"A nation's honor is dearer than a nation's comfort." (Woodrow Wilson)
Ethnonationalist terrorism is "traditional" terrorism in the sense that it is similar to old-style 1970s revolutionary or ideological terrorism. It is also "modern" terrorism with many subtypes which defy simple descriptions and fall into various categories such as state-sponsored, state-sanctioned, proxy, or "stateless." Tracing the origins of such a phenomenon can be difficult because neither ethnicity nor statehood might be involved. For example, groups such as Hamas can be said to run their own quasi-state (the Palestinian Authority), and groups such as Hezbollah can be said to operate a state-within-a-state (southern Lebanon). Both of these groups and their sponsors (Syria and Iran) try to accomplish two things -- an insurgency-led struggle toward an alternative government capable of controlling a given area or country -- and a proxy-led terrorist struggle to carry out the strategic objectives of their sponsor. Ethnonationalist terrorism is complicated and should not be easily dismissed as a specific subtype of anything, particularly as a form of domestic terrorism. As we shall see, it is often international in scope, or perhaps it is more accurate to say the ethnonationalist phenomenon has international reach. The first myth to dispel is that a nationalist group has to have a nation in order to be a nationalist group. The second myth to dispel is that ethnicity is some kind of race-lite or lesser form of race. Ethnicity has nothing to do with race. Ethnic identity more often develops in response to the migration of different groups (Eller 1999), although there may be some genealogical components. Ethnonationalist groups may or may not have some concept of "homeland," and in many cases, their territories aren't easily found on any maps. For definitional purposes, an ethnonationalist is defined as someone who combines both ethnic and national identity in some way for a political purpose, usually to infer superiority over some other group or groups.
Such groups usually issue communiqués taking credit for, and explaining in great detail, their actions and ideologies. They frequently want the world to know about them. Their leaders are often megalomaniacs. Such groups are often willing to form coalitions and ally with "religious" or state terrorists (in order to commit war crimes on behalf of their state sponsors). A lot of murky or "light ethnoterrorism" exists hidden and underground in the form of institutionalized racism and xenophobia. In terms of ideology, Ahmad (2002) says that such groups believe they have a date with destiny. They honestly believe they are, or will be, big players on the stage of world history. Ethnonationalism tends to proliferate within the context of failing or failed states, but it doesn't often stay confined within one state. It can be a type of terrorism with global reach. It crosses borders; it easily spreads; and despite any genealogical requirements, barriers to entry are few when ethnicity is subjectively defined and a matter of speculation or self-identification. Tribalism is just long-term genealogy, as in "branches of humanity" and all that. Most tribal societies don't even have tribes, and tribal identity is a shifting thing, with clans and tribes reshaping, merging, and even inventing origins for themselves (Roy 2000).
An ethnic group is defined as a human population whose members identify with each other, usually on the basis of a presumed common genealogy or ancestry (Smith 1986). Ethnic groups are typically united by common cultural, behavioural, linguistic, or religious practices. An important political science distinction is that an ethnic group is distinguished from a nation-state by the former's lack of sovereignty. Nationality (which is part of the root conception behind nationalism) refers to a person's legal relationship to a legal system, or set of laws which they perceive as applicable to them, although under international law, it is each nation's right to declare whom they believe their nationals are. A person who is not a national of any state is referred to as a stateless person, many of whom are also refugees, asylum seekers, and sometimes present themselves as having dual citizenship (a term not allowed in some nations). Legally, nationality can only be acquired by jus soli (birthright), jus sanguinis (blood), or naturalization (a process that is part of immigration law). Nationalism is an ideology which holds that some notion of nationality or some variant of what is often talked about in the field of "identity politics" should serve as the only legitimate basis for a nation-state. Identity warfare is a rudimentary form of "class warfare" typically carried out in those societies which have yet to accept Western capitalism as a model for development. One of the surest indicators of identity conflicts occurs when you watch elections take place somewhere and there are something like 100 different political parties putting up candidates for office. In all fairness, it should be noted there is much more to the study of identity politics than is presented here, but the larger issues of relationship to social structure need not concern us much since we are interested in the terrorism connections.
THE MOST DANGEROUS KIND OF TERRORISM
One of the undisputed experts on ethno-nationalist terrorism is Daniel Byman (1998; 2005), and he argues that it has some built-in advantages which make it the most dangerous kind of terrorism. These advantages are paraphrased below with some additional extensions added.
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It polarizes ethnic conflict and accentuates a primal fear of race war
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Well-timed and well-placed symbolic attacks reinforce the ethno-nationalist issue
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It easily provokes government over-reaction who see it as an insurgency or domestic problem
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It frequently produces government concessions which are seen as a sign of success
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It often raises money (donations) and public support quickly
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Long-standing logistical support and hiding places are easy to come by
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There is a ready-made audience or constituency (you're either in or out)
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There are no innocent bystanders (anyone not identifying with the right ethnic group is the enemy)
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Terrorized victims often cope by joining the terrorist movement
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Passivity (doing nothing) ensures escalation of the violence to genocide
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You can't trust their cease-fires, peace treaties, or statements of curtailing operations
Countering ethnoterrorism is quite difficult. Ethno-nationalists almost always hold the high ground on morality, being seen as "good patriots," so any moral outrage by a reactionary government is futile as it only reinforces group cohesion. Byman (1998) suggests that what might work is empowering the ethnic community, winning over moderates to the political system, and encouraging self-policing. This is all wishful thinking, as such measures can result in insurgency problems, fractionalization, and escalation. Countering an ethnonationalist terrorist problem that is state-supported by another regime is even more challenging. State-sponsored terrorism, as defined by Byman (2005:10), refers to "a government's intentional assistance to a terrorist group to help it use violence, bolster its political activities, or sustain the organization." Byman (2005) also notes that such groups are good at dodging punishments and sanctions via manipulation and pre-arranged sanctuary escape routes. They usually have safe haven somewhere. A typical manipulative ploy is to curtail or ratchet down terrorist activities until the heat is off. The rhetoric may even change to the point where it appears the group has denounced terrorism. They will use misdirection and conspiracy to deflect attention from themselves. They may use legal systems and/or celebrity mouthpieces to fight against being labeled or designated a terrorist group (sponsors are likely to do this also). Foolish Western governments or international organizations may even send them goodwill financial aid packages, and all the time, they are re-grouping and re-arming. To understand the murkiness behind state sponsorship, take a look at Martin's (2008) second type of state-sponsored terrorism, below:
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state sponsorship: patronage model -- active, overt participation of a patron state's security personnel in carrying out terrorist acts on an international or domestic scale; e.g., "dirty war"
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state sponsorship: assistance model -- tacit, indirect encouragement and support by a patron state through sympathetic proxies and agents to carry out repression on an international or domestic scale; e.g., "civil war"
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF ETHNIC IDENTITY
Ethnonationalist terrorism in practice refers to a group of individuals belonging to an identifiable organization with a well-defined command-and-control structure, clear political, social or economic objectives, and a comprehensible ideology or self-interest with revolutionary connotations (Hoffman 1999). The usual targets of such terrorists are highly selective -- ambassadors, bankers, dignitaries, intelligence agents, law enforcement officers, teachers -- symbols often blamed for economic, political, or social injustice. Occasionally, such a group (or individuals in it) will operate outside their home territory when it is in their interest to do so, or (in in case of the more likely scenario) when they claim to be representing the oppressed or "wandering tribes" of the Third World or the world's diaspora groups. Diaspora (Greek for "scattering or sowing of seeds") is a term from the field of migration studies referring to the study of dispersed ethnic populations. It carries connotations of forced resettlement, expulsion, slavery, racism, war and conflict. It is a fancy word for being an oppressed and scattered people. The existence of a diaspora greatly adds to the potential for global reach.
