7 replies to this topic

[salman10023]

Hello, it has been a long time since I have last been here. But, basically I have been set a gcse controlled assessment question.

I need to write 2500 words.
500 words for the conclusion.
I am finding it very difficult to begin...

Here is my break down of the question so far:
1. The Afghanistan war of today means Bushes war on terror:
The reasons for their quick and brutal response to 9/11. Ideas like they wanted to eliminate the threat, hit them at the core etc. come to my mind. (they did not want a repeat of what happened with the IRA, it carried on for generations and is still happening now).
2. The events of the past refers to PLO and IRA attacks:
plane hijacking, bombings and assassinations etc..

I just need the right websites and resources that can help me address the question.

For this essay, I also have 18 sources that I need to mention to strengthen my arguments (linking them also scores marks).

As always thank you for any support.

[MrJohnDClare]

Personally, I wouldn't have placed too much emphasis on the PLO and the IRA, although they are perhaps worth mentioning.
But I would have thought that much more relevant were:

• The Crusades (cf. this).
  
• British attempts to subjugate Afghanistan in the 19th century - there is a lot of old-fashioned anti-imperialism in what is going on in Afghanistan today
  
• The war against the Russian invasion of Afghanistan - especially the arming, funding and weaponing of the Mujaheddin by the USA, the establishment of the Mujaheddin in the border regions within Pakistan, the formation of Al Qaeda, Bin Laden etc.
  
• The Taliban victory after the departure of the Russians and the regime's subsequent links with terrorism.
  
• The Persian Revolution of 1979 the establishment of Iran as a radical Shia state, and increasing Muslim aggression.
  
• Saddam Hussein's first invasion of Kuwait and his reputation as the Middle East 'bogey man'
  
• 9/11, the American over-reaction to it, and Bush's 'axis of evil' doctrine.
  
• The significance of the Middle East as an oil area - the 1970s 'oil wars'.
  
• The economic poverty of Afghanistan, the opium trade, and western problems with drug addiction.

i.e. to see the current Afghan War in terms of a mutli-faceted outworking of the whole history of relations between the Middle East and the West, rather than just a particularly nasty outbreak of terrorism.

[salman10023]

thank you for all the useful information but the thing is I have 18 sources that are all about the PLO and IRA and I have to center the essay around how their actions are similar to what is happening today:

e.g. all three organisations (al-qaeda, PLO and IRA) used similar tactics

[MrJohnDClare]

thank you for all the useful information but the thing is I have 18 sources that are all about the PLO and IRA and I have to center the essay around how their actions are similar to what is happening today:

e.g. all three organisations (al-qaeda, PLO and IRA) used similar tactics

Forgive me if I am wrong, but don't you get the opportunity to choose your own sources for the controlled assessment?
And if your teachers have chosen them and are insisting you use them, then you need to go to to them and clarify just exactly what you are expected to do with them.

[salman10023]

The sources have been chosen for us already...
I need to mention all of them at some point in the essay and how they interlink sometimes.
I need more information about the similarity between the IRA, PLO and Al Qaeda.

am I allowed to submit my essay for you to check over or is that not allowed?

[MrJohnDClare]

I am sorry but i feel we are letting you down dreadfully.

There are links between the IRA and the PLO, and probably Al Qaeda - I know that IRA members have been all over the world training terrorists in other countries - but just where you could find out such things i can't say.
You really will have to wait and see your teacher.

And no, sorry, we don;t mark draft work, for a whole load of reaons which you can probably think of.

We wish you well, but haven't done very well for you this time.

[salman10023]

thank you for the support anyway. I am sure all will go well God willing as long as I put the correct amount of effort.
I am certain you can help me next time.

[MrJohnDClare]

John Bishop
Thank you for your very kind offer to mark salman's coursework; I am sure it was well-meant.

However, I have not approved your post, so the forum users will not be able to see it.
There are two reasons for this.

Firstly, you will be able to understand why we are not prepared to put a user who is presumably still at school in touch with someone on the web about whom we know nothing. It breaks all the rules of internet safety. if either yourself or Salman make any further attempt to establish contact with each other, I will immediately terminate your membership - not because either of you are bad people, but simply because we cannot afford this forum to be a vehicle for establishing personal internet contacts. The whole strength of this forum is that it is impersonal - that users who are all-but-anonymous write in questions which are answered - by teachers who have been vetted and, if they are British, CRB-checked - in full public view.

Secondly, it is against forum rules to mark coursework. To an extent, this is selfish - it would be impossible in terms of moderator-time to offer a marking service to all and, if we cannot offer it to all, we offer it to none. Secondly, however, it is against the ethos of the forum, which is 'help but not done for you'. There comes a point where 'help' becomes 'cheating' - undue aid. Also, where the coursework is part of an external examination, of course, marking a draft might well be formally construed as cheating, and get the candidate or their work disqualified. So for all these reasons, we do not mark coursework, and your kind offer was, unfortunately, inappropriate for this forum.

I am presuming this was a bona fide offer, and that you are an interested teacher/examiner? If you are, and you would wish to get more involved in the forum - perhaps as a moderator - then please indicate below. I will contact you personally, and you will be able to supply me with details which will allow me to check your credentials; if we are then assured that you are who you say you are, then I will let you lose - within the forum ethos - on the posts! Please understand that this is for the safety of the students.

If you are not a teacher, thank you for your kind offer, and please do not think badly of us ... but you will have to get involved in another way on another forum.
Thank you.