What Terrorists Think: Understanding the Terrorist Threat
by Louise Richardson
(John Murray)
So much histrionic nonsense has been written on the subject of terrorism since September 11 2001 that one might approach this book with at best trepidation, at worst dismay. This would be completely unfair to the author, who has produced a sober, balanced, historically informed and politically canny analyÂsis of her subject.
Louise Richardson is based at the Radcliffe Institute of Harvard University. Irish by birth, she admits that her upbringing during the time of the Troubles has helped her see the complexity of terrorism as a political issue: ordinary people, given the circumstances and the right motivation, can easily make the jump from politically disaffected to suicide bomber.
Subjective perceptions rather than objective conditions cause terrorism, she insists. Poverty alone, or poverty and political oppression, do not create terrorists. These conditions exacerbate it, certainly, as does a sense of relative deprivation. More often though, such conditions are combined with a sense of personal anger and resentment, a feeling of being wronged (sometimes outrage at wrong done) and a desire for revenge.
In the long term, the reasons for terrorism are often political — being an oppressed minority (sometimes majority), resentment towards a dominant state, an oppressive system or religious persecution. It is the short-term motivations — the revenge, renown and response — that are more important and less possible to address.
Terrorists, she writes, are driven by desire for revenge, the need for renown and the desire to generate a response — normally state repression leading, they often believe, to mass uprising. These drives can be found across the gamut of terrorist groups, from ethnic nationalists (the Basque ETA separatists and Palestinians) through revolutionaries fighting against a social order (the Baader Meinhof Gang in Germany and the Red Brigades in Italy) to those seeking the apocalypse (Aun Shunrikyo in Japan) to religious fundamentalists such as al-Qaeda.
Usually people are recruited into terrorist groups by charismatic leaders who help them feel a personal grudge and a desire for revenge, and are further stimulated by a sense that their actions will make them famous or respected in their communities, and that their actions will provoke a repressive state reaction that will force the indifferent masses to revolt.
Leaders of terrorist groups need to tap into grievances and generate sufficient anger that people take things personally. Although, in some cases — like that of Abimael Guzman, head of the Sendero Luminoso in Peru — the capture or elimination of leaders destroys a terrorist group. But sometimes even this cannot stop a movement that has built up momentum.
Tactics in most terrorist groups, writes Richardson, are mostly low-tech and cost relatively little. She does not regard the threat — popular today in security circles — of chemical, biological and nuclear terrorism as significant, simply because such technologies are hard to access, costly and require technical sophistication on the part of the group, a sophistication way beyond most terrorist groups’ means. In addition, much of the “threat” articulated by states today is based on distorted information: a “dirty bomb”, for example, is a lot less lethal than it sounds, is far from being the same as a nuclear device and needs some technical skill to produce.
Chillingly, Richardson presents us with a picture of suicide bombers — not the crazy fanatics of the mass media, but reasonable, normal people whose desire for revenge has led them to such an action. They are usually supported by their community and trained and prepared by a well-structured support team (often as many as 10 in number). They are not a new phenomenon, nor are they necessarily Islamist or Palestinian; until recently the majority of suicide bombers came from the Tamil Tigers separatists of Sri Lanka. And they have a long history, going back to the medieval Assassins and nationalist suicide groups operating in British- and Dutch-controlled Asia. Moreover, in the opinions of both colonial powers, these groups were considered rational, organised and fairly unstoppable.
Ultimately Richardson’s work has to turn to the current political, rhetorical and military “war on terror” being waged by the United States. Her comments on this are devastating. The rhetoric gives greater renown to the terrorists — by making them seem more powerful than they are so that there needs to be a “war” against them. The military approach generates the kind of response the terrorists want: repression, resentment, a greater desire for revenge. And by declaring war on Osama bin Laden, the US has greatly increased his renown. The right approach, writes Richardson (and I concur thoroughly) is treating terrorism as a police matter, requiring investigation rather than invasion, careful intelligence gathering, the infiltration of terrorist groups and their subversion from within.
Richardson deserves heartfelt praise for this book. Intelligent, incisive and clear, it cuts through all the rhetorical guff that we see and hear being spouted. Democracies need to maintain their democracy in a time of terror, not destroy it; terrorism is a policing action, not a war; and, above all, to win one needs the intelligence (mental and information) to outsmart, outmanoeuvre and disable such networks. One would hope that the powers that be read this book and acted on it. Unfortunately, perhaps, the notion military intelligence remains an oxymoron.