Terrorist Issues in the 21st Century - Essay Example

Terrorism Terrorism is the major issue of 21st century. The effectiveness of terrorism is widely debated and the current view that is prevailing among the political science thinkers is that terrorism is an “effective coercive strategy”. They are of the view that terrorists are being successful in persuading governments to accept their demands also to change their political decisions. The principal standard in terrorism studies i.e. the “strategic model” postulates terrorists to be “rational actors”. This view regards terrorists as “political utility maximizers” meaning that they consider the end result of using terrorism to persuade the political decision makers is far greater as compared to other means of protests. This perspective views terrorism as an effective way of pressurizing governments to make or undo important strategic and ideological decisions. The strategic model is based on three basic assumptions (1)Terrorists / miscreants are influenced by the political parties which are comparatively strong and in-power; (2) Terrorists analyze as which political party can be best usable to them in terms of achieving their political objectives; and (3) Terrorism is resorted to when the political objectives are not attainable through peaceful protests. However, the empirical examples contradict these basic assumptions. The terrorists’ organizations have no particular agenda to follow. On the other hand, they continue their activities even after their so called goal is achieved. West Germany’s RAF (Red Army Faction) which initiated its activities for liberation cause continued their terrorist activities even when the political objective was achieved. They then started targeting other organizations having similar agenda as theirs. By attacking civilian population, terrorists have hardly acquired their objectives. Majority terrorist’s organizations such as Al-Qaeda and Hammas and many others have hardly achieved their desired political achievements. Although, they have a success rate of very minimum percentage, this minor percentage cannot be considered as a solid example of success rate. The second assumption of the strategic model is that terrorists resort to terrorism only when they have o other option left. This assumption is a contradiction in itself. The majority of countries that are becoming target of terrorism are democratic. This fact means that the individuals belonging to these countries have all the rights of expression and speech as well as protest. How then it is possible to regard terrorism as the last resort to protest. Mostly the terrorists are prone to this type of protest of violence. They continue to do so in one form or another. Even after gaining political rights or desired political objectives they refuse to unarm, as in the case of militant Sunni groups of Iraq, which is still placing hurdles in the smooth democratic process of the country after a very long oppression by a dictator. Thus, terrorism cannot be justified as the last resort to protest. Terrorists usually do not compromise or negotiate. As terrorism is inherently extreme in its nature it never succumbs to compromise or stepping down. Following truly the political agenda would mean to accept even half of what was asked instead of facing a complete deadlock or non compliance. Yet, terrorists tend to negate this assumption as well. They have a history of non-negotiating temperament and tend to increase their terrorists activities to pressurize the governments to fully accept the terms or face the dire consequences. The strategic model also assumes that terrorists usually have stable and consistent motives. Yet, the available examples negate these assumptions as well. The objectives of terrorists’ organizations keep wavering. The most typical example is that of Al-Qaeda, which had initial agenda of discarding soviets from Afghanistan, which then changed to the mutual cause of eradicating all non-Muslim agendas from Muslim countries. This was eventually transformed to the cause of Freedom for Palestinians and jihad against Israeli oppression. The other commonly known organizations with wavering and unstable political goals or “consistent Ideologies” are Basque separatist Group ETA, which initially fought against the Franco dictatorship in Spain and later fought against the democratic government. These wavering agendas weaken the terrorist’s credibility of his political objectives. Strategic model also infers that there is logic behind each terrorist organization’s attack. They send a sort of signal by attacking civilian population to the political party or government in order for them to act accordingly and comply with their demands. However, majority of attacks are done anonymously which leaves the government in puzzling state as to what exactly was the reason or objective behind the disastrous attack. The rate of anonymous attacks have increased after the 9/11 incident. Thus the idea of terrorism as an effective coercive strategy is annulled by the terrorists themselves as the anonymous attacks reflect no possible logic or objective behind it other than inflicting terror. Also the point of consistency among the terrorist’s organizations seems farfetched as they tend to attack the organizations having same agenda or objective. A logical fight for a cause would mean to facilitate and assist other organizations having same objective. Yet, they frequently attack organizations having same case. In fact majority of time they are hardly fighting for the cause but are trying to completely annihilate the fellow organizations. Tamil Tigers instead of targeting Sinhalese government in mid-1980, fought against the other Tamil organizations with same cause. Another assumption of strategic model is that terrorists tend to leave or completely give up their cause or terrorists activities when they realize that their efforts are not paying off. Today’s terrorist activities negate this assumption as well. The terrorists’ organizations have seldom achieved their motives, but none have actually renounced their terrorists’ activities. The terrorists’ organizations prevailed for centuries, with absolutely little or no decrease in their terrorist activities. There is also a common notion among the terrorists that attacking civilians would help them in achieving their goals or objectives comparatively easily and quickly rather than to attack military set ups. However, they have been proved wrong time and again. The governments tend to succumb somewhat in case the military assets or personals are attacked, yet the policy is of strict no compliance in case of civilian population being attacked. History is filled with such examples, as when the organizations motives are highly questioned when the civilians are attacked for the liberation cause. Russia’s reaction to the 1999 bombings is one such example. Before the bombings, majority of Russians believed that Chechen’s are justified in their cause and favored territorial compromise. Eventually after the three apartment bombings, killing 229 Russian civilians in Sep ’99, the soft corner for Chechens was immediately reversed. After the incident, large segment of population was of the view that the Chechens have no justified objective than to destroy their country i.e. Russia. There is no example or discussion that justifies the acts or behaviors of terrorists. Violence can never be a rational means to an end. The objectives of terrorist can never be to attain peace through professing terror and violence. If the organization is truly following any objective or goal, it will consider the best possible options for the attainment of its goal. However, the terrorist’s organizations up to today have no specific criteria or goal to follow or pursue, and no rational reason for their violent strategies. Works Cited 1. Abrahms, Max. What Terrorists Really Want: Terrorists strategy and Counterterrorism Strategy. Retrieved from http://maxabrahms.com/pdfs/DC_250-1846.pdf 2. Abrahms, Max. Why Terrorism Does not Work. Retrieved from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/isec.2006.31.2.42 . Read More