What compels a person to strap a vest loaded with explosives onto his body and blow himself up in a crowded street? Scholars have answered this question by focusing on the pathology of the “terrorist mind” or the “brainwashing” practices of terrorist organizations. In <I>Caravan of Martyrs</I>, David Edwards argues that we need to understand the rise of suicide bombing in relation to the cultural beliefs and ritual practices associated with...
In this powerful book, David B. Edwards traces the lives of three recent Afghan leaders in Afghanistan's history–Nur Muhammad Taraki, Samiullah Safi, and Qazi Amin Waqad–to explain how the promise of progress and prosperity that animated Afghanistan in the 1960s crumbled and became the present tragedy of discord, destruction, and despair. <I>Before Taliban </I>builds on the foundation that Edwards laid in his previous book, <I>Heroes of the Age, </I>in which he...
Much of the political turmoil that has occurred in Afghanistan since the Marxist revolution of 1978 has been attributed to the dispute between Soviet-aligned Marxists and the religious extremists inspired by Egyptian and Pakistani brands of «fundamentalist» Islam. In a significant departure from this view, David B. Edwards contends that—though Marxism and radical Islam have undoubtedly played a significant role in the conflict—Afghanistan's troubles derive less from foreign forces and the...
