How Will We Fight?

In considering the question “How will we fight?”, this article begins by examining the threats we face from conventional, insurgent, and hybrid enemies as well as terrorists and super-empowered individuals. It then outlines how America can fight effectively against each threat—as well as identifying the deficiencies in our current force structure that will hinder that response. The analysis argues that America needs a well-balanced, medium-weight joint force. It then provides recommendations for each of the services, as well as special operations forces, to achieve that goal. It concludes by describing what is needed to insure our force is capable of the rapid innovation in wartime required of successful nations.     

Three prejudices against terrorism

This article criticises three assumptions regarding terrorism and the agents who carry it out: (1) terrorists are always indiscriminate in their targeting; (2) terrorism is never effective in combating oppression; and (3) terrorists never participate in fair negotiations, as they merely wish to switch places with their oppressors. By criticising these three prejudices against terrorism, the article does not attempt to justify or excuse terrorism generally nor in the specific case of Sri Lanka which is examined. Instead, it creates the necessary room for such justifications or excuses to be critically appraised by dismantling some popular myths surrounding terrorism.     

Why Democracies Make Superior Counterterrorists

The conventional wisdom is that terrorists tend to target democracies because they are uniquely vulnerable to coercion. Terrorists are able to coerce democracies into acceding to their policy demands because liberal countries suffer from two inherent counterterrorism constraints: (1) the commitment to civil liberties prevents democracies from adopting sufficiently harsh countermeasures to eradicate the terrorism threat, and (2) their low civilian cost tolerance limits their ability to withstand attacks on their civilian populations. This article tests both propositions of the conventional wisdom that (a) terrorists attack democracies over other regime types because (b) liberal constraints render democracies vulnerable to coercion. The data do not sustain either proposition: illiberal countries are the victims of a disproportionate number of terrorist incidents and fatalities, and liberal countries are substantially less likely to make policy concessions to terrorists, particularly on issues of maximal importance. A plausibility probe is then developed to explain why democracies have a superior track record against terrorists. The basic argument is that liberal countries are comparatively resistant to coercion—and hence inferior targets—because they are superior counterterrorists. Liberalism's commitment to civil liberties and low civilian cost tolerance are, in the aggregate, actually strategic assets that help democracies prevail in counterterrorist campaigns, thereby reducing the incentives for terrorists to target this regime type. These findings have important implications for how democracies can defend their liberal values and physical security in the age of terrorism.     

NGOs: A ‘New Class’ in International Relations

Nongovernmental organizations have attempted to take control of civil society, displacing traditional governing institutions. This serves the interests of the terrorists, warlords, and mafia dons, who benefit from weak central government, and hinders the West's ability to mobilize allies to participate in the war on terror. NGO leaders who are hostile to the nation-state itself seek to transform a voluntary system of participation in international organizations by sovereign member-states via a “power shift” to an unholy alliance of multinational corporations and NGOs. Since they do not possess the traditional sources of legitimacy enjoyed by nation-states, they seek to impose their will by financial or forceful means—for example, “sanctions” or “humanitarian intervention.” A new class of NGOs has thus emerged that is essentially opposed to the diplomatic, legal, and military measures required for dealing with civilizational conflict.     

The Usefulness of Examining Terrorists’ Rhetoric for Understanding the Nature of Different Terror Groups

ABSTRACT

This study advances a distinction between two generic types of terrorists’ rhetoric: (1) ideological rhetoric candidly reflecting the terrorists’ genuine beliefs and values regarding their military targeting policy (who is a legitimate target), even when adopting such rhetoric involves high image/diplomatic costs; and (2) a PR-oriented rhetoric which consciously misrepresents the terrorists’ intentions and behavior in an attempt to project a more benign and humane image, thus maintaining sympathy and rebuffing criticism. We contend that such a distinction can provide a highly useful metric for assessing terrorists groups’ rationality and pragmatism: the most pragmatic groups will shift between these two types of rhetoric depending on changing strategic needs. To show the practical usefulness of this distinction we provide criteria for categorizing terrorists’ rhetorical responses to (mostly liberal-minded) criticism that they have killed innocent civilians in their enemy’s camp. We apply our criteria by examining terrorists’ (sincere and insincere) apologies.     

