ABSTRACT
What the West in general and the Americans in particular found in Lebanon was exposure to the unknown and unpalatable, a world filled with monsters, a Dragonworld. There were in Lebanon more than one such world, ecosystems that protected those dedicated to imposing change through violence. All underground have special motives but those with incandescent ideals have a revolutionary ecosystem and a sense of purpose that gives a more special impetus. Within Lebanon, as elsewhere, those with limited resources by necessity had been forced to resort to unconventional means. For a generation all the variants of the unconventional, the dreamers and the desperate, the revolutionary and the mad dog killers, were readily to hand. What is sought by a revolutionary underground is legitimacy: a righteousness proclaimed by the involved and recognized by the avowed constituency, by the international community, and even by the opponent.
