After many month of hibernation, finally getting back my north and the south, looking at the beautiful world of geopolitics, full of intrigue and confusion, the world of the new emergent threat ISIS caught my attention. Thus, engulfing in a study concerning this new threat, which bare a linkage to the Great War on Terror few questions as whom are we really fighting? What the war really doing and did we the U.S. pave the way for ISIS the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria and what is the path to be taken in securing these treats needs be scrutinized.
Thus observing the white elephant from all paradigms, an answer can be found in a statement made by the Deputy Director, External Relation for the Human rights watch Caroll Bogert (Watch 2014, n.p). Carol during a session at the Scripps College humanities Institution speaking about “Human Rights in the War on Terror - Are we safer since 9/11” emphasized a very vital element of the war and explain the difficulty the definition of this war has presented in solving or taking a side of who is right and who is wrong. According to Caroll Bogert (2004), “We don’t have a set definition to Terrorism”, “we do not have a set enemy” and “We do not have set definition to the war…we do not even have a battlefield” (Bogert 2005, n.p). Thus, Bogert elaborated further by stating that under these circumstances, which the war itself is, defined the unbalanced nature it present in clearly defining an enemy, fault and a suitable punishment. Being a true statement as of right elaborated by Vilho Harle and Sami Moisio (2008), “Who is a terrorist is the exclusive and sovereign right of the U.S. The terrorist is the enemy of the U.S.” (Harke and Moisio 2008, 350). Hence, it is here we come across the ongoi...
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Shoham, Dany. "The Chemical and Biological Threat of Islam." Chap. 3 in Muhammad's Monsters: A Comprehensive Guide to Radical Islam for Western Audiences, edited by David Bukay, 255-281. Green Forest, AR: Ariel Center for Policy Research, 2004.
Tiffen, Rodney. "The Public Case of War: Australian use of Intelligence and the Case of war in Iraq." In Intelligence and National Security Policymaking on Iraq: British and American Perspectives, edited by James P Pfiffner and Mark Thythian, 106-126. Texas: Manchester University Press, 2008.
Toaldo, Mattia. The Origins of the US War on Terror: Lebanon, Libya and American intervention in the Middle East. Oxon: Routledge, 2013.
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In the article “Is Terrorism Distinctively Wrong?”, Lionel K. McPherson criticizes the dominant view that terrorism is absolutely and unconditionally wrong. He argues terrorism is not distinctively wrong compared to conventional war. However, I claim that terrorism is necessarily wrong.
In this book, Friedman presents a coherent picture of forces in the Middle East that have led to the Israeli- Palestinian confrontation and to bin Laden and his group of terrorists. Friedman’s articles describe meetings, discussions, and arguments he had with people at all levels of society through out the Middle East. From his extensive travels and through dynamic interactions with the people he derived intense insights into how 9/11 came about, why, and what should be done about it.
Host: On September the 11th 2001, the notorious terror organisation known as Al-Qaeda struck at the very heart of the United States. The death count was approximately 3,000; a nation was left in panic. To this day, counterterrorism experts and historians alike regard the event surrounding 9/11 as a turning point in US foreign relations. Outraged and fearful of radical terrorism from the middle-east, President Bush declared that in 2001 that it was a matter of freedoms; that “our very freedom has come under attack”. In his eyes, America was simply targeted because of its democratic and western values (CNN News, 2001). In the 14 years following this pivotal declaration, an aggressive, pre-emptive approach to terrorism replaced the traditional
Gardner, Lloyd C. The Long Road to Baghdad: A History of U.S. Foreign Policy from the 1970s to
Clearly, the UN definition being more general as any act of terror, it is found that revolutionary groups adopt the use of categorical terrorism because it is commonly cheaper than selective terrorism. Further, Goodwin argues that categorical terrorism is employed for the purpose of attacking and threatening what he calls “complicitous civilians.” Complicitous civilians are defined as (1) civilians who often benefit from state actions that the revolutionaries oppose, (2) those that support the state, (3) or civilians who have the ability to influence the state. The primary directive of categorical terrorism is to provoke complicitous civilians from further supporting the state. By applying intense...
