C. Christine Fair is a Provost’s Distinguished Professor at Georgetown University in the Security Studies Program. She is the author of In Their Own Words: Understanding Lashkar-e-Tayyaba (OUP, 2018) and Fighting to the End: The Pakistan Army’s Way of War (OUP, 2014).
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On Aug. 5, the Indian government announced that the “special status” accorded to the state Jammu and Kashmir—which includes Ladakh—was no more.
Editor’s Note: Myanmar has produced one of the world's worst human-made humanitarian crises, with the government there persecuting the Rohingya, a Muslim minority, with thousands dying and hundreds of thousands being displaced. C. Christine Fair, my Georgetown colleague, warns that violence related to this crisis may grow over time. A range of radical groups are focusing on the Rohingya, as are political leaders seeking to burnish their Islamist credentials. All this may produce violence in the years to come.
Daniel Byman
Editor’s Note: Despite the size of its population and growing importance, Bangladesh gets little attention in policy circles. This is true even though radical terrorist groups like the Islamic State are making inroads there. To help remedy this neglect, my Georgetown colleague Christine Fair presents an overview of Islamism in Bangladesh and assesses the terrorism threat there today.
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Editor's Note: Bangladesh, one of the world's largest Muslim countries, is usually considered a success story: slowly but steadily, this secular democracy is climbing out of poverty. This perceived success, however, ignores the country's many problems. Christine Fair, Ali Hamza, and Rebecca Heller—all of Georgetown—paint a far darker picture. They note high degrees of support for militancy and growing violence, arguing that ignoring Bangladesh's problems could prove disastrous.
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Since 9/11, the United States has furnished Pakistan with some $33 billion dollars in economics assistance, foreign military sales, and lucrative “reimbursements” under the coalition support funds (CSF) program. The United States has also provided Pakistan with access to U.S.
Editor's Note: There is a popular misconception that the serious study of Islam is a step on the road toward radicalization and terrorism. Christine Fair, Jacob Goldstein, and Ali Hamza (all of whom I'm proud to say share my Georgetown University universe) come up with a heartening finding for those of us who believe knowledge is good: that those who know more about Islam are more resistant to extremist appeals.
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Editor’s Note: The drone program remains controversial, and critics regularly blast it for creating more terrorists than it kills. Prominent among these critics is Glenn Greenwald, a founding editor of The Intercept, which published an anti-drone report based on leaked documents. C.