Nationalism is the driving force behind a love of country so strong that one is willing to die trying to change or overthrow any government or any enemy in place which is seen as corrupt or oppressive toward one's nationality. Ironically enough, that impulse is part and parcel of the beliefs in liberty and freedom which animate American revolutionary feelings. Hence, the claim is often heard from ethnonationalist terrorists that they are nothing more than freedom fighters, in the same vein that George Washington was a terrorist, etc. It is fairly easy to expose the untruth of this. It is not true because the original Enlightenment notion associated with the thought of Locke, Voltaire, Rousseau, and Montesquieu held that the best form of democratic government was based on the natural desire of people to govern themselves as a distinct nation-state. This is NOT the goal of ethnonationalist terrorists who usually want to take away the freedom to self-govern. Freedom-fighting was indeed the underlying justification for the American Revolution, the French Revolution, the Mexican Revolution, and perhaps even the Cuban Revolution, but upon closer inspection, each one represents different subtypes of nationalism. The concept of "patriotism" might be helpful to make the needed distinctions. Patriotic feelings of loyalty to ethno-nationalist ideas can take different forms depending upon economic and cultural contexts. Most people are familiar with jingoistic nationalism where a common external enemy unites people in a war mentality. That is not true patriotism; that is just warmongering. There is also the concept of self-interest nationalism in which a presumed economic superiority permits the export of a civilization in the name of prosperity. This, with even more idealistic overtones about America not being perfect, but the best country in the world, is the basis of true American patriotism. There also exists what can be called militaristic nationalism which tends to involve fascist or socialist movements that glorify the institutions, icons, and achievements of a nation-state at the expense of civil society. The romantic glorification of a nation's past (real or imagined) is an unworthy basis for patriotism. And finally, there is ethnic nationalism which is rooted in ethnic identity as part of some fantasized future destiny or role in the world. This is the worst form of patriotism, and has become a dominant model of terrorism in the 21st Century. It should be called ethno-nationalist terrorism, or more simply, ethnoterrorism.
Ethnic identity has some unique sociological characteristics. First of all, it is egalitarian - the identity of the masses. Joan of Arc, for example, explained why she continually used familiar names for the French nobility by saying "After all, we're all French." Secondly, it allows a certain amount of freedom while at the same time reinforcing group solidarity. A person who says they are French-American-Canadian, for example, has a couple of second-order identities, but they are still French. Thirdly, there are no entry or exit points for ethnic identity. Nobody needs certificates or credentials to prove their ethnicity, and some people can come and go (exit the group and reenter) with relative ease while others remain trapped in some master status. The most negative aspects of ethnicity involve stereotyping and de-individualization. The negative aspects reveal themselves when it becomes easier to gas the Jew, lynch the Black, or shoot the White Man than it is to understand individuality or face the complexity of pressing social problems. Ethnicity also tends to find its way into public policy, no matter how nondiscriminatory politicians try to be. This is to say, paraphrasing Fukuyama (2006) -- all governments, especially authoritarian governments and to some extent even democratic governments, rely upon a power structure based in some degree on patronage, kinship, and ethnicity. Ethnicity probably can't be avoided; only when it rears its head in an unjust arrangement of the power structure does it serve as a breeding ground for ethnoterrorism.
Nationalism, or more precisely, the concept of nation-state, was used by the great European powers to create and administer their colonies, and it has become customary among academics to bash colonialism, neocolonialism, and hegemony in all its forms, and even the Westphalian nation-state system is not beyond criticism. The world is easier to manage when people "think" they're all part of a nation-state with borders, but danger lurks when people come to "think" that one group is superior to another. It turns out that in our post-colonial era, there are a diverse number of different ethnic groups within the borders of most nation-states. That's why scholars such as Horowitz (1985) say ethnic conflict is nationalist conflict. At the risk of making ethnonationalist sound like separatists, control of the state, a state, any state becomes their goal, and they don't care if they disrupt existing state borders or the existing world system to achieve something. Sometimes nationalist terrorists are referred to as subnational organizations, para-states, states within a state, liberationists, separatists, or unifiers. Regardless of what one calls them, one should never underestimate the power of such groups. They often appear in the form of political parties fighting for a larger slice of a pie. In some cases, they are elites with a grudge going back to some historical accident. Militaristically, they fantasize about some imagined loss, or like the case of the IRA, an exaggerated actual loss. As Connor (1994) points out, such terrorists usually have emotional or personality disorders which consist primarily of an "us-them syndrome." They are capable of the worst atrocities, up to and including genocide. Their passion or drive goes straight to the core of an identity need to "find one's self." They are truly the kind of irrational people who will turn on their friends next, as soon as they are done with their current enemies. In this way, they are a global threat. If one wanted to combine the tasks of ridding the world of would-be dictatorships along with one of the most common breeding grounds for terrorism, ethnonationalism is the kind of terrorism to crack down on.
