Making Enemies: An Anthropology of Islamist Terror, Part I

Abstract

Soon we will mark the fifth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks, and with it the fifth anniversary of the War on Terror. The good news is that the United States has not suffered a comparable blow since that terrible day; the bad news is that our government still lacks a proper understanding of our enemies and what motivates them. That, in turn, is a major reason why the end of this war is nowhere in sight: After all, how can we know if we have defeated