Not long ago many headlines on terrorism appeared in newspapers all over the world. The event happened on the 11th of September, 2001 made countries to pay more attention to this issue. In 2001 President Bush declared that a “war (that) would not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped, and defeated.” Still, no one knows whether this campaign will be successful or not (Rapoport, 2006). One of those things that people can do to decrease the terrorism is to learn history, as the terrorism is not new in the 21th century. The history illustrates that terrorism is deeply implanted in people’s culture. Also it offers prospective for realizing the uniqueness of September 11 and its consequences (Rapoport, 2006).
The serious issue was examined and researched by different distinguished scholars and institutions. For instance, David Rapoport says that terrorism is “the use of violence to provoke consciousness, to evoke certain feelings of sympathy and revulsion.” League of Nations Convention Definition of Terrorism (1937) identified terrorist acts as “all criminal acts directed against a State and intended or calculated to create a state of terror in the minds of particular persons or a group of persons or the general public” (Matusitz, 2013). According to the National Counterterrorism Center, as of October 14, 2008, the United States of America defines terrorism as “premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by sub national groups or clandestine agents.” As for international terrorism, it means “terrorism involving citizens or the territory of more than one country.” Regarding a terrorist group, this is “any group practicing, or which has significant subgroups which practice, international terrorism” (Hopkins, 2009).
The search for causes and causality of terrorism is a central topic in many social sciences, because there is no the only one reason for terrorism to happen. As terrorism needs some time to be formed, there are two main levels of causes that can lead to it: root causes (preconditions) and trigger causes (precipitants). The former is a list of factors that set the stage for terrorism over the long run; the latter is a particular event that immediately precedes the occurrence of terrorism (Concepts of Terrorism, 2008).
The root causes can be divided into three groups. The first one consists of economic conditions in a country and the state of development measured by GDP per capita and its growth rate, economic freedom, quality of institutions and infrastructure, human development index and the level of education. Second group contains political freedom and civil liberties, measured inter alia by composite indexes (POLITY or Freedom House index) and participation rate in elections. The last group consists of political stability which is influenced by the occurrence of civil wars, riots, military conflicts and also captured by regime durability, and times of transition or anarchy. Other control variables include openness of the economy and population size, among others (Kis-Katos, Liebert, & Schulze, 2010).
It is important to understand that terrorism always existed. Even in the 11th century in Syria, there were a mysterious splinter group from the Isma‘ili sect of Shia Muslims. Everyone knew their fanatic mentality and dramatic methods of killing. They were known as the Assassins. The group was used as a systematic long-term political weapon for terror. Today many scientists claim that the Assassins are the first terrorists in the history (Hopkins, 2009).
However, for the first time the term terrorism was used was during the French Revolution in 1793 to describe the Jacobin Reign of Terror in France. Interestingly, but Jacobins used this world in a positive way, meaning “terror is nothing other than justice, prompt, severe, inflexible” (Matusitz, 2013).
One of the most important terrorist groups in the history of terrorism was a 19th century Russian group, named the Narodnaya Volya or the People‘s Will. The Narodnaya Volya did not exercise terrorism from above like the Jacobins did during the French Reign of Terror. Still, this group is considered to be one of first modern terrorist groups. Their main aim was to assassinate Czar Alexander II. This goal was misleading, as the group had a thorough doctrine of terrorism laid out for Russia. The point of the doctrine of violence and terror was to surpass any single violent act for revolution (Hopkins, 2009).
Regarding the US history of terrorism, the first terrorist organization was the white supremacist organization, the Ku Klux Klan. It was formed in 1867 and from the beginning it was non-violent social organization. But, soon in 1868 it became violent and started to murder, beat up, and intimidate black voters and white people, who supported the Republican Party (Rapoport, 2006). Today, the Ku Klux Klan organization seems to be peaceful, fighting against illegal immigration, urban crime, civil unions and same-sex marriage, but without weapon.
However, another main terrorist organization in the United States is Al-Qaeda, an off-shoot of the Muslim Brotherhood. That was Osama bin Laden, who was the leader of Al-Qaeda. He built the whole organization by teaching the ideas of Qutbism and turning it into a plan for terrorist action. Al-Qaeda effects greatly on different countries, but it has a deep rooted effect on the mentality of the terrorists in the United States (Hopkins, 2009). Everyone remembers the attacks on the World Trade Towers on September 11, 2001. Many people heard about US embassy bombings in East Africa in 1998 and others terrorist attacks.