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF GENDER
Ethnonationalist terrorists sometimes operate in multiple theatres of operations and strive to have an international presence or global reach, which gender helps facilitate. One of the emerging trends in female terrorism, according to Farhana Ali, who has done extensive research on the subject, is "the gradual progression of suicide attacks conducted by Muslim women in new theaters of operation, including Chechnya, Egypt, Iraq, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, and Uzbekistan." Historically, the most global terrorists have been left-wing groups, or splintered factions of left-wing groups, who took up the calling of oppressed people everywhere, women included, but female terrorism in the cause of female oppression everywhere does not appear to be the motivation. Historically, women have also been more active as "street activists" and fellow travelers, so the question is what's motivating them to step up and make the ultimate sacrifice. It's interesting to note that some leaders of some state-sponsored, nationalist groups were women. This is different from say, strictly religious terrorism where women are more commonly used as expendable cannon fodder, or terrorism in general, which is a profession dominated by a cult of the male folk-hero. How and why women achieve terrorist leadership roles are matters of speculation, the most speculative hypothesis being that they are more motherly in their training and socialization of others. Not likely, says Laqueur (1999:38), who argues just the opposite, that women are more fanatical and have a greater capacity for suffering, but the field of criminology largely rejects this notion. Stack-O'Connor (2007) finds that the first woman to commit a terrorist act occurred as far back as 1878 (Vera Zasulich), and that women have been struggling for greater participation since. Unfortunately, the media (and often their own group) plays them as "black widows" or "zombies," neither of which profiles them accurately, nor captures the diverse, complex circumstances behind a woman's decision to participate in terrorism. Women terrorists have unique ideological, physical, and cultural barriers to overcome before they can become terrorists, and each context differs, with women in one region perhaps having nothing in common with their "sisters" elsewhere.
Nonetheless, the whole idea of women as terrorists poses some interesting research questions. What motivates them? In what contexts do they rise to leadership roles? Martin (2008) explores some of the history, and finds, curiously enough, that women have always been involved in leading roles, going back at least to the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution when women led such groups as the People's Will and Social Revolutionary Party. The most dangerous woman in American history -- Emma Goldman (1869-1940) -- was quite influential in the anarchism movement. The most influential woman terrorist in history is a Palestinian -- Leila Khaled (1944-) -- who before becoming a respected member of the Palestinian legislature was a prominent airline hijacker during the 60s and 70s as part of the Black September movement. Terrorist groups with prominent women members include: Sri Landa's Tamil Tigers, Germany's Red Army Faction, Italy's Red Brigades, Spain's Basque ETA, and the Japanese Red Army. Insurgent groups with prominent female combatants include: Colombia's FARC and ELN, India's Naxalites, the Communist Party of Nepal, Peru's Shining Path, and Mexico's Zapatistas. Suicide terrorist groups with prominent women members include: Japanese Red Army, Chechnya's Black Widows, Sri Lanka's Black Tigers, Al Aqsa Martyr's Brigade, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Kurdistan's PKK, and al-Qaeda. It is a mistake for academics to focus exclusively upon women terrorists as suicide bombers when the historical evidence suggests a deeper, thought leadership role and possible enhancement of a terrorist group's global reach. Some profiles of a few such groups appear below:
| GERMANY'S RED ARMY FACTION (RAF): A third-generation terrorist group descended from the Baader Meinhof Gang (BMG) and German Red Army, all active from 1968 to 1998, when they indicated they were ceasing operations. Founded out of a student protest movement, Red Army ideology consisted of terrorism on behalf of the oppressed Third World. The BMG picked victims with ethnic-sounding names (e.g. Brinkmann) out of a phone book. The RAF fought to free the BMG founders from prison and later turned their attention to the anti-NATO movement. The BMG had an unique composition of half men, half women. The leaders, Andreas Baader and Ulricke Meinhof - a female - mixed pornography and group sex with their ideological indoctrination. Their story is told at the website This is Baader-Meinhof. Like most European left-wing groups, RAF merged into Direct Action (a shadowy French umbrella group) to create the appearance of a superterrorist united front. In the late 1970s, it was reported that RAF members were training other terrorists in bacteriological warfare at Palestinian camps. |
| ITALIAN RED BRIGADES (BR or Brigate Rosse): An ultra left-wing group active from 1970-1985 founded by a university student, Renato Curcio, and his girlfriend, Mara Cagol, who engaged in over 14,000 terrorist attacks and brought the Italian government to a standstill. Known for decentralized cluster attacks (simultaneous or in sequence), they believed that the only thing politicians of any stripe could understand was violence. They accomplished the murder of former Prime Minister Aldo Moro in 1978, the kidnapping of US Army BGen. James Dozier in 1981, and claimed responsibility for murdering Leamon Hunt, US chief of the Sinai Multinational Observer Group in 1984. Their solid anti-Establishment ideology won the hearts and minds of many followers. They came closest to perfecting the Tupamaros model than any other terrorist group, devised conspiracy-laden propaganda techniques known as the strategy of tension, and have formed alliances with other groups. |