Comment on ‘terrorism and democracy’

The December 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 raises an important legal problem for decision‐makers contemplating retaliation against such acts of terrorism. Conceivably, retaliation could conflict with and help erode international norms of self‐defense. Counter‐terrorist experts and government officials espousing the use of force have minimized, if not ignored, this potential conflict and its negative impact on world order. On the other hand, the 1986 US raid on Libya and the 1985 Israeli raid on PLO headquarters in Tunisia reveal that under limited circumstances force would be deemed appropriate. The informal adjudication of these incidents by relevant international actors suggests a tolerance for the resort to force in the US case and ambivalence in the Israeli case. The US and Israeli cases guide a subsequent discussion of the conditions under which the use of force against terrorist bases in response to terrorist attacks could be legitimated. The resort to force against such activity, it is argued, would have to meet the test of necessity, including: (1) a previous and ongoing series of terrorist attacks, and demonstrated responsibility for those attacks by the actor, state or non‐state, against whom force is used; (2) immediately expected or imminent terrorist attacks endangering human life; and (3) the absence of non‐forcible remedies effective in terminating the terrorist threat. In addition the amount of force would have to be proportional, limited to targets responsible for specific terrorist activity and limited by the objective of terminating that threat.     

The 2009 Elections and Iran's Changing Political Landscape

Iran's June 2009 elections set into motion four processes that are central to the operations of the Islamic Republic regime. They include: the growing gap between large sections of Iranian society from the Islamic Republican state; the steady militarization of the political system; the unprecedented degree to which the Supreme Leader has become an active partisan in the increasingly bitter political infighting among regime insiders, and—most significantly—the violent disruption of an emerging set of “rules of the game,” that previously served as a safety check against excessive factional infighting. This last consequence of the election and its aftermath is likely to leave its most enduring imprint on the State. Specifically, the elections have taken Iran from manageable factionalism to the brink of complete political paralysis. As such, given the untenability of the State's present predicament, far-reaching changes are almost certain to come.     

The New Maritime Strategy: Confronting Peer Competitors, Rogue States, and Transnational Insurgents

Established military organizations, such as the U.S. military services, have many things – revered service traditions, stable bureaucratic structures, standard operating procedures, and of course distinctive weapons systems.¹ Ideally, they should also have a coherent military strategy, one which will guide them in how to fight their wars or how to deter these wars from ever happening. The U.S. Navy is now developing a new maritime strategy, its first real strategy since the 1980s. The Maritime Strategy then was directed toward a single enemy, the Soviet Union. The new strategy faces three very different kinds of enemies: peer competitors, rogue states and transnational terrorists. The new strategy will include such familiar concepts as containment and deterrence, but is should be centered upon the concepts of command of the commons and denial.     

Precision Terror: Suicide Bombing as Control Technology

Suicide bombing can be understood as a technology that successfully integrates people, cultures, and hardware into precise, intelligent, lethal weapons systems. Lacking access to the sophisticated electronic guidance systems of their enemies, terrorists have developed a cost-effective alternative technology by using social and cultural pressure to convert human beings into guidance systems for terrorist ordnance. This demonstrates that while terrorists tend to be imitative in their technologies, they can still be effective and difficult to predict. A significant implication that arises from this discussion is that the American tendency to assume that “high-tech” devices will automatically confer an advantage on the United States in the struggle against terrorism should be reconsidered.     

The phenomenon of conservative terrorism

In his studies of loyalist terrorism in Northern Ireland, Steve Bruce introduces the concept of ‘pro‐state’ terrorism, whereby terrorists carry out attacks in order to eliminate threats which they believe should have been eliminated by the state's security forces. This article argues that whilst the actions of loyalist terrorists may have a pro‐state element, they can more properly be seen in the wider context of conservative terrorism.     

