I Refuse To Believe Most Political Scientists Are This Stupid...[UPDATED]

...but when prominent ones publish such nonsense I begin to doubt that belief:

Since 2004, the number of suicide attacks—whether within a country or transnational—has grown with shocking speed. Through a close analysis of suicide campaigns by Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Lebanon, Israel, Chechnya, and Sri Lanka, the authors provide powerful new evidence that, contrary to popular and dangerously mistaken belief, only a tiny minority of these attacks are motivated solely by religion. Instead, the root cause is foreign military occupation, which triggers secular and religious people alike to carry out suicide attacks.

So, here we have a hypothesis: military occupation causes suicide attacks.

So where have the United States been "occupiers" since 1900?

PHILIPPINES
CUBA
PUERTO RICO
GUAM
NICARAGUA
SAMOA
HAWAII
PANAMA
HONDURAS
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
MEXICO
HAITI
RUSSIA
GUATEMALA
EL SALVADOR
GERMANY
KOREA
JAPAN
VIETNAM

How many of these occupations resulted in suicide attacks against civilian populations? The answer seems to be zero.

Of course, there were other occupations. I wonder how those might be different?

Wikipedia lists the following countries has having experienced suicide attacks:

Afghanistan
Algeria
Egypt
Iran
Iraq
Israel
Lebanon
Pakistan
Russia (Chechnya)
Sri Lanka
United States (9/11 attacks)

Now, Dr. Papes expects you to believe military occupation is the dominant similarity in the above list.

So, what is it that causes occupations in countries that just so happen to be Islamic to spawn suicide attacks, when occupations in the non-Islamic countries did not generate such attacks? Obviously, the prima facie case for Dr. Papes "hypothesis" is simply lacking.

Like I said, nonsense. Very stupid nonsense.

This is what happens when someone allows their ideological attachments to overwhelm reality, honesty and common sense.

UPDATE:

Proving that the modern Left is almost entirely brain-dead, the usual suspects buy this crapola hook, line and sinker.

Given their ability to ignore evidence to keep their ideological preferences unchallenged, I believe it is fair to label the Lefties as positively anti-intellectual.