| JAPANESE RED ARMY (JRA): A far-East left-wing group formed in 1969 by the Young Communists who hijacked an airliner to North Korea and solidified their ties with the intelligence service there. In 1971, the group split into an International branch (led by a woman-Fusako Shigenobu) and Domestic branch (led by Mori Tsuneo). Shigenobu moved to Beirut to join the Palestinians in fighting capitalism by attacking Israel. Mori's branch became a cult-like murderous group, with Mori murdering most of his followers. Shigenobu's branch had the backing of Syria, North Korea and other sponsors, and became an international terrorist ring. From 1985-1999, she masterminded successful attacks against Western interests in Europe, Asia, and even on U.S. soil in New Jersey. In November, 2000, she was finally nabbed by Japanese police [read the story]. |
PROXYSHIP AND STATE-SPONSORSHIP
State-sponsored terrorism has been described above with Byman's (2005) definition, so here we consider the phenomenon of proxy, "puppet" or nuisance terrorism, which occurs when a patron state provides political, economic, or military support to a group of people or organization in a host nation to achieve strategic or hegemonic ends (hegemony defined below) by perpetrating aggressive terrorism on the patron's behalf. It is a low-cost alternative to conventional warfare, and convenient for sponsors who do not wish to be known, are afraid of defeat, or do not wish to appear as the aggressor. Experts worry that this type of terrorism is most likely to involve weapons of mass destruction, not necessarily because nationalists are inclined that way, but because of the problems a state sponsor has in maintaining control and restraining a proxy terrorist group. Fortunately, most of the time, proxy terrorists are relatively easy to control, but their loyalties are questionable and they are always pressing for newer, more lethal weapons. This kind of terrorism is dangerously competitive. Among other things, proxy terrorism requires an understanding of hegemony, or how superpower status is claimed and contested
| ANTONIO GRAMSCI: Early 20th Century Italian diehard communist who resisted Mussolini and invented the concept of hegemony (heg e' mon ee) as the true concern of an open, humanist Marxism, being a struggle for the hearts, minds, and common sense of followers. Hegemony is a word used two ways in the field of international relations. A "hegemonic power" refers to a nation-state with a preponderance of power, and a "hegemonic idea" (Gramsci's notion of it) refers to an attitude, belief, or value that is accepted by most if not all members of society. The two meanings are often combined, such as when someone says powerful nations always try to project their way of seeing things and social arrangements. Control of what people perceive as common sense is hegemonic control. According to Gramsci, anti-hegemony should be Phase One of a terrorist movement, which involves the destruction of beloved symbols, ideals, and commonsense taken-for-granted values. It's not the same as a propaganda campaign, but an attempt to destroy heartfelt values at a primal level. Gramsci's writings are complex and the stuff of much academic research, and his concept has evolved over many years to come to resemble the concept of culture war, except that hegemonic warfare is more geopolitical and doesn't involve simple ideological conflict between traditionalists and progressives. |
Hegemonic control or influence is the real objective of terrorism and those who sponsor terrorism, and proxy sponsorship can make, break, and modify a terrorist group's capabilities in this regard. Hegemony also leads to modification of terrorism, as Chomsky (2003) notes, in terms of who is the latest victim of "Why Do They Hate Us So Much?" A global superpower like the U.S. is an easy target, and to be sure, like all major powers, has extended its hegemonic influence at great risk. There is a long history of "blowback" among other things from hegemonic campaigns.
The great hegemonic wars in history were the Napoleonic Wars, World War I, and World War II, and Organski (1960) developed power transition theory to explain them, which in a nutshell means that international war is more likely whenever a great power declines in its hegemonic influence. Before one gets to the cross-over point where the military capabilities of a rising challenger meet the capabilities of a declining hegemon, both parties are likely to use proxies to test or tease out the order of battle, so to speak. For example, during the World War I era, both Macedonian and Romanian terrorism were carried out as proxy terrorism by the great powers against each other. One might understand proxy terrorism better with the more modern examples of Lebanese, Palestinian, and Cuban terrorism.
Shortly after World War II, Third World terrorism emerged practically everywhere in bids for independence from the colonial powers. It was most violent in Northern Africa and the Middle East, with anti-Israeli terrorism becoming state-sponsored by 1960. Of all the colonial powers, the French faced the most organized resistance, in Algeria and Indochina (Vietnam). The 1960s era brought all the "big players" (China, Russia, the United States) into sponsorship of terrorism, as well as a number of "little players" (Cuba, North Korea, East Germany). Left-Wing and Ultra-Left-Wing terrorism spread rapidly throughout the world, including North America (with the Weathermen and Black Panthers), the Left operating out of the universities. Right-wing terrorism also spread globally, in places like Turkey, Israel, and Latin America, the Right operating mainly out of religious institutions. It's not too much of an exaggeration to say that most of the world's nation-states experienced some kind of proxy terrorism between 1968 and 1974.
After the end of the Cold War, the amount of money traditional supporters gave to their proxy groups decreased, but other supporters moved in to pick up the slack (such as Libya, Iran, Iraq, and Syria). Today, support can come from nation-states, diasporas (immigrant communities in other countries, or nations without states), refugee camps, wealthy individuals, or charitable organizations (Byman et. al. 2001). It is almost certain that state-sponsored terrorism will continue, if only as a "nuisance." The purpose of nuisance terrorism is to intimidate, compel the enemy to waste resources, and thereby weaken him. Below are profiles of two state-sponsored groups, selected to illustrate the longevity of such terrorism.
