Al-Qaeda, ISIS, Boko Haram and Forms of Rebellion in the 21st Century in the Vacuum of Ottoman and Soviet “Collapse”

Abstract

With the collapse of the alternative ideologies of the 20th century, capitalism has had several decades of unopposed influence across the globe. This has had an increasing result of changing the lives of people in the mould of the west to the dismay of many peoples. No ideology unites them, no international organization can protect them from armies and corporate militias and death squads. National governments call those who resist terrorists and so class any actions of self-defense. We have entered an era of global conflict between traditional peoples and corporations where one way of life is being exterminated. While it is in general a continuation of the assault of western colonialism, today’s indigenous rebels instead of being considered devil worshipers are now often seen as minions of terror. Political rebellions, armed gangs and drug lords and religious terrorism appear to form a range of types with conquest of territory the goal on one end and operational integrity (e.g., business) at the other as in oligarchs morphing into warlords and presidents (as in Chechnya and Ukraine). At the same time international confrontations and competition for resources are escalating. The defeat of the USSR is often described as a “collapse” of authority and transition to a new civil entity, Russia, but like the defeat of the Ottoman Empire, it has resulted in a dismemberment of the Soviet Empire. Where the Middle East remains unstable 100 years after the Ottoman defeat, the Russian periphery has become unstable in both independence movements along its southern borders as well as those flanking Europe. The demise of both empires threatens the stability of the world today.