U.S. Policy on Islam

* In response to Robin Wright’s “Fighting the Fires of Islam,” Opinion, July 4:

Wright says, “For the first time in its history, the United States should develop a tangible and realistic foreign policy on a religion.” I hope not.

Hitler developed just such a policy against international Zionism in the early ‘30s, which quickly became Germany’s domestic policy against all German Jews. Such religious history should not be repeated.

Also, Wright is falling into the current conspiratorial trap of substituting one manufactured crisis, the “Red Peril,” for another manufactured crisis, the newly proclaimed “Green Peril.” In fact, we have neither the time, money, justification, nor the manpower to continue our imperialistic adventures in the name of the “New World Order.”

We need to concentrate on the problems that repress our own national order: the economy, education, crime, drugs and AIDS. When we start to hold ourselves accountable for our own domestic affairs, not the domestic affairs of others, then we stand a chance of demonstrating to all nations that democracy works.

DON KAREEM PIERSTORFF

Costa Mesa

* Thank you for Wright’s fine treatment of Islam’s growing influence in the international political arena. In particular, I agree with the challenge of the current U.S. policy of “back(ing) away from endorsing or helping countries in which pluralism could lead to the election of Islamists.” Also, the point that Islam and democracy are compatible is quite right and to be commended.

Unfortunately, the headline did not fit the article. The point of the article was that democracy and decency should be the criteria the U.S. uses to judge a regime, whether it is Islamic or not. The headline suggests the incorrect and asinine notion that Islam is “the enemy.”

ASIF KHALAK

Pasadena

* There is no good excuse for the absence of democracy in the Islamic world, as there was no good excuse for the absence of democracy once in Japan, and more recently, in Russia. Thus, I would agree with Wright that the U.S. has no good reason to discourage the development of a democratic tradition within Islamic civilization.

Nevertheless, I do believe that Islamic theocracies must be subject to containment for the same reason for containing secular dictatorships: They are totalitarian regimes that express an anti-Western evangelization and are dedicated to the subversion of the existing sociopolitical order by all means, including the employment of terrorism as a means of statecraft. In addition, in much of the Middle East, the problem is much more problematic than Wright lets on. The truth is that the Islamic movements in the region are far from democratic and seek to transfer to themselves rather than to break down the absolute monopoly on power held by the present dictatorships. None of this means that Islamic movements cannot operate within a pluralistic framework. But the example of Iran, in which free choice between divergent ideologies is forbidden, and in which religious minorities such as the Bahais are subject to repression, does not inspire any confidence that Islamic political movements are yet capable of living within Western-style democratic processes.

Clearly, the U.S. has every interest in ensuring the emergence of an Islamic civilization that is both democratic and favorable to the security of U.S. interests abroad. But in helping to implement these important objectives, the U.S. must equally insist that Islamic movements repudiate totalitarian sponsors, totalitarian ideologies, and accept the principles of majority rule, protection of minority rights, and alternation of political power that constitute the essence of Western democracy. NORMAN F. BIRNBERG

Long Beach