together. So when you have three plates, tectonic plates colliding, what's going to happen?

THOMAS: [Overlapping] Earthquakes.

AIMEN: Volcanoes, and earthquakes, and seismic shifts. So, Soleimani, you know, was basically moving between the three plates, basically organising this chaos.

THOMAS: So, Aimen, why 2020?

AIMEN: Because he overstepped. That's really… That's it. Because in the six months prior to his death, he escalated so much.

THOMAS: What did he do? [Overlapping]

AIMEN: Beyond America's endurance. And beyond the region’s endurance. One, he escalated by attacking oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz several times, you know, in May and June and June, you know, so he continued to attack and seize oil tankers.

THOMAS: And then there was that famous drone strike of the oil facility in Saudi Arabia. People probably heard about that.

AIMEN: Not only that, like you're talking about the largest producer of oil in the world. You know, you're talking about a country that produced 12% of the world’s oil every day. So, when you attack it with 26 cruise missiles and drones [Overlapping] ...

THOMAS: 26 cruise missiles, I don't think that's what was reported?

AIMEN: It was 26, a combination of cruise missiles and drones.

THOMAS: That is, that's an enormous strike

AIMEN: In one facility alone, 17 explosions. 17 explosions and actually it was so accurate, it was because there was an insider job. Someone placed tracker beams from members of staff who are actually Shia and belong to the IRGC in secret. They are [Overlap] ...

THOMAS: Working for Aramco in Saudi?

AIMEN: Working for Aramco in Saudi.

THOMAS: It's really cold war stuff. My God.

AIMEN: Exactly. They placed tracker beams basically to guide the drones and the cruise muscles to hit their targets with precision accuracy.

THOMAS: I'm very glad that you brought this up because I want to move away from the politics…

AIMEN: Yeah.

THOMAS: … and just go to the nuts and bolts of how someone is assassinated in this way. So obviously as, as you've established, he escalated beyond America's endurance. So, Trump said: “go”. Probably a long-planned assassination strategy was put into effect and a missile from a drone just came out of the sky and obliterated him. But how does that happen? Literally take us into your knowledge of how that kind of thing happens on the ground. What would have America had to do to kill Soleimani, in that way when they said “go”.

AIMEN: Well, when you have targeted assassination, we have to go back into the beginning of the decision. So basically, the decision was taken that Bin Laden must go, Baghdadi must go, you know, Imad Mughniyeh who was the military commander of the Hezbollah during the 2006 war where he was killed

THOMAS: In Damascus. I was there when that happened.

AIMEN: Exactly. In 2008, that was a very sophisticated attack by the Mossad and where they placed a bomb basically in his car seat. You know, obliterated him. So, it was very sophisticated.

THOMAS: So, someone decides this guy needs to go.

AIMEN: Exactly. So, the process is like this: you decide this person is the person I want to get rid of. So, this is your strategy. So how do you go about it? First of all, you have to establish pattern. You have to establish…

THOMAS: But how do you do that? I mean, you literally have to tail them so that you follow their life. You find what? He wakes up at six, he has a boiled egg for breakfast. He shags his wife at seven, he has a shower.

AIMEN: [Laughs]

THOMAS: How is that? How does that who, who's doing this?

AIMEN: Well, when you are a country like America or Israel, you have an army, of intelligence assets on the ground, and in every single country.

THOMAS: You mean CIA agents?

AIMEN: More than that. CIA agents, defence, military intelligence agents, for the Pentagon, the Pentagon have their own intelligence capability: the DIA. Not many people know about it, but it exists.

THOMAS: The DIA is the defence intelligence agency, which is American military intelligence. It's like a CIA inside the Pentagon.

AIMEN: Indeed. Then you'll have the Mossad, and then you have a network of regional assets that helps you. We will talk about that later, what I call basically the privatization of intelligence. This will be another episode. We will talk about how [overlapping]

THOMAS: It's actually this episode, and we're going to get there in a second. [Laughing] So I'll... Let me, I'm in charge of what episode.

AIMEN: Okay. So, so basically you have a a network of privateers, you know, private intelligence.

THOMAS: They’re freelancers, mercenaries. This is Star Wars stuff. This is Han Solo and Greedo shooting out in the Mos Eisley Cantina.