KURDISH WORKER'S PARTY (PKK): Also called the Kurdistan Worker's Party, People's Defense Force, KADEK, and since 2003, called Kongra-Gel, this large group of about 15,000 hardcore fighters are one of the world's largest nationalist terrorist groups. Somewhat Maoist and chameleon-like in character, they have fought for decades to establish a Kurdish statehood. They operate in Turkey and Europe, train in Lebanon, and are supported by Syria and Iran. There are some 20 million Kurds living in diasporas throughout the world (areas in red on map), many in Iraq have been the victims of chemical weapons by the Iraqi government, others in places like Germany have been extorted for money.  They started as an intellectual movement in Turkish universities during 1973 and have evolved into an anti-Turkish, drug-smuggling operation who claim to have renounced Marxism in 1990 and staunchly refuse to have anything to do with religion, but are not above using Islamic rhetoric. They are very ruthless and well-organized, having wiped out more than 10,000 people in village massacres, and don't seem to mind killing non-sympathetic Kurds as well as innocent Turks. They are particularly good at stealing arms from Turkish and NATO military bases. Frustrated by the absence of U.S. and U.N. involvement, they have embraced anti-Western sentiment in recent years, kidnapping and killing Western tourists, with teachers, policemen, and travel agents being their favorite targets. Since 2002, they have toned down their terrorist activities, but attacks continue, particularly in response to Turkish counterinsurgency and counterterrorism operations. |
BASQUE SEPARATISTS (ETA): One of the world's oldest separatist groups who have fought for decades to establish an independent Basque region, an area about 100 square miles between Spain and France. The Basques are one of Europe's oldest Christian ethnic groups, and the region is the world's  number three tourist destination spot. Started as an anti-Franco student resistance movement during 1959, the ETA started murdering Spanish officials in 1968 and have "accidentally" killed about 800 civilians hence, most since 1995 being bombed or kidnapped foreign tourists, mainly British citizens. Robbery, kidnapping, murder, and extortion are their main tactics along with breaking their own ceasefires. They have effectively sabotaged Spanish and French tourism, electoral processes, and seem to favor attacks on nuclear power plants. About 400 of their members are currently imprisoned, and government concessions never seem to be enough for them. They have established a culture of violence similar to the situation in Northern Ireland. No one knows how large they are or who is sponsoring them (Spanish authorities suspect Latin American support). Young people join by paying dues and being trained to kill in small cells of four each. ETA operatives have reportedly trained in Algeria, Libya, Lebanon, and Nicaragua. Cuba and several South American states harbor ETA operatives. |
TERRORISM FROM ABOVE
State terrorism, or terrorism "from above", is more than repression, suppression, and human rights violations. It involves sponsored or unsponsored black operations combined with psychological warfare where reactionary governments, their militaries, militias, intelligence services, or police forces engage in acts ranging from political and mass murder to torture and crimes against humanity. The most horrific acts of terrorism have always been committed in the name of counterterrorism. The United States may be the worst offender in this regard, having supporting at least 30 intolerable regimes since WWII engaged in state terrorism against populist movements (Blum 2000). Operation Phoenix, for example, officially lasted from 1968-1971 where CIA teams went into Vietnamese villages and murdered civilian chiefs because of their politics. The French did much the same thing earlier, and the Vietnam conflict produced what many Third World leaders (in Latin America and elsewhere) emulated as the French-American model of counterterror (torture, murder, and disappearances).
State terrorism is often carried out under the guise of national or economic self-interest when in reality, it's usually the product of a "sick mind" (dictator or strong man) gone mad with power. This sounds harsh, but it accurately describes many self-risen petty thugs as well as puppet dictators. Control of the mass media and suppression of dissent are common trademarks, and it would be a mistake to neglect corruption, or the desire to line one's pockets. State terrorists usually subscribe to an ideology of plutocracy - a system of rule by and for the rich. When state terrorism is uncovered, the spin or media story is often that of a lone gunman, or some other scapegoat or conspiracy theory, which feeds additional conspiracy theories trying to uncover the real story. The most common method of media manipulation is suppression by omission (which involves downplaying the incident or providing the media with a distracter story).
| MICHAEL PARENTI: Late 20th Century political scientist (with his own website), author of over 10 books, and premiere American radical thinker on American involvement with state terrorism (Noam Chomsky being American's second leading radical). He distinguishes "wholesale" terrorism from "retail" terrorism that gets reported in the news. He estimates that U.S.-backed surrogate forces have killed at least 8 million innocent people since Vietnam, and claims U.S. national security agencies and corporate America are the world's leading sponsors of terrorism today. |
State terrorism is almost always ultra-right-wing terrorism, a relentless devotion or crusade to the cause, as for example, with overzealous anti-communism. General Augusto Pinochet (who ruled Chile from 1973-1990) was quoted as saying "I would like to be remembered as a man who served his country, who served Chile throughout his entire life on this earth. And what he did was always done thinking about the welfare of Chile." Pinochet was a U.S.-supported dictator who tortured and executed 2279 dissidents in unusually cruel and perverse ways. Atrocities were also committed after 1981 U.S. involvement in Sandinista Nicaragua with funding of the counterrevolutionaries (Contras) in Honduras, but the media only focused on allegations that Lt. Col. Oliver North was trading drugs for arms. The original handlers of the Contras were Argentine Army intelligence officers.
| ARGENTINA's DIRTY WAR: Beginning in 1976 with the rise of two terrorist groups, the Montoneros (Liberal Peronists) and the ERP (student radicals), both perfecting the Tupamaros model, and Gen. Jorge Rafael Videla's (the Pink Panther's) wiping them out after a military coup, the "Dirty War" was a counterinsurgency campaign to eradicate anyone and anything regarded as politically subversive. Some of the atrocities included rape, baby harvesting, mass murder, cross-border assassinations (Operation Condor, involving Brazil, Uruguay, and Bolivia), and refined torture techniques involving electric shock, asphyxiation and sexual perversion. It lasted until 1982 when the Argentine military went too far and annexed the Falkland Islands, bringing down the wrath of the British and loss of U.S. support. Since 1998, Argentina has been trying to come to grips with this horrible past, and documentation of U.S. involvement has been recently declassified. |
| EAST TIMOR'S INDEPENDENCE: An island country with a number of issues that fought its way to U.N. protection in 1999 after 24 years of Indonesian state terrorism, despite 85% of its territory being burned to the ground and 33% of the population being killed by Indonesian-trained militias and armed forces. The U.S. now has severed all military and training assistance to Indonesia, but for many years, was the principal supporter. Indonesia is the world's largest Muslim country, and has long received U.S. military and economic aid, propping up the 32-year dictatorship of General Suharto, and protecting economic (oil & mining) interests in the Aceh province. The East Timorese are trying to seek justice for war crimes, genocide, and human rights violations such as arbitrary arrests, extrajudicial killings, torture, as well as restrictions on freedoms of speech, press, assembly, and association. |
THE CORRUPTION FACTOR
There are a number of places around the world where bribery, or the misuse of public office for private gain, rules the day, and when an entire nation is run like this, it is more than a breeding ground for terrorism -- it's a safe haven for all kinds of terrorists. Almost every year, the U.S. AID, through a coalition called Transparency International, releases a report called the CPI (Corruption Perceptions Index) which lists the worst offenders -- nations where public officials and their cronies don't miss any chance to take bribes or kickbacks at every opportunity. The leaders of such nations plunder their environment in unsustainable ways, engage in blood diamond commerce (blood or "conflict" diamonds have been financing civil war in Africa for years), put a lot of ghost workers on the bureaucratic payroll, and line their pockets at the expense of their people. The CPI is a poll of polls, drawing upon the collective expertise of several economic intelligence agencies, and here are the worst offenders:
| MOST CORRUPT NATIONS IN THE WORLD |
1. Bangladesh
2. Nigeria
3. Paraguay
4. Madagascar
5. Angola
6. Kenya
7. Indonesia
8. Azerbaijan | 9. Uganda
10. Moldova
11. Haiti
12. Ecuador
13. Cameroon
14. Bolivia
15. Kazakhstan
16. Vietnam |
In these kinds of places, the bribe to get a telephone installed is usually more than the cost of using the telephone for a whole year, and things like that are just the normal way of doing business. Examples of corruption range from fraud, embezzlement, nepotism, bribery, and extortion to influence-peddling. Systematic corruption is prevalent. A customs official usually gets their job through a political favor or bribe, and is expected to share whatever bribes they get with superiors. A judge in a corrupt nation usually has their judicial decision influenced by bribes. Tax, health, fire, and police officials regularly demand bribes. A corrupt government that is neither representative nor effective is not legitimate. There is no rule of law and low accountability for public officials. A patronage system, or one based on personal loyalties, such as to one's family, ethnic, or religious group, has replaced the rule of law. One-party dominance of the political system also creates an underground, black market economy.