Conceptualizing the effects of mass‐mediated terrorism

Abstract

In summer 1985, a TWA plane was hijacked by Shiite terrorists to Beirut creating what turned to be one of the most impressive spectacles of the mass‐mediated “theater of terror.” After the event the American media were blamed for fanning the crisis atmosphere, giving the terrorists the publicity they craved, abetting the terrorists by reporting U.S. military movements, holding a brutal competition among themselves to get exclusive footage or interviews, harassing the hostages’ families, negotiating directly with the terrorists, milking the hostages still held by the terrorists for political and ideological declarations, and propagandizing the terrorists’ anti‐U.S. and anti‐Israel messages. The resulting debate that followed these accusations, illustrates the lingering argument regarding media and terrorism. While some claim that “the media are the terrorists’ best friends. The terrorist act by itself is nothing. Publicity is all”,¹ others argue that the media are avoiding the “real terror” for ideological reasons, averting Western public opinion from U.S. terrorism by underreporting its share in Third World Terrorism.² The ideological loadings of definitions and arguments are combined with confused interpretations of media effects and public opinion to yield an endless, futile debate. The purpose of the paper is to conceptualize basic effects of mass‐mediated terrorism by relating media effects studies to the case of terrorism and public opinion.     

Suffering What It Must? Mongolia and the Power of the ‘Weak’

Mongolia is not a hapless object on which the great powers may act at will. Like other small states existing on the periphery of great powers, Mongolia has—and does exercise—political agency. Its policies and actions affect not only the bilateral relationship it has with each of the greater powers, but—as an outgrowth of those bilateral relations—it also exerts some influence on the relationship that the great powers, in turn, have with each other. “… you know as well as we do that right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.”¹     

Punitive Justifications or Just Punishment? An Ethical Reading of Coercive Diplomacy

Can the use of military force in response to violations of human rights norms be meaningfully described as ‘punishment’? If so, does this form of punishment help to constitute a just and peaceful international order? This paper investigates these two questions by examining the use of strategic bombing in campaigns of coercive diplomacy as a means to punish states. The paper explores the concept of punishment and its relevance for international affairs as a theoretical basis. It then turns to two cases of punitive uses of force—US and UK strikes against Iraq in 1998 and NATO strikes against Serbia in 1999. These two military campaigns are assessed as punitive but not necessarily just in that they fail to fit within a clear, legal institutional order and confuse the agent that deserves punishment. The paper concludes by suggesting that while punishment may be necessary for a legitimate international order, current punitive actions do not support such an order.     

The Palestinian intifada: An analysis of a popular uprising after seven months∗

This study challenges the conventional wisdom that the Internet is a reliable source of operational knowledge for terrorists, allowing them to train for terrorist attacks without access to real-world training camps and practical experience. The article distinguishes between abstract technical knowledge (what the Greeks called techne) and practical, experiential knowledge (mētis), investigating how each helps terrorists prepare for attacks. This distinction offers insight into how terrorists acquire the practical know-how they need to perform their activities as opposed to abstract know-what contained in bomb-making manuals. It also underscores the Internet's limitations as a source of operational knowledge for terrorists. While the Internet allows militants to share substantial techne, along with religious and ideological information, it is not particularly useful for disseminating the experiential and situational knowledge terrorists use to engage in acts of political violence. One likely reason why Al Qaeda and other Islamist terrorists have not made better use of the Internet's training potential to date is that its value as a source of operational knowledge of terrorism is limited.     

Latin American terrorism and the Soviet connection revisited

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, a number of scholars and journalists argued that the USSR was sponsoring terrorism as a means of low‐intensity conflict against the non‐communist world. This view was endorsed by the Reagan administration. This article assesses what substance there is behind such charges as they relate to Latin America. Its main argument is that sponsorship of terrorists has usually occurred as a byproduct of Soviet support of armed revolution as a tactic rather than for terrorism as such. Soviet willingness to assist armed struggle has varied over the last three decades. The article concludes that, given the current priorities of Soviet Latin American policy, Moscow's sponsorship of armed struggle, including terrorism, is decreasing and will almost certainly continue do so.     