AIMEN: Exactly. The Mossad, the CIA, you know, MI6, the French intelligence, even countries from far away, China, Russia, all of these organizations have networks of people who cooperate, and these people are privateers, intelligence collectors who sell information to those who pay.

THOMAS: They do sound like pretty shady individuals. How are they trustworthy? For example, I can imagine one of these privateers being hired by one government to get some intelligence, but then just selling that intelligence to a rival government. Do they work for rival governments and are they trustworthy?

AIMEN: I work with teams that sometime basically work for competing governments. You know, these are teams in Syria.

THOMAS: They're not your employees. They have other people they work for.

AIMEN: Exactly. I just hired them between now and then for whatever project that, you know, comes across my way from whatever government around the world basically that asked the question, you know, or, you know, have the inquiry. So, the problem here is that: you can't control these people on the ground so much because basically they are living in hellish circumstances. They are living in a war zone, man. I mean, it's a war zone. They don't know if they will survive to the next day and if they are found out in Syria, they will be, you know, a head shorter and six feet underground.

THOMAS: Have you ever, ever lost one of your contractors? Have you ever had to face that rather tragic reality?

AIMEN: Not while on the job, but basically over the years I always, you know, almost like I know three or four times a year, we hear about the deaths of these people due to … It’s collateral damage basically, I mean, bombs falling from Russian airplanes, you know, the regime basically shelling of the villages where they are based. Sometimes they lose family members and many of them end up making good money from the work we give them, that they end up basically moving on to Turkey and from there, possibly to other European countries.

THOMAS: I see. So, America has lots of these in Iraq, the American government says to one or two of them: trail Soleimani or maybe even infiltrate within the, within his bodyguards … [Overlapping]

AIMEN: It’s more than that.

THOMAS: … Become a bodyguard

AIMEN: Soleimani because of his constant movements across Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, Turkey, other places. So, what happened is you don't tell him in the classic way, get someone and that's it. No. So basically what you have is that you have what we call basically points on the map where whenever he appears, someone would alert you. So basically, you know, Baghdad, Beirut, Damascus, these are the three weak points in Soleimani’s itinerary. So, you have assets in Beirut who can alert you. They are working in the airport that Iranian VIP is coming and based on the protocol, who picks them up? What car comes? All of these things you can deduce from that, from the repeated nature of that, that this must be Soleimani.

THOMAS: Okay, fine. So, on the morning of the assassination, you know, how does the reaper drone operator who's probably sitting in Utah or something, how does he know that when he pushes the button, the missile is going to get Soleimani?

AIMEN: Several things. First, the American intelligence just learned that he is on a flight from Damascus. Coming to Baghdad. It is a commercial flight so they can shoot it down.

THOMAS: But that's about a 45-minute flight, 50-minute flight.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: So, you can imagine like, you know, red klaxons are going [Thomas making siren sounds].

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: The countdown starts.

AIMEN: Exactly.

AIMEN: But remember, the decision has been taken that he will be killed. And remember that for the several months before that, they would have known about his movements too, but there was no decision to kill yet. There was the planning to kill, the decision has been taken that if certain escalation happened, we will kill him. But until then, the trigger never took place. There was no trigger yet, but the attack against the US Embassy, the attack that killed an American contractor in Kirkuk in Iraq just a few days prior. So, when they happened, now they are going to wait for the next time they know his movement and then take him out. So now they are aware of his movements. He is leaving Damascus airport coming to Baghdad and therefore the Reaper was just waiting. And what the Reaper does is that it has a facial recognition software in it.

THOMAS: This is like stuff out of a Marvel movie. They're just looking at our faces and sort of Thomas' and Waitrose, Thomas's and going into the pub. [Laughs]

AIMEN: Yeah, I think they can't see inside the small buildings, but no, I mean, of course if Soleimani is stepping out of the airplane and then he is moving into a car and while he is on the tarmac, the drone can actually just look at his face, detect his facial features and …

THOMAS: I thought that there needed to be something on the ground, either near him or attached to the car or something. Some, some electronic device that tells the drone where he is. That's not the case?

AIMEN: That's not the case. In this case, basically, they made it easy for the drone because he was a VIP who was taken immediately from the plane stairs into a car and being driven. So, this protocol has been done many times before, so the Americans already knew his protocol. So that's why it was easy for them to recognize that it's him, and then to target him and kill him.

