International Terrorism and Terrorist Organizations - Case Study Example

International Terrorism Introduction Every human being dreams of a peaceful life. A life where he need not look back, see sufferings or pain. Human beings strive to define their lives with comfort, luxury and happiness. This story looks fine till now however the problem crops up when one's happiness is achieved at the cost of some other person's happiness. This can be generalized to a group as a whole rather than a person. This problem arises when groups start fighting against each other for personal benefits under the perception that it could bring peace and happiness to them. Revenge, desire and power are the buzz words that bring this type of havoc in the world. These acts driven by the ideas of a group causes terror in the lives of a larger set of people and is commonly termed as terrorism. This essay would concentrate on various perceptions regarding terrorism that covers international terrorism, the structure and organization of terrorist groups, their views in the support of their actions, historical events that possibly led to revolutions which in turn gave rise to terrorism. A list of possible actions that can be taken to combat against terrorism is presented at the end. Definitions of Terrorism Defining the term terrorism would be a relatively tougher task. Not because of the political and emotional charges that the word carries but because of the flexibility in which the word could be (Hans, 1988). This had been defined by many organizations and institutions and individuals. The US army's study in 1988 counted that about 109 definitions of terrorism existed (Schmidt, 1988). In these definitions almost 22 different elemental definitions were found. A study in 1999 by terrorism expert Mr. Walter Lacquer also concluded that more than a hundred definitions of this word existed and focused on a point that the only general characteristic common to all the definitions about terrorism was that terrorism is closely associated to violence or threat of violence (Hans, 1988). Terrorism is different from criminal activities done for various purposes and it is important that this difference be brought out while defining terrorism. Many regions, countries have taken this issue into consideration while defining the word terrorism. Now let us brood over some important definitions of terrorism. The word terrorism happens to have its first appearance in "The Times" on 30th January 1795 (Hans, 1988). It was put in an excerpt to signify the changes taking place during rising of revolutionary government in France. One of the early definitions of terrorism was given by Maximilian Robespierre in 1794 which says that terror is nothing other than justice, prompt, severe, inflexible and it is not a unique principle (Schmidt, 1988). He regarded this as the consequence of democracy. The word terrorism got its place in English dictionary in the year 1798 and had a meaning "Systematic use of terror as policy". However it is interesting to see that the usage of the word terrorism and its meaning are quite controversial (Hans, 1988). The definitions used at found in the recent days are biased in a sense that they do not clearly specify the dividing line between groups who use the violence to achieve political goals that include government and other terrorist groups. Terrorism is labeled with tags that denote lack of legitimacy and morality. Let us first look at how the United Nations defines the word terrorism. United Nations does not accept any predefined definition of this word however, the UN academic consensus definition by Alex Schmidt is widely used by socialists and it is as follows "Terrorism is an anxiety-inspiring method of repeated violent action, employed by (semi-) clandestine individual, group or state actors, for idiosyncratic, criminal or political reasons, whereby - in contrast to assassination - the direct targets of violence are not the main targets."(Schmidt, 1988) Its short definition is the peacetime equivalent of war crime. However on 17th March 2005 the UN described that any act intended to cause death or serious body harm to civilians or non combatants with the purpose of intimidating a population or compelling a government or an international organization to do or abstain from doing an act. Similar definitions were given by the European Union and the United States that state terrorism as closely related to violence. Other strong definitions include Schmidt and jongman, Jack Gibbs, David Rodin and James M. Poland who gave various perceptions that centered around creating havoc and causing trouble to people for selfish deeds (Harper, 2007). However there is no strict world wide definition of terrorism simply for the fact that there are multiple ways or defining it. An apt definition of terrorism could be the use or threat of serious violence. The definition provided by the UN is a credibly descent definition for a reason that it is not biased. It rules that even the acts done by people for political goals as terrorist. However it clearly separates this from law protection and enforcement. This also allows the governments to adapt and apply a hierarchy of laws for an ordinary criminal and a terrorist. It should also be noted that the definition of terrorism and its implications are region dependent. The Structure of Terrorist Organizations Terrorism is categorized as terrorism due to civil disorders, political terrorism, non political terrorism, quasi terrorism, limited political terrorism and official or sate terrorism. Each category is based and dependent on the group and the type of actions they perform. According to US state intelligence these are categorized into four typologies namely the nationalist, separatist, religious fundamentalist, new religious and social revolutionary. The main reasons for terrorist group formations include higher growth rates, high unemployment, ethnic conflicts, religious conflicts, poor economies, territorial disputes. Generally terrorism in the modern day acts like an economic market. The demand factors are driven by the greed and grievances while the supply factors are driven by deficits in developmental, democratic and dignity issues. The terrorist groups often support their acts by backing their principles and tagging their violent attacks as their fight for freedom or revenge. In many cases