Post-9/11 Anxieties, Donald Trump’s “Post-truths,” Pershing, and Contemporary Defenses of Counterinsurgency “Hearts and Minds” Strategies

Abstract

In this chapter, the author argues that after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, stories about Pershing and pigs started to resurface as intelligence communities “took the gloves” off and came with all types of imaginative counterterrorist strategies. This was a period of time when everyone from Senators to milbloggers was circulating stories of how Pershing may have shot captured Moros with bullets dipped in pig’s blood, and all sorts of permutations of the tale were spread by those who searched for deterrence “Islamic fundamentalists” during the “Global War on Terrorism.” This chapter also shows many of Trump’s critics, at the same time that they attacked the arrival of “post-truths,” applauded the way that Pershing had actually used “hearts and minds” strategies.