There are critical links between corruption, crime, and terrorism. First comes the corruption, which establishes a multiplicity of crimes, including the criminal trafficking networks and black markets that enable gun and drug smuggling, for example. Many of the citizens in such drug transit zones become addicts, but many of them also come to hate what they regard as exacerbating factors -- such as foreign investors allowed to profit through bribes -- and they come to blame not only their own government, but the governments of these foreign investors for the vast poverty and injustice in their land. The irony is that these foreign investors are not even sending the money they make back home, as many of them are engaged in money laundering, or safe off-shore investment banking. Money laundering is also the most common way terrorist groups are financed. Here's a 2003 list that the FATF (Financial Action Task Force) put out that they call Non-Cooperative Countries and Territories, or places where banking regulations are not very strict and tougher regulations have been resisted:
| NATIONS WITH BANKS INVOLVED IN MONEY LAUNDERING |
1. Cook Islands
2. Egypt
3. Guatemala
4. Indonesia
5. Myanmar
6. Nauru
7. Nigeria
8. Philippines | 9. Ukraine
10. Bahamas
11. Cayman Islands
12. Dominica
13. Lebanon
14. Liechtenstein
15. Marshall Islands
16. Grenada |
PROFITEERING OFF TERRORISM
The financial incentive to make money from terrorism is not new, and in fact, any savvy politician or industry leader can find a way to make money from an upheaval (Klein 2008), but there's little need to look further than the worldwide arms market. It's the classic example of how nations do business in troubled times, and the international trade in weapons isn't exactly known for contradicting the saying that you can buy anything from anybody in this business. Countries one would never suspect, like Bolivia, have held major bazaars for arms traders, and much of the remains of the Soviet Union's arsenal went up for sale to anyone with hard currency. The French have historically demonstrated a willingness to sell to anybody, and so have the Belgians, at least in small arms, a specialty of theirs. Two of the main economic forces in the arms market are hybridization and customization. Both involve combining parts of weapons systems from one manufacturer or national entity with parts from another manufacturer or entity, e.g., French computers combined with Russian radar in hard-to-fingerprint MiG fighters along with difficult-to-trace explosive devices. Nobody is suggesting that sophisticated, customized weaponry is being marketed directly to terrorists, but there are ways they can get their hands on some, and the only safeguard appears to be trust in the market dynamics of nation-states who regularly engage in weapons trade. Here's a table of the biggest exporters and importers on the arms market:
| Exporters: | Importers: |
| Russia (18 billion a year)
U.S. (8 billion a year)
France (4 billion a year)
Cuba (2 billion a year)
China (2 billion a year)
Czech Republic (1 billion a year)
Poland (1 billion a year)
Germany (1 billion a year) | Iraq & Iran (6 billion a year)
Saudi Arabia (3 billion a year)
India (3 billion a year)
Vietnam (2 billion a year)
Angola (2 billion a year)
Libya (2 billion a year)
Egypt & Syria (2 billion a year)
Australia & Japan (1 billion a year) |
Other terrorists have been mercenaries, soldiers of fortune, or profiteers. They are guns for hire, as long as they can live with the cause and the money is right. They may or may not have ideological convictions, and a desire to see "action" may or may not be their primary motivating force, but they represent a very dangerous intersection between crime and terrorism. The classic cases of this type are Carlos the Jackal and Abu Nidal; a contemporary example being Dawood Ibrahim.