As for modern terrorism, in 1985, it was observed that 10% of the world’s countries are under 60% of the world’s terrorist attacks. In 2004 scientists examined international terrorist incidents in 112 countries throughout the period between 1975 and 1997. As a result, it was discovered that the Middle East had the highest proportion of international terrorist incidents. Europe is the second. In comparison with the Middle East, Africa, Asia and the Americans have fewer attacks, approximately, 70%, 65%, and 33%, respectively. Furthermore, more than 80 percent of arrested terrorists in the USA and Europe are from the Muslim Diaspora (Concepts of Terrorism, 2008). One of the last researches revealed that there are more domestic terror attacks than international. To compare they say that only 14 percent of 82 thousand terror incidents were international (Concepts of Terrorism, 2008).
Nowadays, there are two forms of terrorism: international and domestic. The only difference between them is the origin of the terrorist or terrorist organization. If it is domestic one, then the group or individual is from the country, where he/she acted. If it is international terrorism, then the country of origin and the country, where the attack was made are different. The examples of this form of terrorism can be Boston Marathon bombings, attacks by Al-Qaeda on September 11, 2001, Los Angeles International Airport shooting in 2002. The Ku Klux Klan, Aryan Nations, May 19th Communist Organization belong to the domestic form of the terrorist organizations (Kis-Katos, Liebert, & Schulze, 2010).
It is essential to describe terrorist identity in order to prevent further terror attacks. Usually they come from ordinary educational and family backgrounds or the middle class. Interestingly, that more than 30% of today’s terrorists are women, because terrorism requires less physical ability than ordinary crimes, like robbery. Over 60% of men are between 19 and 23 years old and about 25% are older than 24. About 40% of women are between 19 and 23 and 50% are 24 or older. Many of female suicide bombers are widows, whose men were killed by the government or the military (Matusitz, 2013). These simple tips can help organizations fighting against terrorism to identify somehow who can be a terrorist or not.
There are also different international organizations fighting against terrorism, among them are: Bureau of Diplomatic Security in the USA, NATO, United Nations (UN), Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.
In its work on counter-terrorism, NATO bases on “improved threat awareness and preparedness, developing adequate capabilities and enhancing engagement with partner countries and other international actors” (Countering Terrorism, 2012).
As one of the largest international organizations, UN is actively engaged in the fight against all forms of terrorism. In 2005 there was established The Counter-Terrorism Implementation Task Force (CTITF), whose main responsibility is to implement the Global Strategy. The primary goal of this Strategy is help Member States with implementing the four pillars of the Strategy: measures to evaluate conditions, where terrorism can spread; measures to prevent terrorism; measures to combat terrorism and deal with consequences; measures to increase the respect for human rights (CTITF, 2006).
References
Rapoport, David C. (2006). Terrorism: critical concepts of political science. NY: Routledge.
Matusitz, Jonathan (2013). Terrorism and Communication: A Critical Introduction. Gainesville: SAGE Publications.
Hopkins, Julia (2009). Terrorist mentality: a common link throughout history? Retrieved from http://kuscholarworks.ku.edu/dspace/bitstream/1808/5994/1/Hopkins_ku_0099M_10701_DATA_1.pdf
Transnational terrorism, security and the rule of law (2008). Concepts of Terrorism: Analysis of the rise, decline, trends and risk. Retrieved from http://www.transnationalterrorism.eu/tekst/publications/WP3%20Del%205.pdf
Kis-Katos K., Liebert H., & Schulze G.G. (2010). On the Origin of Domestic and International Terrorism. Retrieved from http://www.vwl.uni-freiburg.de/iwipol/discussion_papers/DP12_kiskatos-liebert-schulze_dom-intl-terror.pdf
NATO (2012). Countering Terrorism. Retrieved from http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/topics_77646.htm?
United Nations (2006). The Counter-Terrorism Implementation Task Force. Retrieved from http://www.un.org/en/terrorism/ctitf/index.shtml