THOMAS: So, what kind of missile was it?

AIMEN: Hellfire.

THOMAS: And a Hellfire missile, what kind of damage does that missile do?

AIMEN: Oh wow. It obliterate a car, easily.

THOMAS: So, I mean, something like: how many people died in that attack?

AIMEN: I think there were about nine people because, you know… [Overlapping]

THOMAS: We’re talking about vaporisation here.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: I mean, I saw a picture of his maimed, mangled body after that, basically. I mean…

AIMEN: Why didn't you share it on social media, Aimen?

THOMAS: [Laughs] Well, I mean, it's out there. But you know when I saw this, the first thing that came to my mind is that he died when his car was targeted the same way when he planned and orchestrated and gave the order 15 years earlier, almost to the day, 15 years earlier in February of 2005, to kill the former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri. While he was in a car, his body was thrown out of the car, he was maimed. So it felt as if karma, it looked, you know, when they say karma is a bitch, and looking at that in a photo of him mangled like this because his car was attacked and the same way that he ordered another decent, good human being like Rafic Hariri to be killed this way, and I was thinking, you know, that's it. You live by the sword. You die by the sword, you live by the bomb, we die by the bomb. [Laughs]

THOMAS: Well, Aimen. It's always fascinating to hear your insightful comments about these things and you know, just to veer towards a different topic now, the reason you know about these things is because you actually are, to some extent, one of those private practitioners of espionage in the 21st century.

AIMEN: Indeed. To some extent, yes.

THOMAS: So, tell us about this world.

AIMEN: I know we're talking here about, you know, an exceptionally, not just, I'm not going to say secretive, but I would say a fascinating world where you have a lot of former spies continue to be spies, but in a very different manner. They are no longer basically answerable to one single government. Sometimes they are answerable to several governments, because basically they sell their services.

THOMAS: It's a private sector job.

AIMEN: It's a private sector job. What's happened is of course, when you are working in espionage and then you move into working for the banking sector, which basically when I was there, I was a financial investigator into the, you know, the money-laundering and terrorism finance world. As well as security. So then when you are in these jobs, you create a, a network of contacts. You see, espionage is not just only about what you know; it’s who you know. And when you have a massive network of people, friends all over the world, basically, especially in the hotspots centre…

THOMAS: [Interrupting] And to be blunt, these are all bad guys. You have a big Rolodex full of bad guys that you can call.

AIMEN: Oh no. Basically every manner. Bad guys, good guys. You know, neutral guys. People talk about sometimes people who are, even some of them, royalty. You know, you have people basically sometime who are teachers, people basically who are taxi drivers.

THOMAS: And what unites them all is a thirst for money.

AIMEN: Yeah, the desire. You know, why we don't call it the thirst for money. We call it the desire for a better life.

THOMAS: I see.

AIMEN: [Laughs]

THOMAS: So, they're all mercenaries to some extent.

AIMEN: Yes.

THOMAS: Intelligence, mercenaries.

AIMEN: You see, what does intelligence, I mean, just just to give you an idea…

THOMAS: Frankly, I know so little about it. I don't know. [Laughter]

AIMEN: Just to give you an idea and I give the listener an idea. You know, one of the best sources, if you are landing in a city, and you want to know a lot about the city that you landed in, for example, basically I remember I landed in Sao Paulo and I was there investigating Hezbollah finances because Sao Paulo is an important financial hub for Hezbollah. Not many people know that, but it is the case. So, when I land there, you know the most important thing is to find a taxi driver who speaks English. So that's the first thing. The second thing is that when you sit down and talk to them, the taxi drivers know more about the locations of people in the city than anyone else.

So, he will tell you all, “yeah, Shia Lebanese people basically they have, you know, a mosque. They are in this particular neighbourhood. Oh yes. They, you know, they do have a particular get together, you know, in this area or this area. I heard about them.”

THOMAS: Taxi drivers are great sources of information.

AIMEN: Exactly. And actually, even terrorists use them as a source of information. For example, the Bali bombers, when they landed …

THOMAS: The Bali bombers, yes. They landed in 2002. [Overlapping]

AIMEN: Yeah. In 2002. So, when they landed there, it was a taxi driver who told them where the Americans and the Australians go for parties. So basically, taxi drivers are a great source of information. Do not discount them, basically as just people who talk nonsense all the time. No, they see things the average people don't. And as a result, we and the terrorists basically utilize them without them knowing, poor things, for information.