A Review of: “Rebecca Knuth. Burning Books and Leveling Libraries. Extremist Violence and Cultural Destruction.”

In the 1970s, Western European countries were hit hard by terrorism, especially by international terrorism that crossed borders easily and allowed terrorists of different origins to carry out attacks against both governments and people. Consequently, the necessity of fighting this menace also extended to international organisations. This article looks at how the Council of Europe dealt with the issue, and assesses the negotiations that led to the Convention on the Suppression of Terrorism from the German perspective. West Germany was very interested in establishing a sounder international legal framework against terrorism and thought that the Council of Europe would be able to make an important contribution by abolishing the political offence exception that had so far been a core feature of most extradition treaties. This clause allowed political criminals to escape punishment by fleeing to a country that would deny extradition to a different country on the grounds of the political nature of the act committed by the person in question. The article gives an account and analysis of the complex negotiations that finally resulted in the adoption of the Convention in 1977, as well as of the problems encountered and compromises reached during these negotiations.     

Yitzhak Rabin: An Appreciation

The author wrote that “the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin in his seventy-third year ended the life of another ‘son of the founders’ of the state of Israel. He belonged to the generation of 1948—the young men whose military prowess gave Israel a fighting start. Unlike some of his early mentors, such as Yigal Allon and Moshe Dayan, Rabin was to achieve supreme power twice. And more than any other of his generation he will be recalled as the general who waged both war and peace.”     

The role of ideology in terrorists’ target selection

Ideology plays a crucial role in terrorist's target selection; it supplies terrorists with an initial motive for action and provides a prism through which they view events and the actions of other people. Those people and institutions whom they deem guilty of having transgressed the tenets of the terrorists’ ideologically‐based moral framework are considered to be legitimate targets which the terrorists feel justified in attacking. As an extension of this, ideology also allows terrorists to justify their violence by displacing the responsibility onto either their victims or other actors, whom in ideological terms they hold responsible for the state of affairs which the terrorists claim led them to adopt violence. While it is not the only factor which determines whether a potential target is attacked, ideology provides an initial range of legitimate targets and a means by which terrorists seek to justify attacks, both to the outside world and to themselves.     

The Institutionalization of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQMI)

A number of observers have expressed serious concerns that Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQMI), as it expands in the Sahel, may become strong enough to be a threat to Europe and carry on the global mission of Al-Qaeda as conceived by bin Laden. This fear seems unwarranted. Using institutional analysis to study the AQMI behavioral fluctuations over the last decade, this article argues that AQMI's need to find a compromise between external and internal legitimacy has constrained its behavior. The affiliation of the Algerian terrorists with Al-Qaeda was in many ways a marriage of convenience that created a number of internal contradictions. At the cognitive level, implicit Algerian nationalism to rid the country of its corrupt regime remains at odds with pan-Islamic views shared by Al-Qaeda's leadership. At the normative level, indiscriminate suicide bombing supported by Al-Qaeda is abhorrent to many Algerian terrorists, who construe their mandate in the spirit of the Algerian war of independence where it is their duty to protect civilians. These and other contradictions prevent AQMI from developing a coherent political agenda and thus it is less likely to engage in a long-term conflict against European societies.     

Terrorism and Profiling

A key problem for counterterrorism is how large numbers of individuals can be screened most efficiently to discover terrorists. This question arises at security checkpoints of all kinds, from roadblocks to airline security counters. Some argue that certain categories of individuals, for instance, young Muslim men in the airline context, should be screened more heavily than others. Others deride this as racial profiling, and argue that any such scheme would be easily evaded. I examine a model of searching for terrorists among a population divided into categories that vary in their potential reliability or ease of recruitment as agents of terrorist attacks. The equilibria in the model feature profiling, in that different categories are searched with different intensities. Practical difficulties in implementing a rational profiling scheme are discussed.