For approximately the past three decades, a terrorist group has come to plague the world with its activities (Gunaratna, 2002). This group is known as Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda, when translated means “The Base”. It is a terrorist organization that seeks to remove western influence from the Middle East and spread its radical Islamic views. Al Qaeda’s most prominent leader was Osama bin Laden, until his death during a raid upon his compound in Pakistan. The Al Qaeda’s motivation stems primarily from extreme and deeply rooted religious beliefs. Their most used method of attack is through suicide bombers and improvised explosive devices. This organization has also used chemical warfare and at this time is believed to still actively seek to utilize chemical and biological agents as means to battle.
Most Americans believe that the troop presence in Iraq and Afghanistan is due to the terrorist attacks on the United States. And while it is hard to deny that the 9-11 attacks were the impetus for putting boots on the ground, it is imperative that the chain of events following the horror of September 11 are seen to reflect the willingness and wants of actors in control before the towers fell. In no field other than politics does the justification for action often come from a noteworthy event and the true cause stays hidden behind the headlines.... ... middle of paper ... ...
Kash, Douglas A. “An International Legislative Approach to 21st-Century Terrorism.” The Future of Terrorism: Violence in the New Millennium. Ed. Harvey W. Kushner. London: Sage Publications, 1998.
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The threat of global terrorism continues to rise with the total number of deaths reaching 32,685 in 2015, which is an 80 percent increase from 2014 (Global Index). With this said, terrorism remains a growing, and violent phenomenon that has dominated global debates. However, ‘terrorism’ remains a highly contested term; there is no global agreement on exactly what constitutes a terror act. An even more contested concept is whether to broaden the scope of terrorism to include non-state and state actors.
(U) In order to discuss the actions and behaviors of the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL), one must first recognize its origins and its association or disassociation with other terrorist groups. The building of terrorist organizations does not occur overnight, and they take years of careful socialization to occur. To conceptualize the creation of a terrorist organization like ISIS, we have to look at the structural, systemic and motivational factors that comprise the group and its ideologies. If a society loses its cohesion, then some of the socio-political factors such as religion, ethnicity, tribe or clan, and race would come into play to fill that void. We could use a socio-political cleavage matrix to look for the individual friction points to see where the gestation of the terrorist organization starts and why. In this case, we will focus on one who some call the father of Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS). This was Abu Mus’ab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian of the Sunni denomination, who took his name from his birthplace Zarqa, Jordan .
The concept of terrorism is exceedingly difficult to define. Author Gerald Seymour first said in his book Harry’s Game that, “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter”. Each individual may view terrorism in a different light. Because of this, there is currently no universal definition of terrorism. However, in recent years, it has become increasingly more important to form a definition of terrorism, especially while working in the media.
The rise of ISIS poses a great threat to the world as they demonstrate acts of horrific violence through terrorist attacks such as the November 2015 Paris attacks. In order to stop ISIS from such deadly attacks, the first essential step to take is to understand its nature. However, many people are confused about whether ISIS Islamic or not. While most leaders in the West such as Barack Obama and David Cameron claim that ISIS is un-Islamic, some scholars such as Graeme Wood argue that ISIS is Islamic. Although Wood argues that it is impossible to understand ISIS without understanding their religious ideology (“What ISIS Really Wants”), this does not make ISIS Islamic. It is inadequate to argue that ISIS is Islamic because of their misinterpretation
On September 11, 2001, the destruction of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon changed the mindset and the opinion of nearly every American on the one of the most vital issues in the 21st century: terrorism (Hoffman 2). Before one can begin to analyze how the United States should combat such a perverse method of political change, one must first begin to understand what terrorism is, where it is derived from, and why there is terrorism. These issues are essential in America’s analysis of this phenomenon that has revolutionized its foreign policy and changed America’s stance in the world.