THOMAS: What I want to know is, why would a government need to hire you? I mean, governments have James Bonds, you know, they have guys they can call up and say, leave the girl, put on your tuxedo…

AIMEN: [Laughs]

THOMAS: … You know, fly to Baghdad and assassinate that guy, or find out this or that. You know, and HQ gives some magic watches and amazing Aston Martin cars with ejector seats. I mean, governments have these sort of guys, so why do they need you? I mean. No offense, but you know …

AIMEN: [Laughs]

THOMAS: That's not your lifestyle. I know you very well. You're a good boy.

AIMEN: Okay? What does intelligence, but really, most of the intelligence gathered around the world, I'm talking about the human intelligence here rather than the, we talked about it before and season one, signal intelligence and other forms of intelligence, basically, you know, eavesdropping and all of that and electronic, and surveillance. But if you look at the human intelligence, most of it has gathered, really, in restaurants and hotels. Really.

THOMAS: But by freelancers like you, not ... I mean, why would a government hire you or someone like you?

AIMEN: Okay, so let's take an example like Syria. What do you think the survivability is of a white blonde agent going in for the first time into Syria without that much support from local people?

THOMAS: So, Daniel Craig touches down, he walks off the tarmac, everyone says, “I think that guy might be a British spy.”

AIMEN: Exactly. His life expectancy would be measured in minutes. Let's put it this way. So, so what you need then is a local, because you can't put your own people at a stupid risk like this because they will be known immediately. I mean you can't just land in, in a tuxedo.

THOMAS: I'm actually always wondered when I'm watching James Bond movies, look out for the guy in the tuxedo.

AIMEN: Exactly. So, you can't just land in, and even basically if you were, you know, very normal clothes. It's still, casual or whatever. Still you are recognizable as foreigner, so therefore, and even if you send people who are of Syrian origin or Arab origin from your own, but you have to send them slowly, you have to send them gradually and you have to integrate them into society. It takes months.

THOMAS: So...

AIMEN: But what if you need something now?

THOMAS: What if you need something now?

AIMEN: Yes. Therefore, basically you look for people basically who run networks, these privateers and there are quite few of them. I know these private intelligence companies and sometimes they must create as research groups, or research offices. What they do for you, you come to them, you know, let's say basically they have an office in Beirut, or Amman, or Istanbul, and you go to them and you say, “Oh, okay. These are pictures of individuals we are interested in Syria. We want to know where they live. We want to get the exact coordinates. We want you to get close to them, so switch on your wifi and basically find out their IP addresses and all of that.” So, you know, I want to know what caused the drive. Take a video, take a photo. So I would say, “okay, no problem at all. I'm in that office in Beirut.” So basically, I call my, you know, friends, let's say in Adlib or in Raqqa in the past, or in Deir ez-Zor, or in Damascus.

THOMAS: All Syrian cities.

AIMEN: Yup, exactly. So, I called and I say, you know, my friend inside Syria, “who do we have? Let's say in the city of Deir ez-Zor in Idlib, and he would say basically why we have quite few. I have this guy, this guy, this guy, and this guy. Do they have motorcycles or cars? Motorcycles. Okay, perfect. I need motorcycles. Okay, fine. I need…”

THOMAS: Just ordering up, a kind of a menu.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: Of intelligence. [Laughs]

AIMEN: I'm going to send you by either Threema or other, you know, I'm not going to mention other apps, but in certain apps, I’m going to send you basically four pictures of four individuals who are seen in that vicinity. You know, these are what they are known by. This is their Kunya, or the aliases. I want information on them within two weeks. So, within two weeks I would receive full information with fresh photos, fresh videos. I know the exact coordinates of their houses, who they're married to, if they're married, where do they go to pray, what cars they're driving. So perfect. And then I hand over this. Now, if that government wanted to do it on their own, they would have to send someone to find them fast and basically that someone would be at risk. But because the individuals we tasked for this are locals who wanted to do it for money and they have no idea actually, who is the ultimate Tasker,

THOMAS: [Interrupts]

AIMEN: Who is the one who actually, they have no idea. They just know that this is the target. This is what you need to collect. Need-to-know basis. So, then we'll collect all the information and then based on the information, that government will decide either to liquidate…

THOMAS: [Laughs]

AIMEN: ... or to extract. I mean, there are certain, even EU governments did it.