| CARLOS THE JACKAL: aka Carlos Ramirez Santos, aka Salim, Andres Martinez, Taurus, Glen Gebhard, Hector Hevodidbon, and Michael Assat, was a 44-year old Venezuelan raised by Marxist-Leninists who is regarded as a master terrorist (along with Abu Nidal). From the early 1970s until his extradition in 1994 where he showed no remorse and was suspected of being a psychopath (read Carlos Captured), he is responsible for approximately 83 deaths worldwide. Unusual among terrorists, he was a gun for hire, having no dedication to any single ideological cause, and worked for Libya, Syria, and Iraq, among others. He lived a playboy lifestyle, and left dead corpses in his wake. His most famous exploits were the 1975 capture (and billion dollar ransom) of OPEC oil ministers at a meeting in Vienna and the 1980 attempted assassination of INTERPOL and UN Crime Prevention officials in Caracas. There were numerous other exploits, mostly against France (his favorite target), and many of his victims were innocent bystanders. He worked with and trained other terrorist groups: the German Bader-Meinhoff gang (he married one of the gang members), the Italian Red Brigade, the Japanese Red Army, and Middle Eastern groups. |  |
| ABU NIDAL: aka Sabri al-Banna, a Palestinian, born in Jaffa, whose family was run out of Palestine by Israeli forces in 1948, and spent his teenage years becoming a bitter extremist in the refugee camps of Nablus where he also joined Fatah, but split with that PLO group in the 1970s over their being too peace-oriented. He set up his own killer teams to strike at Israelis, westerners, Arab moderates, and Yassar Arafat. His well-disciplined teams became known as the Fatah Revolutionary Council, and carried out over 900 hits (some as contract killings) across 20 countries over 25 years. His methods included hijacking, bombing, and assassination, which seemed to halt in the 1990s. A shadowy, psychotic, and vicious killer, he lived in the shadows most his life, and possessed an extraordinarily warped sense of justice, redress, and revenge. He was discovered dead from gunshot wounds while dying from leukemia in 2002 while living in Iraq. |  |
| DAWOOD IBRAHIM: aka Sheikh Dawood Hassan, was born in Ratnagiri, India in 1955, grew up to become head of a crime syndicate known as D-Company (aka Indian Mafia), and has lived in Dubai, the UAE, and Pakistan (current whereabouts unknown). After masterminding the 1993 Bombay Bombings, India put him on a Most Wanted List. The U.S. believes he controls and runs the drug and gold smuggling routes for al-Qaeda, others, and also handles much of hawala (an underground money transfer system). The U.N. has him on a travel ban, and Interpol has him as Most Wanted for organized crime, terrorism, and counterfeiting. Some consider him a modern Al Capone-type crime lord. He has wiped out other crime lords around the world, for which there is on- and off-again retaliation. He reportedly underwent plastic surgery in 2006 to change his appearance, and there was a false report of Pakistan catching him in 2007. He is believed to have the police and intelligence agents from many countries on his payroll. When he is not busy trying to destabilize governments, he can usually be found fixing sporting events or elections. |  |
NARCOTERRORISM
Narcoterrorism is a term that has instigated debate among experts, ever since Rachel Ehrenfeld (1990) first coined the term in 1990, or so they say on the back of her book Funding Evil (2003). Actually, the term goes back at least 7 years earlier, in 1983, when it was used by the President of Peru. It can also be found much earlier in the literature of the 1950s about China's influence on the drug trade, if one would look for it. Some believe it's a useless term that confuses the drug war with the war on terrorism. Drohan (2005) says that we should start by defining "narco-mercantilism" before calling some country "narcocracies." Others believe using the word narcoterrorism is a way of degrading true revolutionaries. Technically, it refers to the financing of terrorist activities by participation in the drug trade, and some (Napoleoni 2003) have even gone so far as to say narcoterrorism is a component of all terrorism today as a direct outgrowth of the modern global economy's complicity in arms smuggling, narcotics trafficking, and a number of other shadowy criminal activities that take place by proxy on the world stage. Theoretically, narcoterrorism is both a mode of attack (saturating the enemy population with dangerous narcotics) and a tactic (raising so much money you don't have to fight, just buy friend and foe alike). It's closely associated with the practice of money laundering, in which drug dealers convert illegally gained profits to "clean" cash using foreign businesses and banks. The DEA defines it as any terrorist act carried out by groups that are directly or indirectly involved in cultivating, manufacturing, transporting, or distributing illicit drugs. The term is generally applied to groups that use the drug trade to fund terrorism (the most drug-funded terrorist groups being Colombian groups, the Shining Path, the Tamil Tigers, Hezbollah, PKK, ETA, the Real IRA, and Al-Qaeda). Osama bin Laden has reportedly advocated using narcotics trafficking to weaken Western societies by supplying them with addictive drugs. In 2005, Afghan drug lord Baz Mohammad was extradited to the United States, and during testimony said that his partnership with the Taliban was with the understanding he would be committing jihad against America. (Note, in figures based on the year 2000 alone, Americans spent almost $63 billion on illegal narcotics.)
Ever since 1998, the U.S. spends almost $3 billion dollars on interdiction efforts. Most of these funds go to foreign aid at what are called "source-zone" countries, to help them improve their law enforcement capabilities and develop alternative sources of revenue for their economy. The U.S. also uses a certification system to pressure foreign governments to strengthen their legal systems. Decertification results in U.S. opposition to loans from the World Bank and other multinational organizations. The U.S. also works feverishly at increasing its extradition treaties with nations, meaning that they will surrender targeted drug offenders for trial on American soil. Terrorist groups thrive in "source-zone" countries by charging unofficial taxes on the growers. There are also a number of "transit-zone" countries where drugs are refined, cut, designed, imported and exported. A few nations have made drug importing and exporting a main part of their economy, and in such places, the government often collects custom taxes and distributes it to whatever terrorist groups are receiving "safe haven." Drugs are a handy way to get lots of cash. Below is some detailed information about such countries:
| Source Countries | Transit Countries |
Afghanistan - grows 93% of world's opium poppy
Bolivia - third largest producer of cocaine in the world, and also a transit for cocaine from Peru and grower of marijuana
Burma - world's second largest producer of opium poppy
Colombia - world's number one cocaine supplier, and also a major supplier of heroin and precursor chemicals
Jamaica - world's largest producer of marijuana and marijuana-derived products
Laos - opium producer and transit for heroin, amphetamine-type stimulants and precursor chemicals
Mexico - a source of heroin, methamphetamines and marijuana; also a major transit for cocaine
Paraguay - largest marijuana producer in South America; also a transit hub for cocaine
Peru - a major producer of cocaine and big importer of precursor chemicals | Bahamas - a transit hub for cocaine and marijuana
Brazil - a transit hub for cocaine and heroin
Dominican Republic - a transit hub for cocaine, heroin, and marijuana
Ecuador - a transit hub for cocaine, heroin and precursor chemicals
Guatemala - a transit hub for cocaine and heroin; poppy production also on rise
Haiti - a transit hub for cocaine and marijuana
India - a transit hub for heroin, hashish and marijuana
Nigeria - a transit hub for cocaine, heroin, marijuana, and psychotropic substances
Pakistan - a transit hub for opium and hashish; poppy production also on rise
Panama - a transit hub for cocaine and other drugs
Venezuela - a transit hub for cocaine and other drugs |
The violence associated with narcoterrorism is generally targeted at the corruption and/or removal of criminal justice officials, specifically judges and attorney generals. At least this is the Colombian exemplar, which is a $300 million a year business, and produces 80% of the world's cocaine supply and 70% of America's heroin supply.
