Review of Breeding Ground by Deepak Tripathi - Tajae Pryce

Tripathi, Deepak. Breeding Ground Afghanistan and the Origins of Islamist Terrorism. Washington, D.C.: Potomac Books, 2011.

On September 11, 2001, the narrative of the world’s history turned a page to a dark chapter as fear struck a nation whose citizens believed to be impenetrable. The images of civilian planes colliding into tangible symbols of American prosperity and security forever altered the mindset of an entire generation that had never before seen such a resounding attack on their nation, the greatest in the world. As a new decade emerged, so did a new enemy, an enemy comprised of strong-minded individuals who would give up their own lives to systematically take away those of Judeo-Christian likeness in the name of their own faith systems and ideologies. But how ‘new’ exactly was this enemy and how did the world’s superpowers, including the United States, play a role in the indirect formation of this enemy decades before the commencement of a “Global War on Terror”? In Breeding Ground, former BBC journalist Deepak Tripathi investigates the reasons for the ancient kingdom of Afghanistan turning into a hotbed for the formation of violent militias that eventually developed into the terror that is boundlessly battled today. Tripathi focuses heavily on the Soviet-Afghan conflict and intellectually advocates for not only a shift away from America’s militant approach to Middle Eastern issues, but a united effort to promote development and adequate reconciliation to the war-torn region.

            Tripathi’s main objectives are to explore the reasons the invasion of Afghanistan by the United States came about as well as to determine to what effect the Soviet-Afghan conflict had on to development of the dark phenomenon of terrorism the world knows of today. He has gathered his information from sources that allow him to thoroughly investigate these issues including collections of documents from archives of the Cold War International History Project which details the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, national security archives from United State’s archives, and various articles, declassified accounts and books on the subject matters at hand. The author is unforgiving in his consistent use of documentation to not only support his thesis, but to provide the reader with an objective history of his topics and the regions studied. He critically analyzes the military, social, and economic history of Afghanistan and brings each factor together in a fluid manner, for which the material can be digested effectively enough to delve into heavy topics and cause and effect theory. In my opinion Tripathi’s methodology of on backing up virtually every detail of his ideas with concrete sources is critical for a topic such as terrorism. Terrorism has always existed in some form, but as the author would go on to state in this publication, the term has become such a heavily loaded rhetorical weapon after such devastating close-to-home attacks that caution must be applied to anyone surveying it especially only ten years removed from the September 11^th attacks as was the case when this book was published.

            Rather than classifying terrorism as a single action or ideology, Tripathi explains what he calls the “problems with terrorism studies.” These problems can be exemplified through the near-century long struggle of finding an all-encompassing definition of the term itself. As the author references, the United Nation’s General Assembly has been split between either labeling terrorism as either a common crime that should face justice or advocating for the distinction of freedom fighters from terror suspects. Tripathi takes into account the historiographical narrative of terrorism throughout the scholastic realm and adds complexity by including a few paramount implications such as the topics of choice and rationality, physiological forces, and structural factors. With these guidelines of thought, he has explored the culture of terrorism from a dynamic standpoint and has added content to the subject matter at hand in a way that opens up more possibilities for theories and research topics for historians and students alike. For the topic of rational choice, Tripathi cites Mark Harrison to explain that terrorists who go as far as to commit suicide are willing volunteers who cannot simply be characterized as crazy or brainwashed but are committing acts they have planned for, creating decided roles for themselves. Political scientist Ted Gurr is also cited in Tripathi’s argument as approaching terrorism from a psychological standpoint. He argues that states of mass deprivation tends to lead individuals towards committing violent acts as a response; in this case, responding to the war-torn, economically deprived state of Afghanistan after Soviet and American occupancy.

            Tripathi’s argument and methodology is effective because he rationalize his theories with historical accuracies going as far as to include appendixes detailing timelines of important events in Afghan history as well as not only a statement from Osama bin Laden taking account and explaining his purpose for the perpetration of the 9/11 attacks but detailed listings of the hijacker’s airline itineraries, ages and nationality. There are no protruding holes in Breeding Ground’s narrative nor is there a door that Tripathi opens that he does not satisfy with a closing explanation.  He successfully backs up his theory of United States influence, especially in the Soviet-Afghan conflict, creating an atmosphere of hatred for Western establishment and occupancy as well as inadvertently training and supplying soldiers who would later use those resources to wage war on the States.