THOMAS: Liquidation. Woah.

AIMEN: Liquidation even. I know, governments did this.

THOMAS: I should really press you on which governments, but I don't think you'll tell me.

AIMEN: No, but I know sometimes what happened is, you know, some governments even installed live feed cameras. For example, one of the secrets not known actually is that these privateers, these individuals inside Syria placed a live feed camera for more than 16 months outside of the main ISIS court in Raqqa photographing everyone going and coming, and that live feed was in a 24 hours basically beaming into one of the European capitals.

THOMAS: For what purpose?

AIMEN: For basically facial recognition. Just going and coming. People basically going into the court and to ISIS court. So, they identified the judges, their commanders just …

THOMAS: But I don't understand. I can understand, you go into an ISIS court, you can see your face, but you know, you don't come out with your head so …

AIMEN: [Laughs] Well you start to come out with your head, but the execution happened in the public square…

THOMAS: Very pleasant. So, this privatization of espionage that you're talking about, to some extent, you know, I've seen Casablanca, I've seen these movies. I mean, to some extent, governments have always employed freelancers on the ground. But would you say in recent years, decades, even the privatization of espionage has gone up in a way like governments in general outsource to the private sector these days. Are they outsourcing to the private sector in this regard as well?

AIMEN: Yeah, I mean, basically. [Overlapping]

THOMAS: Why? Why did it change?

AIMEN: First in Iraq, we started to see the privatization of armies. You know, we have Black Water. We had EGIS, we had G4S.

THOMAS: These are American security consultants. [Overlapping]

AIMEN: American, British, everything you can imagine.

THOMAS: They’re providing mercenaries on the ground.

AIMEN: South African even, the Maltese. I mean basically, you know, registered in Malta but they are private companies, even basically people from Nepal basically being recruited to go and fight in other Wars. So that's already happened. But the privatisation of intelligence, I’ve never seen it like this before. In the past, it used to be like this: you want to spy on a certain country. You have your own embassy staff in that country. You form really good relationship with businessmen, civil servants, military officers, law enforcement agencies. So, they cultivate all of this and they get the intelligence. However, these days, because the source of the greatest and the gravest security threats happen in places where there are no embassies anymore.

THOMAS: This is a consequence of really the Arab Spring, the War on Terror in general, the nation-state has been weakened throughout the region, and therefore nation-states and the embassies that are meant to dialogue with those nation-states just aren't where the real power lies, in many cases.

AIMEN: I mean down to war zones. I mean, basically this is the problem with gathering information in a war zone for example…

THOMAS: Not just war zones. I think it's important they’re civil war zones.

AIMEN: Exactly.

THOMAS: It’s not that it's a nation-state fighting a nation-state. These are non-state actors within governments, within states, transcending state borders moving. You can't just anymore throw some swanky embassy party, don your tux, handout some champagne, and talk to your Soviet counterpart. You can't do that anymore.

AIMEN: So, places like Afghanistan, Syria, Libya. You are basically at the mercy of people who have strong connections inside.

THOMAS: … these non-state actors.

AIMEN: Non-state actors, basically people basically who have, you know, a small company with a title, or managing director or CEO, or whatever. Basically, I'm a private individual, but I'm a private individual with a massive phone book. And this phone book includes lots of people on the ground there who will do anything for a buck or two because basically they are desperate. They are in a war zone.

THOMAS: So, you say that we started to see this developing in Iraq.

AIMEN: First, and then Syria, Yemen, Libya, Afghanistan. These are the places now where a lot of intelligence, especially Syria, a lot of intelligence is gathered by private individuals. Well, private groups together basically forming these intelligence gathering networks. I mean, basically, when people say data in the West, what Mark Zuckerberg and you know, the owner of Google is doing, you know, data is the new oil. Data is the new wealth. That's in a very crude way what is happening on the ground in Syria and Yemen and Libya. And to some extent, even in Turkey, among the refugee communities. That's what's happening. Data information is so important. And this happened and I've seen it myself. People sometime risk their lives to go and collect the mobile phones and the laptops off a bomb site in Syria. If a site is bombed and this site belonged to either Al Qaeda [Insert Group Here] or any of their affiliates or ISIS, they will go and collect all of these because this can be sold for two thousand, three thousand dollars. Because they contain addresses, phone numbers, email addresses of people within Syria, in Turkey, outside, in Europe, in the Gulf, in the Arab world, which means that every phone have a treasure trove of intelligence. So young city people go collect them very quickly.