-
Colombia -- 167 police officers, 13 Supreme Court judges, and 1 Minister of Justice have been assassinated for their refusal to take money from drug cartels.
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Italy -- 4 judges along with their wives and bodyguards have been pipe bombed
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Russia -- numerous judges are being attacked and killed by gangsters, by police, or by both in combination
-
Mexico -- 2 judges have been assassinated
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Senegal (Africa) -- 1 judge has been assassinated
-
Guatemala -- 1 judge has been assassinated
-
Algeria -- 1 judge has been killed in a drive-by shooting
| COLOMBIA's DRUG WARS: Colombia is the most politically violent country in the world. At least one assassination occurs per week. The government, with U.S. backing, turns a blind eye toward right-wing death squads as well as military action against whole villages, terrorizing, torturing, and murdering those seen as too liberal or sympathetic to the rebels. The rich in Colombia are very rich, and the poor are very poor. The rebels consist of two Left-Wing terrorist groups, the FARC and ELN, which are large and well-equipped. In addition, the country is de facto ruled by Right-Wing drug lord cartels (narcotraficantes) who have cultivated the most popular support. When violence erupts between government, rebel, and cartel forces, the country devolves into anarchy. FARC forces peasants to grow coca and ELN tends to tax existing growers. Another group, the AUC (United Self Defense Forces) also dabbles in the cocaine business. Colombia is the third largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid, and America's "Plan Colombia" hopes to help the government become strong and fight narcotraficantes. In addition, the U.S. government operates a school for military leaders out of Ft. Benning called WHISC (Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation) which teaches counter-insurgency and counter-narcotics methods. Both Plan Colombia and WHISC are the targets of a well-organized protest group (SOAW) in the United States. |
The links between terrorist organizations and drug traffickers can take many forms. According to John Walters, Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, "almost half of known terrorist groups on the State Department's list are known to have, at one point or another, trafficked in drugs" (Walters 2003). Some organized crime books in criminal justice are starting to cover narcoterrorism in depth, with Abadinsky (2007) listing the following groups: FARC, ELN, AUC, Shining Path, Tri-Border Islamic Groups, South Asia and Former Soviet Union groups, Al-Qaida, Kashmiri militant groups, Tamil Tigers, Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Hizballah, PKK, Irish terrorists, Basque terrorists, and the United Wa State Army (UWSA) in Burma.
PETROTERRORISM
Not only has energy or petrosecurity become highly important in the post-9/11 world, but there has long been a feeling (at least among Americans since the Arab Oil Embargo of 1973-74) that certain petro-states are, in effect, holding the U.S. "hostage" over U.S. oil dependency. In fact, one could argue that combatting "petroterrorism" was the first war on terrorism because during the 1970s oil crisis, President Jimmy Carter declared the problem the "moral equivalency of war" (wickedly acronymed MEOW). Oil crises and talk about "petroterrorism" usually involve high gas prices at the pump which affect everyone and leave nobody untouched, but the U.S. suffers in unique ways. Oil crunches lead to an overarching distrust of virtually everything connected to the oil crisis; e.g., distrust of government; perception that oil companies are reaping obscene profits; and stereotyped villifications of Arabs as bad guys. The worst irony of all is that thru oil sales from the Middle East to the U.S., OPEC nations (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Nations) have amassed Sovereign Wealth Fund savings to the tune of roughly $95 trillion in U.S. currency. Holding that much investment capital in another nation's currency gives Arab states a lot of economic power, which if they were to abuse would launch all out economic warfare. In the meantime, petroterrorism is a tolerated form of terrorism easily overlooked, ignored, and existing sub rosa (simmering underground). It is the form of terrorism that nobody dares speak its name.
Let us be clear, then, about what petroterrorism really is. It is NOT, for example, the kind of sabotage and vandalism which occurred during the reconstruction of Iraq where insurgents targeted work done on the oil and gas pipelines, and it is NOT something the U.S. engages in, as some Leftist circles would have it, charging that the U.S. invaded Iraq to steal its oil. Instead, it is a brazen attempt to undermine the U.S. thru "jihadeconomic warfare" (Ehrenfeld 2003). It is financial jihad, or in Arabic, "al-jihad bi-al-mal," and Sharia law mandates that Muslims engage in it against infidels. According to an article with one of its titles called Financial Jihad Against the Infidels, there are four types of jihad which Muslims are obligated to obey: (1) jihad of the tongue -- to preach the word; (2) jihad of the soul -- to struggle personally; (3) jihad in the path -- striving for the cause; and (4) funding jihad -- being charitable and supporting warriors. The Islamic sources for financial jihad are intertwined among the third and fourth type, but the fourth type is often specifically interpreted to mean financial jihad, which manifests itself in various forms, not just via charity, but to leverage encumbrances and endowments in strategic ways.
A related term, petrocracy, has come into parlance to describe countries with developing oil reserves, like Venezuela, which seem to consistently make bad choices concerning politics and economic, sustainable development. For example, in two global petro-empires -- Russia and Venezuela -- there is a tendency among bureaucrats and citizens to blindly trust their leaders because it is assumed that a petrodollar-based currency will be best in the long-run. Petrocracy coincides with blaming the United States for many things, particularly whenever oil markets get jittery. It appears that petrocracy affords dictators in developing countries a new way to take and hold power.
INTERNET RESOURCES
A Case Study of the PKK in Turkey
American State Terrorism
Amnesty International's Pinochet Page
Anti-Corruption Gateway for Europe and Eurasia
Argentina's Dapper-State Terrorism
BBC Special on ETA's Bloody Record
Brigate Rosse: Politics of Protracted War in the Imperialist Metropolis
CNN Special on Basque Conflict in Spain
CNN Special on the Ocalan Trial (PKK)
East Timor Action Network
ICT Profile of the Red Brigades
NarcoTerror.org
Spanish Government Intelligence Report on ETA
The Nationalism Project
Turkish Government Intelligence Report on PKK
U.S. Weapons Sales & Military Training in Indonesia
Wikipedia Entry on Nationalism
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Last updated: Sept. 13, 2008
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