EDITORIAL – The civilized cannot win against the barbaric

The civilized world is finding itself in great difficulty fighting Isis. Even if it manages to contain Isis and push it to near-irrelevance, the fate suffered by its most notorious predecessor al Qaeda, there will always be another group that will rise to take its place. And the civilized world better prepare. Because when that happens, any newer group will even be more barbaric.

And that is precisely the problem facing the civilized world -- it is impossible to fight barbarism in a civilized way. To be sure, there is nothing civilized in war. But for the sake of context and comparison, the only way to understand the current conflict is to resort to the we-versus-they equation. How the war is waged within that equation cannot be viewed otherwise but that Isis is barbaric while the rest of us who are appalled because we are, well, civilized.

This is the same scenario that democratic governments facing various types of insurgencies have been thrust into. These insurgencies have adopted methods of warfare that are no less terroristic than those waged by real terrorists. They do this by employing sneak and wanton attacks that often result in civilian casualties. In fact, the intended result is to inflict as much civilian casualties as possible.

Whatever higher motive these insurgencies may claim cannot and will ever justify the murder of innocents, the destruction of private properties, and the unnecessary disruption of lives in an undeclared war. And while these insurgencies are free to wreak havoc and mayhem, democracies and the civilized authority that represents them cannot respond in kind. Not even if they wanted to.

And that is because these democracies, these civilized authorities, are held back by their civilized principles, enshrined in their civilized institutions. And that is why, even as Isis keeps beheading its captives and keeps killing and driving away huge civilian populations for no other reason than that they belong to other sects or religions, nobody in the civilized world can respond in similar manner.

What aerial bombings that the civilized world has carried out against Isis are guided by codes of conduct that guard against indiscriminate targeting. The bombs are supposed to fall only on known Isis targets. And while there are to be expected some civilian casualties, these are always the result of misses and were never deliberate.

These savages, on the other hand, are taking advantage of this built-in crippling effect of being civilized. Isis and other terrorists and insurgents know well enough to blend in with the civilian populations, using them as human shield. In such an equation, there is no way the civilized can win against the barbaric, not even with numerical superiority or superior weaponry. A thousand bombs cannot stop a knife-wielding savage blending in with civilians.