THOMAS: It's like mining. They're mining for the gold of post-terrorism atrocities. [Overlap]

AIMEN: Exactly. Then these phones and devices, they make it into Turkey where then they are sold to brokers. And these brokers, people like myself and others.

THOMAS: These espionage privateers, aren't they criminals? Isn't this illegal?

AIMEN: Are you saying I’m a criminal?

THOMAS: Far be it for me to say that a former Al-Qaeda bomb maker might be a criminal …

AIMEN: [Laughs]

THOMAS: But I don't understand. Surely this isn't legal. Is it that governments turn a blind eye to this stuff because it's so useful to them?

AIMEN: No, it is perfectly legal because basically, first of all, you know. Imagine. Let's say you, Thomas Small, you have friends in Syria, don't you? Yes. Okay. So basically if I come to you, I’m government, I come to you, Thomas, and I say, Thomas, I know we have heard a rumour of know, basically a coup in Damascus or something like that, you know, there was a coup within the intelligence, and we are trying basically to ascertain is it true or not? Can you tap into your local people that are basically and see what they have heard? And I mean, basically you say yes, of course. And we would say, okay, we want detailed report and you know, then I push an envelope to you basically with five, $6,000. And I say, this is for your trouble. And also, you can basically send gifts, your friends there in Damascus, but we need, really good, juicy information.

THOMAS: So, you…

AIMEN: Come back to me and you say, yes, we found out this, this, this

THOMAS: Ok, that doesn't sound so illegal. But you know, come on. Sometimes you're going to be asked maybe to do something illegal or certainly immoral. How do you navigate the thorny moral swamp of private espionage?

AIMEN: That is where you have layers and layers of different levels of commitments. So basically, for example, you know, I wouldn't do any, how can I say assassination, engineer any extraction.

THOMAS: Why now?

AIMEN: Because basically, there is so much, you know, legality issues behind this. You're right, in a sense, because you know, if you just kind of, my work, my work is information gathering. That's it.

THOMAS: [Laughs]

AIMEN: You know? So, what they do with that, what the governments do with that after that, I mean, that's their own business.

THOMAS: Have you ever been in a position where you, you heard, saw on the news or heard through your, through your networks, of a strike against a facility or a strike against a person and you thought to yourself, “Hmm. I know how they knew where that guy was.”

AIMEN: Well, to some extent, yes. I'm not going to say no. It does happen, but sometime you're wondering. Because sometime you pass this intelligence basically to a particular government, but then the Russians come and destroy it, and then that's when you know that definitely it wasn't the government that supplied the Russians with it. Why? Because they are enemies. They are not talking to each other whatsoever. So then how did the Russians know about that? Because if I knew about it. If I knew about it, if my sources on the ground confirmed that this is a weapons storage facility for Al-Nusra…

THOMAS: Al-Qaeda

AIMEN: Yeah, Al-Qaeda. Then basically the Russians would have their own privateers, possibly the same privateers who I have, might have been tasked by the Russians.

THOMAS: Hmm.

AIMEN: It's a murky world.

THOMAS: Very murky. So back to Qasem Soleimani then. He is often credited. Let's play devil's advocate here. So obviously, you know, you weren't a huge fan of Qasem Soleimani. You probably smiled to yourself when you found out that he had been assassinated.

AIMEN: Smiled? I danced in the house!

THOMAS: Danced in the house. Let's imagine, I mean, there are some people who say that Qasem Soleimani is a hero because he played such a vital role in the destruction of ISIS.

AIMEN: Well, first of all. Okay. Soleimani did not defeat ISIS. Let's put this a myth to rest. It was the American firepower, from the sky raining on ISIS that ended them. Because the Iranians and the Iraqi militias did not have the capability to just take cities and then hold them because they couldn't. Because only the American precision firepower, massive overwhelming firepower that did that for them. So, you know, what Soleimani provided is boots on the ground.

THOMAS: Shia militia men.