it is specified that their attack is a counter to protect themselves and in many cases in the name of god. These groups feel that they are deprived of the status and power that they really deserve in the society. These groups are led by people who have their personal desires and use ignorant and unaware people for their purposes. The structure of a terrorist organization also determines its strengths and weaknesses. There are certain generic models of these terrorist groups and most of the organizations follow this structure (Hans, 1988). As mentioned earlier, in recent times these groups are operating for their political agendas and are influenced by their ethnic greed or state independence ideas. These have led to a generational change in the organization of these groups. There are two broad categories of organization of terrorist groups namely hierarchical and networked. Whether a group is hierarchical or networked is going to be dependent on the age of the terrorist organization. Newer groups tend to have a networked organization. Ideologies also have a significant impact on the structure of a group. For instance, Leninist or Maoist ideologies driven groups tend to have a hierarchical structure. However within a large structure all the groups tend to act as cellular organizations. The head at each cell level is responsible for the tactical actions and synchronization among activities of other peer groups. Hence his position is vital. The terrorist groups that deal with political agendas are more of hierarchical. Each group has a stage of development and this determines their scope and actions in terms of the region and plots. Smaller groups combine to a larger one of a larger group splits into many smaller groups. Smallest unit of a terrorist group are cells and the primary reason for this is their security. Also in many cases multi functional cells are common. The cell leader is the one who communicates and coordinates actions with higher level cells and other peer cells. A terrorist group may be formed from one cell alone that acts locally or from multiple cells geographically distributed that act globally. The number of cells is proportional to the size of the terrorist group and its operational range. Samuel Huntington's Paradigms An important paradigm to study and understand here is the Samuel Huntington's cultural paradigms. This theory of Samuel formulated in 1993 is termed as the clash of civilizations that asserts that people's cultural and religious identities would be the primary source of conflict in the post cold war session (Andrej, 2004). In his hypothesis he puts forward that the division in human kind in the new world would be cultural. According to him the major map of the 8 cultural civilizations is as follows: Western, Orthodox world, Latin America, Muslim, Hindu, Sinic, Japanese, and African. He has cited many wars to prove his hypothesis. Basically the division is based on ethnic, religion or global location, linguistic communities and proximity issues. This is closely associated with the formation of terrorist groups and conflicts. Hence these paradigms fit best here. For instance, the 11th September 2001 attack on US or the US invasion of Afghanistan, Indo-Pak war, the minor groups threatening and resorting to terrorist acts are a few to mention. The clash of civilizations Impact of Social Movements Social movements are described as a type of group action. They basically form informal groupings of individuals or organizations focused on a specific issue. During the 19th century these have been common due to increased rate of education and labor movements (Marco, 1999). The social movements in 19th century were mainly due to political and economic changes. Few of the movements that had an impact on the present day's terrorist groups from 18th and the 19th century are the French revolution, the polish constitution of 1791, the labor movement and the socialist movement that led to the formation of two separate political parties of the west. The Russian revolution and the civil disobedience movement are worth to mention here (Marco, 1999). These movements have had an impact on people who tried to put their views and become important in the society. These led to violent movements that in turn led to terrorism. Terrorist movements have had their influence from the global movements like the anarchist movement that seek to change the world at a global level. As the basic structure and principles of any social movement were described as collective work and informal groupings, these ideas were well pick up by the terrorist groups. Hence, it could be stated that informally the socialist movements led to the terrorist group formation. Steps to Combat The government or the law enforcing agency can take up the following actions in order to fight against terrorism for a peaceful world. To have a very good understanding with the UN and give more support and power to them to intervene. To have frequent bilateral discussions and mutual cultural studies would do a lot of help in understanding each other better. To have a thorough check on the flow of money would help track the terrorist activities. Awareness campaigns, improving trade relations and reducing number of illiterates would help reduce this problem to a greater extent. This world is a peaceful place to live. Mutual understanding would do a lot of help than mutual distrust and constant fighting. Every culture and religion speaks to believe in good things, to do good things and does not criticize the principles of other religions of ethnics. The expressions are the same however the language differs. Better understanding would lead to a peaceful world. Happiness is inherent in making others lives convenient. References Marco G. Giugni (1999), How Social Movements Matter, University of Minnesota Press Tusicisny, Andrej (2004). "Civilizational Conflicts: More Frequent, Longer, and Bloodier" Journal of Peace Research 41 (4): 485-498 Schmidt (1988), Jongman et al. Political terrorism: a new guide to actors, authors, concepts, data bases, theories, and literature. Amsterdam: North Holland, Transaction Books. Douglas Harper (2007), "Terrorism," Dictionary.com Online Etymology Dictionary Hans Koehler (ed.) (1988), Terrorism and National Liberation. Proceedings of the International Conference on the Question of Terrorism, Frankfurt. Read More