AIMEN: Exactly. But Soleimani wasn't doing it out of the goodness of his heart. He was taking advantage that, “Oh, this is the chaos through which I can create a massive unregulated army.” He wasn't recruiting men to join the Iraq army. He was recruiting men to join a revolutionary Iranian-backed army.

THOMAS: And he recruited tens of thousands.

AIMEN: Hundreds of thousands.

THOMAS: And they still exist. I mean, even though Soleimani might be dead, but they exist –– what's going to happen to these Shia militia who, who actually feel perhaps, more allegiance to Iran than Iraq?

AIMEN: Well, that is what the protests happening right now in Iraq is about. Is Iraq going to end up like Lebanon, having a state within a state. I mean, Hezbollah in Lebanon being a state within a state, having a private army, private welfare network, private finance, private everything.

THOMAS: Which would suit the Iranians very well.

AIMEN: Exactly. So, in other words, it is a very weak nation-state. So, the protest in Iraq right now, gathering momentum and not only Sudanese. But also, many, many Shia Arabs who do not like the idea of Iraq becoming just another province for Iran.

THOMAS: But we can understand why the Shia of Iraq think that caused Qasem Soleimani was their saviour. Because ultimately ISIS is coming, you know, down the road. And anyone who's going to fight ISIS is probably your friend.

AIMEN: And we can say the same thing about Al-Qaeda in Yemen. Yemenis in the South will view them basically as the saviours against the Houthis. At the end of the day, we cannot basically just sit there and cheer packs of wolves fighting each other. And ignore the fact that lambs need to be saved. So, because they are fighting each other over who will eat the pack of lambs.

THOMAS: So, who is the shepherd here? Is it, with this newly muscular America and President Trump is America once again, playing the role of the shepherd, trying to fight the wolves off the sheep, the lambs, whatever? I'm screwing up your metaphor.

AIMEN: I mean, I just had to have a very difficult time picturing Trump as a shepherd, basically with his stick and a turban over his head. [Laughs]

THOMAS: I've heard some of these Jeffrey Epstein revelations.

AIMEN: [Laughs]

THOMAS: I don't have a hard time imagining that.

AIMEN: But, can I tell you something? Yes. America is playing to some extent, basically, the role of the shepherd. But the role of the shepherd as a whole is played by the nation-states. We come back again, Thomas into the question of what do we want? Do we want the modern nation-state to prevail because they are the best guarantors of safety, security, stability, prosperity in the region, or do we want trans-national ideology built on revolutionary ideas, perpetual revolution that will keep shedding blood on, and on, and on, until they build their empires on mountains of skulls and oceans of blood.

THOMAS: Well, I think we know how America would answer that question. It sides with the nation-state. As long as the nation-state buys into America's hegemonic role as chief shepherd of the sheep. Now, that really brings us to what series two of Conflicted is going to be all about. In the first series, we focused more narrowly on the War on Terror and the modern history of the Middle East. In this series, we're going to widen the scope of our investigation out a bit. And we're going to tell a slightly larger historical story. It's what has been called and indeed was called by George Bush Senior, just at the end of the Cold War, America's new world order. America's attempt to create an everlasting, prosperous and peaceful world and really lies behind so much of what we see in the headlines today.

[OUTRO MUSIC]

THOMAS: you've been listening to Conflicted with me. Thomas Small and my good friend, Aimen Dean. Conflicted is a Message Heard production. It's produced by Sandra Ferrari, Jake Warren and Jake Otajovic, edited by Sandra Ferrari. Our theme music is by Matt Huxley. New episodes of season two of Conflicted will come out every other week on Wednesday, so tune in.

This season, we're trying something a little bit different. We want to hear more from you. Dear listener, what did we get right? What did we get wrong? What topics do you want to hear us chat about in future episodes? We've set up a Facebook discussion group. You can find the link in the show notes or search “Conflicted Podcast Discussion Group” on Facebook to join in the group. We'll post early access to episode teasers, recommend further reading for people, looking to go deeper into episode topics as well as running exclusive giveaways. Each week we'll be giving away some recommended reading to one lucky listener. All you have to do is join the group. This week's book is The Twilight War: the secret history of America's 30-year conflict with Iran, an excellently written and researched account of US-Iranian relations from the 1979 Iranian revolution onward. Join our Facebook group before the 19th of February and you might just win. You'll hear from us soon in two weeks’ time.